[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 192 (Wednesday, December 14, 2011)]
[House]
[Pages H8952-H8956]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
FORT HOOD SHOOTINGS: WORKPLACE VIOLENCE OR TERRORISM?
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 5, 2011, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter) is recognized
for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. CARTER. Mr. Speaker, 13 adults and one unborn child were killed
and 31 individuals were wounded in a shooting attack at Fort Hood,
Texas, on November 5, 2009. Since that time, the Department of Defense
has taken no steps to award combat benefits to the casualties or even
officially recognize the attack as a terrorist incident.
The House and Senate have included two reform measures in the NDAA,
which we just passed, while additional attacks have been attempted by
similar high-profile radical Islamic terrorists. It is past time for
the government to deliver on this act.
Mr. Speaker, here we are almost 3 years later, and there's been a
recent report that has come out; and in that report, it references this
incident of this slaughter of American troops on Fort Hood soil in
Texas. It references that it shall be taken up as part of workplace
violence.
The Obama regime calls the Fort Hood shooting ``workplace violence.''
Sure, it's workplace violence: it's where they work and it's violence.
But we have a concept of what workplace violence is. And your normal
workplace violence is not preceded by a shout by the shooter, ``God is
great,'' in the Arabic language. It's not preceded by discussions by
the alleged perpetrator. It's alleged because he hasn't been convicted
yet. And we, in a free American world, take the position that all are
innocent until proven guilty. So we will call him the ``alleged''
shooter.
But there's clear evidence in reports by the Defense Department and
by reports by the news media, reports by witnesses on the scene,
reports by his fellow soldiers, reports by folks from Walter Reed
Hospital where this American-trained, military-trained doctor worked
that he had advocated that the American soldier was wrong and that he
was contrary, and he spoke and preached Islamic terrorism.
So your normal workplace violence, that's not a part of the factor.
Yet this is what happened in this case. Senator Collins on Wednesday
blasted the Defense Department, and bless her for it, for classifying
the Fort Hood massacre as workplace violence and suggested political
correctness is being placed above the security of the Nation's Armed
Forces at home.
I've been talking about this now since the day after this happened.
We can't have a world where political correctness fails to define the
criminal act. By its very nature, whether we're talking about military
law and the criminal relations in military law, we're just talking
about criminal acts in general, we have to be able to define them. Just
to make the system work we have to be able to define them.
But more importantly, we owe a duty and a responsibility to the
American soldier to call an event what it is and not try to put a
smokescreen over it or cloud the issue or in any way worry about the
feelings of groups, because the definition is the definition. This man
identified himself that he was committing this act in the name of ``God
is great'' in Arabic. He acknowledged when questioned that it was part
of his mission. He acknowledged that he had dealt with terrorist
spokesmen in the past and that the concept came from his interaction
with Awlaki and others.
So this guy is an Islamic terrorist. There's no other way you can
describe this gentleman.
But now years after the event as he sits in the Bell County Jail in
Belton, Texas, we continue to have reports coming down from our Defense
Department that the folks that are responsible for our soldiers and
responsible for those who died in this incident want to downplay this
to be treated as an incident of workplace violence with all the white
bread connotation that that has. To me, we ought to be ashamed of
ourselves.
So let's look at some of the evidence we have that connects this to
Islamic terrorism, recognizing the November 5, 2009, attack on Fort
Hood, Texas, as an act of radical Islamic terrorism and jihad.
{time} 1930
Anwar Awlaki connection. Now, Mr. Awlaki is no longer with us. We
have taken that boy out. Yet the bottom line is, at the time this
happened, they were directly connected.
This man preached, taught, and encouraged violence--Islamic terrorist
violence: ``Hasan's presentations to the DOD on jihad justification.''
He would argue with his fellow soldiers about the justification for
having jihad against the American military. Mr. Hasan was a member of
the United States Army. He was a major. He had been serving in the
Medical Corps as a psychiatrist. He was trained with American taxpayer
dollars, but he was preaching jihad to soldiers, and there was lots of
evidence.
I had a bill, which was included in this recent defense bill that we
just passed. It said that this guy was telling people that he'd
believed in this kind of thing since medical school. Now he's a major,
serving as a psychiatrist, advising our soldiers.
``Hasan purchased and practiced with high-capacity firearms prior to
the attack.'' He went out and he bought firearms. He bought them at a
local gun store. Of the guns that were used in the killings, one of
them was a semiautomatic weapon with a large magazine capacity. He went
out to the firing range and familiarized himself with these weapons
prior to this incident.
You can't think of this as some guy who goes postal all of a sudden.
This guy was planning this whole event. He shouts, ``God is great'' in
Arabic, before he starts shooting, but they refer to it in the context
of the broader threat of workplace violence. I think there is a very
good argument that the evidence shows this was a premeditated act on
the part of Major Hasan; and I believe when this case finally gets to
trial that the evidence will be overwhelming that it was premeditated.
At the time of the event, Lieutenant General Cone, the III Corps
Commander at Fort Hood, told NBC's ``Today'' show on the Friday after
the shooting that the soldiers who witnessed the shooting rampage that
left 13 people dead reported that the gunman shouted, ``Allahu
Akbar''--which means ``God is great''--before opening fire at the Texas
post.
The day after, it was being reported that he did this. Yet, in the
initial report that came out from the Defense Department, the man's
name didn't even appear. The relationship to any Islamic terrorism was
not referenced. It was like any major from any outfit just wandered in
and started shooting soldiers, like he was having a bad day or
something.
Now we get another comment saying that we're going to treat this in
the bigger scope of workplace violence. Certainly, we want to prevent
workplace violence in every workplace, but
[[Page H8953]]
the connotation is that this is just something that happened. It's not
something that just happened because, quite honestly, since that time,
others have been caught who reportedly were trying to imitate this
shooter, Mr. Hasan.
We introduced a bill, the Fort Hood Families Benefits Protection Act.
It would award both military and civilian casualties of the Ford Hood
attack with combat status to ensure full benefits and eligibility for
the Purple Heart and other awards and for the civilian award
equivalence to the Secretary of Defense's Defense of Freedom medal.
Now, why did I ask for that? Because there was a precedent for it.
When they flew the plane into the Pentagon on 9/11, this is what was
the finding of the Department of Defense--that it was an act of
terrorism, and therefore they should be treated as combat casualties,
and those two medals were awarded. This didn't just come off the top of
my head. This is what happened with the first terrorist attack in our
country and with the second or third or whatever attack this one was.
When this man walked into that room, there were people in civilian
garb, and there were people in uniform. He went out of his way to shoot
the people in uniform. The civilians who were injured were injured
because of misfire or misdirection. As he walked down that line, his
target was all of those soldiers who were doing nothing more than
either coming back from being off post and out of the country--or
wherever they'd been--or preparing for their next duty stations,
wherever they may be going--Iraq or Afghanistan. They were being
processed and they were in this big room. He walked down the line,
shooting everybody in uniform.
Now, when you're killing our combat soldiers and when you're crying
out slogans of the jihad terrorists, why wouldn't you think it's a
terrorist attack, and why shouldn't these people who died in the line
of duty be treated like those at the Pentagon who died in the line of
duty?
In fact, except for what we were able to put together in
circumstantial evidence after the fact, at the time of the incident, we
had no idea who flew that plane into the Pentagon. We just made an
educated guess. In this case, before this shooting started, the guy
identified himself and what his mission was.
For some reason, in this world of political correctness, someone has
the idea that this is good for the morale of our military soldiers or
that it's good for something as, I think, the Chief of Staff said when
this happened: Oh, this is sure going to hurt our Islamic outreach
program.
Whether it's good for that or not, I hold nothing against the Islamic
people nor does anybody at Fort Hood; but we hold a lot against Islamic
terrorists who kill soldiers, and the Department of Defense should have
the guts to step up and to stand up for these soldiers.
I see my good friend and colleague from Texas, former Judge Louie
Gohmert, has joined me here.
Congressman Gohmert, I yield such time as you may require.
Mr. GOHMERT. I thank my friend, and I appreciate his taking the time
to discuss this matter of national security.
I have the quote directly here from Army Chief of Staff General
George W. Casey, Jr., who was the Chief of Staff at the time of the
Fort Hood attack. He came out and had this prepared quote to give.
Mr. CARTER. He was Chief of Staff of the Army.
Mr. GOHMERT. Chief of Staff of the Army.
Mr. CARTER. Correct.
Mr. GOHMERT. This is a quote that, obviously, he and those helping
him had prepared to give in response to 14 people being killed. We know
one was an unborn child and that one of the people was a pregnant
woman--a female soldier. So here is the quote that they had prepared
after 13 of his soldiers lay either dying or dead at Fort Hood:
``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.''
{time} 1940
This is a general who is charged with leading soldiers and directing
soldiers in war and in battle with an avowed enemy. Well, we have an
enemy who has sworn to be at war with us. And one of those enemies was
Major Hasan at Fort Hood, who went off on a shooting spree.
Now unfortunately, our leaders did not bother to monitor the security
of our own soldiers, such that when Major Hasan made actual
pronouncements in advance that he could not be deployed and be a Muslim
because, in his interpretation of the Koran--thankfully it's not all of
our Muslim soldiers in the U.S. military that have this
interpretation--but his interpretation was that he could not be
deployed because that might require him to kill Muslims in a foreign
country without cause.
And under the belief of some Muslims, like Major Hasan, if he were to
kill a Muslim without cause--for example, in his way of thinking, it is
appropriate cause, say, if a Muslim were to become a Christian, then
that is a cause, in his mind, worthy of killing the individual, if they
committed this horrible crime, in his mind, according to the Koran, of
becoming a Christian. That's worth killing them for. But since he
couldn't be sure that in a foreign country in a battle with Muslims
that he might not be required to shoot someone who had not committed
apostasy and not committed some act that justified murder under the
Koran, then he could not be deployed. And if he were deployed, he would
have to kill American soldiers to avoid having to go kill soldiers
overseas.
It is interesting because you would think that the military would be
concerned about this issue and that we would try to make sure that this
incident that happened at Fort Hood would not happen again. You would
think that when this private showed up on al Jazeera in uniform and
told al Jazeera basically the same things that Major Hasan had, that
people like General Casey would be concerned. But apparently, he was
more concerned about our diversity than he was about the lives of his
own soldiers.
So when you see this private on al Jazeera--and it's not hard. You
can go online and find this on YouTube, his interview--he spoke in
English. But the story was done actually in the language that al
Jazeera prefers, and it's not English. He explained basically what
Major Hasan did. And this is a line from al Jazeera, ``I can't both
deploy and be a Muslim.'' And we have the transcript of what he said,
the transcript of the story. But basically, he was letting people like
General Casey, that would bother to worry about the--well, not General
Casey, because he is worried about diversity, and the safety of his
soldiers is secondary to that. But for those who are concerned, number
one, about the safety of those in this country and making sure that
their own soldiers are tantamount, in their minds, they would be
concerned when you have another soldier saying the same things Major
Hasan did before the killing spree.
So we know that there are people in our special ops, in our military
that noted this, that saw this, that said, This is a guy we had better
watch. But because the people at the top are more concerned about
diversity than they are about our soldiers' safety--I mean, it's bad
enough that they put their lives on the line. They're willing to do
that in combat. But you would think that there would be more concern
for their own safety in their own units. Nothing was done about this
private.
And despite this Justice Department trying to vilify gun dealers whom
it forced into making sales to criminals who carry guns across the
border, and despite the efforts that were made to maybe--and in fact,
names were produced, pictures were produced of gun dealers out of the
Fast and the Furious program--despite that, it was not General Casey,
not one of his subordinates, not one of our own people in the military
that reported this guy. No. Nothing was done, even though they knew he
was ready to pull a Major Hasan, he could not be deployed, nothing was
done. And it was not until he went to a gun dealer. The gun dealer
became suspicious. The gun dealer reported him. Thank God for Americans
like that gun dealer who realized, We've got our own soldiers' lives at
stake here. He reported him.
[[Page H8954]]
Then locally he was dealt with and interdiction occurred, and he was
not given the chance to kill the soldiers he wanted to, again at Fort
Hood. Because if it weren't for the gun dealer and those intervening--
not the military, not our intelligence, who surely monitor al Jazeera
and would surely note a soldier in uniform with the screaming eagle
patch on his arm, and that this is something we need to worry about.
But because we have become so politically correct, to the detriment
and death of our own soldiers, nothing was done from intelligence, from
State, from Justice. It took a local gun dealer to protect our soldiers
at Fort Hood. And you wonder how many more times this is going to have
to happen.
Heck, this soldier--you can go on Facebook, and you can find that he
notes his activities and interests. CAIR, the Council on American-
Islamic Relations. CAIR is named in the Holy Land Foundation trial as a
coconspirator. There was evidence produced that showed that CAIR was
also funding terrorism, funding Hamas, participating in that venture
with the Holy Land Foundation, as found by the Fifth Circuit when they
refused to eliminate CAIR's name from their pleadings. He identifies
CAIR as one of his interests and activities. And our intelligence, our
military, they didn't pick up on that. Why? Because that would be
politically incorrect and might hurt our diversity.
We've got outstanding Muslim soldiers serving in our military who
love and care about this country, like all other soldiers. But it is
insane and I believe a violation of the commitment and oath that every
officer takes--like I did when I went in the military--not to keep your
eyes open and protect those people who are put to your service as your
charges.
So here he is, Nasser Abdo. He went on al Jazeera. He makes it clear,
he may have to kill American soldiers. He cannot allow himself to be
deployed as a Muslim. He requested conscientious objector status. And
all we can do is thank God for the gun dealer that did what his
superiors should have done in this case. It's time to end political
correctness when it costs the lives of those protecting us.
I thank my friend for yielding.
Mr. CARTER. When you read the reports on Major Hasan, he was acting
erratically. In the months before the attack, he promoted radical
Islamic views while at Walter Reed Hospital. He exchanged email with
Anwar al-Awlaki, a Yemeni cleric with terrorist ties. All of those
references also pertained to the soldiers you were talking about right
there. It is all part of a network.
{time} 1950
Now, is every Muslim that is involved in the United States military
involved in this? Absolutely not. I went to the National Training
Center in California, and I met loyal, truly loyal and patriotic Muslim
Americans who are helping our soldiers understand the nature, the
language, the concepts, everything that they might be facing as they
interact with Muslim civilians over in Iraq. And they do it in
constructed villages.
I met a guy who was a former cab driver from Chicago who said, Man,
I've come up in the world; I'm now mayor of this town, because he was
negotiating with a mayor and city councilman for our soldiers as they
came into the National Training Center. These people are patriots. They
are living out in the desert just to help our soldiers understand.
I'm not anti those folks, but you can't have a world where you refuse
to identify evil, and this is what you do when political correctness
overcomes the truth.
Janet Napolitano personally testified: Violent Islamic terrorism was
part and parcel of the Fort Hood killings, Homeland Security Napolitano
said on February 24, 2010, about 3 months after the event, 4 months
after the event, in a Senate Homeland Security Committee. She
testified--accurately--and I praise her for it, that this was a
terrorist act.
And yet we continue to have from the Department of Defense the soft-
soaping of this whole issue and the disguising of this whole issue. And
now with their statement that they are going to deal with it as they
would deal with any workplace violence, you know, it just never stops.
The shoe bomber, the Christmas following this incident, the shoe
bomber who did exactly what Major Hasan did, reading back what the
press reported, acted erratically before his attack, promoted radical
Islamic views, and exchanged emails with Awlaki in Yemen. He did all of
those things. And when caught, referenced Major Hasan as one of his
heroes. He got caught before he blew up an airplane. Praise God. Thank
goodness.
So, you know, over 3 years since the incident, the Defense Department
is still taking the position that this should be treated as normal
workforce violence or something to that effect.
I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. GOHMERT. I think it is particularly interesting that this
determination by the Army came, or our military leaders, came here in
December. We just observed--it wasn't a celebration--we observed the
anniversary of Pearl Harbor. As Judge Carter pointed out numerous
times, the victims of the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon have been
recognized as victims of warfare. They were attacked by people of the
same belief as Major Hasan, that he secures a place in paradise if he
is killed while killing infidels like his soldier friends.
In fact, those soldiers that he was also hired to counsel as a
counselor at Fort Hood, a local imam for Fort Hood, and yet one cannot
help but wonder if these same folks who declared the deaths at the
hands of a Muslim extremist at Fort Hood, if these same people in
charge today had been in charge on December 7, 1941, then there is
nothing to indicate their reasoning would have been different. All of
those soldiers killed at Pearl Harbor, those entombed in the Arizona,
those killed in that horrific surprise attack, actually they were at
their duty stations. They were at work and someone came and killed
them. Therefore, apparently under the reasoning as applied at Fort
Hood, those killed at Pearl Harbor could also be considered as having
been killed in workplace violence. It was violent. It was their
workplace. Therefore, our mental geniuses that decided Fort Hood was
workplace violence could say that about Pearl Harbor.
Mr. CARTER. Don't you wonder have we changed so much since the attack
on Pearl Harbor that we don't recognize an enemy attack on us and we
just want to stick our head in the sand and act like it didn't happen?
Here's an interesting report from Time magazine. They are asking the
question, and they state: The U.S. military just released a report--
this is that first report--not once mentioning Major Hasan's name or
even discussing whether the killings had anything to do with his Muslim
faith. The fort ignores the elephant in the room.
That's what I said. And it's true. It does ignore the elephant in the
room. If before the first bullet is fired, a man shouts, Allahu Akhbar,
that elephant is in the room. And all of the cover-up and all of the
writing of the reports with reference to typical workforce violence, or
treat it as workforce violence, it doesn't make sense. It was an attack
on American soldiers in uniform.
I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. GOHMERT. With regard to that very issue, we know that in the 9/11
Commission there were hundreds of mentions of Islam, jihad, all of
these type things that we know were involved. And again, we thank God
that the vast majority of Muslims love this country like we do. They
are not about to kill Christians, Jews; but there are those in the
radical element that believe otherwise. And we ought to be able to talk
about it. We now know that this administration has seen to such a
purging of our training material for Defense Department, Intelligence,
State, that in the current lexicon from which the FBI, our intelligence
folks are trained, there are zero mentions of Islam, zero mentions of
jihad, zero mentions of the very things that created the worst attack
on American soil in American history.
As one of our own officers told me: We have been blinded in this war
with those using terrorism. We're not allowed to see our enemy. We're
not allowed to describe our enemy. We're not allowed to talk about who
the real enemy is. We're just expected to protect America with our eyes
closed and our mouths shut. That's no way to protect America.
[[Page H8955]]
Mr. CARTER. This exhibit here is from the San Francisco Chronicle:
Political Correctness on Fort Hood at the Pentagon. Political
correctness is alive in the Pentagon. Witness the protecting the force
lessons from Fort Hood. A Department of Defense report released last
week on the November 5 shooting, if the report's purpose was to craft
lessons to prevent future attacks, how could they leave out radical
Islam? Ignoring Hasan's pro-terrorist Web postings, the report instead
focuses on workplace violence programs to prevent workplace violence
such as the post office's Going Postal program and the stress imposed
on military health care providers.
{time} 2000
The whole point of that San Francisco Chronicle article is to point
out, I think, the irony of what we are teaching our soldiers to protect
them from events like this and what we are excluding from the evidence.
And I think that's blatantly not in the best interests of the soldier.
Mr. GOHMERT. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. CARTER. Yes.
Mr. GOHMERT. There is an article dated February 9, 2010, in The
Washington Times by Bill Gertz that says, the Army was warned about the
jihadist threat in '08. It says:
Almost 2 years before the deadly Fort Hood shooting by a
radicalized Muslim officer, the U.S. Army was explicitly
warned that jihadism--Islamic holy war--was a serious problem
and threat to personnel in the U.S., according to
participants at a major Army-sponsored conference.
It references Patrick Poole, Army Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Myers,
and Terri Wonder as individuals that participated. It says:
The shooting at a recruiting center in Little Rock,
Arkansas, in June and the November shooting at Fort Hood,
Texas, that killed 13 people have exposed the problem of the
Army's deficiencies in understanding the nature of the
domestic Islamic terrorist threat, Mr. Poole said.
The incidents have raised questions about whether the Army
made any effort to ``operationalize'' the threat warnings
from the 2008 conference and develop policies to counter the
threats. ``The answer quite clearly is no,'' Mr. Poole said.
And then it goes on to discuss this whole problem, and Mr. Poole
said:
I noted because of our lack of understanding of Islamic
doctrines, Islamic jihad and my view that our
counterintelligence function is broken, outdated, being
usurped in some cases by public affairs and equal opportunity
officials, we were going to get soldiers killed in America on
our own bases for that professional ignorance.
This is the kind of thing that should not be happening. This article
was in 2010, before at least two other individuals had gone on Al
Jazeera in uniform blasting our military and indicating they could not
ever be deployed in a Muslim area.
It's also worth noting that the term ``Islamophobe,'' that I'm sure
is being generated right now about the two of us here talking about
this issue, actually originated with the Organization of Islamic
Conference, the OIC. They came up with the terms ``Islamophobia'' and
``Islamophobe,'' and there is an ongoing effort to brand anybody who
attempts to identify those by their beliefs who have gone about killing
Americans, terrorizing Americans as an Islamophobe or as having
Islamophobia.
We know that there are places like Harvard where a professor from
India who wrote an article about the attacks that are ongoing on his
homeland in India by Muslim extremists and how that should be dealt
with, he was fired because Islamic activists at Harvard do not believe
we should have free speech anymore. And as I mentioned on this floor
earlier this week, one of the 2005 10-year goals of the Muslim
Brotherhood here in America is to subvert our Constitution to sharia
law by 2015. That effort is ongoing.
And when they continue to brand professors, soldiers, and
intelligence officers as Islamophobes and that we need laws to prevent
people from describing radical jihadists who want to kill our own
American people, as long as that's being done and that's being allowed,
then our First Amendment rights are being subverted to sharia law, and
we're well on our way to their meeting their 2015 goal as more and more
good folks have been won over into this idea, this thought, that, gee,
if you say anything about radical jihadists and radical Islamists,
you're the sick one and you need to be stopped.
This is an ongoing effort around the world, and we cannot allow it to
overtake America. We should be able to recognize those wonderful,
patriotic Muslims in America for who they are, but we should also be
able to recognize and talk about those who want to kill us and destroy
our way of life for who they are. They're radical Islamic jihadists.
Mr. CARTER. I thank the gentleman.
You just referenced in your poster and showed us a picture of Mr.
Abdo, the man that was saying he couldn't go to war. That was back on
July 28, 2011, after the workplace violence. Another soldier made the
same claim, and Abdo was also referenced in this story.
More and more of these folks are stepping up and saying they can't be
deployed because they are Muslim and can't kill Muslims, and they
reference Hasan, this man who is sitting in the Bell County jail
awaiting trial probably this spring and is, I understand it, awaiting
trial on a death penalty case, a potential death penalty case.
Everybody knew what it was when they attacked the Pentagon. What
happened to us that we decided when, in front of 50 witnesses, somebody
shoots a bunch of people and we can't recognize what that was? This was
a surprise attack like Pearl Harbor. That was a premeditated murder
like you and I have dealt with in the past with more witnesses than you
could put on a stand. I mean, this is not going to be a hard case to
prove because, fortunately, he didn't kill everybody in the room. In
fact, he left an awful lot of witnesses there to testify.
He is just lucky he didn't get killed in an active shooter program
that our two police officers used to respond effectively to his
slaughter.
Mr. GOHMERT. If the gentleman would yield.
Mr. CARTER. I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. GOHMERT. Well, my friend the judge indicates he was lucky,
unfortunately, in his perverted way of thinking. That also is a way of
thinking that confounded Thomas Jefferson when he was negotiating with
the Islamic Barbary pirates.
He actually believed he would have gone to paradise and had dozens of
virgins at his disposal if he had been killed, so he doesn't
necessarily think of himself as lucky. Nor would those in Iran, once a
nuclear weapon or nuclear weapons are assuredly procured, be any
different. They would believe, if they were to go up with the nuclear
weapon that they carried into some place where lots of Americans were
or Israelis were, then they would be assured of instantly being
transported to paradise. Some of us have a different view of what they
would find when they meet their Maker after this life, and I think
they're going to be terribly surprised.
But our job and our oath is to our Constitution. It's to provide for
the common defense against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And when
someone presents this kind of danger to our troops, it is just
unfathomable that our military leaders would become so politically
correct and so militarily neutered that they would not stand up for
their own troops, for those whose care has been put under their service
and attention.
I thank my friend for yielding.
{time} 2010
Mr. CARTER. Mr. Gohmert, let me read to you a resolution, H. Res.
495, which I dropped yesterday. It's a resolution recognizing the
November 5, 2009, attack on Fort Hood, Texas, as an act of radical
Islamic terrorism and jihad:
Whereas the United States Army Major Nidal Hasan is
reported to have communicated on multiple occasions with
radical Islamic terrorist, Anwar al-Awlaki, on the topic of
justifying jihad on the United States and its Armed Forces;
Whereas Major Hasan delivered addresses to the Department
of Defense personnel concerning the justification of jihad
against the United States Armed Forces;
Whereas Major Hasan is reported to have planned and trained
for an attack on unarmed members of the United States Armed
Forces at Fort Hood, Texas, with the specific intent to kill
and injure those troops before the deployment to overseas
theaters of war;
Whereas Major Hasan is reported to have declared his attack
to be an act of jihad in defense of Islam, shouting ``God is
great'' in
[[Page H8956]]
Arabic while gunning down unarmed military personnel and
civilians;
Whereas Major Hasan is currently charged with murder of 13
and attempted murder of 32 United States citizens during that
attack;
And whereas the Department of Defense submitted
correspondence to the United States Senate Committee on
Homeland Security which referred to the violent Islamic
extremist attack on Fort Hood, Texas, in the context of a
broader threat of workplace violence: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, that the House of Representatives recognizes the
attack on Fort Hood, Texas, as an act of radical Islamic
terrorism and jihad against the United States Armed Forces.
I have submitted this to the House, and I'm going to be seeking
support for this resolution.
I wonder sometimes what our Forefathers would think of how far we've
gone out of kilter in recognizing who's our friend and who's our enemy,
or how we are so concerned about what the speak police or the voice
police would say to us about some language we use that we would be
willing to put those men and women who wear the uniform of our armed
services at risk rather than make a statement that might offend
somebody.
I think our grandparents would look at this country and say, what
happened, what happened to the United States of America that I fought
for in World War II or Korea or Vietnam? When did it become evil for
Americans to speak the truth? Why would people who have four stars on
their shoulder, who we highly respect as leaders of our armed services,
tolerate being instructed in this concept of political correctness and
be treating this as if it were an ordinary incident of workforce
violence? How do we justify that? Where is the common sense in this
effort? We're worried about hurting other people's feelings, and other
people are killing us. I mean, this doesn't make any sense.
And most of all, let's not forget--because I attended the funeral of
one of the civilians. I have met with some of the wives and children of
these dead combat soldiers and talked to the parents that looked me in
the eye and said, how do I figure this out? My kid was there to be
deployed for the fourth time. He stood in harm's way for our country 3
years already, and he goes over to the deployment center for a routine
matter dealing with paperwork and he gets attacked and killed in Texas,
just right down the street from where he lives. And his children and
his wife are without a brave American soldier who had proven his worth
in combat in three deployments already.
This is something that his parent sits there and says, how could
anything like this ever happen? I mean, I know to be praying every day
for my child when he's in combat. This is the profession he has chosen;
I respect it. I fear for him; I worry about him. I want to make sure--
he or she, because our ladies are fighting just like our men. And now I
get the word that my son is killed down the street from his kid's
elementary school while he's going through a routine act of filling out
paperwork in the Army?
And then what do we tell that parent when later we find out that a
report has come out from the government saying ``routine workforce
violence''? Come on, come on. What's wrong with this? I think it's just
tragic.
I introduced a bill that just said, look, acknowledge it for what it
is. Nothing will draw disrespect for the Purple Heart, or others who
are wounded in combat in a combat theater, to just acknowledge that
these innocent people got attacked on their way to their next
deployment, or on their way back from their last deployment, on our
soil, on our military base, in our State of Texas. Can we at least give
them the respect to acknowledge that they're part of the war effort,
that this guy shot them because we are at war with terrorists? Give
them combat credit. Give them the honor and respect that comes from
that. But we're still not able to get that done.
We're going to keep trying. I have people call me from all over the
country and say, how are we doing? You know, my kid at least ought to
get a Purple Heart. My daughter ought to get a Purple Heart for the
wound she received, and now she's debilitated and has to go out of the
Army. My son, who's going through constant therapy for his head wound,
he ought to be recognized by the Army for what happened to him, the
reality of what happened to him.
And so we won't make the easy acknowledgement that these folks were
in combat. And the only reason they didn't fight this guy is because
they were not armed. And the reason they were not armed is because
you're not supposed to be armed on post. This guy attacks them. If they
would have been armed, it would have been over when the first bullet
fired. These are combat veterans.
But no, we are very strict--oh, we're now going to change this
designation the Army has or that designation the Army has. But we
aren't going to call this guy a terrorist. Don't mention the word
``Islamic.'' Don't recognize his relationship with an Islamic
terrorist. Ignore all that evidence, ignore the testimony of 50-some-
odd witnesses and say we will treat it within the concept of workforce
violence. What does that say to the wife or husband of that soldier, or
the father or mother of that soldier, or the brother and sister of that
soldier that was killed or wounded with a debilitating wound--many of
which are still struggling with their wounds, just like they do in
combat.
Yet we conveniently define things in that situation, but refuse to
define the act that caused the situation. This just is not right.
That's why I'm very grateful my friend Mr. Gohmert and I came down here
to talk about this. This is all about trying to just set the record
straight. You know, let's call it like we see it, and let's don't think
we have to protect anybody.
And it has absolutely nothing to do with the Muslim religion. If he
was a Baptist and was shouting Baptist slogans as his reason for
shooting somebody, we ought to call him a Baptist.
This is a tragedy. It's a terrible tragedy because these were
soldiers, all of whom had been willing to go in harm's way on behalf of
our country, and most of whom had gone into harm's way on behalf of our
country and suffered through that miserable weather and those dark
lonely nights, and all the other things that soldiers suffer through
when they're addressing terrorism around the world.
{time} 2020
I say around the world because we've still got plenty of places we're
addressing terrorism, not just Iraq and Afghanistan. To have us be
willing to soft-pedal what happened to them is an American tragedy, and
I'm going to continue to talk about it.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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