Post by Admin on Dec 10, 2015 2:15:08 GMT
How Scientology became a hidden nest of Nazi scientists:
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Operation Paperclip
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip
"Project Paperclip" redirects here. For Holocaust project, see Paper Clips Project. For other uses, see Paper clip (disambiguation).
Operation Paperclip (1949–1990) was the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) program in which over 1,500 German scientists, engineers, and technicians, from Nazi Germany and other foreign countries were brought to the United States for employment in the aftermath of World War II. It was conducted by the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA), and in the context of the burgeoning Cold War. One purpose of Operation Paperclip was to deny German scientific expertise and knowledge to the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom, as well as inhibiting post-war Germany from redeveloping its military research capabilities. The Soviet Union had competing extraction programs known as "trophy brigades" and Operation Osoaviakhim.
Although the JIOA's recruitment of German scientists began after the Allied victory in Europe on May 8, 1945, U.S. President Harry Truman did not formally order the execution of Operation Paperclip until August 1945. Truman's order expressly excluded anyone found "to have been a member of the Nazi Party, and more than a nominal participant in its activities, or an active supporter of Nazi militarism." However, those restrictions would have rendered ineligible most of the leading scientists the JIOA had identified for recruitment, among them rocket scientists Wernher von Braun, Kurt H. Debus and Arthur Rudolph, and the physician Hubertus Strughold, each earlier classified as a "menace to the security of the Allied Forces."
To circumvent President Truman's anti-Nazi order and the Allied Potsdam and Yalta agreements, the JIOA worked independently to create false employment and political biographies for the scientists. The JIOA also expunged the scientists' Nazi Party memberships and regime affiliations from the public record. Once "bleached" of their Nazism, the scientists were granted security clearances by the U.S. government to work in the United States. Paperclip, the project's operational name, derived from the paperclips used to attach the scientists' new political personae to their "US Government Scientist" JIOA personnel files.
Osenberg List
Having failed to conquer the USSR with Operation Barbarossa (June–December 1941), the Siege of Leningrad (September 1941 – January 1944), Operation Nordlicht ("Northern Light", August–October 1942), and the Battle of Stalingrad (July 1942 – February 1943), Nazi Germany found itself at a logistical disadvantage. The failed conquest had depleted German resources and its military-industrial complex was unprepared to defend the Großdeutsches Reich (Greater German Reich) against the Red Army's westward counterattack. By early 1943, the German government began recalling from combat a number of scientists, engineers, and technicians; they returned to work in research and development to bolster German defense for a protracted war with the USSR. The recall from frontline combat included 4,000 rocketeers returned to Peenemünde, in northeast coastal Germany.
" Overnight, Ph.D.s were liberated from KP duty, masters of science were recalled from orderly service, mathematicians were hauled out of bakeries, and precision mechanics ceased to be truck drivers. "
— Dieter K. Huzel, Peenemünde to Canaveral
The Nazi government's recall of their now-useful intellectuals for scientific work first required identifying and locating the scientists, engineers, and technicians, then ascertaining their political and ideological reliability. Werner Osenberg, the engineer-scientist heading the Wehrforschungsgemeinschaft (Military Research Association), recorded the names of the politically-cleared men to the Osenberg List, thus reinstating them to scientific work.
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In March 1945, at Bonn University, a Polish laboratory technician found pieces of the Osenberg List stuffed in a toilet; the list subsequently reached MI6, who transmitted it to U.S. Intelligence. Then U.S. Army Major Robert B. Staver, Chief of the Jet Propulsion Section of the Research and Intelligence Branch of the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps, used the Osenberg List to compile his list of German scientists to be captured and interrogated; Wernher von Braun, Nazi Germany's premier rocket scientist, headed Major Staver's list.
Identification
In Operation Overcast, Major Staver's original intent was only to interview the scientists, but what he learned changed the operation's purpose. On May 22, 1945, he transmitted to U.S. Pentagon headquarters Colonel Joel Holmes's telegram urging the evacuation of German scientists and their families, as most "important for the Pacific war" effort. Most of the Osenberg List engineers worked at the Baltic coast German Army Research Center Peenemünde, developing the V-2 rocket. After capturing them, the Allies initially housed them and their families in Landshut, Bavaria, in southern Germany.
Beginning on July 19, 1945, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) managed the captured ARC rocketeers under Operation Overcast. However, when the "Camp Overcast" name of the scientists' quarters became locally-known, the program was renamed Operation Paperclip in November 1945. Despite these attempts at secrecy, later that year the press interviewed several of the scientists.
Regarding Operation Alsos, Allied Intelligence described nuclear physicist Werner Heisenberg, the German nuclear energy project principal, as "worth more to us than ten divisions of Germans." In addition to rocketeers and nuclear physicists, the Allies also sought chemists, physicians, and naval weaponeers.
Meanwhile, the Technical Director of the German Army Rocket Center, Wernher von Braun, was jailed at P.O. Box 1142, a military-intelligence black site in Fort Hunt, Virginia, in the United States. Since the prison was unknown to the international community, its operation by the US was in violation of the Geneva Convention of 1929, which the United States had ratified. Although Von Braun's interrogators pressured him, he was not tortured; however, in 1944 another prisoner of war, U-boat Captain Werner Henke, had been shot and killed while climbing the fence at Fort Hunt.
Capture and detention
Early on, the United States created the Combined Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee (CIOS). This provided the information on targets for the T-Forces that went in and targeted scientific, military and industrial installations (and their employees) for their know-how. Initial priorities were advanced technology, such as infrared, that could be used in the war against Japan; finding out what technology had been passed on to Japan; and finally to halt the research. A project to halt the research was codenamed "Project Safehaven", and it was not initially targeted against the Soviet Union; rather the concern was that German scientists might emigrate and continue their research in countries such as Spain, Argentina or Egypt, all of which had sympathized with Nazi Germany. In order to avoid the complications involved with the emigration of German scientists, the CIOS was responsible for scouting and kidnapping high profile individuals for the deprivation of technological advancements in nations outside of the US.
Much U.S. effort was focused on Saxony and Thuringia, which by July 1, 1945, would become part of the Soviet Occupation zone. Many German research facilities and personnel had been evacuated to these states, particularly from the Berlin area. Fearing that the Soviet takeover would limit U.S. ability to exploit German scientific and technical expertise, and not wanting the Soviet Union to benefit from said expertise, the United States instigated an "evacuation operation" of scientific personnel from Saxony and Thuringia, issuing orders such as:
On orders of Military Government you are to report with your family and baggage as much as you can carry tomorrow noon at 1300 hours (Friday, 22 June 1945) at the town square in Bitterfeld. There is no need to bring winter clothing. Easily carried possessions, such as family documents, jewelry, and the like should be taken along. You will be transported by motor vehicle to the nearest railway station. From there you will travel on to the West. Please tell the bearer of this letter how large your family is.
By 1947 this evacuation operation had netted an estimated 1,800 technicians and scientists, along with 3,700 family members. Those with special skills or knowledge were taken to detention and interrogation centers, such as one code-named DUSTBIN, to be held and interrogated, in some cases for months.
A few of the scientists were gathered up in Operation Overcast, but most were transported to villages in the countryside where there were neither research facilities nor work; they were provided stipends and forced to report twice weekly to police headquarters to prevent them from leaving. The Joint Chiefs of Staff directive on research and teaching stated that technicians and scientists should be released "only after all interested agencies were satisfied that all desired intelligence information had been obtained from them".
On November 5, 1947, the Office of Military Government of the United States (OMGUS), which had jurisdiction over the western part of occupied Germany, held a conference to consider the status of the evacuees, the monetary claims that the evacuees had filed against the United States, and the "possible violation by the US of laws of war or Rules of Land Warfare". The OMGUS director of Intelligence R. L. Walsh initiated a program to resettle the evacuees in the Third World, which the Germans referred to as General Walsh's "Urwald-Programm" (jungle program), however this program never matured. In 1948, the evacuees received settlements of 69.5 million Reichsmarks from the U.S., a settlement that soon became severely devalued during the currency reform that introduced the Deutsche Mark as the official currency of western Germany.
John Gimbel concludes that the United States put some of Germany's best minds on ice for three years, therefore depriving the German recovery of their expertise.
Scientists
In May 1945, the U.S. Navy "received in custody" Dr. Herbert A. Wagner, the inventor of the Hs 293 missile; for two years, he first worked at the Special Devices Center, at Castle Gould and at Hempstead House, Long Island, New York; in 1947, he moved to the Naval Air Station Point Mugu.
In August 1945, Colonel Holger Toftoy, head of the Rocket Branch of the Research and Development Division of the U.S. Army's Ordnance Corps, offered initial one-year contracts to the rocket scientists; 127 of them accepted. In September 1945, the first group of seven rocket scientists arrived at Fort Strong, located on Long Island in Boston harbor: Wernher von Braun, Erich W. Neubert, Theodor A. Poppel, August Schulze, Eberhard Rees, Wilhelm Jungert, and Walter Schwidetzky.
Beginning in late 1945, three rocket-scientist groups arrived in the United States for duty at Fort Bliss, Texas, and at White Sands Proving Grounds, New Mexico, as "War Department Special Employees".
In 1946, the United States Bureau of Mines employed seven German synthetic fuel scientists at a Fischer-Tropsch chemical plant in Louisiana, Missouri.
In early 1950, legal U.S. residency for some of the Project Paperclip specialists was effected through the U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico; thus, Nazi scientists legally entered the United States from Latin America.
Eighty-six aeronautical engineers were transferred to Wright Field, where the United States had Luftwaffe aircraft and equipment captured under Operation Lusty (Luftwaffe Secret Technology).
The United States Army Signal Corps employed 24 specialists – including the physicists Georg Goubau, Gunter Guttwein, Georg Hass, Horst Kedesdy, and Kurt Lehovec; the physical chemists Rudolf Brill, Ernst Baars, and Eberhard Both; the geophysicist Helmut Weickmann; the optician Gerhard Schwesinger; and the engineers Eduard Gerber, Richard Guenther, and Hans Ziegler.
In 1959, 94 Operation Paperclip men went to the United States, including Friedwardt Winterberg and Friedrich Wigand. Throughout its operations to 1990, Operation Paperclip imported 1,600 men, as part of the intellectual reparations owed to the United States and the UK, some $10 billion in patents and industrial processes.
During the decades after they were included in Operation Paperclip, some scientists were investigated because of their activities during World War II. Arthur Rudolph was deported in 1984, but not prosecuted, and West Germany granted him citizenship. Similarly, Georg Rickhey, who came to the United States under Operation Paperclip in 1946, was returned to Germany to stand trial at the Dora Trial in 1947; he was acquitted, and returned to the United States in 1948, eventually becoming a U.S. citizen. The aeromedical library at Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, had been named after Hubertus Strughold in 1977. However, it was later renamed because documents from the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal linked Strughold to medical experiments in which inmates from Dachau were tortured and killed.
Key figures:
Rocketry
Rudi Beichel, Magnus von Braun, Wernher von Braun, Werner Dahm, Konrad Dannenberg, Kurt H. Debus, Walter Dornberger, Ernst R. G. Eckert, Krafft Arnold Ehricke, Otto Hirschler, Hermann H. Kurzweg, Fritz Mueller, Eberhard Rees, Gerhard Reisig, Georg Rickhey, Werner Rosinski, Ludwig Roth, Arthur Rudolph, Ernst Steinhoff, Ernst Stuhlinger, Bernhard Tessmann, and Georg von Tiesenhausen (see List of German rocket scientists in the US).
Aeronautics
Sighard F. Hoerner, Siegfried Knemeyer, Alexander Martin Lippisch, Hans Multhopp, Hans von Ohain, and Kurt Tank
Medicine – biological weapons, chemical weapons, human experimentation, human factors in space medicine
Hans Antmann, Kurt Blome, Erich Traub, Walter Schreiber, and Hubertus Strughold
Electronics
Hans Hollmann, Kurt Lehovec, Johannes Plendl, Heinz Schlicke and Hans K. Ziegler
Intelligence
Otto von Bolschwing
Similar operations:
APPLEPIE: Project to capture and interrogate key Wehrmacht, RSHA AMT VI, and General Staff officers knowledgeable of the industry and economy of the USSR.
DUSTBIN (counterpart of ASHCAN): An Anglo-American military intelligence operation established first in Paris, then in Kransberg Castle, at Frankfurt.
ECLIPSE (1944): An unimplemented Air Disarmament Wing plan for post-war operations in Europe for destroying V-1 and V-2 missiles.
Safehaven: US project within ECLIPSE meant to prevent the escape of Nazi scientists from Allied-occupied Germany.
Field Information Agency; Technical (FIAT): US Army agency for securing the "major, and perhaps only, material reward of victory, namely, the advancement of science and the improvement of production and standards of living in the United Nations, by proper exploitation of German methods in these fields"; FIAT ended in 1947, when Operation Paperclip began functioning.
On April 26, 1946, the Joint Chiefs of Staff issued JCS Directive 1067/14 to General Eisenhower instructing that he "preserve from destruction and take under your control records, plans, books, documents, papers, files and scientific, industrial and other information and data belonging to . . . German organizations engaged in military research"; and that, excepting war-criminals, German scientists be detained for intelligence purposes as required.
National Interest/Project 63: Job placement assistance for Nazi engineers at Lockheed, Martin Marietta, North American Aviation, and other aeroplane companies, whilst American aerospace engineers were being laid off work.
Operation Alsos, Operation Big, Operation Epsilon, Russian Alsos: Soviet, American and British efforts to capture German nuclear secrets, equipment, and personnel.
Operation Backfire: A British effort at capturing rocket and aerospace technology from Cuxhaven.
Fedden Mission: British mission to gain technical intelligence concerning advanced German aircraft and their propulsion systems.
Operation Lusty: US efforts to capture German aeronautical equipment, technology, and personnel.
Operation Osoaviakhim (sometimes transliterated as "Operation Ossavakim"), a Soviet counterpart of Operation Paperclip, involving German technicians, managers, skilled workers and their respective families who were relocated to the USSR in October 1946.
Operation Surgeon: British operation for denying German aeronautical expertise from the USSR, and for exploiting German scientists in furthering British research.
Special Mission V-2: April–May 1945 US operation, by Maj. William Bromley, that recovered parts and equipment for 100 V-2 missiles from a Mittelwerk underground factory in Kohnstein within the Soviet zone. Maj. James P. Hamill co-ordinated the transport of the equipment on 341 railroad cars with the 144th Motor Vehicle Assembly Company, from Nordhausen to Erfurt, just before the Soviets arrived. (see also Operation Blossom, Broomstick Scientists, Hermes project, Operations Sandy and Pushover)
Target Intelligence Committee: US project to exploit German cryptographers.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to
Operation Paperclip.
In popular culture:
In James Rollins' novel Ice Hunt (2003), the Russian commander Viktor Petkov cites multiple American research projects that violated modern standards of ethics and asks Matt Pike, "Then how do you justify Project Paperclip?", when Matt claims that US research, including the Tuskegee Experiment, was not comparable to the Nazis' experiments or to the human experimentation at the Grendel Ice Station in the book.(Chapter 16, page 16.)
In the 2014 film Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Operation Paperclip is attributed to the fictional agency S.H.I.E.L.D., recruiting German scientists after WWII including Dr. Arnim Zola. This ultimately backfires, as Zola recreates his former organization HYDRA from within, mixing S.H.I.E.L.D. employees with sleeper agents and sowing international chaos up until the modern day.
In The X-Files, in the third season's second episode (titled Paper Clip), Agent Mulder receives a tape with files containing stolen top secret information about experiments on extraterrestrials carried out in Operation Paperclip (see also Syndicate (The X-Files) hashtag Early years).
in Sara Paretsky's 2013 novel Critical Mass Operation Paperclip is crucial to the plot.
See also:
Operation Osoaviakhim
List of former Nazi Party members
Carmel Offie
Fort Bliss
Operation Bloodstone
Operation Lusty — targeting advanced aircraft of the defeated Luftwaffe
Ratlines (World War II)
Unit 731 — Japanese human experimenters recruited for their biological weapons technology.
Upper Atmosphere Research Panel
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Excerpts from Fort Bliss History
from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Bliss
World War I and World War II
As American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) commander (1917–1918), John J. Pershing transferred to Fort Bliss and was responsible for the organization, training, and supply of an inexperienced force that eventually grew from 27,000 men to over 2,000,000—the National Army of World War I.
From 10 December 1917 – 12 May 1918, the wartime 15th Cavalry Division existed at Fort Bliss. Similarly, the Headquarters, 2nd Cavalry Brigade was initially activated at Fort Bliss on 10 December 1917 and then deactivated in July 1919, but then reactivated at Fort Bliss on 31 August 1920. Predominantly a cavalry post since 1912, Fort Bliss acquired three light armored cars, eight medium armored cars, two motorcycles, and two trucks on 8 November 1928.
During World War II, Fort Bliss focused on training anti-aircraft artillery battalions (AAA). In September 1940 the Coast Artillery's anti-aircraft training center was established, and in 1941 the 1st Tow Target Squadron arrived to fly target drones (the 6th, 19th, & 27th Tow Target Squadrons were at the nearby Biggs Field). On 3 August 1944, the Anti-Aircraft Artillery School was ordered from Camp Davis to Fort Bliss to make the training of anti-aircraft gunners easier, and they became the dominant force at Fort Bliss following the departure of the U.S. 1st Cavalry Division. Also during the war, the base was used to hold approximately 91 German and Italian Americans and Japanese from Hawaii (then a territory), who were arrested as potential fifth columnists but, in most cases, denied due process.
Group of 104 Operation Paperclip rocket scientists in 1946 at Fort Bliss (35 were at White Sands Proving Grounds)
By February 1946, over 100 Operation Paperclip scientists had arrived to develop rockets and were attached to the Office of the Chief of Ordnance Corps, Research and Development Service, Suboffice (Rocket), headed by Major James P. Hamill. Although the scientists were initially “pretty much kept on ice” (resulting in the nickname "Operation Icebox"), they were subsequently divided into a research group and a group who assisted with V-2 test launches at White Sands Proving Grounds. German families began arriving in December 1946, and by the spring of 1948, the number of German rocket specialists (nicknamed "Prisoners of Peace") in the US was 127. Fort Bliss rocket launches included firings of the Private missile at the Hueco Range in April 1945. In 1953, funding cuts caused the cancellation of work on the Hermes B2 ramjet work that had begun at Fort Bliss.
In late 1953 after troops had been trained at the Ft Bliss Guided Missile School, field-firing operations of the MGM-5 Corporal were underway at Red Canyon Range Camp, WSPG. In April 1950, the 1st Guided Missile Group named the Republic-Ford JB-2 the ARMY LOON.
The Cold War
Fort Bliss trained thousands of U.S. Soldiers during the Cold War. As the United States gradually came to master the art of building and operating missiles, Fort Bliss and White Sands Missile Range became more and more important to the country, and were expanded accordingly. On 1 July 1957 the U.S. Army Air Defense Center was established at Fort Bliss. Located at this Center, in addition to Center Headquarters, are the U.S. Army Air Defense School; Air Defense; the 6th Artillery Group (Air Defense); the 61st Ordnance Group; and other supporting elements. In 1957 Fort Bliss and its anti-aircraft personnel began using Nike Ajax, Nike Hercules, Hawk, Sprint, Chaparral, and Redeye missiles. Fort Bliss took on the important role of providing a large area for troops to conduct live fire exercises with the missiles.
Because of the large number of Army personnel enrolled in the air defense school, Fort Bliss saw two large rounds of construction in 1954 and 1958. The former was aimed at creating more barracks facilities, while the latter was aimed at building new classrooms, materials labs, a radar park, and a missile laboratory. Between 1953 and 1957 the Army also expanded McGregor Range in an effort to accommodate live fire exercises of the new missile systems. Throughout the Cold War Fort Bliss remained a premier site for testing anti-aircraft equipment.
Fort Bliss was used as the Desert Stage of the Ranger School training course to prepare Ranger School graduates for operations in the deserts of the Middle East. From 1983 to 1987, Fort Bliss was home to the Ranger School's newly formed 4th (Desert Ranger) Training Company. This unit was later expanded in 1987 to form the newly created Ranger Training Brigade's short-lived 7th Ranger Training Battalion, which was then transferred to the Dugway Proving Grounds in Utah. The deserts of Utah proved to be unsuitable so the 7th Ranger Training Battalion was returned to Fort Bliss from 1991 until the Ranger School's Desert Phase was discontinued in 1995.
While the United States Army Air Defense Artillery School develops doctrine and tactics, training current and future soldiers has always been its core mission. Until 1990 the post was used for Basic Training and Advanced Individual Training (AIT), under the 1/56 ADA Regiment, part of 6th ADA. Before 1989, 1/56 had three basic training companies and two AIT batteries. After 1990, 1/56 dropped basic training, that mission assumed by Fort Sill. The unit now had four enlisted batteries for enlisted AIT, one battery for the Officer's Basic Course and Captain's Career Course (added in 2004) and one company that trained army truck drivers (MOS 88M).
Base Realignment and Closure
In 1995, the Department of Defense recommended that the U.S. 3d Armored Cavalry Regiment be relocated to Fort Carson, Colorado. Efforts to consolidate units from another post with those units that remained at Fort Bliss were overruled by the Base Realignment and Closing Commission, leaving Fort Bliss without any armored vehicles. Units operating the US Army’s MIM-104 Patriot Missile Defense System relocated to Fort Bliss during the 1990s. The Patriot system played an important role in the Persian Gulf War/Operation Desert Storm in 1991. In commemoration, the US 54 expressway in northeast El Paso was designated the Patriot Freeway.
The War on Terror
After the September 11, 2001 attacks, Fort Bliss provided ADA Battalions for US and NATO use in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has served as one of the major deployment centers for troops bound for Iraq and Afghanistan. This mission is accomplished via nearby Biggs Army Airfield, which is included in the installation's supporting areas. Following the War in Afghanistan (2001–present) in 2001 Fort Bliss began training Afghan security forces at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy at Fort Bliss, with the hope that these newly trained soldiers would eventually be able to take control of their own national security.
Base Realignment and Closure, 2005
See also: Base Realignment and Closure, 2005
In 2005, the Pentagon recommended transforming Fort Bliss into a heavy armor training post, to include approximately 11,500 new troops from the U.S. 1st Armored Division – at that time stationed in Germany -, as well as units from Fort Sill and Fort Hood. An estimated 15,918 military jobs and 384 civilian jobs were planned to be transferred to Fort Bliss, brought the total number of troops stationed at Fort Bliss under this alignment to a total of 33,500 by 2012. Officials from Fort Bliss and the City of El Paso were thrilled with the decision; the general mood of the city government was perfectly captured by 14 May edition of the El Paso Times, which boldly proclaimed "BLISS WINS BIG".
According to Senator Eliot Shapleigh, the BRAC commission considered three primary factors to make its decision: The military value of Fort Bliss, the potential for other branches of the armed service to use a post as large as Fort Bliss, and the lack of urban encroachment around Fort Bliss that would otherwise hinder its growth. The arrival of the 11,500 troops from the 1st Armored Division is also expected to create some 20,196 direct and indirect military and civilian jobs in El Paso. According to the Department of Defense, this is the largest net gain in the United States tied to the Base Realignment and Closure recommendations. Of the 20,196 new jobs expected to come to El Paso as a result of Bliss’ realignment 9,000 would be indirect civilian jobs created by the influx of soldiers to the "Sun City". When the BRAC commission recommendations were released Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison’s spokesman reported that El Paso was the only area that came out with a major gain of forces.
The news that El Paso had been selected to receive major elements of the 1st Armored Division was met with joy, but at the same time many expressed surprise at the panel's recommendation to transfer the Air Defense Artillery School, 6th ADA Brigade, and its accompanying equipment (including the MIM-104 Patriot Missile Anti-Aircraft/Anti Missile defense system) to Fort Sill. On 25 August officials representing Fort Bliss went before the BRAC Commission to plead their case for maintaining the ADA school and its accompanying equipment at Fort Bliss, citing among other thing the size of Fort Bliss and the history of the ADA school in the region. The BRAC Commission ultimately ruled against Fort Bliss, and the roughly 4,500 affected soldiers were transferred to Fort Sill, Oklahoma. The entire transfer of soldiers to and from Fort Bliss was completed no later than 15 September 2011.
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Shooting At Fort Bliss PX Leaves One Dead, One Injured
www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/42496217.html
FORT BLISS (April 5, 2009)--A Fort Bliss soldier was shot to death Saturday afternoon at the Fort Bliss Post Exchange by her husband, who then wounded himself, authorities said.
The man, a civilian, was in intensive care at University Medical Center in El Paso, said Col. Ed Manning, the garrison commander at Fort Bliss.
The names of the shooting victims were not immediately released.
Manning said that the woman was at Fort Bliss for training and lived on the post.
He said the man did not live on the post.
Manning said the shooting was an isolated incident and said the post is safe.
FBI spokeswoman Andrea Simmons told the El Paso Times that after shooting the soldier, the man tried to kill himself.
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2009 Fort Hood shooting
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Fort_Hood_shooting
On November 5, 2009, a mass shooting took place at Fort Hood, near Killeen, Texas. Nidal Hasan, a U.S. Army major and psychiatrist, fatally shot 13 people and injured more than 30 others. The shooting produced more casualties than any other on an American military base. Several individuals, including Senator Joe Lieberman, General Barry McCaffrey, President Barack Obama and others have called the event a terrorist attack. The United States Department of Defense and federal law enforcement agencies have classified the shootings as an act of workplace violence.
Hasan was shot and as a result is paralyzed from the waist down. Hasan was arraigned by a military court on July 20, 2011 and was charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. His court-martial began on August 7, 2013. Due to the nature of the charges (more than one premeditated, or first-degree, murder case, in a single crime), Hasan faced either the death penalty or life in prison without parole upon conviction. Hasan was found guilty on all 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder on August 23, 2013, and was sentenced to death on August 28, 2013.
Days after the shooting, reports in the media revealed that a Joint Terrorism Task Force had been aware of a series of e-mails between Hasan and the Yemen-based imam Anwar al-Awlaki, who had been monitored by the NSA as a security threat, and that Hasan's colleagues had been aware of his increasing radicalization for several years. The failure to prevent the shootings led the Defense Department and the FBI to commission investigations, and Congress to hold hearings.
The U.S. government declined requests from survivors and family members of the slain to categorize the Fort Hood shooting as an act of terrorism, or motivated by militant Islamic religious convictions. In November 2011, a group of survivors and family members filed a lawsuit against the government for negligence in preventing the attack, and to force the government to classify the shootings as terrorism. The Pentagon argued that charging Hasan with terrorism was not possible within the military justice system and that such action could harm the military prosecutors' ability to sustain a guilty verdict against Hasan.
Shootings
Preparations
According to pretrial testimony, Hasan entered the Guns Galore store in Killeen on July 31, 2009, and purchased the FN Five-seven semi-automatic pistol that he was to use in the attack at Fort Hood. According to Army Specialist William Gilbert, a regular customer at the store, Hasan entered the store and asked for "the most technologically advanced weapon on the market and the one with the highest standard magazine capacity." Hasan was allegedly asked how he intended to use the weapon, but simply repeated that he wanted the most advanced handgun with the largest magazine capacity. The three people with Hasan—Gilbert, the store manager, and an employee—all recommended the FN Five-seven pistol. As Gilbert owned one of the pistols, he spent an hour describing its operation to Hasan.
Hasan left the store, saying he needed to research the weapon. He returned to purchase the gun the next day, and visited the store once a week to buy extra magazines, along with over 3000 rounds of 5.7×28mm SS192 and SS197SR ammunition total. In the weeks prior to the attack, Hasan visited an outdoor shooting range in Florence, where he allegedly became adept at hitting silhouette targets at distances of up to 100 yards.
Soldier Readiness Processing Center shootings
At approximately 1:34 p.m. local time, November 5, 2009, Hasan entered his workplace, the Soldier Readiness Processing Center, where personnel receive routine medical treatment immediately prior to and on return from deployment. He was armed with the FN Five-seven pistol, which he had fitted with two Lasermax laser sights: one red, and one green. A Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum revolver (an older model) was later found on Hasan's person, but he did not use it to shoot any of the victims.
According to eyewitnesses, Hasan had taken a seat at an empty table and bowed his head for several seconds when he suddenly stood up, shouted "Allahu Akbar!" and opened fire. Witnesses said Hasan initially "sprayed bullets at soldiers in a fanlike motion" before taking aim at individual soldiers. Eyewitness Sgt. Michael Davis said: "The rate of fire was pretty much constant shooting. When I initially heard it, it sounded like an M16."
Army reserve Captain John Gaffaney tried to stop Hasan by charging him, but was mortally wounded before reaching him. Civilian physician assistant Michael Cahill also tried to charge Hasan with a chair, but was shot and killed. Army reserve Specialist Logan Burnett tried to stop Hasan by throwing a folding table at him, but he was shot in the left hip, fell down, and crawled to a nearby cubicle.
According to testimony from witnesses, Hasan passed up several opportunities to shoot civilians, and instead targeted soldiers in uniform, who - in accordance with military policy - were not carrying personal firearms. At one point, Hasan reportedly approached a group of five civilians hiding under a desk. He looked at them, swept the dot of his pistol's laser sight over one of the men's faces, and turned away without firing.
Base civilian police Sergeant Kimberly Munley, who had rushed to the scene in her patrol car, encountered Hasan in the area outside the Soldier Readiness Processing Center. Hasan fired at Munley, who exchanged shots with him using her 9mm M9 pistol. Munley's hand was hit by shrapnel when one of Hasan's bullets struck a nearby rain gutter, and then two bullets struck Munley: the first bullet hit her thigh, and the second hit her knee. As she began to fall from the first bullet, the second bullet struck her femur, shattering it and knocking her to the ground. Hasan walked up to Munley and kicked her pistol out of reach.
As the shooting continued outside, nurses and medics entered the building, secured the doors with a belt and rushed to help the wounded. According to the responding nurses, there was so much blood covering the floor inside the building, that they were unable to maintain balance, and had difficulty reaching the wounded to help them. In the area outside the building, Hasan continued to shoot at fleeing soldiers, and civilian police Sergeant Mark Todd arrived and shouted commands at Hasan to surrender. Todd said: "Then he turned and fired a couple of rounds at me. I didn't hear him say a word, he just turned and fired." The two exchanged shots, and Hasan was felled by five shots from Todd, who kicked the pistol out of his hand and put handcuffs on him as he fell unconscious.
Aftermath
An investigator later testified that 146 spent shell casings were recovered inside the building. Another 68 casings were collected outside, for a total of 214 rounds fired by the attacker and responding police officers. A medic who treated Hasan said his pockets were full of pistol magazines. When the shooting ended, he was still carrying 177 rounds of unfired ammunition in his pockets, contained in both 20- and 30-round magazines. The incident, which lasted about 10 minutes, resulted in 13 killed—12 soldiers and one civilian; 11 died at the scene, and two died later in a hospital; and 30 people wounded.
Initially, officials thought three soldiers were involved in the shooting; two other soldiers were detained, but subsequently released. The Fort Hood website posted a notice indicating that the shooting was not a drill. Immediately after the shooting, the base and surrounding areas were locked down by military police and U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command (CID) until around 7 pm local time. In addition, Texas Rangers, Texas DPS troopers, deputies from the Bell County Sheriff's Office, and FBI agents from Austin and Waco were dispatched to the base. U.S. President Barack Obama was briefed on the incident and later made a statement about the shooting.
On November 5, 2010, one year later, 52 individuals received awards for their actions in the shooting. The Soldier's Medal was awarded posthumously to Captain John Gaffaney, who died trying to charge the shooter; fifty other medals were presented to other responders, including seven others who were awarded the Soldier's Medal. The Secretary of the Army Award for Valor was awarded to police officers Kimberly Munley and Mark Todd, for the roles they played in stopping the shooter. On May 23, 2011, the Army Award for Valor was posthumously awarded to the civilian physician assistant Michael Cahill, who died trying to charge the shooter with a chair. In May 2012, Senator Joe Lieberman and Representative Peter T. King proposed legislation that would make the victims of the shooting eligible for the Purple Heart. In the 113th Congress, Representative John Carter introduced legislation to change the shooting designation from "workplace violence" to "combat related" which would make the victims of the shooting eligible to receive full benefits and the Purple Heart.
In July 2014, a memorial for those killed during the attack began to be built in Killeen.
On February 6, 2015, the Department of Defense DoD issued a press release, in which United States Secretary of the Army John M. McHugh announced that he was approving the awarding of the Purple Heart and its civilian counterpart, the Secretary of Defense Medal for the Defense of Freedom, to victims of the shooting. This is a result of Congress expanding the eligibility requirement under a provision of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2015. On April 10, 2015, nearly 50 awards were handed out to dozens of survivors.
Casualties
Thirteen people were slain in the attack. Over thirty people were wounded; some from gunshots, others from falls or other injuries incurred during the incident, and many suffered psychological trauma or shock. The Army, press, and investigative bodies have reported several numbers for the total number of injured, without indicating what sorts of injuries they were counting, nor how: and
Hasan, the gunman, was taken to Scott and White Memorial Hospital, a trauma center in Temple, Texas, and later moved to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, where he was held under heavy guard. Hasan was hit by at least four shots.[68] As a result of bullet wounds to his spine, he is now paraplegic. He was later held at the Bell County jail in Belton, Texas.
Ten of the injured were also treated at Scott and White.[69] Seven wounded victims were taken to Metroplex Adventist Hospital in Killeen. Eight others received hospital treatment for shock. On November 20, 2009, it was announced that eight of the wounded service members would deploy overseas.
Fatalities
The 13 killed were:
Name Age Hometown Rank/occupation Notes
Michael Grant Cahill 62 Spokane, Washington Civilian Physician Assistant Shot while trying to charge the shooter
Libardo Eduardo Caraveo 52 Woodbridge, Virginia Major
Justin Michael DeCrow 32 Plymouth, Indiana Staff Sergeant Shot in the chest
John P. Gaffaney 56 Serra Mesa, California Captain Shot while trying to charge the shooter
Frederick Greene 29 Mountain City, Tennessee Specialist Shot while trying to charge the shooter
Jason Dean Hunt 22 Norman, Oklahoma Specialist Shot in the back
Amy Sue Krueger 29 Kiel, Wisconsin Staff Sergeant Shot in the chest
Aaron Thomas Nemelka 19 West Jordan, Utah Private First Class Shot in the chest
Michael S. Pearson 22 Bolingbrook, Illinois Private First Class Shot in the chest
Russell Gilbert Seager 51 Racine, Wisconsin Captain
Francheska Velez 21 Chicago, Illinois Private First Class Shot in the chest. Was pregnant when killed, and the baby also died.
Juanita L. Warman 55 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Lieutenant Colonel Shot in the abdomen
Kham See Xiong 23 Saint Paul, Minnesota Private First Class Shot in the head
Gunshot wounds
The following people suffered gunshot wounds and survived:
Count Name Rank/occupation Notes
1 James Armstrong Specialist Shot in the leg
2 Patrick Blue III Sergeant Not shot, but hit in the side by bullet fragments
3 Keara Bono Torkelson Specialist Shot in the shoulder and grazed in the head
4 Logan M. Burnett Specialist Shot in the hip, left elbow, and hand
5 Alan Carroll Specialist Shot in the upper right arm, right bicep, left side of back, and left leg
6 Dorothy Carskadon Captain Shot in the leg, hip, and stomach, and grazed on the forehead; permanently disabled.
7 Joy Clark Staff Sergeant Shot in the forearm
8 Matthew D. Cooke Specialist
9 Chad Davis Staff Sergeant Shot in the shoulder
10 Mick Engnehl Private Shot in the shoulder and grazed in the neck
11 Joseph T. Foster Private Shot in the hip
12 Amber Gadlin (formerly Amber Bahr) Private
13 Nathan Hewitt Sergeant Shot twice in the leg
14 Alvin Howard Sergeant Shot in the left shoulder
15 Najee M. Hull Private Shot once in the knee and twice in the back
16 Eric Williams Jackson Staff Sergeant Shot in the right arm
17 Justin T. Johnson Private Shot once in the foot and twice in the back
18 Alonzo M. Lunsford, Jr Staff Sergeant Grazed in the head, and shot twice in the stomach
19 Shawn N. Manning Staff Sergeant Grazed in the lower right side, and shot in the left upper chest, left back, lower right thigh, upper right thigh, and right foot
20 Paul Martin Staff Sergeant Shot in the arm, leg, and back
21 Brandy Mason 2nd Lieutenant Shot in the hip
22 Grant Moxon Specialist Shot in the leg
23 Kimberly Munley Civilian Police Sergeant Shot twice in the leg
24 John Pagel Specialist Shot through his left arm; bullet traveled into left side of his chest
25 Dayna Ferguson Roscoe Specialist Shot in the arm, shoulder, and thigh
26 Christopher H. Royal Chief Warrant Officer Started a nonprofit foundation called "32 Still Standing" to raise money to support the survivors.
27 Randy Royer Major Shot in the arm and leg
28 Jonathan Sims Specialist Shot in the chest, back
29 George O. Stratton, III Specialist Shot in the shoulder
30 Patrick Zeigler Staff Sergeant Shot in the left shoulder, left forearm, left hip, and left side of head
31 Miguel A. Valdivia Sergeant Shot in the right thigh and left hip
32 Thuan Nguyen Staff Sergeant Shot in the thigh
Shooter
Main article: Nidal Hasan
Major Nidal Hasan
During his court-martial on August 6, 2013 before a panel of 13 officers, Major Nidal Malik Hasan declared that he was the shooter. Hasan is unmarried and was described as socially isolated. Born in the United States, Hasan is a practicing Muslim who, according to one of his cousins, became more devout after the deaths of his parents in 1998 and 2001. His cousin did not recall him ever expressing radical or anti-American views. Another cousin, Nader Hasan, a lawyer in Virginia, said that Nidal Hasan's opinion turned against the United States after he heard stories from his patients, who had returned from fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq. Because of what Hasan said was discrimination and his deepening anguish about serving in a military that fought against Muslims, he told some members of his family that he wanted to leave the military. He said that he could not, but he may have been given inappropriate advice.
From 2003 to 2009, Hasan was stationed at Walter Reed Medical Center for his internship and residency; he also had a two-year fellowship at USUHS completed in 2009. According to National Public Radio (NPR), officials at Walter Reed Medical Center repeatedly expressed concern about Hasan's behavior during the entire six years he was there; Hasan's supervisors gave him poor evaluations and warned him that he was doing substandard work. In early 2008 (and on later occasions), several key officials met to discuss what to do about Hasan. Attendees of these meetings reportedly included the Walter Reed chief of psychiatry, the chairman of the USUHS Psychiatry Department, two assistant chairs of the USUHS Psychiatry Department (one of whom was the director of Hasan's psychiatry fellowship), another psychiatrist, and the director of the Walter Reed psychiatric residency program. According to NPR, fellow students and faculty were "deeply troubled" by Hasan's behavior, which they described as "disconnected", "aloof", "paranoid", "belligerent" and "schizoid".
Once, while presenting what was supposed to be a medical lecture to other psychiatrists, Hasan talked about Islam, and said that, according to the Koran, non-believers would be sent to hell, decapitated, set on fire, and have burning oil poured down their throats. A Muslim psychiatrist in the audience raised his hand, and challenged Hasan's claims. According to the Associated Press, Hasan's lecture also "justified suicide bombings." In the summer of 2009, after completion of his programs, he was transferred to Fort Hood.
At Fort Hood, Hasan rented an apartment away from other officers, in a somewhat rundown area. Two days before the shooting, Hasan gave away furniture from his home, saying he was going to be deployed. He also handed out copies of the Qur'an, along with his business cards, which gave a Maryland phone number and read "Behavioral Heatlh [sic] – Mental Health – Life Skills | Nidal Hasan, MD, MPH | SoA(SWT) | Psychiatrist". The cards did not reflect his military rank.
In May 2001, Hasan attended the funeral of his mother, held at the Dar Al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Virginia, which has 3,000 members. He may also have occasionally prayed there but, for a period of ten years, he prayed several times a week at the Muslim Community Center in Silver Spring, Maryland, closer to where he lived and worked. He was regularly seen there by the imam and other members. His attendance at the Falls Church mosque was in the same period as that of Nawaf al-Hazmi and Hani Hanjour, two of the hijackers in the September 11 attacks, who went there from April 2001 to later in the summer. A law enforcement official said that the FBI will probably look into whether Hasan associated with the hijackers. A review of Hasan's computer and his e-mail accounts revealed he had visited radical Islamist, a senior law enforcement official said.
Pictured: Anwar al-Awlaki in 2008, with whom Hasan communicated in the months prior to the shootings
Hasan expressed admiration for the teachings of Anwar al-Awlaki, the imam at the Dar al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Virginia between 2000 and 2002. Awlaki had been the subject of several FBI investigations, and had helped hijackers al-Hazmi and Hanjour settle, and provided spiritual guidance to them when they met him at the San Diego mosque, and after they drove to the east coast. Considered moderate then, Al-Awlaki appeared to become radicalized after 2006 and was under surveillance. After Hasan wrote nearly 20 e-mails to him between December 2008 and June 2009, Hasan was investigated by the FBI. The fact that Hasan had "certain communications" with the subject of a Joint Terrorism Task Force investigation was revealed in an FBI press release made on November 9, 2009, and reporting by the media immediately revealed that the subject was Awlaki and the communications were e-mails. In one, Hasan wrote: "I can't wait to join you" in the afterlife. Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, a military analyst at the Center for Advanced Defense Studies, suggested that Hasan was "either offering himself up or [had] already crossed that line in his own mind."
Army employees were informed of the contacts at the time, but they believed that the e-mails were consistent with Hasan's professional mental health research about Muslims in the armed services, as part of his master's work in Disaster and Preventive Psychiatry. A DC-based joint terrorism task force operating under the FBI was notified, and the information reviewed by one of its Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS) employees, who concluded there was not sufficient information for a larger investigation. Senior officers at the Department of Defense stated they were not notified of such investigations before the shootings.
Possible motives
Nidal Malik Hasan
Immediately after the shooting, analysts and public officials openly debated Hasan's motive and preceding psychological state: a military activist, Selena Coppa, remarked that Hasan's psychiatrist colleagues "failed to notice how deeply disturbed someone right in their midst was." A spokesperson for U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, one of the first officials to comment on Hasan's background, told reporters that Hasan was upset about his pending deployment to Afghanistan on November 28. Noel Hamad, Hasan's aunt, said that the family was not aware he was being sent to Afghanistan.
The Dallas Morning News reported on November 17 that ABC News, citing anonymous sources, reported that investigators suspect that the shootings were triggered by superiors' refusal to process Hasan’s requests that some of his patients be prosecuted for war crimes based on statements they made during psychiatric sessions with him. Dallas attorney Patrick McLain, a former Marine, said that Hasan may have been legally justified in his request, but he could not comment without knowing what soldiers had said. Fellow psychiatrists complained to superiors that Hasan's actions violated doctor-patient confidentiality.
Duane Reasoner, a convert to Islam whom Hasan was mentoring in the religion, said the psychiatrist did not want to be deployed. "'He said Muslims shouldn't be in the U.S. military, because obviously Muslims shouldn't kill Muslims. He told me not to join the Army.'"
Senator Joe Lieberman called for a probe by the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, which he chairs. Lieberman said "it's premature to reach conclusions about what motivated Hasan ... I think it's very important to let the Army and the FBI go forward with this investigation before we reach any conclusions." Two weeks later, when opening his committee's hearings, Lieberman labeled the shooting "the most destructive terrorist attack on America since September 11, 2001."
Michael Welner, M.D., a leading forensic psychiatrist with experience examining mass shooters, said that the shooting had elements common to both ideological and workplace mass shootings. Welner, who believed Hasan wanted to create a "spectacle", said that a trauma care worker, even under mental distress, would not normally be expected to be homicidal toward his patients unless his ideology trumped his Hippocratic oath–Welner thought Hasan expressed this in shouting, "Allahu Akhbar," as he shot unarmed men. An analyst of terror investigations, Carl Tobias, opined that the attack did not fit the profile of terrorism, and was more similar to the Virginia Tech massacre, committed by a student believed to be severely mentally ill.
Michael Scheuer, the retired former head of the Bin Laden Issue Station, and former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey have called the event a terrorist attack, as has the terrorism expert Walid Phares. Retired General Barry McCaffrey said on Anderson Cooper 360° that "it's starting to appear as if this was a domestic terrorist attack on fellow soldiers by a major in the Army who we educated for six years while he was giving off these vibes of disloyalty to his own force."
Some of Hasan's former colleagues have said he performed substandard work and occasionally unnerved them by expressing fervent Islamic views and deep opposition to the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Others were more concerned about his apparent mental instability and paranoid behaviors. Throughout his years at Walter Reed, heads of departments had regularly discussed his mental state, as they were "deeply concerned" about his behavior.
Brian Levin of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism wrote that the case sits at the crossroads of crime, terrorism and mental distress. He compared the possible role of religion to the beliefs of Scott Roeder, a Christian who murdered Dr. George Tiller, who practiced abortion. Such offenders "often self-radicalize from a volatile mix of personal distress, psychological issues, and an ideology that can be sculpted to justify and explain their anti-social leanings."
At his trial in June 2013, Hasan declared his motive as wanting to defend the lives of the Taliban leadership in Afghanistan. Army prosecutors said that he sought to align himself with Islamic extremists.
Hasan's description of motives
In August 2013, Fox News released documents from Major Hasan in which he explained his motives. Most of the documents included the acronym "SoA", which is considered shorthand for "Soldier of Allah." In one document, Hasan wrote that he was required to renounce any oaths that required him to defend any man-made constitution over the commandments mandated in Islam. In another document, he wrote "I invite the world to read the book of All-Mighty Allah and decide for themselves if it is the truth from their Lord. My desire is to help people attain heaven by the mercy of their Lord."
In another document, Hasan wrote that there is a fundamental and irreconcilable conflict between American democracy and Islamic governance. Specifically:
. . . in an American democracy, 'we the people' govern according to what 'we the people' think is right or wrong, even if it specifically goes against what All-Mighty God commands.
He further explained that separation of Church and State is an unacceptable attempt to get along with unbelievers, because "Islam was brought to prevail over other religions" and not to be equal with or subservient to them.
Reaction
Many have characterized the attack as terrorism. Two weeks after recommending no conclusions be drawn until after the investigation was completed, Senator Joe Lieberman called the shooting "the most destructive terrorist attack on America since September 11, 2001." Michael Scheuer, the retired former head of the Bin Laden Issue Station, and former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey also described it as a terrorist attack. A group of soldiers and families have sought to have the defense secretary designate the shooting a "terrorist attack;" this would provide them with benefits equal to injuries in combat.
The FBI has found no evidence to indicate Hasan had any co-conspirators or was part of a broader terrorist plot, and has not established his motives. The Defense Department currently classifies Hasan's attack as an act of workplace violence and will not make further statements until the court martial.
President Obama
Pictured:U.S. President Barack Obama at the memorial service for the victims of the shooting rampage
The U.S. President's initial response to the attack came during a scheduled speech at the Tribal Nations Conference for America’s 564 federally recognized Native American tribes. Obama was criticized by the media for being "insensitive", as he addressed the shooting only three minutes into his prepared speech, and then for not according it sufficient gravitas. Later, the President delivered the memorial eulogy for the victims. Reaction to his memorial speech was largely positive, with some deeming it one of his best. The speech was criticized by a Wall Street Journal reporter, who found the speech largely absent of emotion, while a National Review columnist criticized Obama for refusing to acknowledge Islamic terrorism as having a role in the shooting. On December 6, 2015, in his speech addressing terrorism, Obama included the Fort Hood shooting among Islamic inspired terrorist incidents.
Fort Hood personnel
Retired Army colonel Terry Lee, who had worked with Hasan, said the psychiatrist expressed the hope that Obama would withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, and argued with military colleagues who supported the wars.
Army Secretary John McHugh and Chief of Staff Gen. George W. Casey, Jr. discussing the shooting at a press conference at Fort Hood
U.S. Government
A spokesman for the Defense Department called the shooting an "isolated and tragic case", and Defense Secretary Robert Gates pledged that his department would do "everything in its power to help the Fort Hood community get through these difficult times." The chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, and numerous politicians, expressed condolences to the victims and their families.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano stated "we object to—and do not believe—that anti-Muslim sentiment should emanate from this ... This was an individual who does not, obviously, represent the Muslim faith." Chief of Staff Gen. George W. Casey, Jr. said "I'm concerned that this increased speculation could cause a backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers ... Our diversity, not only in our Army, but in our country, is a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that’s worse."
In January 2010, a senior Obama administration official, who declined to be named, referred to the shooting as "an act of terrorism", however other administration officials have not referred to the shootings as a terrorist event.
Victims of the shooting were denied Purple Hearts as well as associate benefits. In 2013, during the 113th United States Congress, Representative Carter submitted the Honoring the Fort Hood Heroes Act for consideration. The bill was referred to committee. In 2015, a similar bill was introduced in the legislature of Texas, to award the Texas Purple Heart Medal to the shooting victims.
The National Defense Authorization Act 2015 authorizes the Department of Defense to award Purple Heart Medals to those wounded during the attack. The award was previously denied due to the categorization of the event as "workplace violence". The law requires that the Department of Defense to define the event as an "international terrorist attack". In February 2015, the Department of the Army approved awarding of the Purple Heart to those injured by Hasan during the shooting, providing those injured with a higher degree of services from the Veterans Affairs. The Army plans to present the Purple Hearts in April 2015; which was carried out on 10 April 2015. Following the awarding benefits for those wounded in hostile-fire were extended to the Purple Heart recipients, and it was announced that those killed and injured during the 2009 Little Rock recruiting office shooting would also receive the Purple Heart.
Veteran groups
Family members and troops attend a memorial service honoring the victims of the mass murder.
Veterans groups across the United States expressed condolences for victims of the attack. American Legion National Commander Clarence E. Hill stated, "The American Legion extends condolences to the victims and the families of those affected by the shootings at Fort Hood." Veterans of Foreign Wars National Commander Thomas J. Tradewell Sr. states, "The entire military family is grieving right now. I just want them to know they do not grieve alone. Our hearts and prayers are with them."
Military policy on bases
The Army places strict restrictions on personal firearms carried onto Fort Hood and other bases. Military weapons are used only for training or by base security. Personal weapons bought on base are required to be secured at all times and must be registered with the provost marshal. Specialist Jerry Richard, a soldier working at the Readiness Center, said he felt this policy left the soldiers vulnerable to violent assaults: "Overseas you are ready for it. But here you can't even defend yourself." Jacob Sullum, an opponent of gun control, described the base as a "gun-free zone."
Hasan's family
A spokesman for the Hasan family said the actions of their cousin were "despicable and deplorable", and do not reflect how they were raised.
American Muslim groups
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) condemned the shooting and noted that it was not in keeping with Muslim teachings. The spokesman asked Americans to treat it as an "isolated incident of a deranged individual." He pointed out that disturbed individuals could use any religion for their own purposes, but the Muslim community condemned this violence.
Salman al-Ouda, a dissident Saudi cleric and former inspiration to Osama bin Laden, condemned the shooting, saying the incident would have bad consequences:
"...undoubtedly this man might have a psychological problem; he may be a psychiatrist but he [also] might have had psychological distress, as he was being commissioned to go to Iraq or Afghanistan, and he was capable of refusing to work whatever the consequences were." The senior analyst at the NEFA Foundation described Ouda’s comments as "a good indication of how far on a tangent Anwar al-Awlaki is."
Anwar al-Awlaki
Main article: Anwar al-Awlaki
Soon after the attack, Anwar al-Awlaki posted praise for Hasan for the shooting on his website. He wrote, "Nidal Hasan is a hero, the fact that fighting against the U.S. army is an Islamic duty today cannot be disputed. Nidal has killed soldiers who were about to be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan in order to kill Muslims." In March 2010, Al-Awlaki alleged that the Obama administration tried to portray Hasan's actions as an individual act of violence from an estranged individual, and that it was trying to suppress information for the American public. He said:
"Until this moment the administration is refusing to release the e-mails exchanged between myself and Nidal. And after the operation of our brother Umar Farouk the initial comments coming from the administration were looking the same – another attempt at covering up the truth. But Al Qaeda cut off Obama from deceiving the world again by issuing their statement claiming responsibility for the operation.
(Note: The US investigation found no evidence that ties Hasan to al-Qaeda. See section below.)
On April 6, 2010, The New York Times reported that President Obama had authorized the targeted killing of al-Awlaki, who had been hunted by the Yemen government since going into hiding. On September 30, 2011, two Predator drones fired missiles at a vehicle with al-Awlaki aboard, killing him and Samir Khan.
Investigation and prosecution
The criminal investigation was conducted jointly by the FBI, the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command, and the Texas Rangers Division. As a member of the military, Hasan is subject to the jurisdiction of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (military law). He was initially represented by Belton, Texas-based John P. Galligan, a criminal defense attorney and retired US Army Colonel. Hasan regained consciousness on November 9, but refused to talk to investigators. The investigative officer in charge of his article 32 hearing was Colonel James L. Pohl, who had previously led the investigation into the Abu Ghraib abuses, and is the Chief Presiding Officer of the Guantanamo military commissions.
On November 9, 2009, the FBI said that investigators believed Hasan had acted alone. They disclosed that they had reviewed evidence which included 2008 conversations with an individual that an official identified as Anwar al-Awlaki, but said they did not find any evidence that Hasan had received orders or help from anyone. According to a November 11 press release, after preliminary examination of Hasan’s computers and internet activity, they had found no information to indicate he had any co-conspirators or was part of a broader terrorist plot, stressing the "early stages" of the review. They said no e-mail communications with outside facilitators or known terrorists were found.
Investigators were evaluating reports that, in May 2001, Hasan had attended a mosque in Virginia for the funeral of his mother, which was attended that spring and summer by two of the 9/11 hijackers. The imam was the American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, then considered a moderate.[citation needed] Awlaki has since been accused of aiding the 9/11 plot and since 2006–2007 has been identified as radicalized. Investigators were trying to determine if al-Awlaki's teachings influenced Hasan. For ten years, Hasan prayed several times a week at the Muslim Community Center in Silver Spring, Maryland, closer to where he lived and worked.
Army officials said, "Right now we're operating on the belief that he acted alone and had no help". No motive for the shootings was offered, but they believed Hasan had written an Internet posting that appeared to support suicide bombings. Sen. Lieberman opined that Hasan was under personal stress and may have turned to Islamic extremism.
In pressing charges against Hasan, the Department of Defense and the DoJ agreed that Hasan would be prosecuted in a military court. Observers noted this was consistent with investigators' concluding he had acted alone. During a November 21 hearing in Hasan's hospital room, a magistrate ruled that there was probable cause that Hasan committed the November 5 shooting, and ordered that he be held in pre-trial confinement after being released from hospital care. On November 12 and December 2, respectively, Hasan was charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder by the Army; he may face additional charges at court-martial.
Prosecutors did not file a count for the death of the fetus of Francheska Velez. Such a charge is available to prosecutors under the Unborn Victims of Violence Act and Article 119a of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. If civilian prosecutors indicted him for being part of a terrorist plot, it could have justified moving all or part of his case into federal criminal courts under U.S. anti-terrorism laws. The military justice system rarely carries out capital punishment—and no executions have been carried out since 1961. Neither has any incident of mass murder been prosecuted by the military since then. (From 1916 to 1961, the U.S. Army executed 135 people.)
Trial
In late January 2011, Hasan was judged sane for trial by an Army sanity board, normally composed of doctors and psychologists. This allowed a capital trial, and more information about his mental state at the time of the shootings was able to be introduced by the defense during the trial.
He was formally arraigned on July 20, 2011. He did not enter a plea, and the judge granted a request by Hasan's attorneys that a plea be entered at a later, unspecified, date. The judge initially set a trial date for Maj. Hasan's court-martial for March 5, 2012. Later, the court-martial date was pushed back after Hasan switched lawyers, to provide them time to prepare his defense.
Having previously instructed Hasan to follow Army regulations and shave a beard he had grown, the judge, Colonel Gregory Gross, found him in contempt in July 2012 and fined him. His court-martial was set to begin on August 20, 2012. He was fined again for retaining his beard, and warned that he could be forcibly shaved prior to his court-martial.
On August 15, Hasan was scheduled to enter pleas to the charges brought against him before the beginning of the court-martial; he would not be allowed to plead guilty to the premeditated murder charges as the prosecution is pursuing the death penalty in his case. Hasan objected to being shaved against his will, and his attorney's appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces. Hasan said having a beard was part of his religious belief.
On August 27, the Appeals Court announced that the trial could continue, but did not rule whether Hasan could be forcibly shaved. The Appeals court has rejected previous attempts by Hasan to receive "religious accommodation" from Army Regulation to wear his beard. On September 6, Gross ordered that Hasan be shaved after it was determined that the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act did not apply to this case; however, it will not be enforced until his appeals are exhausted, further delaying the trial.
During the hearing on September 6, 2012, Hasan twice offered to plead guilty; however, Army rules at the time prohibited the judge from accepting a guilty plea in a death penalty case. On September 21, defense attorneys of Hasan filed two appeals with the Army Court of Criminal Appeals regarding his beard, postponing the trial. Residents of Killeen were upset about the delays in going to trial.
n mid-October, the Army Court of Criminal Appeals upheld Colonel Gross' decision that Hasan could be forcibly shaved. Hasan's attorneys filed an appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces seeking to overturn the lower court, and to have Gross removed.
On Tuesday, December 4, 2012, the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces vacated Major Hasan's six convictions for contempt of court and removed the judge, Colonel Gregory Gross, from the case, stating he had not shown the requisite impartiality. The Court of Appeals overturned an order to have Hasan's beard be forcibly shaven; it did not rule on whether Hasan's religious rights had been violated. The Court of Appeals additionally ruled that it was the military command's responsibility, not the military judge, to ensure Hasan met grooming standards. The Army's Judge Advocate General appointed a new judge to replace Gross. The ruling was called "unusual" by Jeffrey Addicott of the Center for Terrorism Law at St. Mary's University, and called "rare" by military defense attorney Frank Spinner.
Colonel Tara A. Osborn was appointed as the new judge for the trial on the same day that Gross was removed. In 2011 Osborn presided over a death penalty case, the court martial of SGT Joseph Bozicevich, who was sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole for killing his squad leader and another soldier. In January 2013, Osborn was deliberating whether to remove the death penalty, due to the Defense attorney's claim that LTG Campbell was not impartial when it was decided that Hasan would face the death penalty. On January 31, Osborn ruled that a capital murder trial was constitutional, based on a 1996 Supreme Court case regarding Dwight J. Loving; Osborn additionally ruled that her court did not have jurisdiction regarding Hasan's beard, and it was a matter to take up with Hasan's chain of command. As of February 2013, the court-martial had been set to start in May 29, 2013, with jury selection to begin on July 1, 2013.
On June 3, 2013, a military judge gave approval for Hasan to represent himself at his upcoming murder trial. His attorneys were to remain on the case but only if he asked for their help. Jury selection started on June 5 and opening arguments took place on August 6. U.S. Army Judge Colonel Tara Osborn ruled on June 14, 2013 that Hasan couldn't claim as a part of his defense that he was defending the Taliban. The trial was scheduled to begin on August 6. During an exclusive interview with Fox News, Hasan justified his actions during the Fort Hood shooting by claiming that the US military was at war with Islam. This marked the first occasion that Hasan had talked to American media since his arrest. In the past, Hasan had only spoken via telephone with Al-Jazeera.
During the first day of the trial on August 6, Hasan—who was representing himself— admitted that he was the gunman during the Fort Hood shootings in 2009 and stated that the evidence would show that he was the shooter. He also told the panel hearing that he had "switched sides" and regarded himself as a Mujahideen waging "jihad" against the United States. By August 7, disagreements between Hasan and his stand-by defense team led Judge Osborn to suspend the proceedings. Hasan's defense attorneys were concerned that his defense strategy would lead to him receiving the death penalty. Since the prosecution had sought the death penalty, his defense team sought to prevent this.
Overall, the trial cost almost $5 million, with the largest expense being transportation, followed by expert witness fees.
Conviction and sentencing
On August 23, 2013, he was convicted on all charges after the jury deliberated for seven hours. Five days later, a U.S. military court sentenced him to death for the shootings. At the time of his sentencing, he became the sixth person on military death row.
Internal investigations
Main article: Joint Terrorism Task Force
The FBI noted that Hasan had first been brought to their attention in December 2008 by a Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF). Communications between Hasan and al-Awlaki, and other similar communications, were reviewed and considered to be consistent with Hasan's professional research at the Walter Reed Medical Center. "Because the content of the communications was explainable by his research and nothing else derogatory was found, the JTTF concluded that Major Hasan was not involved in terrorist activities or terrorist planning."
On December 2009, FBI Director Robert Mueller appointed William Webster, a former director of the FBI, to establish a commission to conduct an independent review of the FBI's handling of assessing the risk that Hasan posed.
On January 15, 2010, the Department of Defense released the findings of its investigation, which found that the Department was unprepared to defend against internal threats. Secretary Robert Gates said that previous incidents had not drawn enough attention to workplace violence and "self-radicalization" within the military. He also suggested that some officials may be held responsible for not drawing attention to Hasan prior to the shooting. The Department report did not touch upon Hasan's motives.
James Corum, a retired Army Reserve Lieutenant Colonel and Dean at the Baltic Defence College in Estonia, called the Defense Department report "a travesty", for failing to mention Hasan's devotion to Islam and his radicalization. Texas Representative John Carter criticized the report, saying he felt the government was "afraid to be accused of profiling somebody". John Lehman, a member of the 9/11 Commission and Secretary of the Navy under Ronald Reagan, said he felt that the report "shows you how deeply entrenched the values of political correctness have become." The columnist Debra Saunders of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote in an opinion piece: "Even ... if the report's purpose was to craft lessons to prevent future attacks, how could they leave out radical Islam?"
The leaders of the investigation, former Secretary of the Army Togo West and retired Admiral Vernon Clark, responded by saying their "concern is with actions and effects, not necessarily with motivations", and that they did not want to conflict with the criminal investigation on Hasan that was under way.
In February 2010, the Boston Globe obtained a confidential internal report detailing results of the Army's investigation. According to the Globe, the report concluded that officers within the Army were aware of Hasan's tendencies toward radical Islam since 2005. It noted one incident in 2007 in which Hasan gave a classroom presentation titled, "Is the War on Terrorism a War on Islam: An Islamic Perspective". The instructor reportedly interrupted Hasan, as he thought the psychiatrist was trying to justify terrorism, according to the Globe. Hasan's superior officers took no action related to this incident, believing Hasan's comments were protected under the First Amendment and that having a Muslim psychiatrist contributed to diversity. The report noted that Hasan's statements might have been grounds for removing him from service, as the First Amendment did not apply to soldiers in the same way as for civilians.
In July 2012, the Webster Commission's final report was submitted. Webster made 18 recommendations to the FBI. The report found issues in information sharing, failure to follow up on leads, computer technology issues, and failure of the FBI headquarters to coordinate two field offices working on leads related to Hasan.
In August 2013, Mother Jones magazine described multiple intercepted e-mails from Hasan to Awlaki. In one 2008 e-mail, Hasan asked Awlaki whether he considered those who died attacking their fellow soldiers "Shaheeds", or martyrs. In a 2009 e-mail, Hasan asked Awlaki whether "indiscriminately killing civilians" was allowed. Both e-mails were forwarded to the Defense Criminal Investigative Services (DCIS). However, DCIS failed to connect the two e-mails to each other, and the 2008 e-mail was given only a cursory investigation. A DCIS agent later explained that the subject was "politically sensitive".
In November 2013, Army Secretary John M. McHugh is quoted as writing that he has "directed my staff to conduct a thorough review of the record of trial in the court-martial of Major Hasan to ascertain if those proceedings revealed new evidence or information that establishes clearly the necessary link to international terrorism".
Lawsuit
A lawsuit filed in November 2011 by victims and their family members alleges that the government's failure to take action against Hasan before the attack was willful negligence prompted by "political correctness." The 83 claimants seek $750 million in compensation from the Army.
As of 2012, the Department of Defense classifies the case as one of workplace violence. A spokesman for the Department stated,
"The Department of Defense is committed to the integrity of the ongoing court martial proceedings of Major Nadal Hasan and for that reason will not further characterize, at this time, the incident that occurred at Fort Hood on November 5, 2009. Major Hassan has been charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder, and 32 counts of attempted murder. As with all pending UCMJ matters, the accused is innocent until proven guilty."
A group of 160 victims and family members have asked the government to declare the Fort Hood attack an act of terrorism, which would mean that injuries would be treated as if the victims were in a combat zone, providing them more benefits. US Representatives John R. Carter and Michael T. McCaul wrote, "Based on all the facts, it is inconceivable to us that the DOD and the Army continue to label this attack ‘workplace violence’ in spite of all the evidence that clearly proves the Fort Hood shooting was an act of terror." Carter and McCaul drew their conclusions from their interpretation of existing investigations.
On November 5, 2012, 148 plaintiffs, including victims and families of victims, filed a wrongful death claim against the United States Government, Hasan, and the estate of Anwar al-Awlaki. Their lawsuit alleges there were due process violations, intentional misrepresentation, assault and battery, gross negligence, and civil conspiracy.
The lawsuit was featured on ABC News on February 12, 2013.
See also:
1991 Luby's shooting – another mass shooting near Fort Hood
1995 William Kreutzer, Jr. case – convicted of killing an officer and wounding 17 other soldiers at Fort Bragg, North Carolina
2003 Hasan Akbar case – convicted of murder of two officers at Camp Pennsylvania, Kuwait
2005 deaths of Phillip Esposito and Louis Allen – Staff Sergeant Alberto Martinez was charged and subsequently acquitted of murdering his commander and another officer in Tikrit, Iraq.
2009 Camp Liberty killings – Sgt. John M. Russell charged with five counts of murder and one count of aggravated assault for attack at Camp Liberty, Iraq
2009 Little Rock recruiting office shooting – Major Hasan was "happy" about Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad drive-by shooting of two soldiers
2009 Lloyd R. Woodson case – arrested with military-grade illegal weapons and a detailed map of the Fort Drum military installation
2013 Chris Kyle – murder of celebrated Iraq sniper with no established motive by Marine said to suffer from PTSD
2013 Washington Navy Yard shooting – a mass shooting at the Naval Sea Systems Command headquarters with 13 people dead
2014 Fort Hood shooting – another mass shooting at Fort Hood with four people dead and 12 others wounded
2015 Chattanooga shootings – a spree shooting at two military installations with five people dead and three others wounded
Capital punishment by the United States military
List of massacres in the United States
Naser Jason Abdo
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Fort Bliss shooting: Retired soldier who shot 2 is killed outside store
'It was senseless'
archive.elpasotimes.com/ci_16138637
By Chris Roberts and Adriana M. Chávez \ El Paso Times
POSTED: 09/22/2010
FORT BLISS -- Retired Army Sgt. Steven Kropf apparently flashed his military identification card on Monday and drove onto the post carrying a revolver he used to kill one woman and seriously injure another, officials said Tuesday.
Kropf, a 63-year-old El Paso resident, entered the crowded shoppette at 1333 Cassidy Road, went to offices at the rear of the store and shot Bettina Maria Goins, 44, of El Paso, and another woman, in the head, officials said. After the shooting, Kropf walked to the parking lot and sat in his car, where he was shot dead by Army civilian police, said officials of the FBI, which is handling the case.
Officials would not elaborate on what led to police shooting Kropf. Police fired twice at Kropf.
Goins and the other woman, whom officials have not identified, were taken to Beaumont Army Medical Center, where Goins died. The other victim was recovering at Beaumont late Tuesday. Officials said she was shot in the head and the chest. The caliber of the weapon used has not been disclosed.
Few other details on the shooting were offered Tuesday. Maj. Gen. Dana Pittard, the post commander, said officials were ensuring that information made public was factual.
"Our heart, our prayers and our condolences go out to the victims of (Monday's) tragic events," Pittard said at an afternoon news conference in the shoppette's parking lot.
Goins was "a mother of two, a grandmother of two and she was a great friend to many.
And again, we are so sorry for that loss. We also have another team Bliss member who is currently fighting for her life, but is in stable condition right now."
FBI officials said a motive was still under investigation.
However, Maria-Laura Nasti, Goins' daughter, and Kim Rodriguez, who described herself as Goins' best friend, provided some details of the violence. Much of that information was given to them by officials handling the case, they said.
Kropf apparently had a history of angry outbursts and had been fired from a post convenience store for chasing an alleged beer thief, which was against store policy, Rodriguez said. Kropf called the Fort Bliss shoppette Monday looking for his girlfriend, who reportedly worked at one of the post's stores, she said. When Kropf called the store, the unnamed victim told him she could not give him any information.
Goins worked at another convenience store on post and was at the shoppette where the shooting took place to pick up additional Halloween candy, Nasti said.
A short while later, about 3 p.m., Kropf showed up in the store and began shooting. Goins was an innocent bystander, Nasti said.
"He took her away from us," Nasti said. "It was senseless."
A neighbor of Kropf's said he did not know him well and exchanged pleasantries when Kropf walked his dog in the neighborhood.
"They kept to themselves," George Lewis said.
Lewis said he thought Kropf was married and moved into the neighborhood in the Northeast about a year ago. He also said he thought the woman moved away a month or two ago.
Counseling had been provided to shoppers and witnesses of the shooting, Pittard said.
After speaking with employees, officials decided to reopen the shoppette today, Pittard said.
Pittard said the post will increase random vehicle inspections at the entry gates and review its policy on private wea pons on post. But he said the shooting was "an isolated incident," and described Kropf as "one disgruntled, deranged individual."
"Fort Bliss is still, and remains still, one of the safest installations in our country, one of the safest places to live and work in our country," Pittard said.
Generally speaking, people are not supposed to carry loaded private weapons on post, an official said. But all retired military receive identification cards they can use to enter the post. And random inspections will not catch every person with a weapon.
"The way we look at this, it's not about just the gate -- that if you just make the gate large enough and strong enough that you can prevent anything like this from happening," Pittard said. "That's not what it's about. It's about making sure that we have resilient systems in place where we can react and respond and take care of our soldiers, family members and civilians here on post."
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France and Italy Will Also Send Advisers to Libya Rebels
By ALAN COWELL and RAVI SOMAIYA - APRIL 20, 2011
www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/world/africa/21libya.html
PARIS — The French and Italian governments said Wednesday that they would join Britain in sending a small number of military liaison officers to support the ragtag rebel army in Libya, offering a diplomatic boost for the insurgent leader, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, as he met with President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris.
After the meeting, The Associated Press reported, Mr. Sarkozy pledged to intensify French airstrikes that started in March.
The announcements came as the international community searched for a means to break a bloody battlefield deadlock that has killed hundreds in the contested cities of Misurata and Ajdabiya and left the rebels in tenuous control of a few major coastal cities in their campaign against Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.
Hartmann Washington
It is obvious that France and England will never again deal with Qaddafi. If he is not removed from power, then Libyan oil will never flow again to France and England.
They also coincided with word out of Qatar that Moussa Koussa, the former Libyan foreign minister who defected to Britain last month, was seeking asylum in that Arab emirate. In an interview with Al Arabiya, another Qaddafi minister, Abdulrahman Shalgam, said that Mr. Koussa — who has been freed of the financial sanctions slapped on all Libyan officials but who faces possible prosecution over the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 in Scotland — is most likely to remain in Qatar, where he went for a conference last week.
Pictured: President Nicholas Sarkozy of France with Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, the head of the Libyan rebel council, in Paris on Wednesday. - Credit Philippe Wojazer/Reuters
The decision to send military advisers seemed to push the three countries closer toward the limits of the United Nations Security Council resolution in mid-March authorizing NATO airstrikes but specifically “excluding a foreign occupation force of any form on any part of Libyan territory.” But the promised deployments also seemed a tacit admission that almost five weeks of airstrikes have not been enough to disable Colonel Qaddafi’s troops and prevent his loyalists from threatening rebel forces and civilians.
The French government spokesman, François Baroin, told reporters on Wednesday that the number of military liaison officers would be in single digits and that their mission would be to help “organize the protection of the civilian population.” The British deployment could involve up to 20 advisers.
William Hague, the British foreign secretary, said on Tuesday that the British advisers would help the makeshift rebel forces “improve their military organizational structures, communications and logistics.”
Italy’s defense minister, Ignazio La Russa, said at a news conference Wednesday that Italy would send advisers “according to the needs” of the rebels. He said the advisers’ specific mission had not yet been determined. “They won’t be on the battlefield,” he said. “They’ll be mentors, they won’t accompany them. Training is one thing, participation another.”
Mr. La Russa said he believed that the rebels had more weapons than the ones they had taken from Colonel Qaddafi’s stockpiles. “They’re rich in enthusiasm, they want to fight for liberty, but naturally they are poor in experience and arms,” Mr. La Russa said of the rebels. “I don’t think they only have arms from the Qaddafi army. Some help arrived,” he added without elaborating further.
The moves to send military personnel have been likened by some critics to America’s decision to send military advisers to Vietnam, raising worries in both countries that they are being drawn closer to a conflict with no clear resolution on behalf of a fractious and militarily ineffective insurgent force about which little is known.
Facing restive electorates and with their forces already deployed in Afghanistan, European governments want to be seen in strict compliance with the U.N. resolution authorizing “all necessary measures” to protect civilians in Libya, short of an occupation.
But, in Britain at least, some lawmakers have noted that their government’s involvement has already progressed from the supply of body armor and communications equipment to the rebels, announced a week ago, to sending advisers, prompting questions about what further embroilment might entail.
Sir Menzies Campbell, the former leader of the Liberal Democrat Party, which is now part of a governing coalition with the Conservatives, said Tuesday that the advisers “must not be seen as a first installment of further military deployment.” He added, “Vietnam began with an American president sending military advisers.”
Members of Parliament have also called for a fresh debate. “This is clear evidence of mission creep,” said John Baron, a Conservative member. “Now we are beginning to put military personnel on the ground, something that wasn’t even discussed when we debated this issue.”
France’s foreign minister, Alain Juppé, told reporters in Paris on Tuesday that he remained “absolutely opposed to a deployment of troops on the ground, “ words echoed on Wednesday by Defense Minister Gérard Longuet, who said the Security Council resolution permitting airstrikes did not authorize the use of foreign ground forces.
On Wednesday, nonetheless, the satirical and investigative French weekly Le Canard Enchaîné reported that, along with Britain and the United States, France had sent covert special forces to Libya three weeks ago to assess the impact of allied airstrikes.
The Libyan government criticized the British decision to send advisers, saying the move would prolong conflict. Instead, Libya’s foreign minister, Abdul Ati al-Obeidi, used a BBC interview broadcast on Wednesday to renew the Tripoli authorities’ frequent call for a cease-fire and a suspension of NATO bombing to permit a settlement negotiated by Libyans themselves without foreign interference.
“We think any military presence is a step backwards,” Mr. Obeidi said, “and we are sure that if this bombing stopped and there is a real cease-fire we could have a dialogue among all Libyans about what they want — democracy, political reform, constitution, election. This could not be done with what is going on now.”
Mr. Obeidi said that following a cease-fire, the Libyan government was open to establishing an interim government and a six-month transition to United Nations-supervised elections, BBC radio reported, adding: “The foreign minister said the election could cover any issue raised by all Libyans, anything could go on the table, including, he implied, the future of Qaddafi as leader.”
Libyan opposition leaders have dismissed as trickery any offer that does not begin with Colonel Qaddafi’s resignation and the banishment of him and his family from the country.
President Sarkozy met Mr. Abdel-Jalil, formerly Colonel Qaddafi’s justice minister, to try to find a means to break the deadlock and to debate “the process of democratic transition,” according to a statement from the French president’s office.
The prime minister, François Fillon, who also planned to meet Mr. Abdel-Jalil on Wednesday, was quoted in news reports as saying France would intensify airstrikes “to prevent Qaddafi forces from pursuing their attacks on civilian populations.”
“But at the same time, we will need to find a political solution, that is, conditions for a dialogue so that the Libyan crisis can be resolved,” he said in Kiev, Ukraine, according to Agence France-Presse.
Libyan state television reported on Wednesday that NATO warplanes had struck telecommunications and broadcasting infrastructure. But it did not say where or when the reported attacks took place.
Allied bombing sorties and Tomahawk missiles have failed to tip the balance decisively in favor of a rebel group with disjointed leadership, limited weapons and many inexperienced fighters. And civilian casualties have continued to mount. On Tuesday, the United Nations said that at least 20 children had been killed in the siege of Misurata.
Alan Cowell reported from Paris, and Ravi Somaiya from London. Scott Sayare contributed reporting from Paris and Rachel Donadio from Rome.
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2014 Fort Hood shooting
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Fort_Hood_shooting
On April 2, 2014, a shooting spree occurred at several locations on the Fort Hood military base near Killeen, Texas. Four people, including the gunman, were killed, while fourteen additional people were injured, twelve by gunshot wounds. The shooter, 34-year-old Army Specialist Ivan Lopez, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Shootings
Immediately prior to the shooting, Lopez went to the 49th Transportation Battalion administrative office, where he tried to seek a ten-day leave form so he could attend to "family matters". However, he was informed that he would have to come back later to retrieve it, sparking a verbal altercation between him and several other soldiers. The request was ultimately denied because Lopez had already secured housing in an apartment in Killeen.
Lopez then went outside to smoke a cigarette. At approximately 4:00 p.m., he returned and opened fire with a .45-caliber Smith & Wesson M&P pistol inside the same building, injuring two soldiers: Sgt. Jonathan Westbrook, one of the soldiers involved in the altercation with Lopez, who was hit four times; and Maj. Patrick Miller, who sheltered other soldiers in his office despite being shot in the stomach. Lopez also killed Sgt. First Class Daniel Ferguson, another soldier involved in the altercation, while the latter was barricading a conference room door that couldn't be locked.
He then got into his car and drove slowly to a motor pool building to which he had been assigned, firing at two soldiers and wounding one of them along the way on 73rd Street. Upon reaching the building, Lopez fired at a female soldier inside the office, but missed her and grazed the head of another soldier. He then killed Sgt. Timothy Owens when he approached him and tried to talk him down, and wounded another soldier. He then moved on to the building's vehicle bay area, where he injured two soldiers, after which his weapon misfired. Lopez then proceeded to the 1st Medical Brigade headquarters in his car.
Along the way, he fired a round into a car occupied by two soldiers, wounding the passenger. Reaching the intersection of 73rd Street and Motorpool Road, Lopez shot at two other soldiers, but missed both of them. Reaching the medical building, Lopez shot and wounded 1st Lt. John Arroyo, Jr., in the throat as he was walking outside in the western parking lot. He then entered the building and fatally shot a soldier at the main entrance desk, Staff Sgt. Carlos Lazaney-Rodriguez; he also wounded two other soldiers inside. Then, Lopez walked down the main hallway, wounded another soldier, and exited through a doorway.
Approximately eight minutes after the shooting first started, Lopez drove to the parking lot of another building, Building 39002, where he was confronted by an unidentified female military police officer, with whom he had a verbal exchange. When he brandished his weapon, the officer fired a shot at him that missed. Lopez responded by committing suicide, shooting himself in the right side of the head with his own pistol. A total of 34 rounds were fired during the shooting spree: eleven at the administrative office, nine at the motor pool building, five at the medical building, and nine from inside his car. It was later revealed that Lopez, who was in uniform at the time of the shooting, wasn't authorized to carry a concealed firearm.
Victims
Three people, excluding the gunman, were killed in the shooting. They were identified as:
Name Age Hometown Rank/occupation Notes
Daniel M. Ferguson 39 Mulberry, Florida, U.S. Sergeant First Class Died while barricading a door
Timothy W. Owens 37 Effingham, Illinois, U.S. Sergeant Died while trying to talk down Lopez
Carlos A. Lazaney-Rodriguez 38 Aguadilla, Puerto Rico Staff Sergeant
Aftermath
During the shooting, the Bell County Communications Center dispatched deputies and troopers from the Texas Department of Public Safety to the nearby post after receiving reports of an "active shooter", sheriff's Lt. Donnie Adams said. Federal Bureau of Investigation spokeswoman Michelle Lee said its agents were also headed to the scene. The base confirmed the shooting in a brief statement posted online on April 2, 2014. On its Twitter feed and Facebook page, Fort Hood officials ordered everyone on base to "shelter in place" during the shooting.
All of the injured victims were taken to Carl R. Darnall Army Medical Center, for initial treatment and stabilization. Once they were stabilized they were then transferred to Scott & White Memorial Hospital where they received further care. As of April 10, twelve of the sixteen wounded have been released from the hospitals and returned to duty, while the other four remain hospitalized in stable condition.
Reacting to the incident, President Barack Obama said at a fundraiser in Chicago that he was left "heartbroken" and assured that the events would be investigated. The base was previously the scene of a mass shooting in 2009, in which 13 people were killed and more than 30 wounded. One week after the shooting, Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama traveled to Fort Hood to attend a ceremony honoring the victims.
On April 16, discussion was renewed over if soldiers should be allowed to carry concealed firearms on military bases in Texas and other states.
On January 23, 2015, the Army concluded from an investigation into the shooting that there was no indication of a possibility of violent behavior from Lopez through his medical and personnel records. A report on the investigation cited that Lopez's commanders knew very little of his personal difficulties and would have provided him with help had he disclosed these difficulties. It also highlighted gaps in information sharing, as Lopez's supervisors believed they were unable to obtain his personal information due to federal medical privacy laws. Previously, in the wake of the aforementioned 2009 Fort Hood shooting, information sharing regarding medical history was among 78 recommendations suggested to identify the risk of violent behavior. However, this recommendation was not implemented due to "constraints on exchanging information between military and civilian behavioral health care providers". The 2015 report recommended improvements with the level of contact between commanders and their newly assigned soldiers, and that soldiers should register personally owned weapons with their commanders.
Perpetrator
Ivan A. Lopez-Lopez (October 23, 1979 – April 2, 2014) was an Iraq War veteran who was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico. He enlisted in the Puerto Rico National Guard on January 4, 1999, but was unable to pass a required English language course and was subsequently discharged on November 30 of the same year. Lopez reenlisted on April 30, 2003, as an infantryman and served until 2010. He also joined the United States Army in June 2008. He was married and had four children, two of them from a previous marriage.
Service in the U.S. Army
Lopez was a specialist, and at the time of the shooting, he was assigned to the 13th Sustainment Command, a logistics and support unit at Fort Hood. He was previously assigned in Fort Bliss, but was transferred to another base for four months, then moved to Fort Hood two months prior to the shooting. Lopez previously reported at Fort Hood in 2006 during his time in the Puerto Rico National Guard, where he was given orders to deploy to Egypt from February 15, 2007, to February 10, 2008.
From August 6 to December 18, 2011, Lopez served a tour in Iraq, participating in Operation New Dawn as security detail. On or about December 12, his convoy was involved in a roadside bombing. Though Lopez would allege that he had experiences in direct combat in Iraq and cited the bombing of his convoy, investigators determined he was not within the blast radius of the bomb used.
On November 29, 2013, he began receiving training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, graduating three months later. During his time there, he attempted to purchase a weapon on two separate occasions. On the second occasion, Lopez was persuaded by a classmate to reconsider the purchase.
Motives for the shooting
Lopez was allegedly distraught over financial issues and the deaths of his grandfather and then his mother during a two-month period five months prior to the shooting. He was also undergoing regular psychiatric treatment for depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder. He tried to take a leave of absence in order to attend his mother's funeral in Puerto Rico. It took five days for the leave to be approved, but he was only allowed to be absent for 24 hours, which allegedly upset him. The leave was eventually extended to two days. More recently, Lopez had asked for a transfer, claiming that he was "being taunted and picked on" by other soldiers in his unit.
During a press conference on the day of the shooting, Fort Hood Commander Mark A. Milley stated that Lopez died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. On March 1, 2014, over one month prior to the shooting, Lopez purchased the weapon used in the shooting from Guns Galore, the same store where Nidal Malik Hasan, the convicted perpetrator of the Fort Hood shooting in 2009, originally purchased his own weapon. Lopez's weapon was not registered with the installation. He had previously purchased a firearm of the same model, unregistered with the installation, on February 23, although he reported it stolen on March 1, the same day he bought a replacement. During that same month, he had seen a psychologist and was prescribed Ambien for a sleeping problem.
In his Facebook account, Lopez made posts in which he alleged that he was robbed by two men and also criticized Adam Lanza, the perpetrator of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012. Lopez also described his experiences in direct combat during his tour in Iraq, although military officials confirmed that Lopez did not experience any direct combat. A Facebook page created by Lopez claimed that he was a sniper who had been to the Central African Republic.
On March 24, Lopez's battalion began tracking a ten-day permissive temporary duty (PTDY) request he made immediately after joining Fort Hood so he could help his family relocate to an apartment in Killeen, as his current one was burglarized. He was given a four-day pass by his acting sergeant, who informed him that he would receive PTDY after his return. Lopez spent the pass from March 27 to March 30. He returned to Fort Hood on March 31, though when he received the PTDY form, it was filled with errors and Lopez had to resubmit it with corrections. Though the corrected form was signed, it did not have a control number, which is reported to have led to the conflict in the 49th Transportation Battalion office that sparked the shooting.
See also:
2009 Fort Hood shooting, a fatal shooting in the same area in 2009 where 13 were killed and more than 30 were injured
Gun violence in the United States
Washington Navy Yard shooting, a mass shooting committed in 2013 at the United States Naval Sea Systems Command
2015 Chattanooga shootings, a spree shooting committed in 2015 at two military installations in Chattanooga, Tennessee
Luby's shooting, another mass shooting in Killeen, Texas
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U.S. to Commit Up to 3,000 Troops to Fight Ebola in Africa
By HELENE COOPER, MICHAEL D. SHEAR and DENISE GRADYSEPT. 15, 2014
www.nytimes.com/2014/09/16/world/africa/obama-to-announce-expanded-effort-against-ebola.html?_r=0
WASHINGTON — Under pressure to do more to confront the Ebola outbreak sweeping across West Africa, President Obama on Tuesday is to announce an expansion of military and medical resources to combat the spread of the deadly virus, administration officials said.
The president will go beyond the 25-bed portable hospital that Pentagon officials said they would establish in Liberia, one of the three West African countries ravaged by the disease, officials said. Mr. Obama will offer help to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia in the construction of as many as 17 Ebola treatment centers in the region, with about 1,700 treatment beds.
Dr. Mosoka Fallah, center, an epidemiologist and immunologist, with residents of New Kru Town, a district in Monrovia, Liberia.Back to the Slums of His Youth, to Defuse the Ebola Time Bomb SEPT. 13, 2014
Times Topic: The Ebola Outbreak in West Africa
Senior administration officials said Monday night that the Department of Defense would open a joint command operation in Monrovia, Liberia, to coordinate the international effort to combat the disease. The military will also provide engineers to help construct the additional treatment facilities and will send enough people to train up to 500 health care workers a week to deal with the crisis.
The body of a man thought to have died of Ebola on a Monrovia, Liberia, street on Monday. The Liberian president has implored President Obama to do more. Credit Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times
Officials said the military expected to send as many as 3,000 people to Africa to take charge of responding to the Ebola outbreak.
“We all recognize that this is such an extraordinary, serious epidemic,” a senior official told reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of Mr. Obama’s public remarks on Tuesday. The efforts should turn the tide from a high-transmission epidemic that continues to grow every day, other officials said.
The White House plan would increase the number of doctors and other health care workers being sent to West Africa from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other American agencies, officials said.
The American government will also provide 400,000 Ebola home health and treatment kits to Liberia, as well as tens of thousands of kits intended to test whether people have the disease. The Pentagon will provide some logistical equipment for health workers going to West Africa and what administration officials described as “command and control” organizational assistance on how to coordinate the overall relief work. The Army Corps of Engineers is expected to be part of the Defense Department effort.
Administration officials did not say how soon the 17 treatment centers would be built in Liberia; officials there, as well as international aid officials, have said that 1,000 beds are needed in Liberia in the next week alone to contain a disease that has been spreading exponentially.
Monrovia, the Liberian capital, is facing a widespread Ebola epidemic, and as the number of infected grows faster than hospital capacity, some patients wait outside near death. By Ben C. Solomon on Publish Date September 11, 2014.
Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease and public health expert at Vanderbilt University, praised the plan, calling it a “major commitment,” and said it was more extensive than he had expected.
“It seems coordinated and coherent,” Dr. Schaffner said. He added that “the real core” was the Defense Department’s logistical support “because the heart of any kind of epidemic containment concept is getting the goods to the right place, putting up the institution.”
Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said the plan was an important first step, “but it is clearly not enough.” The focus on Liberia, he said, is too limited, and more help should be extended to Sierra Leone and Guinea, the other countries at the center of the worst Ebola outbreak ever recorded.
“We should see all of West Africa now as one big outbreak,” Dr. Osterholm said. “It’s very clear we have to deal with all the areas with Ebola. If the U.S. is not able or not going to do it, that’s all the more reason to say the rest of the world has to do it.”
Dr. Jack Chow, a professor of global health at Carnegie Mellon University, also warned that “the virus does not recognize national borders and will continue to spread where health care is inadequate.”
Graphic: How Many Ebola Patients Have Been Treated Outside of Africa?
Top White House aides on Monday rejected criticism from African officials, doctors and representatives from aid groups who said the United States had been slow to act in the face of the disease. Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, said the government, including the C.D.C., had committed more than $100 million since the outbreak started in the early spring.
“The C.D.C. has responded commensurate to the seriousness” of the crisis, Mr. Earnest told reporters ahead of a trip Mr. Obama has planned to the agency’s headquarters in Atlanta on Tuesday afternoon. Mr. Earnest called the response “among the largest deployments of C.D.C. personnel ever.”
Senior administration officials conceded that the effort must expand further as the outbreak threatens to spread in Africa and, potentially, beyond the continent. Officials said medical experts in the government were genuinely worried about the possibility of a mutation that could turn the virus into a more contagious sickness that could threaten the United States.
The World Health Organization has issued a dire Ebola warning for Liberia, saying that the number of afflicted patients was increasing exponentially and that all new treatment facilities were overwhelmed, “pointing to a large but previously invisible caseload.” The description of the crisis in Liberia suggested an even more chaotic situation there than had been thought.
Ms. Johnson Sirleaf, who has implored Mr. Obama to do more to help her country battle the disease, traveled over the weekend through Monrovia, the Liberian capital, with the United States ambassador, Deborah R. Malac.
“What is needed is on a scale that is unprecedented,” a senior administration official said in an interview, speaking on the condition of anonymity because she was not allowed by the White House to talk on the record ahead of Mr. Obama’s announcement.
The United States, a second senior administration official said, also plans to send 400,000 home protective kits to the four counties in Liberia that have been hardest hit by Ebola. The kits will include protective gear for family members, gloves and masks, disinfectants, and fever-reducing drugs.
That is worrisome, Dr. Osterholm said, because it is difficult to care for Ebola patients without becoming infected, and there is no proof that the kits will work. “We are going to endanger family members more by providing the kits,” he said.
Helene Cooper and Michael D. Shear reported from Washington, and Denise Grady from New York.
A version of this article appears in print on September 16, 2014, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Obama to Call for Expansion of Ebola Fight.
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Thomas Eric Duncan: First Ebola death in U.S.
By Greg Botelho and Jacque Wilson, CNN
Updated 3:19 PM ET, Wed October 8, 2014
www.cnn.com/2014/10/08/health/thomas-eric-duncan-ebola/
Thomas Eric Duncan left Liberia for the United States, by official accounts, a healthy man. Just over two weeks later, he passed away at a Dallas, Texas, hospital with Ebola.
Duncan was admitted into isolation at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital on September 28 with common symptoms of Ebola: fever, vomiting and diarrhea. He later tested positive for the virus that has killed more than 3,400 people in West Africa.
He was started on the experimental drug brincidofovir on October 4 -- far too long after he arrived at the hospital, his family has said. On Tuesday, the hospital reported that Duncan was on a ventilator and his kidneys were failing.
Duncan died on Wednesday at 7:51 a.m.
"His suffering is over," his partner Louise Troh said in a statement. "My family is in deep sadness and grief, but we leave him in the hands of God. Our deepest sympathies go out to his father and family in Liberia and here in America. Eric was a wonderful man who showed compassion toward all."
Who was Duncan, besides the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States? When did he start to feel sick, and why couldn't the U.S. health care system save him?
"The past week has been an enormous test of our health system, but for one family it has been far more personal," Dr. David Lakey, commissioner of the Texas Department of State Health Services, said in a statement. "The doctors, nurses and staff at Presbyterian provided excellent and compassionate care, but Ebola is a disease that attacks the body in many ways. We'll continue every effort to contain the spread of the virus and protect people from this threat."
Who was Thomas Eric Duncan?
He was a 42-year-old Liberian citizen. Duncan's Facebook page indicates that he's from the Liberian capital of Monrovia, where he attended E. Jonathan Goodridge High School.
Why did he come to the United States?
To visit family and friends. Duncan was visiting his son and his son's mother in Dallas, according to Wilfred Smallwood, Duncan's half-brother, who noted this was Duncan's first trip to America.
When did Duncan leave Liberia?
He departed the West African nation on September 19, CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden says.
How did he get Ebola?
Health authorities haven't said.
Witnesses say Duncan had been helping Ebola patients in Liberia. Liberian community leader Tugbeh Chieh Tugbeh said Duncan was caring for an Ebola-infected patient at a residence in Paynesville City, just outside Monrovia.
The New York Times reported that Duncan had direct contact with a pregnant woman stricken with Ebola on September 15, days before he left for the United States. Citing the woman's parents and Duncan's neighbors in Monrovia, Liberia, the newspaper said Duncan had helped carry the ailing woman home after a hospital turned her away because there wasn't enough space in its Ebola treatment ward.
Was he screened for Ebola before getting on the plane?
Yes, according to Binyah Kesselly, board chairman of the Liberia Airport Authority.
"The first screening was at the gate, before you get to the parking lot. The second time is before you enter the terminal building and the third is before you board the flight. At every point your temperature is scanned."
His temperature at those checkpoints was a consistent 97.3 degrees Fahrenheit, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention chief Thomas Frieden told reporters Thursday.
Yet on a health screening questionnaire, Duncan answered "no" to questions about whether he had cared for a patient with the deadly virus and whether he had touched the body of someone who died in an area affected by the disease, Kesselly said.
Complete coverage on Ebola
When did his Ebola symptoms appear?
"Four or five days" after his trip, according to the CDC's Frieden.
This doesn't mean that Duncan actually got infected with Ebola in the United States. The incubation period for the virus is 2 to 21 days, meaning that a person could be infected with the disease for up to three weeks before showing any signs of it.
When he did seek medical help?
Duncan first walked into Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas after 10 p.m. on September 25.
Smallwood reports Duncan had a fever and was vomiting during this first visit to the Dallas hospital. The hospital, in a statement, said he had a "low grade fever and abdominal pain."
He underwent basic blood tests but wasn't screened for Ebola, said Dr. Edward Goodman from the Dallas hospital. Duncan left the medical facility after being given antibiotics and a pain reliever, his friend said.
"His condition did not warrant admission," the hospital said. "He also was not exhibiting symptoms specific to Ebola."
Were flags raised that Duncan might have Ebola?
After being asked by a nurse, Duncan did say that he'd traveled from Africa, said Dr. Mark Lester, executive vice president of Texas Health Presbyterian's parent company.
But that detail -- which might have raised an alarm that Duncan might have Ebola, since Liberia is one of the countries hardest hit by the virus -- was not "fully communicated" to the medical team, according to Lester.
When was he admitted to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital?
On September 28. By the time Duncan arrived via ambulance, "EMS had already identified potential need for isolation," the hospital said.
What treatment did he receive?
Duncan was given supportive therapy -- meaning fluids and other therapies that would help support his immune system while it was trying to fight off the virus. He was also started on the experimental anti-viral drug brincidofovir on October 4.
Since the drugs being used to treat Ebola are still experimental, it is up to each individual hospital to file the paperwork with the Food and Drug Administration for permission to get the drug from the manufacturer and use it.
The hospital has declined to tell CNN when they filed for permission to the FDA to use brincidofovir.
"The care team has been consulting with the CDC and Emory, on a daily basis since Mr. Duncan was admitted to the hospital, discussing the possible course of treatment, including the use of investigational drugs," hospital spokesman Wendell Watson said in a statement.
Family questions wait on experimental drug
Duncan was not given a blood transfusion with blood donated by an Ebola survivor, as Ebola patients Dr. Rick Sacra and Ashoka Mukpo were given in Nebraska.
Why did he die?
The other Ebola patients brought to the United States for treatment are still alive. Three have been released from the hospital and one is reportedly in stable condition at The Nebraska Medical Center. So what's different about Duncan?
As Lakey said, Ebola attacks the body in many ways. Experts estimate the current outbreak in West Africa has around a 71% fatality rate. Supportive therapy can help, but there are no proven cures for the disease.
Duncan did not start receiving treatment until several days after he started experiencing symptoms, which may have contributed to his rapid decline.
What will happen to his body?
An Ebola patient's body is still highly infectious. Any contact with the bodily fluids could result in transmission of the virus. "Only personnel trained in handling infected human remains, and wearing PPE (personal protective equipment), should touch, or move, any Ebola-infected remains," CDC guidelines state. "Autopsies on patients who die of Ebola should be avoided."
Duncan's body will be enclosed in two bags and the bags will be disinfected for transportation, Texas health officials say. Then the body will be cremated.
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Why is Obama taking reservists out of civilian jobs to send into Ebola hot zones?
Written by Allen West on October 17, 2014
www.allenbwest.com/2014/10/obama-taking-reservists-civilian-jobs-send-ebola-hot-zones/
Some things are just dumb and some things are absolutely insane. Such is the decision made by Barack Hussein Obama via executive order on Thursday.
As reported by Politico, “President Obama authorized the Pentagon to call up military reservists to help fight the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. The president issued an executive order and a letter to Congress that said he’d deemed it “necessary to augment the active armed forces of the United States for the effective conduct of Operation United Assistance, which is providing support to civilian-led humanitarian assistance and consequence management support related to the Ebola virus disease outbreak in West Africa.”
“About 540 U.S. active duty troops are now posted in Liberia, helping its government, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other agencies fight the outbreak. Obama’s order would permit the Pentagon to call up National Guard troops or military reservists to join the effort.”
I do believe the U.S. military can play a part in combatting the spread of the Ebola virus — here in America, but not overseas — and especially not in the Ebola “hot zone. Of course it’s just too easy to point out the irony of Obama’s intransigence regarding “boots on the ground” to combat an enemy that has beheaded Americans — but somehow combatting Ebola is more important.
If we have healthcare professionals in America who have contracted this disease, why are we sending in our own troops who aren’t trained or prepared for this endeavor? And where is the United Nations? Where is the World Health Organization?
So now we’re going to take men and women out of their civilian jobs and deploy them into a dangerous virus zone? Has Obama secured safe transit and clearance for these troops when they redeploy from West Africa? I understand our military providing humanitarian assistance – as a matter of fact in late 2005, I remember an earthquake hitting us in Kabul ,Afghanistan at the Military Training Center. The epicenter was over in Pakistan. And our military executed humanitarian assistance operations into Pakistan to provide aid. It’s important to note the exact same helicopters that were flying combat operations in Afghanistan were tasked to fly cross-border into the country where the enemy had sanctuary to fulfill that mission.
We got that, and saluted our brave men and women, saluted the flag and executed the operation. However, in this case, Obama is deploying our men and women into an area where they’ll be exposed to a deadly killer enemy against which they cannot fight. Why? Is this the warped sense of commitment Obama sees for our military that he and his policies are decimating?
Politico reports “as many as 4,000 or more American troops could deploy to West Africa to help fight the Ebola outbreak there, Pentagon press secretary Rear Adm. John Kirby said Thursday. They’re helping build and support Ebola treatment units, run mobile testing labs and train health care workers in an all-out effort to containing the deadly virus. USAID’s leader in Monrovia, Ben Hemingway, told reporters at the Pentagon by phone on Thursday that it was “difficult” to assess whether the outbreak has slowed since the international response began. The current military commander in Liberia, Maj. Gen. Darryl Williams (an Army Artilleryman with whom I served in the 4th Infantry Division) said Marines are still flying to remote parts of the country doing “site surveys” for areas where they could build the Ebola treatment units.”
“U.S. troops have been tasked with building 17 treatment centers, 65 “community care centers” and setting up four more mobile testing labs. The Pentagon estimates operations there could last a year or more. Each service member deploying to Liberia is getting special instructions on preventing infection, Williams said, and everyone is taking intense precautions to avoid infection. For example, Williams estimated he’d had his temperature taken eight times just on Wednesday. “It’s discipline,” he said. “Everyday in the morning with my breakfast, I take a malaria pill … We don’t shake hands. I wash my hands — a lot — with chlorine.”
“MG Williams said commanders have contingency plans in case an American soldier or aid worker does contract Ebola: Those patients would be isolated, quarantined and flown to the U.S. for treatment.”
“He acknowledged, however, the arrangements aren’t yet clear for American personnel whose normal duty stations are overseas. It isn’t clear, for example, whether the Marines who deployed to Liberia from Spain would have to be quarantined before they can return there, or whether Williams’ own staff members could rotate directly back to Caserma Ederle [Vicenza] Italy (where I served as a young lieutenant).”
So there are SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement) details that apparently haven’t been hammered out.
I know Major General Darryl Williams and am quite sure he’ll accomplish the mission assigned to him, but I question why the Commander-in-Chief deployed our military into a very dangerous area to build treatment centers and “community care centers?” Our men and women shouldn’t be used as some sort of hired hands. We could have easily provided prefab shelters that are easy for host nation personnel to construct. And I am further concerned about calling up additional reservists and exposing them to this deadly virus.
This is a disconcerting misuse of our U.S. military. I wonder if the Commander-in-Chief will visit those troops during the year he has committed them. And lastly, what are their rules of engagement during this deployment?
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All Hell breaks loose if you recieve the Nobel Peace Prize for efforts towards peace but the world insists on war anyway.... or was it the world that decided that after all, and not the guy that pre-won the prize without doing the work, along with his henchmen?
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October 27, 2014
U.S. soldiers isolated in Italy for Ebola screening after Liberia mission
Gregg Zoroya and John Bacon, USA TODAY 8:18 p.m. EDT October 27, 2014
www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/10/27/us-soldiers-isolated-italy-ebola/18010271/
The commander of U.S. Army Africa is among a dozen soldiers who have been placed in isolation over Ebola concerns at a U.S. military base in Italy after wrapping up a mission to Liberia, the Pentagon said Monday.
The soldiers were isolated at the base in Vicenza over the weekend as a precaution although none have shown any symptoms of exposure to the virus that has killed thousands in West Africa, Army Col. Steven Warren said.
Warren said the soldiers, who were part of Operation United Assistance in West Africa, were being kept at a separate unit at the base for 21 days, the incubation period for Ebola. Maj. Gen. Darryl Williams, commander of U.S. Army Africa, is among those being isolated.
Their isolation is not required by Pentagon guidelines, Warren said.
The Pentagon said Monday evening that the Army Chief of Staff had directed "a 21-day controlled monitoring period'' from Ebola assistance operations in West Africa.
Soldiers will be housed in a separate facility on their base, with no physical contact with family members, the Army said. They will be allowed to visit the gym and have access to TV and Internet, and medical checks will be conducted twice a day.
The Army said in a statement that the step was being taken "out of caution to ensure soldiers, family members and their surrounding communities are confident that we are taking all steps necessary to protect their health.''
The operation in West Africa is providing logistics, training and engineering support to the U.S. humanitarian program fighting the Ebola outbreak in the region. On Sunday, Army Maj. Gen. Gary Volesky replaced Williams as commander of Operation United Assistance.
Pictured: A health worker takes the temperature of U.S. Marines arriving to take part in Operation United Assistance on Oct. 9 near Monrovia, Liberia. (Photo: John Moore, Getty Images)
More than 700 U.S. servicemembers are now deployed to West Africa, including almost 600 in Liberia and 100 in Senegal. Over the coming weeks, that could grow to upwards of 3,900 personnel, Pentagon press secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said.
A 25-bed hospital in Monrovia, Liberia, should be fully operational next week once the construction of the supporting facilities is complete, Kirby said. The hospital will be staffed by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services personnel. In addition, the construction of the first Ebola Treatment Unit at Tubmanburg, Liberia, is nearing final completion and two more will be ready soon, Kirby said..
The death toll from the Ebola epidemic rose to more than 10,000 known cases through Oct. 23, the World Health Organization said Saturday. Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone account for all but a handful of the deaths.
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2 dead, including shooter, at Fort Bliss veterans' hospital
Published January 07, 2015 - FoxNews.com
www.foxnews.com/us/2015/01/07/fort-bliss-medical-center-shooting/
A shooting at a west Texas veterans' clinic on Tuesday left two people dead, including the gunman, military authorities said.
The shooting was reported shortly after 3 p.m. local time at the El Paso VA Health Care System clinic, which is part of Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. Maj. Gen. Stephen M. Twitty confirmed the details at a news conference Tuesday night, but declined to provide further information -- such as a possible motive, the relationship between the male shooter and the victim, or how the shooter died -- and did not take questions.
"Everything is under control and there is no immediate threat to Fort Bliss or the neighboring community," said Twitty, commanding officer of Fort Bliss.
The veterans' clinic will remain closed Wednesday, authorities said.
The El Paso Times, citing the office of Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-Texas, said a doctor at the fort's veterans' hospital was shot and that the shooter apparently shot and killed himself. A message left for the congressman's office by FoxNews.com was not immediately returned, and a spokesman for Fort Bliss said he was unable to confirm or deny the report.
The FBI, which is leading the investigation, has hundreds of potential witnesses, many of whom were patients or would-be patients at the clinic, said Douglas Lindquist, special agent in charge of the FBI El Paso office.
"Those people were here seeking medical assistance, so we understand the difficulties that this situation presents to them and we're trying to expeditiously get through those hundreds of witnesses to find out details about this incident," Lindquist said.
The VA clinic came under scrutiny last year after a federal audit showed it had some of the nation's longest wait times for veterans' trying to see a doctor for the first time. A survey of hundreds of West Texas veterans last year found that they waited an average of more than two months to see a Veterans Affairs mental health professional and even longer to see a physician.
O'Rourke commissioned that survey of more than 690 veterans living in El Paso County. O'Rourke also was active in a congressional probe into long waiting times in the VA health care system.
In a statement issued by his office Tuesday, the El Paso Democrat said his "thoughts and prayers are with the men and women at the El Paso VA clinic."
The VA said in a statement that it "is deeply saddened by the tragic situation that has occurred in El Paso, and we are actively working with our partners at Fort Bliss to investigate this matter."
"The safety and continued care of our veterans and the staff will be our focus throughout this situation," the agency said.
Fox News' Karl de Vries, Casey Stegall, Justin Fishel and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Fort Hood-based brigade to aid Ebola response in West Africa
March 9, 2015
www.army.mil/article/144107/Fort_Hood_based_brigade_to_aid_Ebola_response_in_West_Africa/
By Walter T. Ham IV, 20th CBRNE Command Public Affairs
FORT HOOD, Texas (March 9, 2015) -- The 48th Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear, or CBRN, Brigade headquarters will deploy to Liberia to command the remaining American forces supporting the U.S. effort to contain the worst Ebola outbreak in history.
The brigade cased its unit colors during a ceremony at the III Corps Headquarters on Fort Hood, March 9, before its first deployment since being activated in 2007.
As many U.S. troops return home from the Ebola mission in Liberia, the Fort Hood-based CBRN brigade will replace the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) as the joint forces headquarters.
The 48th CBRN Brigade will support the U.S. Agency of International Development and provide oversight of any required follow-on capabilities. Other response functions are being transitioned to civilian personnel.
"Troops are coming home but the United States is not leaving West Africa," said Col. Sven Erichsen, the commander of the 48th CBRN Brigade.
"The civilian-led response will actually grow in size and number in the weeks ahead to continue the fight against Ebola until there are zero cases," said Erichsen, a native of Forest Grove, Oregon.
The 48th CBRN Brigade is a part of the 20th CBRNE Command (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosives), the U.S. Department of Defense's only formation that combats global CBRNE threats.
The 20th CBRNE Command, headquartered on Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, is home to more than 85 percent of the active U.S. Army's CBRNE capabilities, including two explosive ordnance disposal, or EOD, groups, one chemical brigade, nuclear disablement teams, CBRNE coordination elements, expeditionary laboratories, remediation and consequence management units.
Another 20th CBRNE Command formation, the 1st Area Medical Laboratory, or 1st AML, deployed to Liberia in October 2014. The 1st AML commanded Task Force Scientist, a joint task force that operated six Ebola testing laboratories in Liberia.
Brig. Gen. JB Burton, commanding general of the 20th CBRNE Command, said the 48th CBRN Brigade and 1st AML deployments demonstrate the flexibility of his one-of-a-kind command.
"The deployment of the 48th CBRN Brigade Headquarters into Liberia as part of the enduring U.S. commitment to understand and contain the Ebola virus demonstrates that this command and this CBRNE enterprise must be more than weapons of mass destruction focused," Burton said. "We must be capable of and comfortable with operating effectively across the full spectrum of CBRNE hazards."
In support of the U.S. Army's regional alignment efforts, the 48th CBRN Brigade serves with III Corps in Europe, Africa and the Middle East; the 71st EOD Group operates with I Corps in the Asia Pacific region; and the 52nd EOD Group deploys with the XVIII Airborne Corps on global response force missions.
"With the ever evolving CBRNE threats facing our nation, we need to fully leverage and integrate all of our capabilities to confront and defeat CBRNE hazards," said Burton, a native of Tullahoma, Tennessee. "This deployment is another important first in the 20th CBRNE Command's history of service with distinction around the globe."
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Army Engineers Back In Fort Hood After Battling Ebola In Africa
By EILEEN PACE • MAR 24, 2015
tpr.org/post/army-engineers-back-fort-hood-after-battling-ebola-africa#stream/0
Operation United Assistance has come to a close for more than 500 members of the 36th Engineer Brigade, who have completed the 21-day quarantine at Fort Hood after returning from West Africa over the last few weeks.
Lt. Col. John Hartke said that as soon as they arrived in Liberia last October, the troops began building 100-bed treatment facilities to help stem the tide of Ebola.
“The country’s still recovering from their civil war, and they don’t have a very strong medical infrastructure. So by creating these Ebola treatment centers — and there was one built in every county in the country —it provided an infrastructure for the people who were infected with Ebola, or even suspected of being infected with Ebola, a place to go so that we could stop the transmission,” he said.
Hartke said that at its peak, the mission had 750 beds available, but that number was reduced as the incidence of the disease started to decline.
He believed it was the first time for such a coordinated disease response by the U.S. Army. “I’ve been in the Army 27 years and this is the first time I’ve seen something like this where we’ve gone and responded in this way. We’ve responded to natural disasters like Haiti before, but to target a disease, this is the first one I’m aware of,” he said.
Also returning to Fort Hood this month were 100 troops with the 48th Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and Explosives Brigade.
The Army said the United States was not leaving West Africa. A civilian-led response will continue to fight Ebola until there are zero cases.
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Two Fort Bliss soldiers arrested in Downtown shooting
By Aaron Martinez / El Paso Times / Follow @amartinez31
POSTED: 08/21/2015 07:12:08 PM MDT
archive.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_28683186/two-fort-bliss-soldiers-arrested-downtown-shooting/
Two Fort Bliss soldiers were arrested Wednesday in connection with a shooting last week in the Union Plaza Entertainment District in Downtown El Paso, officials said.
Devion Lee Hall and Deshaun Provoid, both 20, were arrested by Fort Bliss Military Police after the El Paso Police Department identified them as suspects in the shooting. The men were then turned over to the El Paso Police Department.
Fort Bliss officials confirmed that the men are soldiers at the post and are both privates first class.
The shooting took place at about 2:15 a.m. Aug. 15 in the 100 Block of South Anthony Street, El Paso police said.
Two men were injured in the shooting, police said. The two men, whose names have not been released, got into argument with a group of people, police said.
One of the people involved in the argument went to a car and pulled out a shotgun, police said. He then allegedly struck a 25-year-old man in the head with the stock of the weapon.
The man fired a round from the shotgun and struck a 21-year-old man in the face, police said.
Police have not released information on what roles Hall and Provoid played in the shooting.
Both victims were taken to hospitals with non-life threatening injuries, police said.
Hall and Provoid were arrested on suspicion of criminal attempted murder and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. They booked into El Paso County Jail.
Hall's bond was set at $250,000, while Provoid was booked on a bond totaling $40,000.
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Operation Paperclip
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip
"Project Paperclip" redirects here. For Holocaust project, see Paper Clips Project. For other uses, see Paper clip (disambiguation).
Operation Paperclip (1949–1990) was the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) program in which over 1,500 German scientists, engineers, and technicians, from Nazi Germany and other foreign countries were brought to the United States for employment in the aftermath of World War II. It was conducted by the Joint Intelligence Objectives Agency (JIOA), and in the context of the burgeoning Cold War. One purpose of Operation Paperclip was to deny German scientific expertise and knowledge to the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom, as well as inhibiting post-war Germany from redeveloping its military research capabilities. The Soviet Union had competing extraction programs known as "trophy brigades" and Operation Osoaviakhim.
Although the JIOA's recruitment of German scientists began after the Allied victory in Europe on May 8, 1945, U.S. President Harry Truman did not formally order the execution of Operation Paperclip until August 1945. Truman's order expressly excluded anyone found "to have been a member of the Nazi Party, and more than a nominal participant in its activities, or an active supporter of Nazi militarism." However, those restrictions would have rendered ineligible most of the leading scientists the JIOA had identified for recruitment, among them rocket scientists Wernher von Braun, Kurt H. Debus and Arthur Rudolph, and the physician Hubertus Strughold, each earlier classified as a "menace to the security of the Allied Forces."
To circumvent President Truman's anti-Nazi order and the Allied Potsdam and Yalta agreements, the JIOA worked independently to create false employment and political biographies for the scientists. The JIOA also expunged the scientists' Nazi Party memberships and regime affiliations from the public record. Once "bleached" of their Nazism, the scientists were granted security clearances by the U.S. government to work in the United States. Paperclip, the project's operational name, derived from the paperclips used to attach the scientists' new political personae to their "US Government Scientist" JIOA personnel files.
Osenberg List
Having failed to conquer the USSR with Operation Barbarossa (June–December 1941), the Siege of Leningrad (September 1941 – January 1944), Operation Nordlicht ("Northern Light", August–October 1942), and the Battle of Stalingrad (July 1942 – February 1943), Nazi Germany found itself at a logistical disadvantage. The failed conquest had depleted German resources and its military-industrial complex was unprepared to defend the Großdeutsches Reich (Greater German Reich) against the Red Army's westward counterattack. By early 1943, the German government began recalling from combat a number of scientists, engineers, and technicians; they returned to work in research and development to bolster German defense for a protracted war with the USSR. The recall from frontline combat included 4,000 rocketeers returned to Peenemünde, in northeast coastal Germany.
" Overnight, Ph.D.s were liberated from KP duty, masters of science were recalled from orderly service, mathematicians were hauled out of bakeries, and precision mechanics ceased to be truck drivers. "
— Dieter K. Huzel, Peenemünde to Canaveral
The Nazi government's recall of their now-useful intellectuals for scientific work first required identifying and locating the scientists, engineers, and technicians, then ascertaining their political and ideological reliability. Werner Osenberg, the engineer-scientist heading the Wehrforschungsgemeinschaft (Military Research Association), recorded the names of the politically-cleared men to the Osenberg List, thus reinstating them to scientific work.
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In March 1945, at Bonn University, a Polish laboratory technician found pieces of the Osenberg List stuffed in a toilet; the list subsequently reached MI6, who transmitted it to U.S. Intelligence. Then U.S. Army Major Robert B. Staver, Chief of the Jet Propulsion Section of the Research and Intelligence Branch of the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps, used the Osenberg List to compile his list of German scientists to be captured and interrogated; Wernher von Braun, Nazi Germany's premier rocket scientist, headed Major Staver's list.
Identification
In Operation Overcast, Major Staver's original intent was only to interview the scientists, but what he learned changed the operation's purpose. On May 22, 1945, he transmitted to U.S. Pentagon headquarters Colonel Joel Holmes's telegram urging the evacuation of German scientists and their families, as most "important for the Pacific war" effort. Most of the Osenberg List engineers worked at the Baltic coast German Army Research Center Peenemünde, developing the V-2 rocket. After capturing them, the Allies initially housed them and their families in Landshut, Bavaria, in southern Germany.
Beginning on July 19, 1945, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) managed the captured ARC rocketeers under Operation Overcast. However, when the "Camp Overcast" name of the scientists' quarters became locally-known, the program was renamed Operation Paperclip in November 1945. Despite these attempts at secrecy, later that year the press interviewed several of the scientists.
Regarding Operation Alsos, Allied Intelligence described nuclear physicist Werner Heisenberg, the German nuclear energy project principal, as "worth more to us than ten divisions of Germans." In addition to rocketeers and nuclear physicists, the Allies also sought chemists, physicians, and naval weaponeers.
Meanwhile, the Technical Director of the German Army Rocket Center, Wernher von Braun, was jailed at P.O. Box 1142, a military-intelligence black site in Fort Hunt, Virginia, in the United States. Since the prison was unknown to the international community, its operation by the US was in violation of the Geneva Convention of 1929, which the United States had ratified. Although Von Braun's interrogators pressured him, he was not tortured; however, in 1944 another prisoner of war, U-boat Captain Werner Henke, had been shot and killed while climbing the fence at Fort Hunt.
Capture and detention
Early on, the United States created the Combined Intelligence Objectives Subcommittee (CIOS). This provided the information on targets for the T-Forces that went in and targeted scientific, military and industrial installations (and their employees) for their know-how. Initial priorities were advanced technology, such as infrared, that could be used in the war against Japan; finding out what technology had been passed on to Japan; and finally to halt the research. A project to halt the research was codenamed "Project Safehaven", and it was not initially targeted against the Soviet Union; rather the concern was that German scientists might emigrate and continue their research in countries such as Spain, Argentina or Egypt, all of which had sympathized with Nazi Germany. In order to avoid the complications involved with the emigration of German scientists, the CIOS was responsible for scouting and kidnapping high profile individuals for the deprivation of technological advancements in nations outside of the US.
Much U.S. effort was focused on Saxony and Thuringia, which by July 1, 1945, would become part of the Soviet Occupation zone. Many German research facilities and personnel had been evacuated to these states, particularly from the Berlin area. Fearing that the Soviet takeover would limit U.S. ability to exploit German scientific and technical expertise, and not wanting the Soviet Union to benefit from said expertise, the United States instigated an "evacuation operation" of scientific personnel from Saxony and Thuringia, issuing orders such as:
On orders of Military Government you are to report with your family and baggage as much as you can carry tomorrow noon at 1300 hours (Friday, 22 June 1945) at the town square in Bitterfeld. There is no need to bring winter clothing. Easily carried possessions, such as family documents, jewelry, and the like should be taken along. You will be transported by motor vehicle to the nearest railway station. From there you will travel on to the West. Please tell the bearer of this letter how large your family is.
By 1947 this evacuation operation had netted an estimated 1,800 technicians and scientists, along with 3,700 family members. Those with special skills or knowledge were taken to detention and interrogation centers, such as one code-named DUSTBIN, to be held and interrogated, in some cases for months.
A few of the scientists were gathered up in Operation Overcast, but most were transported to villages in the countryside where there were neither research facilities nor work; they were provided stipends and forced to report twice weekly to police headquarters to prevent them from leaving. The Joint Chiefs of Staff directive on research and teaching stated that technicians and scientists should be released "only after all interested agencies were satisfied that all desired intelligence information had been obtained from them".
On November 5, 1947, the Office of Military Government of the United States (OMGUS), which had jurisdiction over the western part of occupied Germany, held a conference to consider the status of the evacuees, the monetary claims that the evacuees had filed against the United States, and the "possible violation by the US of laws of war or Rules of Land Warfare". The OMGUS director of Intelligence R. L. Walsh initiated a program to resettle the evacuees in the Third World, which the Germans referred to as General Walsh's "Urwald-Programm" (jungle program), however this program never matured. In 1948, the evacuees received settlements of 69.5 million Reichsmarks from the U.S., a settlement that soon became severely devalued during the currency reform that introduced the Deutsche Mark as the official currency of western Germany.
John Gimbel concludes that the United States put some of Germany's best minds on ice for three years, therefore depriving the German recovery of their expertise.
Scientists
In May 1945, the U.S. Navy "received in custody" Dr. Herbert A. Wagner, the inventor of the Hs 293 missile; for two years, he first worked at the Special Devices Center, at Castle Gould and at Hempstead House, Long Island, New York; in 1947, he moved to the Naval Air Station Point Mugu.
In August 1945, Colonel Holger Toftoy, head of the Rocket Branch of the Research and Development Division of the U.S. Army's Ordnance Corps, offered initial one-year contracts to the rocket scientists; 127 of them accepted. In September 1945, the first group of seven rocket scientists arrived at Fort Strong, located on Long Island in Boston harbor: Wernher von Braun, Erich W. Neubert, Theodor A. Poppel, August Schulze, Eberhard Rees, Wilhelm Jungert, and Walter Schwidetzky.
Beginning in late 1945, three rocket-scientist groups arrived in the United States for duty at Fort Bliss, Texas, and at White Sands Proving Grounds, New Mexico, as "War Department Special Employees".
In 1946, the United States Bureau of Mines employed seven German synthetic fuel scientists at a Fischer-Tropsch chemical plant in Louisiana, Missouri.
In early 1950, legal U.S. residency for some of the Project Paperclip specialists was effected through the U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico; thus, Nazi scientists legally entered the United States from Latin America.
Eighty-six aeronautical engineers were transferred to Wright Field, where the United States had Luftwaffe aircraft and equipment captured under Operation Lusty (Luftwaffe Secret Technology).
The United States Army Signal Corps employed 24 specialists – including the physicists Georg Goubau, Gunter Guttwein, Georg Hass, Horst Kedesdy, and Kurt Lehovec; the physical chemists Rudolf Brill, Ernst Baars, and Eberhard Both; the geophysicist Helmut Weickmann; the optician Gerhard Schwesinger; and the engineers Eduard Gerber, Richard Guenther, and Hans Ziegler.
In 1959, 94 Operation Paperclip men went to the United States, including Friedwardt Winterberg and Friedrich Wigand. Throughout its operations to 1990, Operation Paperclip imported 1,600 men, as part of the intellectual reparations owed to the United States and the UK, some $10 billion in patents and industrial processes.
During the decades after they were included in Operation Paperclip, some scientists were investigated because of their activities during World War II. Arthur Rudolph was deported in 1984, but not prosecuted, and West Germany granted him citizenship. Similarly, Georg Rickhey, who came to the United States under Operation Paperclip in 1946, was returned to Germany to stand trial at the Dora Trial in 1947; he was acquitted, and returned to the United States in 1948, eventually becoming a U.S. citizen. The aeromedical library at Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, had been named after Hubertus Strughold in 1977. However, it was later renamed because documents from the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal linked Strughold to medical experiments in which inmates from Dachau were tortured and killed.
Key figures:
Rocketry
Rudi Beichel, Magnus von Braun, Wernher von Braun, Werner Dahm, Konrad Dannenberg, Kurt H. Debus, Walter Dornberger, Ernst R. G. Eckert, Krafft Arnold Ehricke, Otto Hirschler, Hermann H. Kurzweg, Fritz Mueller, Eberhard Rees, Gerhard Reisig, Georg Rickhey, Werner Rosinski, Ludwig Roth, Arthur Rudolph, Ernst Steinhoff, Ernst Stuhlinger, Bernhard Tessmann, and Georg von Tiesenhausen (see List of German rocket scientists in the US).
Aeronautics
Sighard F. Hoerner, Siegfried Knemeyer, Alexander Martin Lippisch, Hans Multhopp, Hans von Ohain, and Kurt Tank
Medicine – biological weapons, chemical weapons, human experimentation, human factors in space medicine
Hans Antmann, Kurt Blome, Erich Traub, Walter Schreiber, and Hubertus Strughold
Electronics
Hans Hollmann, Kurt Lehovec, Johannes Plendl, Heinz Schlicke and Hans K. Ziegler
Intelligence
Otto von Bolschwing
Similar operations:
APPLEPIE: Project to capture and interrogate key Wehrmacht, RSHA AMT VI, and General Staff officers knowledgeable of the industry and economy of the USSR.
DUSTBIN (counterpart of ASHCAN): An Anglo-American military intelligence operation established first in Paris, then in Kransberg Castle, at Frankfurt.
ECLIPSE (1944): An unimplemented Air Disarmament Wing plan for post-war operations in Europe for destroying V-1 and V-2 missiles.
Safehaven: US project within ECLIPSE meant to prevent the escape of Nazi scientists from Allied-occupied Germany.
Field Information Agency; Technical (FIAT): US Army agency for securing the "major, and perhaps only, material reward of victory, namely, the advancement of science and the improvement of production and standards of living in the United Nations, by proper exploitation of German methods in these fields"; FIAT ended in 1947, when Operation Paperclip began functioning.
On April 26, 1946, the Joint Chiefs of Staff issued JCS Directive 1067/14 to General Eisenhower instructing that he "preserve from destruction and take under your control records, plans, books, documents, papers, files and scientific, industrial and other information and data belonging to . . . German organizations engaged in military research"; and that, excepting war-criminals, German scientists be detained for intelligence purposes as required.
National Interest/Project 63: Job placement assistance for Nazi engineers at Lockheed, Martin Marietta, North American Aviation, and other aeroplane companies, whilst American aerospace engineers were being laid off work.
Operation Alsos, Operation Big, Operation Epsilon, Russian Alsos: Soviet, American and British efforts to capture German nuclear secrets, equipment, and personnel.
Operation Backfire: A British effort at capturing rocket and aerospace technology from Cuxhaven.
Fedden Mission: British mission to gain technical intelligence concerning advanced German aircraft and their propulsion systems.
Operation Lusty: US efforts to capture German aeronautical equipment, technology, and personnel.
Operation Osoaviakhim (sometimes transliterated as "Operation Ossavakim"), a Soviet counterpart of Operation Paperclip, involving German technicians, managers, skilled workers and their respective families who were relocated to the USSR in October 1946.
Operation Surgeon: British operation for denying German aeronautical expertise from the USSR, and for exploiting German scientists in furthering British research.
Special Mission V-2: April–May 1945 US operation, by Maj. William Bromley, that recovered parts and equipment for 100 V-2 missiles from a Mittelwerk underground factory in Kohnstein within the Soviet zone. Maj. James P. Hamill co-ordinated the transport of the equipment on 341 railroad cars with the 144th Motor Vehicle Assembly Company, from Nordhausen to Erfurt, just before the Soviets arrived. (see also Operation Blossom, Broomstick Scientists, Hermes project, Operations Sandy and Pushover)
Target Intelligence Committee: US project to exploit German cryptographers.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to
Operation Paperclip.
In popular culture:
In James Rollins' novel Ice Hunt (2003), the Russian commander Viktor Petkov cites multiple American research projects that violated modern standards of ethics and asks Matt Pike, "Then how do you justify Project Paperclip?", when Matt claims that US research, including the Tuskegee Experiment, was not comparable to the Nazis' experiments or to the human experimentation at the Grendel Ice Station in the book.(Chapter 16, page 16.)
In the 2014 film Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Operation Paperclip is attributed to the fictional agency S.H.I.E.L.D., recruiting German scientists after WWII including Dr. Arnim Zola. This ultimately backfires, as Zola recreates his former organization HYDRA from within, mixing S.H.I.E.L.D. employees with sleeper agents and sowing international chaos up until the modern day.
In The X-Files, in the third season's second episode (titled Paper Clip), Agent Mulder receives a tape with files containing stolen top secret information about experiments on extraterrestrials carried out in Operation Paperclip (see also Syndicate (The X-Files) hashtag Early years).
in Sara Paretsky's 2013 novel Critical Mass Operation Paperclip is crucial to the plot.
See also:
Operation Osoaviakhim
List of former Nazi Party members
Carmel Offie
Fort Bliss
Operation Bloodstone
Operation Lusty — targeting advanced aircraft of the defeated Luftwaffe
Ratlines (World War II)
Unit 731 — Japanese human experimenters recruited for their biological weapons technology.
Upper Atmosphere Research Panel
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Excerpts from Fort Bliss History
from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Bliss
World War I and World War II
As American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) commander (1917–1918), John J. Pershing transferred to Fort Bliss and was responsible for the organization, training, and supply of an inexperienced force that eventually grew from 27,000 men to over 2,000,000—the National Army of World War I.
From 10 December 1917 – 12 May 1918, the wartime 15th Cavalry Division existed at Fort Bliss. Similarly, the Headquarters, 2nd Cavalry Brigade was initially activated at Fort Bliss on 10 December 1917 and then deactivated in July 1919, but then reactivated at Fort Bliss on 31 August 1920. Predominantly a cavalry post since 1912, Fort Bliss acquired three light armored cars, eight medium armored cars, two motorcycles, and two trucks on 8 November 1928.
During World War II, Fort Bliss focused on training anti-aircraft artillery battalions (AAA). In September 1940 the Coast Artillery's anti-aircraft training center was established, and in 1941 the 1st Tow Target Squadron arrived to fly target drones (the 6th, 19th, & 27th Tow Target Squadrons were at the nearby Biggs Field). On 3 August 1944, the Anti-Aircraft Artillery School was ordered from Camp Davis to Fort Bliss to make the training of anti-aircraft gunners easier, and they became the dominant force at Fort Bliss following the departure of the U.S. 1st Cavalry Division. Also during the war, the base was used to hold approximately 91 German and Italian Americans and Japanese from Hawaii (then a territory), who were arrested as potential fifth columnists but, in most cases, denied due process.
Group of 104 Operation Paperclip rocket scientists in 1946 at Fort Bliss (35 were at White Sands Proving Grounds)
By February 1946, over 100 Operation Paperclip scientists had arrived to develop rockets and were attached to the Office of the Chief of Ordnance Corps, Research and Development Service, Suboffice (Rocket), headed by Major James P. Hamill. Although the scientists were initially “pretty much kept on ice” (resulting in the nickname "Operation Icebox"), they were subsequently divided into a research group and a group who assisted with V-2 test launches at White Sands Proving Grounds. German families began arriving in December 1946, and by the spring of 1948, the number of German rocket specialists (nicknamed "Prisoners of Peace") in the US was 127. Fort Bliss rocket launches included firings of the Private missile at the Hueco Range in April 1945. In 1953, funding cuts caused the cancellation of work on the Hermes B2 ramjet work that had begun at Fort Bliss.
In late 1953 after troops had been trained at the Ft Bliss Guided Missile School, field-firing operations of the MGM-5 Corporal were underway at Red Canyon Range Camp, WSPG. In April 1950, the 1st Guided Missile Group named the Republic-Ford JB-2 the ARMY LOON.
The Cold War
Fort Bliss trained thousands of U.S. Soldiers during the Cold War. As the United States gradually came to master the art of building and operating missiles, Fort Bliss and White Sands Missile Range became more and more important to the country, and were expanded accordingly. On 1 July 1957 the U.S. Army Air Defense Center was established at Fort Bliss. Located at this Center, in addition to Center Headquarters, are the U.S. Army Air Defense School; Air Defense; the 6th Artillery Group (Air Defense); the 61st Ordnance Group; and other supporting elements. In 1957 Fort Bliss and its anti-aircraft personnel began using Nike Ajax, Nike Hercules, Hawk, Sprint, Chaparral, and Redeye missiles. Fort Bliss took on the important role of providing a large area for troops to conduct live fire exercises with the missiles.
Because of the large number of Army personnel enrolled in the air defense school, Fort Bliss saw two large rounds of construction in 1954 and 1958. The former was aimed at creating more barracks facilities, while the latter was aimed at building new classrooms, materials labs, a radar park, and a missile laboratory. Between 1953 and 1957 the Army also expanded McGregor Range in an effort to accommodate live fire exercises of the new missile systems. Throughout the Cold War Fort Bliss remained a premier site for testing anti-aircraft equipment.
Fort Bliss was used as the Desert Stage of the Ranger School training course to prepare Ranger School graduates for operations in the deserts of the Middle East. From 1983 to 1987, Fort Bliss was home to the Ranger School's newly formed 4th (Desert Ranger) Training Company. This unit was later expanded in 1987 to form the newly created Ranger Training Brigade's short-lived 7th Ranger Training Battalion, which was then transferred to the Dugway Proving Grounds in Utah. The deserts of Utah proved to be unsuitable so the 7th Ranger Training Battalion was returned to Fort Bliss from 1991 until the Ranger School's Desert Phase was discontinued in 1995.
While the United States Army Air Defense Artillery School develops doctrine and tactics, training current and future soldiers has always been its core mission. Until 1990 the post was used for Basic Training and Advanced Individual Training (AIT), under the 1/56 ADA Regiment, part of 6th ADA. Before 1989, 1/56 had three basic training companies and two AIT batteries. After 1990, 1/56 dropped basic training, that mission assumed by Fort Sill. The unit now had four enlisted batteries for enlisted AIT, one battery for the Officer's Basic Course and Captain's Career Course (added in 2004) and one company that trained army truck drivers (MOS 88M).
Base Realignment and Closure
In 1995, the Department of Defense recommended that the U.S. 3d Armored Cavalry Regiment be relocated to Fort Carson, Colorado. Efforts to consolidate units from another post with those units that remained at Fort Bliss were overruled by the Base Realignment and Closing Commission, leaving Fort Bliss without any armored vehicles. Units operating the US Army’s MIM-104 Patriot Missile Defense System relocated to Fort Bliss during the 1990s. The Patriot system played an important role in the Persian Gulf War/Operation Desert Storm in 1991. In commemoration, the US 54 expressway in northeast El Paso was designated the Patriot Freeway.
The War on Terror
After the September 11, 2001 attacks, Fort Bliss provided ADA Battalions for US and NATO use in Afghanistan and Iraq, and has served as one of the major deployment centers for troops bound for Iraq and Afghanistan. This mission is accomplished via nearby Biggs Army Airfield, which is included in the installation's supporting areas. Following the War in Afghanistan (2001–present) in 2001 Fort Bliss began training Afghan security forces at the U.S. Army Sergeants Major Academy at Fort Bliss, with the hope that these newly trained soldiers would eventually be able to take control of their own national security.
Base Realignment and Closure, 2005
See also: Base Realignment and Closure, 2005
In 2005, the Pentagon recommended transforming Fort Bliss into a heavy armor training post, to include approximately 11,500 new troops from the U.S. 1st Armored Division – at that time stationed in Germany -, as well as units from Fort Sill and Fort Hood. An estimated 15,918 military jobs and 384 civilian jobs were planned to be transferred to Fort Bliss, brought the total number of troops stationed at Fort Bliss under this alignment to a total of 33,500 by 2012. Officials from Fort Bliss and the City of El Paso were thrilled with the decision; the general mood of the city government was perfectly captured by 14 May edition of the El Paso Times, which boldly proclaimed "BLISS WINS BIG".
According to Senator Eliot Shapleigh, the BRAC commission considered three primary factors to make its decision: The military value of Fort Bliss, the potential for other branches of the armed service to use a post as large as Fort Bliss, and the lack of urban encroachment around Fort Bliss that would otherwise hinder its growth. The arrival of the 11,500 troops from the 1st Armored Division is also expected to create some 20,196 direct and indirect military and civilian jobs in El Paso. According to the Department of Defense, this is the largest net gain in the United States tied to the Base Realignment and Closure recommendations. Of the 20,196 new jobs expected to come to El Paso as a result of Bliss’ realignment 9,000 would be indirect civilian jobs created by the influx of soldiers to the "Sun City". When the BRAC commission recommendations were released Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison’s spokesman reported that El Paso was the only area that came out with a major gain of forces.
The news that El Paso had been selected to receive major elements of the 1st Armored Division was met with joy, but at the same time many expressed surprise at the panel's recommendation to transfer the Air Defense Artillery School, 6th ADA Brigade, and its accompanying equipment (including the MIM-104 Patriot Missile Anti-Aircraft/Anti Missile defense system) to Fort Sill. On 25 August officials representing Fort Bliss went before the BRAC Commission to plead their case for maintaining the ADA school and its accompanying equipment at Fort Bliss, citing among other thing the size of Fort Bliss and the history of the ADA school in the region. The BRAC Commission ultimately ruled against Fort Bliss, and the roughly 4,500 affected soldiers were transferred to Fort Sill, Oklahoma. The entire transfer of soldiers to and from Fort Bliss was completed no later than 15 September 2011.
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Shooting At Fort Bliss PX Leaves One Dead, One Injured
www.kwtx.com/home/headlines/42496217.html
FORT BLISS (April 5, 2009)--A Fort Bliss soldier was shot to death Saturday afternoon at the Fort Bliss Post Exchange by her husband, who then wounded himself, authorities said.
The man, a civilian, was in intensive care at University Medical Center in El Paso, said Col. Ed Manning, the garrison commander at Fort Bliss.
The names of the shooting victims were not immediately released.
Manning said that the woman was at Fort Bliss for training and lived on the post.
He said the man did not live on the post.
Manning said the shooting was an isolated incident and said the post is safe.
FBI spokeswoman Andrea Simmons told the El Paso Times that after shooting the soldier, the man tried to kill himself.
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2009 Fort Hood shooting
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_Fort_Hood_shooting
On November 5, 2009, a mass shooting took place at Fort Hood, near Killeen, Texas. Nidal Hasan, a U.S. Army major and psychiatrist, fatally shot 13 people and injured more than 30 others. The shooting produced more casualties than any other on an American military base. Several individuals, including Senator Joe Lieberman, General Barry McCaffrey, President Barack Obama and others have called the event a terrorist attack. The United States Department of Defense and federal law enforcement agencies have classified the shootings as an act of workplace violence.
Hasan was shot and as a result is paralyzed from the waist down. Hasan was arraigned by a military court on July 20, 2011 and was charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. His court-martial began on August 7, 2013. Due to the nature of the charges (more than one premeditated, or first-degree, murder case, in a single crime), Hasan faced either the death penalty or life in prison without parole upon conviction. Hasan was found guilty on all 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder on August 23, 2013, and was sentenced to death on August 28, 2013.
Days after the shooting, reports in the media revealed that a Joint Terrorism Task Force had been aware of a series of e-mails between Hasan and the Yemen-based imam Anwar al-Awlaki, who had been monitored by the NSA as a security threat, and that Hasan's colleagues had been aware of his increasing radicalization for several years. The failure to prevent the shootings led the Defense Department and the FBI to commission investigations, and Congress to hold hearings.
The U.S. government declined requests from survivors and family members of the slain to categorize the Fort Hood shooting as an act of terrorism, or motivated by militant Islamic religious convictions. In November 2011, a group of survivors and family members filed a lawsuit against the government for negligence in preventing the attack, and to force the government to classify the shootings as terrorism. The Pentagon argued that charging Hasan with terrorism was not possible within the military justice system and that such action could harm the military prosecutors' ability to sustain a guilty verdict against Hasan.
Shootings
Preparations
According to pretrial testimony, Hasan entered the Guns Galore store in Killeen on July 31, 2009, and purchased the FN Five-seven semi-automatic pistol that he was to use in the attack at Fort Hood. According to Army Specialist William Gilbert, a regular customer at the store, Hasan entered the store and asked for "the most technologically advanced weapon on the market and the one with the highest standard magazine capacity." Hasan was allegedly asked how he intended to use the weapon, but simply repeated that he wanted the most advanced handgun with the largest magazine capacity. The three people with Hasan—Gilbert, the store manager, and an employee—all recommended the FN Five-seven pistol. As Gilbert owned one of the pistols, he spent an hour describing its operation to Hasan.
Hasan left the store, saying he needed to research the weapon. He returned to purchase the gun the next day, and visited the store once a week to buy extra magazines, along with over 3000 rounds of 5.7×28mm SS192 and SS197SR ammunition total. In the weeks prior to the attack, Hasan visited an outdoor shooting range in Florence, where he allegedly became adept at hitting silhouette targets at distances of up to 100 yards.
Soldier Readiness Processing Center shootings
At approximately 1:34 p.m. local time, November 5, 2009, Hasan entered his workplace, the Soldier Readiness Processing Center, where personnel receive routine medical treatment immediately prior to and on return from deployment. He was armed with the FN Five-seven pistol, which he had fitted with two Lasermax laser sights: one red, and one green. A Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum revolver (an older model) was later found on Hasan's person, but he did not use it to shoot any of the victims.
According to eyewitnesses, Hasan had taken a seat at an empty table and bowed his head for several seconds when he suddenly stood up, shouted "Allahu Akbar!" and opened fire. Witnesses said Hasan initially "sprayed bullets at soldiers in a fanlike motion" before taking aim at individual soldiers. Eyewitness Sgt. Michael Davis said: "The rate of fire was pretty much constant shooting. When I initially heard it, it sounded like an M16."
Army reserve Captain John Gaffaney tried to stop Hasan by charging him, but was mortally wounded before reaching him. Civilian physician assistant Michael Cahill also tried to charge Hasan with a chair, but was shot and killed. Army reserve Specialist Logan Burnett tried to stop Hasan by throwing a folding table at him, but he was shot in the left hip, fell down, and crawled to a nearby cubicle.
According to testimony from witnesses, Hasan passed up several opportunities to shoot civilians, and instead targeted soldiers in uniform, who - in accordance with military policy - were not carrying personal firearms. At one point, Hasan reportedly approached a group of five civilians hiding under a desk. He looked at them, swept the dot of his pistol's laser sight over one of the men's faces, and turned away without firing.
Base civilian police Sergeant Kimberly Munley, who had rushed to the scene in her patrol car, encountered Hasan in the area outside the Soldier Readiness Processing Center. Hasan fired at Munley, who exchanged shots with him using her 9mm M9 pistol. Munley's hand was hit by shrapnel when one of Hasan's bullets struck a nearby rain gutter, and then two bullets struck Munley: the first bullet hit her thigh, and the second hit her knee. As she began to fall from the first bullet, the second bullet struck her femur, shattering it and knocking her to the ground. Hasan walked up to Munley and kicked her pistol out of reach.
As the shooting continued outside, nurses and medics entered the building, secured the doors with a belt and rushed to help the wounded. According to the responding nurses, there was so much blood covering the floor inside the building, that they were unable to maintain balance, and had difficulty reaching the wounded to help them. In the area outside the building, Hasan continued to shoot at fleeing soldiers, and civilian police Sergeant Mark Todd arrived and shouted commands at Hasan to surrender. Todd said: "Then he turned and fired a couple of rounds at me. I didn't hear him say a word, he just turned and fired." The two exchanged shots, and Hasan was felled by five shots from Todd, who kicked the pistol out of his hand and put handcuffs on him as he fell unconscious.
Aftermath
An investigator later testified that 146 spent shell casings were recovered inside the building. Another 68 casings were collected outside, for a total of 214 rounds fired by the attacker and responding police officers. A medic who treated Hasan said his pockets were full of pistol magazines. When the shooting ended, he was still carrying 177 rounds of unfired ammunition in his pockets, contained in both 20- and 30-round magazines. The incident, which lasted about 10 minutes, resulted in 13 killed—12 soldiers and one civilian; 11 died at the scene, and two died later in a hospital; and 30 people wounded.
Initially, officials thought three soldiers were involved in the shooting; two other soldiers were detained, but subsequently released. The Fort Hood website posted a notice indicating that the shooting was not a drill. Immediately after the shooting, the base and surrounding areas were locked down by military police and U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command (CID) until around 7 pm local time. In addition, Texas Rangers, Texas DPS troopers, deputies from the Bell County Sheriff's Office, and FBI agents from Austin and Waco were dispatched to the base. U.S. President Barack Obama was briefed on the incident and later made a statement about the shooting.
On November 5, 2010, one year later, 52 individuals received awards for their actions in the shooting. The Soldier's Medal was awarded posthumously to Captain John Gaffaney, who died trying to charge the shooter; fifty other medals were presented to other responders, including seven others who were awarded the Soldier's Medal. The Secretary of the Army Award for Valor was awarded to police officers Kimberly Munley and Mark Todd, for the roles they played in stopping the shooter. On May 23, 2011, the Army Award for Valor was posthumously awarded to the civilian physician assistant Michael Cahill, who died trying to charge the shooter with a chair. In May 2012, Senator Joe Lieberman and Representative Peter T. King proposed legislation that would make the victims of the shooting eligible for the Purple Heart. In the 113th Congress, Representative John Carter introduced legislation to change the shooting designation from "workplace violence" to "combat related" which would make the victims of the shooting eligible to receive full benefits and the Purple Heart.
In July 2014, a memorial for those killed during the attack began to be built in Killeen.
On February 6, 2015, the Department of Defense DoD issued a press release, in which United States Secretary of the Army John M. McHugh announced that he was approving the awarding of the Purple Heart and its civilian counterpart, the Secretary of Defense Medal for the Defense of Freedom, to victims of the shooting. This is a result of Congress expanding the eligibility requirement under a provision of the National Defense Authorization Act of 2015. On April 10, 2015, nearly 50 awards were handed out to dozens of survivors.
Casualties
Thirteen people were slain in the attack. Over thirty people were wounded; some from gunshots, others from falls or other injuries incurred during the incident, and many suffered psychological trauma or shock. The Army, press, and investigative bodies have reported several numbers for the total number of injured, without indicating what sorts of injuries they were counting, nor how: and
Hasan, the gunman, was taken to Scott and White Memorial Hospital, a trauma center in Temple, Texas, and later moved to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas, where he was held under heavy guard. Hasan was hit by at least four shots.[68] As a result of bullet wounds to his spine, he is now paraplegic. He was later held at the Bell County jail in Belton, Texas.
Ten of the injured were also treated at Scott and White.[69] Seven wounded victims were taken to Metroplex Adventist Hospital in Killeen. Eight others received hospital treatment for shock. On November 20, 2009, it was announced that eight of the wounded service members would deploy overseas.
Fatalities
The 13 killed were:
Name Age Hometown Rank/occupation Notes
Michael Grant Cahill 62 Spokane, Washington Civilian Physician Assistant Shot while trying to charge the shooter
Libardo Eduardo Caraveo 52 Woodbridge, Virginia Major
Justin Michael DeCrow 32 Plymouth, Indiana Staff Sergeant Shot in the chest
John P. Gaffaney 56 Serra Mesa, California Captain Shot while trying to charge the shooter
Frederick Greene 29 Mountain City, Tennessee Specialist Shot while trying to charge the shooter
Jason Dean Hunt 22 Norman, Oklahoma Specialist Shot in the back
Amy Sue Krueger 29 Kiel, Wisconsin Staff Sergeant Shot in the chest
Aaron Thomas Nemelka 19 West Jordan, Utah Private First Class Shot in the chest
Michael S. Pearson 22 Bolingbrook, Illinois Private First Class Shot in the chest
Russell Gilbert Seager 51 Racine, Wisconsin Captain
Francheska Velez 21 Chicago, Illinois Private First Class Shot in the chest. Was pregnant when killed, and the baby also died.
Juanita L. Warman 55 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Lieutenant Colonel Shot in the abdomen
Kham See Xiong 23 Saint Paul, Minnesota Private First Class Shot in the head
Gunshot wounds
The following people suffered gunshot wounds and survived:
Count Name Rank/occupation Notes
1 James Armstrong Specialist Shot in the leg
2 Patrick Blue III Sergeant Not shot, but hit in the side by bullet fragments
3 Keara Bono Torkelson Specialist Shot in the shoulder and grazed in the head
4 Logan M. Burnett Specialist Shot in the hip, left elbow, and hand
5 Alan Carroll Specialist Shot in the upper right arm, right bicep, left side of back, and left leg
6 Dorothy Carskadon Captain Shot in the leg, hip, and stomach, and grazed on the forehead; permanently disabled.
7 Joy Clark Staff Sergeant Shot in the forearm
8 Matthew D. Cooke Specialist
9 Chad Davis Staff Sergeant Shot in the shoulder
10 Mick Engnehl Private Shot in the shoulder and grazed in the neck
11 Joseph T. Foster Private Shot in the hip
12 Amber Gadlin (formerly Amber Bahr) Private
13 Nathan Hewitt Sergeant Shot twice in the leg
14 Alvin Howard Sergeant Shot in the left shoulder
15 Najee M. Hull Private Shot once in the knee and twice in the back
16 Eric Williams Jackson Staff Sergeant Shot in the right arm
17 Justin T. Johnson Private Shot once in the foot and twice in the back
18 Alonzo M. Lunsford, Jr Staff Sergeant Grazed in the head, and shot twice in the stomach
19 Shawn N. Manning Staff Sergeant Grazed in the lower right side, and shot in the left upper chest, left back, lower right thigh, upper right thigh, and right foot
20 Paul Martin Staff Sergeant Shot in the arm, leg, and back
21 Brandy Mason 2nd Lieutenant Shot in the hip
22 Grant Moxon Specialist Shot in the leg
23 Kimberly Munley Civilian Police Sergeant Shot twice in the leg
24 John Pagel Specialist Shot through his left arm; bullet traveled into left side of his chest
25 Dayna Ferguson Roscoe Specialist Shot in the arm, shoulder, and thigh
26 Christopher H. Royal Chief Warrant Officer Started a nonprofit foundation called "32 Still Standing" to raise money to support the survivors.
27 Randy Royer Major Shot in the arm and leg
28 Jonathan Sims Specialist Shot in the chest, back
29 George O. Stratton, III Specialist Shot in the shoulder
30 Patrick Zeigler Staff Sergeant Shot in the left shoulder, left forearm, left hip, and left side of head
31 Miguel A. Valdivia Sergeant Shot in the right thigh and left hip
32 Thuan Nguyen Staff Sergeant Shot in the thigh
Shooter
Main article: Nidal Hasan
Major Nidal Hasan
During his court-martial on August 6, 2013 before a panel of 13 officers, Major Nidal Malik Hasan declared that he was the shooter. Hasan is unmarried and was described as socially isolated. Born in the United States, Hasan is a practicing Muslim who, according to one of his cousins, became more devout after the deaths of his parents in 1998 and 2001. His cousin did not recall him ever expressing radical or anti-American views. Another cousin, Nader Hasan, a lawyer in Virginia, said that Nidal Hasan's opinion turned against the United States after he heard stories from his patients, who had returned from fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq. Because of what Hasan said was discrimination and his deepening anguish about serving in a military that fought against Muslims, he told some members of his family that he wanted to leave the military. He said that he could not, but he may have been given inappropriate advice.
From 2003 to 2009, Hasan was stationed at Walter Reed Medical Center for his internship and residency; he also had a two-year fellowship at USUHS completed in 2009. According to National Public Radio (NPR), officials at Walter Reed Medical Center repeatedly expressed concern about Hasan's behavior during the entire six years he was there; Hasan's supervisors gave him poor evaluations and warned him that he was doing substandard work. In early 2008 (and on later occasions), several key officials met to discuss what to do about Hasan. Attendees of these meetings reportedly included the Walter Reed chief of psychiatry, the chairman of the USUHS Psychiatry Department, two assistant chairs of the USUHS Psychiatry Department (one of whom was the director of Hasan's psychiatry fellowship), another psychiatrist, and the director of the Walter Reed psychiatric residency program. According to NPR, fellow students and faculty were "deeply troubled" by Hasan's behavior, which they described as "disconnected", "aloof", "paranoid", "belligerent" and "schizoid".
Once, while presenting what was supposed to be a medical lecture to other psychiatrists, Hasan talked about Islam, and said that, according to the Koran, non-believers would be sent to hell, decapitated, set on fire, and have burning oil poured down their throats. A Muslim psychiatrist in the audience raised his hand, and challenged Hasan's claims. According to the Associated Press, Hasan's lecture also "justified suicide bombings." In the summer of 2009, after completion of his programs, he was transferred to Fort Hood.
At Fort Hood, Hasan rented an apartment away from other officers, in a somewhat rundown area. Two days before the shooting, Hasan gave away furniture from his home, saying he was going to be deployed. He also handed out copies of the Qur'an, along with his business cards, which gave a Maryland phone number and read "Behavioral Heatlh [sic] – Mental Health – Life Skills | Nidal Hasan, MD, MPH | SoA(SWT) | Psychiatrist". The cards did not reflect his military rank.
In May 2001, Hasan attended the funeral of his mother, held at the Dar Al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Virginia, which has 3,000 members. He may also have occasionally prayed there but, for a period of ten years, he prayed several times a week at the Muslim Community Center in Silver Spring, Maryland, closer to where he lived and worked. He was regularly seen there by the imam and other members. His attendance at the Falls Church mosque was in the same period as that of Nawaf al-Hazmi and Hani Hanjour, two of the hijackers in the September 11 attacks, who went there from April 2001 to later in the summer. A law enforcement official said that the FBI will probably look into whether Hasan associated with the hijackers. A review of Hasan's computer and his e-mail accounts revealed he had visited radical Islamist, a senior law enforcement official said.
Pictured: Anwar al-Awlaki in 2008, with whom Hasan communicated in the months prior to the shootings
Hasan expressed admiration for the teachings of Anwar al-Awlaki, the imam at the Dar al-Hijrah mosque in Falls Church, Virginia between 2000 and 2002. Awlaki had been the subject of several FBI investigations, and had helped hijackers al-Hazmi and Hanjour settle, and provided spiritual guidance to them when they met him at the San Diego mosque, and after they drove to the east coast. Considered moderate then, Al-Awlaki appeared to become radicalized after 2006 and was under surveillance. After Hasan wrote nearly 20 e-mails to him between December 2008 and June 2009, Hasan was investigated by the FBI. The fact that Hasan had "certain communications" with the subject of a Joint Terrorism Task Force investigation was revealed in an FBI press release made on November 9, 2009, and reporting by the media immediately revealed that the subject was Awlaki and the communications were e-mails. In one, Hasan wrote: "I can't wait to join you" in the afterlife. Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, a military analyst at the Center for Advanced Defense Studies, suggested that Hasan was "either offering himself up or [had] already crossed that line in his own mind."
Army employees were informed of the contacts at the time, but they believed that the e-mails were consistent with Hasan's professional mental health research about Muslims in the armed services, as part of his master's work in Disaster and Preventive Psychiatry. A DC-based joint terrorism task force operating under the FBI was notified, and the information reviewed by one of its Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS) employees, who concluded there was not sufficient information for a larger investigation. Senior officers at the Department of Defense stated they were not notified of such investigations before the shootings.
Possible motives
Nidal Malik Hasan
Immediately after the shooting, analysts and public officials openly debated Hasan's motive and preceding psychological state: a military activist, Selena Coppa, remarked that Hasan's psychiatrist colleagues "failed to notice how deeply disturbed someone right in their midst was." A spokesperson for U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, one of the first officials to comment on Hasan's background, told reporters that Hasan was upset about his pending deployment to Afghanistan on November 28. Noel Hamad, Hasan's aunt, said that the family was not aware he was being sent to Afghanistan.
The Dallas Morning News reported on November 17 that ABC News, citing anonymous sources, reported that investigators suspect that the shootings were triggered by superiors' refusal to process Hasan’s requests that some of his patients be prosecuted for war crimes based on statements they made during psychiatric sessions with him. Dallas attorney Patrick McLain, a former Marine, said that Hasan may have been legally justified in his request, but he could not comment without knowing what soldiers had said. Fellow psychiatrists complained to superiors that Hasan's actions violated doctor-patient confidentiality.
Duane Reasoner, a convert to Islam whom Hasan was mentoring in the religion, said the psychiatrist did not want to be deployed. "'He said Muslims shouldn't be in the U.S. military, because obviously Muslims shouldn't kill Muslims. He told me not to join the Army.'"
Senator Joe Lieberman called for a probe by the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, which he chairs. Lieberman said "it's premature to reach conclusions about what motivated Hasan ... I think it's very important to let the Army and the FBI go forward with this investigation before we reach any conclusions." Two weeks later, when opening his committee's hearings, Lieberman labeled the shooting "the most destructive terrorist attack on America since September 11, 2001."
Michael Welner, M.D., a leading forensic psychiatrist with experience examining mass shooters, said that the shooting had elements common to both ideological and workplace mass shootings. Welner, who believed Hasan wanted to create a "spectacle", said that a trauma care worker, even under mental distress, would not normally be expected to be homicidal toward his patients unless his ideology trumped his Hippocratic oath–Welner thought Hasan expressed this in shouting, "Allahu Akhbar," as he shot unarmed men. An analyst of terror investigations, Carl Tobias, opined that the attack did not fit the profile of terrorism, and was more similar to the Virginia Tech massacre, committed by a student believed to be severely mentally ill.
Michael Scheuer, the retired former head of the Bin Laden Issue Station, and former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey have called the event a terrorist attack, as has the terrorism expert Walid Phares. Retired General Barry McCaffrey said on Anderson Cooper 360° that "it's starting to appear as if this was a domestic terrorist attack on fellow soldiers by a major in the Army who we educated for six years while he was giving off these vibes of disloyalty to his own force."
Some of Hasan's former colleagues have said he performed substandard work and occasionally unnerved them by expressing fervent Islamic views and deep opposition to the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Others were more concerned about his apparent mental instability and paranoid behaviors. Throughout his years at Walter Reed, heads of departments had regularly discussed his mental state, as they were "deeply concerned" about his behavior.
Brian Levin of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism wrote that the case sits at the crossroads of crime, terrorism and mental distress. He compared the possible role of religion to the beliefs of Scott Roeder, a Christian who murdered Dr. George Tiller, who practiced abortion. Such offenders "often self-radicalize from a volatile mix of personal distress, psychological issues, and an ideology that can be sculpted to justify and explain their anti-social leanings."
At his trial in June 2013, Hasan declared his motive as wanting to defend the lives of the Taliban leadership in Afghanistan. Army prosecutors said that he sought to align himself with Islamic extremists.
Hasan's description of motives
In August 2013, Fox News released documents from Major Hasan in which he explained his motives. Most of the documents included the acronym "SoA", which is considered shorthand for "Soldier of Allah." In one document, Hasan wrote that he was required to renounce any oaths that required him to defend any man-made constitution over the commandments mandated in Islam. In another document, he wrote "I invite the world to read the book of All-Mighty Allah and decide for themselves if it is the truth from their Lord. My desire is to help people attain heaven by the mercy of their Lord."
In another document, Hasan wrote that there is a fundamental and irreconcilable conflict between American democracy and Islamic governance. Specifically:
. . . in an American democracy, 'we the people' govern according to what 'we the people' think is right or wrong, even if it specifically goes against what All-Mighty God commands.
He further explained that separation of Church and State is an unacceptable attempt to get along with unbelievers, because "Islam was brought to prevail over other religions" and not to be equal with or subservient to them.
Reaction
Many have characterized the attack as terrorism. Two weeks after recommending no conclusions be drawn until after the investigation was completed, Senator Joe Lieberman called the shooting "the most destructive terrorist attack on America since September 11, 2001." Michael Scheuer, the retired former head of the Bin Laden Issue Station, and former U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey also described it as a terrorist attack. A group of soldiers and families have sought to have the defense secretary designate the shooting a "terrorist attack;" this would provide them with benefits equal to injuries in combat.
The FBI has found no evidence to indicate Hasan had any co-conspirators or was part of a broader terrorist plot, and has not established his motives. The Defense Department currently classifies Hasan's attack as an act of workplace violence and will not make further statements until the court martial.
President Obama
Pictured:U.S. President Barack Obama at the memorial service for the victims of the shooting rampage
The U.S. President's initial response to the attack came during a scheduled speech at the Tribal Nations Conference for America’s 564 federally recognized Native American tribes. Obama was criticized by the media for being "insensitive", as he addressed the shooting only three minutes into his prepared speech, and then for not according it sufficient gravitas. Later, the President delivered the memorial eulogy for the victims. Reaction to his memorial speech was largely positive, with some deeming it one of his best. The speech was criticized by a Wall Street Journal reporter, who found the speech largely absent of emotion, while a National Review columnist criticized Obama for refusing to acknowledge Islamic terrorism as having a role in the shooting. On December 6, 2015, in his speech addressing terrorism, Obama included the Fort Hood shooting among Islamic inspired terrorist incidents.
Fort Hood personnel
Retired Army colonel Terry Lee, who had worked with Hasan, said the psychiatrist expressed the hope that Obama would withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, and argued with military colleagues who supported the wars.
Army Secretary John McHugh and Chief of Staff Gen. George W. Casey, Jr. discussing the shooting at a press conference at Fort Hood
U.S. Government
A spokesman for the Defense Department called the shooting an "isolated and tragic case", and Defense Secretary Robert Gates pledged that his department would do "everything in its power to help the Fort Hood community get through these difficult times." The chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, and numerous politicians, expressed condolences to the victims and their families.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano stated "we object to—and do not believe—that anti-Muslim sentiment should emanate from this ... This was an individual who does not, obviously, represent the Muslim faith." Chief of Staff Gen. George W. Casey, Jr. said "I'm concerned that this increased speculation could cause a backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers ... Our diversity, not only in our Army, but in our country, is a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that’s worse."
In January 2010, a senior Obama administration official, who declined to be named, referred to the shooting as "an act of terrorism", however other administration officials have not referred to the shootings as a terrorist event.
Victims of the shooting were denied Purple Hearts as well as associate benefits. In 2013, during the 113th United States Congress, Representative Carter submitted the Honoring the Fort Hood Heroes Act for consideration. The bill was referred to committee. In 2015, a similar bill was introduced in the legislature of Texas, to award the Texas Purple Heart Medal to the shooting victims.
The National Defense Authorization Act 2015 authorizes the Department of Defense to award Purple Heart Medals to those wounded during the attack. The award was previously denied due to the categorization of the event as "workplace violence". The law requires that the Department of Defense to define the event as an "international terrorist attack". In February 2015, the Department of the Army approved awarding of the Purple Heart to those injured by Hasan during the shooting, providing those injured with a higher degree of services from the Veterans Affairs. The Army plans to present the Purple Hearts in April 2015; which was carried out on 10 April 2015. Following the awarding benefits for those wounded in hostile-fire were extended to the Purple Heart recipients, and it was announced that those killed and injured during the 2009 Little Rock recruiting office shooting would also receive the Purple Heart.
Veteran groups
Family members and troops attend a memorial service honoring the victims of the mass murder.
Veterans groups across the United States expressed condolences for victims of the attack. American Legion National Commander Clarence E. Hill stated, "The American Legion extends condolences to the victims and the families of those affected by the shootings at Fort Hood." Veterans of Foreign Wars National Commander Thomas J. Tradewell Sr. states, "The entire military family is grieving right now. I just want them to know they do not grieve alone. Our hearts and prayers are with them."
Military policy on bases
The Army places strict restrictions on personal firearms carried onto Fort Hood and other bases. Military weapons are used only for training or by base security. Personal weapons bought on base are required to be secured at all times and must be registered with the provost marshal. Specialist Jerry Richard, a soldier working at the Readiness Center, said he felt this policy left the soldiers vulnerable to violent assaults: "Overseas you are ready for it. But here you can't even defend yourself." Jacob Sullum, an opponent of gun control, described the base as a "gun-free zone."
Hasan's family
A spokesman for the Hasan family said the actions of their cousin were "despicable and deplorable", and do not reflect how they were raised.
American Muslim groups
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) condemned the shooting and noted that it was not in keeping with Muslim teachings. The spokesman asked Americans to treat it as an "isolated incident of a deranged individual." He pointed out that disturbed individuals could use any religion for their own purposes, but the Muslim community condemned this violence.
Salman al-Ouda, a dissident Saudi cleric and former inspiration to Osama bin Laden, condemned the shooting, saying the incident would have bad consequences:
"...undoubtedly this man might have a psychological problem; he may be a psychiatrist but he [also] might have had psychological distress, as he was being commissioned to go to Iraq or Afghanistan, and he was capable of refusing to work whatever the consequences were." The senior analyst at the NEFA Foundation described Ouda’s comments as "a good indication of how far on a tangent Anwar al-Awlaki is."
Anwar al-Awlaki
Main article: Anwar al-Awlaki
Soon after the attack, Anwar al-Awlaki posted praise for Hasan for the shooting on his website. He wrote, "Nidal Hasan is a hero, the fact that fighting against the U.S. army is an Islamic duty today cannot be disputed. Nidal has killed soldiers who were about to be deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan in order to kill Muslims." In March 2010, Al-Awlaki alleged that the Obama administration tried to portray Hasan's actions as an individual act of violence from an estranged individual, and that it was trying to suppress information for the American public. He said:
"Until this moment the administration is refusing to release the e-mails exchanged between myself and Nidal. And after the operation of our brother Umar Farouk the initial comments coming from the administration were looking the same – another attempt at covering up the truth. But Al Qaeda cut off Obama from deceiving the world again by issuing their statement claiming responsibility for the operation.
(Note: The US investigation found no evidence that ties Hasan to al-Qaeda. See section below.)
On April 6, 2010, The New York Times reported that President Obama had authorized the targeted killing of al-Awlaki, who had been hunted by the Yemen government since going into hiding. On September 30, 2011, two Predator drones fired missiles at a vehicle with al-Awlaki aboard, killing him and Samir Khan.
Investigation and prosecution
The criminal investigation was conducted jointly by the FBI, the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command, and the Texas Rangers Division. As a member of the military, Hasan is subject to the jurisdiction of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (military law). He was initially represented by Belton, Texas-based John P. Galligan, a criminal defense attorney and retired US Army Colonel. Hasan regained consciousness on November 9, but refused to talk to investigators. The investigative officer in charge of his article 32 hearing was Colonel James L. Pohl, who had previously led the investigation into the Abu Ghraib abuses, and is the Chief Presiding Officer of the Guantanamo military commissions.
On November 9, 2009, the FBI said that investigators believed Hasan had acted alone. They disclosed that they had reviewed evidence which included 2008 conversations with an individual that an official identified as Anwar al-Awlaki, but said they did not find any evidence that Hasan had received orders or help from anyone. According to a November 11 press release, after preliminary examination of Hasan’s computers and internet activity, they had found no information to indicate he had any co-conspirators or was part of a broader terrorist plot, stressing the "early stages" of the review. They said no e-mail communications with outside facilitators or known terrorists were found.
Investigators were evaluating reports that, in May 2001, Hasan had attended a mosque in Virginia for the funeral of his mother, which was attended that spring and summer by two of the 9/11 hijackers. The imam was the American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, then considered a moderate.[citation needed] Awlaki has since been accused of aiding the 9/11 plot and since 2006–2007 has been identified as radicalized. Investigators were trying to determine if al-Awlaki's teachings influenced Hasan. For ten years, Hasan prayed several times a week at the Muslim Community Center in Silver Spring, Maryland, closer to where he lived and worked.
Army officials said, "Right now we're operating on the belief that he acted alone and had no help". No motive for the shootings was offered, but they believed Hasan had written an Internet posting that appeared to support suicide bombings. Sen. Lieberman opined that Hasan was under personal stress and may have turned to Islamic extremism.
In pressing charges against Hasan, the Department of Defense and the DoJ agreed that Hasan would be prosecuted in a military court. Observers noted this was consistent with investigators' concluding he had acted alone. During a November 21 hearing in Hasan's hospital room, a magistrate ruled that there was probable cause that Hasan committed the November 5 shooting, and ordered that he be held in pre-trial confinement after being released from hospital care. On November 12 and December 2, respectively, Hasan was charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder by the Army; he may face additional charges at court-martial.
Prosecutors did not file a count for the death of the fetus of Francheska Velez. Such a charge is available to prosecutors under the Unborn Victims of Violence Act and Article 119a of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. If civilian prosecutors indicted him for being part of a terrorist plot, it could have justified moving all or part of his case into federal criminal courts under U.S. anti-terrorism laws. The military justice system rarely carries out capital punishment—and no executions have been carried out since 1961. Neither has any incident of mass murder been prosecuted by the military since then. (From 1916 to 1961, the U.S. Army executed 135 people.)
Trial
In late January 2011, Hasan was judged sane for trial by an Army sanity board, normally composed of doctors and psychologists. This allowed a capital trial, and more information about his mental state at the time of the shootings was able to be introduced by the defense during the trial.
He was formally arraigned on July 20, 2011. He did not enter a plea, and the judge granted a request by Hasan's attorneys that a plea be entered at a later, unspecified, date. The judge initially set a trial date for Maj. Hasan's court-martial for March 5, 2012. Later, the court-martial date was pushed back after Hasan switched lawyers, to provide them time to prepare his defense.
Having previously instructed Hasan to follow Army regulations and shave a beard he had grown, the judge, Colonel Gregory Gross, found him in contempt in July 2012 and fined him. His court-martial was set to begin on August 20, 2012. He was fined again for retaining his beard, and warned that he could be forcibly shaved prior to his court-martial.
On August 15, Hasan was scheduled to enter pleas to the charges brought against him before the beginning of the court-martial; he would not be allowed to plead guilty to the premeditated murder charges as the prosecution is pursuing the death penalty in his case. Hasan objected to being shaved against his will, and his attorney's appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces. Hasan said having a beard was part of his religious belief.
On August 27, the Appeals Court announced that the trial could continue, but did not rule whether Hasan could be forcibly shaved. The Appeals court has rejected previous attempts by Hasan to receive "religious accommodation" from Army Regulation to wear his beard. On September 6, Gross ordered that Hasan be shaved after it was determined that the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act did not apply to this case; however, it will not be enforced until his appeals are exhausted, further delaying the trial.
During the hearing on September 6, 2012, Hasan twice offered to plead guilty; however, Army rules at the time prohibited the judge from accepting a guilty plea in a death penalty case. On September 21, defense attorneys of Hasan filed two appeals with the Army Court of Criminal Appeals regarding his beard, postponing the trial. Residents of Killeen were upset about the delays in going to trial.
n mid-October, the Army Court of Criminal Appeals upheld Colonel Gross' decision that Hasan could be forcibly shaved. Hasan's attorneys filed an appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces seeking to overturn the lower court, and to have Gross removed.
On Tuesday, December 4, 2012, the Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces vacated Major Hasan's six convictions for contempt of court and removed the judge, Colonel Gregory Gross, from the case, stating he had not shown the requisite impartiality. The Court of Appeals overturned an order to have Hasan's beard be forcibly shaven; it did not rule on whether Hasan's religious rights had been violated. The Court of Appeals additionally ruled that it was the military command's responsibility, not the military judge, to ensure Hasan met grooming standards. The Army's Judge Advocate General appointed a new judge to replace Gross. The ruling was called "unusual" by Jeffrey Addicott of the Center for Terrorism Law at St. Mary's University, and called "rare" by military defense attorney Frank Spinner.
Colonel Tara A. Osborn was appointed as the new judge for the trial on the same day that Gross was removed. In 2011 Osborn presided over a death penalty case, the court martial of SGT Joseph Bozicevich, who was sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole for killing his squad leader and another soldier. In January 2013, Osborn was deliberating whether to remove the death penalty, due to the Defense attorney's claim that LTG Campbell was not impartial when it was decided that Hasan would face the death penalty. On January 31, Osborn ruled that a capital murder trial was constitutional, based on a 1996 Supreme Court case regarding Dwight J. Loving; Osborn additionally ruled that her court did not have jurisdiction regarding Hasan's beard, and it was a matter to take up with Hasan's chain of command. As of February 2013, the court-martial had been set to start in May 29, 2013, with jury selection to begin on July 1, 2013.
On June 3, 2013, a military judge gave approval for Hasan to represent himself at his upcoming murder trial. His attorneys were to remain on the case but only if he asked for their help. Jury selection started on June 5 and opening arguments took place on August 6. U.S. Army Judge Colonel Tara Osborn ruled on June 14, 2013 that Hasan couldn't claim as a part of his defense that he was defending the Taliban. The trial was scheduled to begin on August 6. During an exclusive interview with Fox News, Hasan justified his actions during the Fort Hood shooting by claiming that the US military was at war with Islam. This marked the first occasion that Hasan had talked to American media since his arrest. In the past, Hasan had only spoken via telephone with Al-Jazeera.
During the first day of the trial on August 6, Hasan—who was representing himself— admitted that he was the gunman during the Fort Hood shootings in 2009 and stated that the evidence would show that he was the shooter. He also told the panel hearing that he had "switched sides" and regarded himself as a Mujahideen waging "jihad" against the United States. By August 7, disagreements between Hasan and his stand-by defense team led Judge Osborn to suspend the proceedings. Hasan's defense attorneys were concerned that his defense strategy would lead to him receiving the death penalty. Since the prosecution had sought the death penalty, his defense team sought to prevent this.
Overall, the trial cost almost $5 million, with the largest expense being transportation, followed by expert witness fees.
Conviction and sentencing
On August 23, 2013, he was convicted on all charges after the jury deliberated for seven hours. Five days later, a U.S. military court sentenced him to death for the shootings. At the time of his sentencing, he became the sixth person on military death row.
Internal investigations
Main article: Joint Terrorism Task Force
The FBI noted that Hasan had first been brought to their attention in December 2008 by a Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF). Communications between Hasan and al-Awlaki, and other similar communications, were reviewed and considered to be consistent with Hasan's professional research at the Walter Reed Medical Center. "Because the content of the communications was explainable by his research and nothing else derogatory was found, the JTTF concluded that Major Hasan was not involved in terrorist activities or terrorist planning."
On December 2009, FBI Director Robert Mueller appointed William Webster, a former director of the FBI, to establish a commission to conduct an independent review of the FBI's handling of assessing the risk that Hasan posed.
On January 15, 2010, the Department of Defense released the findings of its investigation, which found that the Department was unprepared to defend against internal threats. Secretary Robert Gates said that previous incidents had not drawn enough attention to workplace violence and "self-radicalization" within the military. He also suggested that some officials may be held responsible for not drawing attention to Hasan prior to the shooting. The Department report did not touch upon Hasan's motives.
James Corum, a retired Army Reserve Lieutenant Colonel and Dean at the Baltic Defence College in Estonia, called the Defense Department report "a travesty", for failing to mention Hasan's devotion to Islam and his radicalization. Texas Representative John Carter criticized the report, saying he felt the government was "afraid to be accused of profiling somebody". John Lehman, a member of the 9/11 Commission and Secretary of the Navy under Ronald Reagan, said he felt that the report "shows you how deeply entrenched the values of political correctness have become." The columnist Debra Saunders of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote in an opinion piece: "Even ... if the report's purpose was to craft lessons to prevent future attacks, how could they leave out radical Islam?"
The leaders of the investigation, former Secretary of the Army Togo West and retired Admiral Vernon Clark, responded by saying their "concern is with actions and effects, not necessarily with motivations", and that they did not want to conflict with the criminal investigation on Hasan that was under way.
In February 2010, the Boston Globe obtained a confidential internal report detailing results of the Army's investigation. According to the Globe, the report concluded that officers within the Army were aware of Hasan's tendencies toward radical Islam since 2005. It noted one incident in 2007 in which Hasan gave a classroom presentation titled, "Is the War on Terrorism a War on Islam: An Islamic Perspective". The instructor reportedly interrupted Hasan, as he thought the psychiatrist was trying to justify terrorism, according to the Globe. Hasan's superior officers took no action related to this incident, believing Hasan's comments were protected under the First Amendment and that having a Muslim psychiatrist contributed to diversity. The report noted that Hasan's statements might have been grounds for removing him from service, as the First Amendment did not apply to soldiers in the same way as for civilians.
In July 2012, the Webster Commission's final report was submitted. Webster made 18 recommendations to the FBI. The report found issues in information sharing, failure to follow up on leads, computer technology issues, and failure of the FBI headquarters to coordinate two field offices working on leads related to Hasan.
In August 2013, Mother Jones magazine described multiple intercepted e-mails from Hasan to Awlaki. In one 2008 e-mail, Hasan asked Awlaki whether he considered those who died attacking their fellow soldiers "Shaheeds", or martyrs. In a 2009 e-mail, Hasan asked Awlaki whether "indiscriminately killing civilians" was allowed. Both e-mails were forwarded to the Defense Criminal Investigative Services (DCIS). However, DCIS failed to connect the two e-mails to each other, and the 2008 e-mail was given only a cursory investigation. A DCIS agent later explained that the subject was "politically sensitive".
In November 2013, Army Secretary John M. McHugh is quoted as writing that he has "directed my staff to conduct a thorough review of the record of trial in the court-martial of Major Hasan to ascertain if those proceedings revealed new evidence or information that establishes clearly the necessary link to international terrorism".
Lawsuit
A lawsuit filed in November 2011 by victims and their family members alleges that the government's failure to take action against Hasan before the attack was willful negligence prompted by "political correctness." The 83 claimants seek $750 million in compensation from the Army.
As of 2012, the Department of Defense classifies the case as one of workplace violence. A spokesman for the Department stated,
"The Department of Defense is committed to the integrity of the ongoing court martial proceedings of Major Nadal Hasan and for that reason will not further characterize, at this time, the incident that occurred at Fort Hood on November 5, 2009. Major Hassan has been charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder, and 32 counts of attempted murder. As with all pending UCMJ matters, the accused is innocent until proven guilty."
A group of 160 victims and family members have asked the government to declare the Fort Hood attack an act of terrorism, which would mean that injuries would be treated as if the victims were in a combat zone, providing them more benefits. US Representatives John R. Carter and Michael T. McCaul wrote, "Based on all the facts, it is inconceivable to us that the DOD and the Army continue to label this attack ‘workplace violence’ in spite of all the evidence that clearly proves the Fort Hood shooting was an act of terror." Carter and McCaul drew their conclusions from their interpretation of existing investigations.
On November 5, 2012, 148 plaintiffs, including victims and families of victims, filed a wrongful death claim against the United States Government, Hasan, and the estate of Anwar al-Awlaki. Their lawsuit alleges there were due process violations, intentional misrepresentation, assault and battery, gross negligence, and civil conspiracy.
The lawsuit was featured on ABC News on February 12, 2013.
See also:
1991 Luby's shooting – another mass shooting near Fort Hood
1995 William Kreutzer, Jr. case – convicted of killing an officer and wounding 17 other soldiers at Fort Bragg, North Carolina
2003 Hasan Akbar case – convicted of murder of two officers at Camp Pennsylvania, Kuwait
2005 deaths of Phillip Esposito and Louis Allen – Staff Sergeant Alberto Martinez was charged and subsequently acquitted of murdering his commander and another officer in Tikrit, Iraq.
2009 Camp Liberty killings – Sgt. John M. Russell charged with five counts of murder and one count of aggravated assault for attack at Camp Liberty, Iraq
2009 Little Rock recruiting office shooting – Major Hasan was "happy" about Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad drive-by shooting of two soldiers
2009 Lloyd R. Woodson case – arrested with military-grade illegal weapons and a detailed map of the Fort Drum military installation
2013 Chris Kyle – murder of celebrated Iraq sniper with no established motive by Marine said to suffer from PTSD
2013 Washington Navy Yard shooting – a mass shooting at the Naval Sea Systems Command headquarters with 13 people dead
2014 Fort Hood shooting – another mass shooting at Fort Hood with four people dead and 12 others wounded
2015 Chattanooga shootings – a spree shooting at two military installations with five people dead and three others wounded
Capital punishment by the United States military
List of massacres in the United States
Naser Jason Abdo
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Fort Bliss shooting: Retired soldier who shot 2 is killed outside store
'It was senseless'
archive.elpasotimes.com/ci_16138637
By Chris Roberts and Adriana M. Chávez \ El Paso Times
POSTED: 09/22/2010
FORT BLISS -- Retired Army Sgt. Steven Kropf apparently flashed his military identification card on Monday and drove onto the post carrying a revolver he used to kill one woman and seriously injure another, officials said Tuesday.
Kropf, a 63-year-old El Paso resident, entered the crowded shoppette at 1333 Cassidy Road, went to offices at the rear of the store and shot Bettina Maria Goins, 44, of El Paso, and another woman, in the head, officials said. After the shooting, Kropf walked to the parking lot and sat in his car, where he was shot dead by Army civilian police, said officials of the FBI, which is handling the case.
Officials would not elaborate on what led to police shooting Kropf. Police fired twice at Kropf.
Goins and the other woman, whom officials have not identified, were taken to Beaumont Army Medical Center, where Goins died. The other victim was recovering at Beaumont late Tuesday. Officials said she was shot in the head and the chest. The caliber of the weapon used has not been disclosed.
Few other details on the shooting were offered Tuesday. Maj. Gen. Dana Pittard, the post commander, said officials were ensuring that information made public was factual.
"Our heart, our prayers and our condolences go out to the victims of (Monday's) tragic events," Pittard said at an afternoon news conference in the shoppette's parking lot.
Goins was "a mother of two, a grandmother of two and she was a great friend to many.
And again, we are so sorry for that loss. We also have another team Bliss member who is currently fighting for her life, but is in stable condition right now."
FBI officials said a motive was still under investigation.
However, Maria-Laura Nasti, Goins' daughter, and Kim Rodriguez, who described herself as Goins' best friend, provided some details of the violence. Much of that information was given to them by officials handling the case, they said.
Kropf apparently had a history of angry outbursts and had been fired from a post convenience store for chasing an alleged beer thief, which was against store policy, Rodriguez said. Kropf called the Fort Bliss shoppette Monday looking for his girlfriend, who reportedly worked at one of the post's stores, she said. When Kropf called the store, the unnamed victim told him she could not give him any information.
Goins worked at another convenience store on post and was at the shoppette where the shooting took place to pick up additional Halloween candy, Nasti said.
A short while later, about 3 p.m., Kropf showed up in the store and began shooting. Goins was an innocent bystander, Nasti said.
"He took her away from us," Nasti said. "It was senseless."
A neighbor of Kropf's said he did not know him well and exchanged pleasantries when Kropf walked his dog in the neighborhood.
"They kept to themselves," George Lewis said.
Lewis said he thought Kropf was married and moved into the neighborhood in the Northeast about a year ago. He also said he thought the woman moved away a month or two ago.
Counseling had been provided to shoppers and witnesses of the shooting, Pittard said.
After speaking with employees, officials decided to reopen the shoppette today, Pittard said.
Pittard said the post will increase random vehicle inspections at the entry gates and review its policy on private wea pons on post. But he said the shooting was "an isolated incident," and described Kropf as "one disgruntled, deranged individual."
"Fort Bliss is still, and remains still, one of the safest installations in our country, one of the safest places to live and work in our country," Pittard said.
Generally speaking, people are not supposed to carry loaded private weapons on post, an official said. But all retired military receive identification cards they can use to enter the post. And random inspections will not catch every person with a weapon.
"The way we look at this, it's not about just the gate -- that if you just make the gate large enough and strong enough that you can prevent anything like this from happening," Pittard said. "That's not what it's about. It's about making sure that we have resilient systems in place where we can react and respond and take care of our soldiers, family members and civilians here on post."
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France and Italy Will Also Send Advisers to Libya Rebels
By ALAN COWELL and RAVI SOMAIYA - APRIL 20, 2011
www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/world/africa/21libya.html
PARIS — The French and Italian governments said Wednesday that they would join Britain in sending a small number of military liaison officers to support the ragtag rebel army in Libya, offering a diplomatic boost for the insurgent leader, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, as he met with President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris.
After the meeting, The Associated Press reported, Mr. Sarkozy pledged to intensify French airstrikes that started in March.
The announcements came as the international community searched for a means to break a bloody battlefield deadlock that has killed hundreds in the contested cities of Misurata and Ajdabiya and left the rebels in tenuous control of a few major coastal cities in their campaign against Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.
Hartmann Washington
It is obvious that France and England will never again deal with Qaddafi. If he is not removed from power, then Libyan oil will never flow again to France and England.
They also coincided with word out of Qatar that Moussa Koussa, the former Libyan foreign minister who defected to Britain last month, was seeking asylum in that Arab emirate. In an interview with Al Arabiya, another Qaddafi minister, Abdulrahman Shalgam, said that Mr. Koussa — who has been freed of the financial sanctions slapped on all Libyan officials but who faces possible prosecution over the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 in Scotland — is most likely to remain in Qatar, where he went for a conference last week.
Pictured: President Nicholas Sarkozy of France with Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, the head of the Libyan rebel council, in Paris on Wednesday. - Credit Philippe Wojazer/Reuters
The decision to send military advisers seemed to push the three countries closer toward the limits of the United Nations Security Council resolution in mid-March authorizing NATO airstrikes but specifically “excluding a foreign occupation force of any form on any part of Libyan territory.” But the promised deployments also seemed a tacit admission that almost five weeks of airstrikes have not been enough to disable Colonel Qaddafi’s troops and prevent his loyalists from threatening rebel forces and civilians.
The French government spokesman, François Baroin, told reporters on Wednesday that the number of military liaison officers would be in single digits and that their mission would be to help “organize the protection of the civilian population.” The British deployment could involve up to 20 advisers.
William Hague, the British foreign secretary, said on Tuesday that the British advisers would help the makeshift rebel forces “improve their military organizational structures, communications and logistics.”
Italy’s defense minister, Ignazio La Russa, said at a news conference Wednesday that Italy would send advisers “according to the needs” of the rebels. He said the advisers’ specific mission had not yet been determined. “They won’t be on the battlefield,” he said. “They’ll be mentors, they won’t accompany them. Training is one thing, participation another.”
Mr. La Russa said he believed that the rebels had more weapons than the ones they had taken from Colonel Qaddafi’s stockpiles. “They’re rich in enthusiasm, they want to fight for liberty, but naturally they are poor in experience and arms,” Mr. La Russa said of the rebels. “I don’t think they only have arms from the Qaddafi army. Some help arrived,” he added without elaborating further.
The moves to send military personnel have been likened by some critics to America’s decision to send military advisers to Vietnam, raising worries in both countries that they are being drawn closer to a conflict with no clear resolution on behalf of a fractious and militarily ineffective insurgent force about which little is known.
Facing restive electorates and with their forces already deployed in Afghanistan, European governments want to be seen in strict compliance with the U.N. resolution authorizing “all necessary measures” to protect civilians in Libya, short of an occupation.
But, in Britain at least, some lawmakers have noted that their government’s involvement has already progressed from the supply of body armor and communications equipment to the rebels, announced a week ago, to sending advisers, prompting questions about what further embroilment might entail.
Sir Menzies Campbell, the former leader of the Liberal Democrat Party, which is now part of a governing coalition with the Conservatives, said Tuesday that the advisers “must not be seen as a first installment of further military deployment.” He added, “Vietnam began with an American president sending military advisers.”
Members of Parliament have also called for a fresh debate. “This is clear evidence of mission creep,” said John Baron, a Conservative member. “Now we are beginning to put military personnel on the ground, something that wasn’t even discussed when we debated this issue.”
France’s foreign minister, Alain Juppé, told reporters in Paris on Tuesday that he remained “absolutely opposed to a deployment of troops on the ground, “ words echoed on Wednesday by Defense Minister Gérard Longuet, who said the Security Council resolution permitting airstrikes did not authorize the use of foreign ground forces.
On Wednesday, nonetheless, the satirical and investigative French weekly Le Canard Enchaîné reported that, along with Britain and the United States, France had sent covert special forces to Libya three weeks ago to assess the impact of allied airstrikes.
The Libyan government criticized the British decision to send advisers, saying the move would prolong conflict. Instead, Libya’s foreign minister, Abdul Ati al-Obeidi, used a BBC interview broadcast on Wednesday to renew the Tripoli authorities’ frequent call for a cease-fire and a suspension of NATO bombing to permit a settlement negotiated by Libyans themselves without foreign interference.
“We think any military presence is a step backwards,” Mr. Obeidi said, “and we are sure that if this bombing stopped and there is a real cease-fire we could have a dialogue among all Libyans about what they want — democracy, political reform, constitution, election. This could not be done with what is going on now.”
Mr. Obeidi said that following a cease-fire, the Libyan government was open to establishing an interim government and a six-month transition to United Nations-supervised elections, BBC radio reported, adding: “The foreign minister said the election could cover any issue raised by all Libyans, anything could go on the table, including, he implied, the future of Qaddafi as leader.”
Libyan opposition leaders have dismissed as trickery any offer that does not begin with Colonel Qaddafi’s resignation and the banishment of him and his family from the country.
President Sarkozy met Mr. Abdel-Jalil, formerly Colonel Qaddafi’s justice minister, to try to find a means to break the deadlock and to debate “the process of democratic transition,” according to a statement from the French president’s office.
The prime minister, François Fillon, who also planned to meet Mr. Abdel-Jalil on Wednesday, was quoted in news reports as saying France would intensify airstrikes “to prevent Qaddafi forces from pursuing their attacks on civilian populations.”
“But at the same time, we will need to find a political solution, that is, conditions for a dialogue so that the Libyan crisis can be resolved,” he said in Kiev, Ukraine, according to Agence France-Presse.
Libyan state television reported on Wednesday that NATO warplanes had struck telecommunications and broadcasting infrastructure. But it did not say where or when the reported attacks took place.
Allied bombing sorties and Tomahawk missiles have failed to tip the balance decisively in favor of a rebel group with disjointed leadership, limited weapons and many inexperienced fighters. And civilian casualties have continued to mount. On Tuesday, the United Nations said that at least 20 children had been killed in the siege of Misurata.
Alan Cowell reported from Paris, and Ravi Somaiya from London. Scott Sayare contributed reporting from Paris and Rachel Donadio from Rome.
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2014 Fort Hood shooting
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Fort_Hood_shooting
On April 2, 2014, a shooting spree occurred at several locations on the Fort Hood military base near Killeen, Texas. Four people, including the gunman, were killed, while fourteen additional people were injured, twelve by gunshot wounds. The shooter, 34-year-old Army Specialist Ivan Lopez, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Shootings
Immediately prior to the shooting, Lopez went to the 49th Transportation Battalion administrative office, where he tried to seek a ten-day leave form so he could attend to "family matters". However, he was informed that he would have to come back later to retrieve it, sparking a verbal altercation between him and several other soldiers. The request was ultimately denied because Lopez had already secured housing in an apartment in Killeen.
Lopez then went outside to smoke a cigarette. At approximately 4:00 p.m., he returned and opened fire with a .45-caliber Smith & Wesson M&P pistol inside the same building, injuring two soldiers: Sgt. Jonathan Westbrook, one of the soldiers involved in the altercation with Lopez, who was hit four times; and Maj. Patrick Miller, who sheltered other soldiers in his office despite being shot in the stomach. Lopez also killed Sgt. First Class Daniel Ferguson, another soldier involved in the altercation, while the latter was barricading a conference room door that couldn't be locked.
He then got into his car and drove slowly to a motor pool building to which he had been assigned, firing at two soldiers and wounding one of them along the way on 73rd Street. Upon reaching the building, Lopez fired at a female soldier inside the office, but missed her and grazed the head of another soldier. He then killed Sgt. Timothy Owens when he approached him and tried to talk him down, and wounded another soldier. He then moved on to the building's vehicle bay area, where he injured two soldiers, after which his weapon misfired. Lopez then proceeded to the 1st Medical Brigade headquarters in his car.
Along the way, he fired a round into a car occupied by two soldiers, wounding the passenger. Reaching the intersection of 73rd Street and Motorpool Road, Lopez shot at two other soldiers, but missed both of them. Reaching the medical building, Lopez shot and wounded 1st Lt. John Arroyo, Jr., in the throat as he was walking outside in the western parking lot. He then entered the building and fatally shot a soldier at the main entrance desk, Staff Sgt. Carlos Lazaney-Rodriguez; he also wounded two other soldiers inside. Then, Lopez walked down the main hallway, wounded another soldier, and exited through a doorway.
Approximately eight minutes after the shooting first started, Lopez drove to the parking lot of another building, Building 39002, where he was confronted by an unidentified female military police officer, with whom he had a verbal exchange. When he brandished his weapon, the officer fired a shot at him that missed. Lopez responded by committing suicide, shooting himself in the right side of the head with his own pistol. A total of 34 rounds were fired during the shooting spree: eleven at the administrative office, nine at the motor pool building, five at the medical building, and nine from inside his car. It was later revealed that Lopez, who was in uniform at the time of the shooting, wasn't authorized to carry a concealed firearm.
Victims
Three people, excluding the gunman, were killed in the shooting. They were identified as:
Name Age Hometown Rank/occupation Notes
Daniel M. Ferguson 39 Mulberry, Florida, U.S. Sergeant First Class Died while barricading a door
Timothy W. Owens 37 Effingham, Illinois, U.S. Sergeant Died while trying to talk down Lopez
Carlos A. Lazaney-Rodriguez 38 Aguadilla, Puerto Rico Staff Sergeant
Aftermath
During the shooting, the Bell County Communications Center dispatched deputies and troopers from the Texas Department of Public Safety to the nearby post after receiving reports of an "active shooter", sheriff's Lt. Donnie Adams said. Federal Bureau of Investigation spokeswoman Michelle Lee said its agents were also headed to the scene. The base confirmed the shooting in a brief statement posted online on April 2, 2014. On its Twitter feed and Facebook page, Fort Hood officials ordered everyone on base to "shelter in place" during the shooting.
All of the injured victims were taken to Carl R. Darnall Army Medical Center, for initial treatment and stabilization. Once they were stabilized they were then transferred to Scott & White Memorial Hospital where they received further care. As of April 10, twelve of the sixteen wounded have been released from the hospitals and returned to duty, while the other four remain hospitalized in stable condition.
Reacting to the incident, President Barack Obama said at a fundraiser in Chicago that he was left "heartbroken" and assured that the events would be investigated. The base was previously the scene of a mass shooting in 2009, in which 13 people were killed and more than 30 wounded. One week after the shooting, Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama traveled to Fort Hood to attend a ceremony honoring the victims.
On April 16, discussion was renewed over if soldiers should be allowed to carry concealed firearms on military bases in Texas and other states.
On January 23, 2015, the Army concluded from an investigation into the shooting that there was no indication of a possibility of violent behavior from Lopez through his medical and personnel records. A report on the investigation cited that Lopez's commanders knew very little of his personal difficulties and would have provided him with help had he disclosed these difficulties. It also highlighted gaps in information sharing, as Lopez's supervisors believed they were unable to obtain his personal information due to federal medical privacy laws. Previously, in the wake of the aforementioned 2009 Fort Hood shooting, information sharing regarding medical history was among 78 recommendations suggested to identify the risk of violent behavior. However, this recommendation was not implemented due to "constraints on exchanging information between military and civilian behavioral health care providers". The 2015 report recommended improvements with the level of contact between commanders and their newly assigned soldiers, and that soldiers should register personally owned weapons with their commanders.
Perpetrator
Ivan A. Lopez-Lopez (October 23, 1979 – April 2, 2014) was an Iraq War veteran who was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico. He enlisted in the Puerto Rico National Guard on January 4, 1999, but was unable to pass a required English language course and was subsequently discharged on November 30 of the same year. Lopez reenlisted on April 30, 2003, as an infantryman and served until 2010. He also joined the United States Army in June 2008. He was married and had four children, two of them from a previous marriage.
Service in the U.S. Army
Lopez was a specialist, and at the time of the shooting, he was assigned to the 13th Sustainment Command, a logistics and support unit at Fort Hood. He was previously assigned in Fort Bliss, but was transferred to another base for four months, then moved to Fort Hood two months prior to the shooting. Lopez previously reported at Fort Hood in 2006 during his time in the Puerto Rico National Guard, where he was given orders to deploy to Egypt from February 15, 2007, to February 10, 2008.
From August 6 to December 18, 2011, Lopez served a tour in Iraq, participating in Operation New Dawn as security detail. On or about December 12, his convoy was involved in a roadside bombing. Though Lopez would allege that he had experiences in direct combat in Iraq and cited the bombing of his convoy, investigators determined he was not within the blast radius of the bomb used.
On November 29, 2013, he began receiving training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, graduating three months later. During his time there, he attempted to purchase a weapon on two separate occasions. On the second occasion, Lopez was persuaded by a classmate to reconsider the purchase.
Motives for the shooting
Lopez was allegedly distraught over financial issues and the deaths of his grandfather and then his mother during a two-month period five months prior to the shooting. He was also undergoing regular psychiatric treatment for depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder. He tried to take a leave of absence in order to attend his mother's funeral in Puerto Rico. It took five days for the leave to be approved, but he was only allowed to be absent for 24 hours, which allegedly upset him. The leave was eventually extended to two days. More recently, Lopez had asked for a transfer, claiming that he was "being taunted and picked on" by other soldiers in his unit.
During a press conference on the day of the shooting, Fort Hood Commander Mark A. Milley stated that Lopez died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. On March 1, 2014, over one month prior to the shooting, Lopez purchased the weapon used in the shooting from Guns Galore, the same store where Nidal Malik Hasan, the convicted perpetrator of the Fort Hood shooting in 2009, originally purchased his own weapon. Lopez's weapon was not registered with the installation. He had previously purchased a firearm of the same model, unregistered with the installation, on February 23, although he reported it stolen on March 1, the same day he bought a replacement. During that same month, he had seen a psychologist and was prescribed Ambien for a sleeping problem.
In his Facebook account, Lopez made posts in which he alleged that he was robbed by two men and also criticized Adam Lanza, the perpetrator of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012. Lopez also described his experiences in direct combat during his tour in Iraq, although military officials confirmed that Lopez did not experience any direct combat. A Facebook page created by Lopez claimed that he was a sniper who had been to the Central African Republic.
On March 24, Lopez's battalion began tracking a ten-day permissive temporary duty (PTDY) request he made immediately after joining Fort Hood so he could help his family relocate to an apartment in Killeen, as his current one was burglarized. He was given a four-day pass by his acting sergeant, who informed him that he would receive PTDY after his return. Lopez spent the pass from March 27 to March 30. He returned to Fort Hood on March 31, though when he received the PTDY form, it was filled with errors and Lopez had to resubmit it with corrections. Though the corrected form was signed, it did not have a control number, which is reported to have led to the conflict in the 49th Transportation Battalion office that sparked the shooting.
See also:
2009 Fort Hood shooting, a fatal shooting in the same area in 2009 where 13 were killed and more than 30 were injured
Gun violence in the United States
Washington Navy Yard shooting, a mass shooting committed in 2013 at the United States Naval Sea Systems Command
2015 Chattanooga shootings, a spree shooting committed in 2015 at two military installations in Chattanooga, Tennessee
Luby's shooting, another mass shooting in Killeen, Texas
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U.S. to Commit Up to 3,000 Troops to Fight Ebola in Africa
By HELENE COOPER, MICHAEL D. SHEAR and DENISE GRADYSEPT. 15, 2014
www.nytimes.com/2014/09/16/world/africa/obama-to-announce-expanded-effort-against-ebola.html?_r=0
WASHINGTON — Under pressure to do more to confront the Ebola outbreak sweeping across West Africa, President Obama on Tuesday is to announce an expansion of military and medical resources to combat the spread of the deadly virus, administration officials said.
The president will go beyond the 25-bed portable hospital that Pentagon officials said they would establish in Liberia, one of the three West African countries ravaged by the disease, officials said. Mr. Obama will offer help to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia in the construction of as many as 17 Ebola treatment centers in the region, with about 1,700 treatment beds.
Dr. Mosoka Fallah, center, an epidemiologist and immunologist, with residents of New Kru Town, a district in Monrovia, Liberia.Back to the Slums of His Youth, to Defuse the Ebola Time Bomb SEPT. 13, 2014
Times Topic: The Ebola Outbreak in West Africa
Senior administration officials said Monday night that the Department of Defense would open a joint command operation in Monrovia, Liberia, to coordinate the international effort to combat the disease. The military will also provide engineers to help construct the additional treatment facilities and will send enough people to train up to 500 health care workers a week to deal with the crisis.
The body of a man thought to have died of Ebola on a Monrovia, Liberia, street on Monday. The Liberian president has implored President Obama to do more. Credit Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times
Officials said the military expected to send as many as 3,000 people to Africa to take charge of responding to the Ebola outbreak.
“We all recognize that this is such an extraordinary, serious epidemic,” a senior official told reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of Mr. Obama’s public remarks on Tuesday. The efforts should turn the tide from a high-transmission epidemic that continues to grow every day, other officials said.
The White House plan would increase the number of doctors and other health care workers being sent to West Africa from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other American agencies, officials said.
The American government will also provide 400,000 Ebola home health and treatment kits to Liberia, as well as tens of thousands of kits intended to test whether people have the disease. The Pentagon will provide some logistical equipment for health workers going to West Africa and what administration officials described as “command and control” organizational assistance on how to coordinate the overall relief work. The Army Corps of Engineers is expected to be part of the Defense Department effort.
Administration officials did not say how soon the 17 treatment centers would be built in Liberia; officials there, as well as international aid officials, have said that 1,000 beds are needed in Liberia in the next week alone to contain a disease that has been spreading exponentially.
Monrovia, the Liberian capital, is facing a widespread Ebola epidemic, and as the number of infected grows faster than hospital capacity, some patients wait outside near death. By Ben C. Solomon on Publish Date September 11, 2014.
Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease and public health expert at Vanderbilt University, praised the plan, calling it a “major commitment,” and said it was more extensive than he had expected.
“It seems coordinated and coherent,” Dr. Schaffner said. He added that “the real core” was the Defense Department’s logistical support “because the heart of any kind of epidemic containment concept is getting the goods to the right place, putting up the institution.”
Michael T. Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said the plan was an important first step, “but it is clearly not enough.” The focus on Liberia, he said, is too limited, and more help should be extended to Sierra Leone and Guinea, the other countries at the center of the worst Ebola outbreak ever recorded.
“We should see all of West Africa now as one big outbreak,” Dr. Osterholm said. “It’s very clear we have to deal with all the areas with Ebola. If the U.S. is not able or not going to do it, that’s all the more reason to say the rest of the world has to do it.”
Dr. Jack Chow, a professor of global health at Carnegie Mellon University, also warned that “the virus does not recognize national borders and will continue to spread where health care is inadequate.”
Graphic: How Many Ebola Patients Have Been Treated Outside of Africa?
Top White House aides on Monday rejected criticism from African officials, doctors and representatives from aid groups who said the United States had been slow to act in the face of the disease. Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, said the government, including the C.D.C., had committed more than $100 million since the outbreak started in the early spring.
“The C.D.C. has responded commensurate to the seriousness” of the crisis, Mr. Earnest told reporters ahead of a trip Mr. Obama has planned to the agency’s headquarters in Atlanta on Tuesday afternoon. Mr. Earnest called the response “among the largest deployments of C.D.C. personnel ever.”
Senior administration officials conceded that the effort must expand further as the outbreak threatens to spread in Africa and, potentially, beyond the continent. Officials said medical experts in the government were genuinely worried about the possibility of a mutation that could turn the virus into a more contagious sickness that could threaten the United States.
The World Health Organization has issued a dire Ebola warning for Liberia, saying that the number of afflicted patients was increasing exponentially and that all new treatment facilities were overwhelmed, “pointing to a large but previously invisible caseload.” The description of the crisis in Liberia suggested an even more chaotic situation there than had been thought.
Ms. Johnson Sirleaf, who has implored Mr. Obama to do more to help her country battle the disease, traveled over the weekend through Monrovia, the Liberian capital, with the United States ambassador, Deborah R. Malac.
“What is needed is on a scale that is unprecedented,” a senior administration official said in an interview, speaking on the condition of anonymity because she was not allowed by the White House to talk on the record ahead of Mr. Obama’s announcement.
The United States, a second senior administration official said, also plans to send 400,000 home protective kits to the four counties in Liberia that have been hardest hit by Ebola. The kits will include protective gear for family members, gloves and masks, disinfectants, and fever-reducing drugs.
That is worrisome, Dr. Osterholm said, because it is difficult to care for Ebola patients without becoming infected, and there is no proof that the kits will work. “We are going to endanger family members more by providing the kits,” he said.
Helene Cooper and Michael D. Shear reported from Washington, and Denise Grady from New York.
A version of this article appears in print on September 16, 2014, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Obama to Call for Expansion of Ebola Fight.
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Thomas Eric Duncan: First Ebola death in U.S.
By Greg Botelho and Jacque Wilson, CNN
Updated 3:19 PM ET, Wed October 8, 2014
www.cnn.com/2014/10/08/health/thomas-eric-duncan-ebola/
Thomas Eric Duncan left Liberia for the United States, by official accounts, a healthy man. Just over two weeks later, he passed away at a Dallas, Texas, hospital with Ebola.
Duncan was admitted into isolation at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital on September 28 with common symptoms of Ebola: fever, vomiting and diarrhea. He later tested positive for the virus that has killed more than 3,400 people in West Africa.
He was started on the experimental drug brincidofovir on October 4 -- far too long after he arrived at the hospital, his family has said. On Tuesday, the hospital reported that Duncan was on a ventilator and his kidneys were failing.
Duncan died on Wednesday at 7:51 a.m.
"His suffering is over," his partner Louise Troh said in a statement. "My family is in deep sadness and grief, but we leave him in the hands of God. Our deepest sympathies go out to his father and family in Liberia and here in America. Eric was a wonderful man who showed compassion toward all."
Who was Duncan, besides the first person to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States? When did he start to feel sick, and why couldn't the U.S. health care system save him?
"The past week has been an enormous test of our health system, but for one family it has been far more personal," Dr. David Lakey, commissioner of the Texas Department of State Health Services, said in a statement. "The doctors, nurses and staff at Presbyterian provided excellent and compassionate care, but Ebola is a disease that attacks the body in many ways. We'll continue every effort to contain the spread of the virus and protect people from this threat."
Who was Thomas Eric Duncan?
He was a 42-year-old Liberian citizen. Duncan's Facebook page indicates that he's from the Liberian capital of Monrovia, where he attended E. Jonathan Goodridge High School.
Why did he come to the United States?
To visit family and friends. Duncan was visiting his son and his son's mother in Dallas, according to Wilfred Smallwood, Duncan's half-brother, who noted this was Duncan's first trip to America.
When did Duncan leave Liberia?
He departed the West African nation on September 19, CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden says.
How did he get Ebola?
Health authorities haven't said.
Witnesses say Duncan had been helping Ebola patients in Liberia. Liberian community leader Tugbeh Chieh Tugbeh said Duncan was caring for an Ebola-infected patient at a residence in Paynesville City, just outside Monrovia.
The New York Times reported that Duncan had direct contact with a pregnant woman stricken with Ebola on September 15, days before he left for the United States. Citing the woman's parents and Duncan's neighbors in Monrovia, Liberia, the newspaper said Duncan had helped carry the ailing woman home after a hospital turned her away because there wasn't enough space in its Ebola treatment ward.
Was he screened for Ebola before getting on the plane?
Yes, according to Binyah Kesselly, board chairman of the Liberia Airport Authority.
"The first screening was at the gate, before you get to the parking lot. The second time is before you enter the terminal building and the third is before you board the flight. At every point your temperature is scanned."
His temperature at those checkpoints was a consistent 97.3 degrees Fahrenheit, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention chief Thomas Frieden told reporters Thursday.
Yet on a health screening questionnaire, Duncan answered "no" to questions about whether he had cared for a patient with the deadly virus and whether he had touched the body of someone who died in an area affected by the disease, Kesselly said.
Complete coverage on Ebola
When did his Ebola symptoms appear?
"Four or five days" after his trip, according to the CDC's Frieden.
This doesn't mean that Duncan actually got infected with Ebola in the United States. The incubation period for the virus is 2 to 21 days, meaning that a person could be infected with the disease for up to three weeks before showing any signs of it.
When he did seek medical help?
Duncan first walked into Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas after 10 p.m. on September 25.
Smallwood reports Duncan had a fever and was vomiting during this first visit to the Dallas hospital. The hospital, in a statement, said he had a "low grade fever and abdominal pain."
He underwent basic blood tests but wasn't screened for Ebola, said Dr. Edward Goodman from the Dallas hospital. Duncan left the medical facility after being given antibiotics and a pain reliever, his friend said.
"His condition did not warrant admission," the hospital said. "He also was not exhibiting symptoms specific to Ebola."
Were flags raised that Duncan might have Ebola?
After being asked by a nurse, Duncan did say that he'd traveled from Africa, said Dr. Mark Lester, executive vice president of Texas Health Presbyterian's parent company.
But that detail -- which might have raised an alarm that Duncan might have Ebola, since Liberia is one of the countries hardest hit by the virus -- was not "fully communicated" to the medical team, according to Lester.
When was he admitted to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital?
On September 28. By the time Duncan arrived via ambulance, "EMS had already identified potential need for isolation," the hospital said.
What treatment did he receive?
Duncan was given supportive therapy -- meaning fluids and other therapies that would help support his immune system while it was trying to fight off the virus. He was also started on the experimental anti-viral drug brincidofovir on October 4.
Since the drugs being used to treat Ebola are still experimental, it is up to each individual hospital to file the paperwork with the Food and Drug Administration for permission to get the drug from the manufacturer and use it.
The hospital has declined to tell CNN when they filed for permission to the FDA to use brincidofovir.
"The care team has been consulting with the CDC and Emory, on a daily basis since Mr. Duncan was admitted to the hospital, discussing the possible course of treatment, including the use of investigational drugs," hospital spokesman Wendell Watson said in a statement.
Family questions wait on experimental drug
Duncan was not given a blood transfusion with blood donated by an Ebola survivor, as Ebola patients Dr. Rick Sacra and Ashoka Mukpo were given in Nebraska.
Why did he die?
The other Ebola patients brought to the United States for treatment are still alive. Three have been released from the hospital and one is reportedly in stable condition at The Nebraska Medical Center. So what's different about Duncan?
As Lakey said, Ebola attacks the body in many ways. Experts estimate the current outbreak in West Africa has around a 71% fatality rate. Supportive therapy can help, but there are no proven cures for the disease.
Duncan did not start receiving treatment until several days after he started experiencing symptoms, which may have contributed to his rapid decline.
What will happen to his body?
An Ebola patient's body is still highly infectious. Any contact with the bodily fluids could result in transmission of the virus. "Only personnel trained in handling infected human remains, and wearing PPE (personal protective equipment), should touch, or move, any Ebola-infected remains," CDC guidelines state. "Autopsies on patients who die of Ebola should be avoided."
Duncan's body will be enclosed in two bags and the bags will be disinfected for transportation, Texas health officials say. Then the body will be cremated.
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Why is Obama taking reservists out of civilian jobs to send into Ebola hot zones?
Written by Allen West on October 17, 2014
www.allenbwest.com/2014/10/obama-taking-reservists-civilian-jobs-send-ebola-hot-zones/
Some things are just dumb and some things are absolutely insane. Such is the decision made by Barack Hussein Obama via executive order on Thursday.
As reported by Politico, “President Obama authorized the Pentagon to call up military reservists to help fight the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. The president issued an executive order and a letter to Congress that said he’d deemed it “necessary to augment the active armed forces of the United States for the effective conduct of Operation United Assistance, which is providing support to civilian-led humanitarian assistance and consequence management support related to the Ebola virus disease outbreak in West Africa.”
“About 540 U.S. active duty troops are now posted in Liberia, helping its government, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other agencies fight the outbreak. Obama’s order would permit the Pentagon to call up National Guard troops or military reservists to join the effort.”
I do believe the U.S. military can play a part in combatting the spread of the Ebola virus — here in America, but not overseas — and especially not in the Ebola “hot zone. Of course it’s just too easy to point out the irony of Obama’s intransigence regarding “boots on the ground” to combat an enemy that has beheaded Americans — but somehow combatting Ebola is more important.
If we have healthcare professionals in America who have contracted this disease, why are we sending in our own troops who aren’t trained or prepared for this endeavor? And where is the United Nations? Where is the World Health Organization?
So now we’re going to take men and women out of their civilian jobs and deploy them into a dangerous virus zone? Has Obama secured safe transit and clearance for these troops when they redeploy from West Africa? I understand our military providing humanitarian assistance – as a matter of fact in late 2005, I remember an earthquake hitting us in Kabul ,Afghanistan at the Military Training Center. The epicenter was over in Pakistan. And our military executed humanitarian assistance operations into Pakistan to provide aid. It’s important to note the exact same helicopters that were flying combat operations in Afghanistan were tasked to fly cross-border into the country where the enemy had sanctuary to fulfill that mission.
We got that, and saluted our brave men and women, saluted the flag and executed the operation. However, in this case, Obama is deploying our men and women into an area where they’ll be exposed to a deadly killer enemy against which they cannot fight. Why? Is this the warped sense of commitment Obama sees for our military that he and his policies are decimating?
Politico reports “as many as 4,000 or more American troops could deploy to West Africa to help fight the Ebola outbreak there, Pentagon press secretary Rear Adm. John Kirby said Thursday. They’re helping build and support Ebola treatment units, run mobile testing labs and train health care workers in an all-out effort to containing the deadly virus. USAID’s leader in Monrovia, Ben Hemingway, told reporters at the Pentagon by phone on Thursday that it was “difficult” to assess whether the outbreak has slowed since the international response began. The current military commander in Liberia, Maj. Gen. Darryl Williams (an Army Artilleryman with whom I served in the 4th Infantry Division) said Marines are still flying to remote parts of the country doing “site surveys” for areas where they could build the Ebola treatment units.”
“U.S. troops have been tasked with building 17 treatment centers, 65 “community care centers” and setting up four more mobile testing labs. The Pentagon estimates operations there could last a year or more. Each service member deploying to Liberia is getting special instructions on preventing infection, Williams said, and everyone is taking intense precautions to avoid infection. For example, Williams estimated he’d had his temperature taken eight times just on Wednesday. “It’s discipline,” he said. “Everyday in the morning with my breakfast, I take a malaria pill … We don’t shake hands. I wash my hands — a lot — with chlorine.”
“MG Williams said commanders have contingency plans in case an American soldier or aid worker does contract Ebola: Those patients would be isolated, quarantined and flown to the U.S. for treatment.”
“He acknowledged, however, the arrangements aren’t yet clear for American personnel whose normal duty stations are overseas. It isn’t clear, for example, whether the Marines who deployed to Liberia from Spain would have to be quarantined before they can return there, or whether Williams’ own staff members could rotate directly back to Caserma Ederle [Vicenza] Italy (where I served as a young lieutenant).”
So there are SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement) details that apparently haven’t been hammered out.
I know Major General Darryl Williams and am quite sure he’ll accomplish the mission assigned to him, but I question why the Commander-in-Chief deployed our military into a very dangerous area to build treatment centers and “community care centers?” Our men and women shouldn’t be used as some sort of hired hands. We could have easily provided prefab shelters that are easy for host nation personnel to construct. And I am further concerned about calling up additional reservists and exposing them to this deadly virus.
This is a disconcerting misuse of our U.S. military. I wonder if the Commander-in-Chief will visit those troops during the year he has committed them. And lastly, what are their rules of engagement during this deployment?
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All Hell breaks loose if you recieve the Nobel Peace Prize for efforts towards peace but the world insists on war anyway.... or was it the world that decided that after all, and not the guy that pre-won the prize without doing the work, along with his henchmen?
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October 27, 2014
U.S. soldiers isolated in Italy for Ebola screening after Liberia mission
Gregg Zoroya and John Bacon, USA TODAY 8:18 p.m. EDT October 27, 2014
www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2014/10/27/us-soldiers-isolated-italy-ebola/18010271/
The commander of U.S. Army Africa is among a dozen soldiers who have been placed in isolation over Ebola concerns at a U.S. military base in Italy after wrapping up a mission to Liberia, the Pentagon said Monday.
The soldiers were isolated at the base in Vicenza over the weekend as a precaution although none have shown any symptoms of exposure to the virus that has killed thousands in West Africa, Army Col. Steven Warren said.
Warren said the soldiers, who were part of Operation United Assistance in West Africa, were being kept at a separate unit at the base for 21 days, the incubation period for Ebola. Maj. Gen. Darryl Williams, commander of U.S. Army Africa, is among those being isolated.
Their isolation is not required by Pentagon guidelines, Warren said.
The Pentagon said Monday evening that the Army Chief of Staff had directed "a 21-day controlled monitoring period'' from Ebola assistance operations in West Africa.
Soldiers will be housed in a separate facility on their base, with no physical contact with family members, the Army said. They will be allowed to visit the gym and have access to TV and Internet, and medical checks will be conducted twice a day.
The Army said in a statement that the step was being taken "out of caution to ensure soldiers, family members and their surrounding communities are confident that we are taking all steps necessary to protect their health.''
The operation in West Africa is providing logistics, training and engineering support to the U.S. humanitarian program fighting the Ebola outbreak in the region. On Sunday, Army Maj. Gen. Gary Volesky replaced Williams as commander of Operation United Assistance.
Pictured: A health worker takes the temperature of U.S. Marines arriving to take part in Operation United Assistance on Oct. 9 near Monrovia, Liberia. (Photo: John Moore, Getty Images)
More than 700 U.S. servicemembers are now deployed to West Africa, including almost 600 in Liberia and 100 in Senegal. Over the coming weeks, that could grow to upwards of 3,900 personnel, Pentagon press secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said.
A 25-bed hospital in Monrovia, Liberia, should be fully operational next week once the construction of the supporting facilities is complete, Kirby said. The hospital will be staffed by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services personnel. In addition, the construction of the first Ebola Treatment Unit at Tubmanburg, Liberia, is nearing final completion and two more will be ready soon, Kirby said..
The death toll from the Ebola epidemic rose to more than 10,000 known cases through Oct. 23, the World Health Organization said Saturday. Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone account for all but a handful of the deaths.
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2 dead, including shooter, at Fort Bliss veterans' hospital
Published January 07, 2015 - FoxNews.com
www.foxnews.com/us/2015/01/07/fort-bliss-medical-center-shooting/
A shooting at a west Texas veterans' clinic on Tuesday left two people dead, including the gunman, military authorities said.
The shooting was reported shortly after 3 p.m. local time at the El Paso VA Health Care System clinic, which is part of Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. Maj. Gen. Stephen M. Twitty confirmed the details at a news conference Tuesday night, but declined to provide further information -- such as a possible motive, the relationship between the male shooter and the victim, or how the shooter died -- and did not take questions.
"Everything is under control and there is no immediate threat to Fort Bliss or the neighboring community," said Twitty, commanding officer of Fort Bliss.
The veterans' clinic will remain closed Wednesday, authorities said.
The El Paso Times, citing the office of Rep. Beto O'Rourke, D-Texas, said a doctor at the fort's veterans' hospital was shot and that the shooter apparently shot and killed himself. A message left for the congressman's office by FoxNews.com was not immediately returned, and a spokesman for Fort Bliss said he was unable to confirm or deny the report.
The FBI, which is leading the investigation, has hundreds of potential witnesses, many of whom were patients or would-be patients at the clinic, said Douglas Lindquist, special agent in charge of the FBI El Paso office.
"Those people were here seeking medical assistance, so we understand the difficulties that this situation presents to them and we're trying to expeditiously get through those hundreds of witnesses to find out details about this incident," Lindquist said.
The VA clinic came under scrutiny last year after a federal audit showed it had some of the nation's longest wait times for veterans' trying to see a doctor for the first time. A survey of hundreds of West Texas veterans last year found that they waited an average of more than two months to see a Veterans Affairs mental health professional and even longer to see a physician.
O'Rourke commissioned that survey of more than 690 veterans living in El Paso County. O'Rourke also was active in a congressional probe into long waiting times in the VA health care system.
In a statement issued by his office Tuesday, the El Paso Democrat said his "thoughts and prayers are with the men and women at the El Paso VA clinic."
The VA said in a statement that it "is deeply saddened by the tragic situation that has occurred in El Paso, and we are actively working with our partners at Fort Bliss to investigate this matter."
"The safety and continued care of our veterans and the staff will be our focus throughout this situation," the agency said.
Fox News' Karl de Vries, Casey Stegall, Justin Fishel and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Fort Hood-based brigade to aid Ebola response in West Africa
March 9, 2015
www.army.mil/article/144107/Fort_Hood_based_brigade_to_aid_Ebola_response_in_West_Africa/
By Walter T. Ham IV, 20th CBRNE Command Public Affairs
FORT HOOD, Texas (March 9, 2015) -- The 48th Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear, or CBRN, Brigade headquarters will deploy to Liberia to command the remaining American forces supporting the U.S. effort to contain the worst Ebola outbreak in history.
The brigade cased its unit colors during a ceremony at the III Corps Headquarters on Fort Hood, March 9, before its first deployment since being activated in 2007.
As many U.S. troops return home from the Ebola mission in Liberia, the Fort Hood-based CBRN brigade will replace the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) as the joint forces headquarters.
The 48th CBRN Brigade will support the U.S. Agency of International Development and provide oversight of any required follow-on capabilities. Other response functions are being transitioned to civilian personnel.
"Troops are coming home but the United States is not leaving West Africa," said Col. Sven Erichsen, the commander of the 48th CBRN Brigade.
"The civilian-led response will actually grow in size and number in the weeks ahead to continue the fight against Ebola until there are zero cases," said Erichsen, a native of Forest Grove, Oregon.
The 48th CBRN Brigade is a part of the 20th CBRNE Command (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosives), the U.S. Department of Defense's only formation that combats global CBRNE threats.
The 20th CBRNE Command, headquartered on Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, is home to more than 85 percent of the active U.S. Army's CBRNE capabilities, including two explosive ordnance disposal, or EOD, groups, one chemical brigade, nuclear disablement teams, CBRNE coordination elements, expeditionary laboratories, remediation and consequence management units.
Another 20th CBRNE Command formation, the 1st Area Medical Laboratory, or 1st AML, deployed to Liberia in October 2014. The 1st AML commanded Task Force Scientist, a joint task force that operated six Ebola testing laboratories in Liberia.
Brig. Gen. JB Burton, commanding general of the 20th CBRNE Command, said the 48th CBRN Brigade and 1st AML deployments demonstrate the flexibility of his one-of-a-kind command.
"The deployment of the 48th CBRN Brigade Headquarters into Liberia as part of the enduring U.S. commitment to understand and contain the Ebola virus demonstrates that this command and this CBRNE enterprise must be more than weapons of mass destruction focused," Burton said. "We must be capable of and comfortable with operating effectively across the full spectrum of CBRNE hazards."
In support of the U.S. Army's regional alignment efforts, the 48th CBRN Brigade serves with III Corps in Europe, Africa and the Middle East; the 71st EOD Group operates with I Corps in the Asia Pacific region; and the 52nd EOD Group deploys with the XVIII Airborne Corps on global response force missions.
"With the ever evolving CBRNE threats facing our nation, we need to fully leverage and integrate all of our capabilities to confront and defeat CBRNE hazards," said Burton, a native of Tullahoma, Tennessee. "This deployment is another important first in the 20th CBRNE Command's history of service with distinction around the globe."
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Army Engineers Back In Fort Hood After Battling Ebola In Africa
By EILEEN PACE • MAR 24, 2015
tpr.org/post/army-engineers-back-fort-hood-after-battling-ebola-africa#stream/0
Operation United Assistance has come to a close for more than 500 members of the 36th Engineer Brigade, who have completed the 21-day quarantine at Fort Hood after returning from West Africa over the last few weeks.
Lt. Col. John Hartke said that as soon as they arrived in Liberia last October, the troops began building 100-bed treatment facilities to help stem the tide of Ebola.
“The country’s still recovering from their civil war, and they don’t have a very strong medical infrastructure. So by creating these Ebola treatment centers — and there was one built in every county in the country —it provided an infrastructure for the people who were infected with Ebola, or even suspected of being infected with Ebola, a place to go so that we could stop the transmission,” he said.
Hartke said that at its peak, the mission had 750 beds available, but that number was reduced as the incidence of the disease started to decline.
He believed it was the first time for such a coordinated disease response by the U.S. Army. “I’ve been in the Army 27 years and this is the first time I’ve seen something like this where we’ve gone and responded in this way. We’ve responded to natural disasters like Haiti before, but to target a disease, this is the first one I’m aware of,” he said.
Also returning to Fort Hood this month were 100 troops with the 48th Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and Explosives Brigade.
The Army said the United States was not leaving West Africa. A civilian-led response will continue to fight Ebola until there are zero cases.
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Two Fort Bliss soldiers arrested in Downtown shooting
By Aaron Martinez / El Paso Times / Follow @amartinez31
POSTED: 08/21/2015 07:12:08 PM MDT
archive.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_28683186/two-fort-bliss-soldiers-arrested-downtown-shooting/
Two Fort Bliss soldiers were arrested Wednesday in connection with a shooting last week in the Union Plaza Entertainment District in Downtown El Paso, officials said.
Devion Lee Hall and Deshaun Provoid, both 20, were arrested by Fort Bliss Military Police after the El Paso Police Department identified them as suspects in the shooting. The men were then turned over to the El Paso Police Department.
Fort Bliss officials confirmed that the men are soldiers at the post and are both privates first class.
The shooting took place at about 2:15 a.m. Aug. 15 in the 100 Block of South Anthony Street, El Paso police said.
Two men were injured in the shooting, police said. The two men, whose names have not been released, got into argument with a group of people, police said.
One of the people involved in the argument went to a car and pulled out a shotgun, police said. He then allegedly struck a 25-year-old man in the head with the stock of the weapon.
The man fired a round from the shotgun and struck a 21-year-old man in the face, police said.
Police have not released information on what roles Hall and Provoid played in the shooting.
Both victims were taken to hospitals with non-life threatening injuries, police said.
Hall and Provoid were arrested on suspicion of criminal attempted murder and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. They booked into El Paso County Jail.
Hall's bond was set at $250,000, while Provoid was booked on a bond totaling $40,000.