After Ft Hood, Army trouble recruiting Muslims

[Warrior-Mentor]

After Fort Hood jihad massacre,
U.S. Army having more trouble recruiting Muslim troops
Robert Spencer
Jihad Watch
December 12, 2009

Because, you see, the massacre made Muslims afraid -- not of jihadist supremacism within their own ranks, but of discrimination in the military! But never fear, the Army is still doggedly trying to recruit them, and of course not dreaming of asking potential recruits a single question about what they think of jihad and Islamic supremacism. That would be "Islamophobic"!

"Fort Hood ups challenge to recruit Muslim, Arab troops," by Kathleen Gray and Donna Leinwand for USA TODAY, December 10 (thanks to all who this in):

DEARBORN, Mich. -- Army recruiter Sgt. Chris McGarity is on the front lines of the military's effort to add troops who speak Arabic and understand Middle Eastern culture -- a battle that grew more challenging after the shooting at Fort Hood, Texas.

McGarity says he recently signed up an Arab-American high school student who lacked only her parents' approval to enlist. Then came the Nov. 5 rampage at Fort Hood. The Army has charged Maj. Nidal Hasan, 39, a Muslim and Arab American, with killing 13 people and wounding 32.

The high school student's mother "made her withdraw her application," McGarity says.

Such experiences illustrate heightened fears of discrimination and harassment aimed at Arab-American and Muslim troops since the Fort Hood shooting, says Mikey Weinstein, a former Air Force lawyer who founded the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, which advocates for separation between church and state in the military.

Muslims in the military experience "horrible" discrimination, he says.

Before the shooting at Fort Hood, the foundation had 80 Muslim clients who had reported instances of discrimination and harassment, Weinstein says. Complaints jumped 20% to 103 in the weeks after the shooting. "We had people almost immediately ... being told 'you people' should not be in the military," he says.

Weinstein says he regularly gets complaints from troops who report name-calling, extra duty on holidays such as Christmas and Thanksgiving, anti-Muslim graffiti scrawled on prayer centers, and officers who encourage their troops to kill Muslims or demand Christian prayer....

"If you don't have a valid green card, you're out. If you can't pass the aptitude test or can't physically qualify, you're out," says McGarity, 31, who served in Iraq early in the war and has recruited in Dearborn for four years. "Then there are the guys who are willing, but their families aren't."

The recruiters recognize that Arab-American enlistees may worry about fitting in with fellow troops or having to fight in Arab or Muslim countries. They work with Arab organizations in the community and attend job fairs to meet potential recruits. They hire Arabic linguists to work in their office, learning about the Middle Eastern cultures themselves.

Sgt. Ian Parker, 27, starts conversations with potential soldiers by asking how they feel about going to Iraq or Afghanistan. "Once you hit an objection to that, you're just wasting your time," Parker says.

Arab Americans and Muslims in the military remain a tiny minority. Of nearly 1.5 million active-duty military, about 3,500 are Arab Americans. The military does not keep full data on the number of Muslim troops.

Jamal Baadani, 45, a Marine reservist living in Virginia, is one of them. He founded the Association of Patriotic Arab Americans in Military and often walked around Arab-American communities in uniform. People would ask why he wanted to serve a government "that's going to kill your own kind," he says.

"The U.S. military did not go over there to 'kill your kind.' They went over there to attack a threat that came to this country to attack us," Baadani would respond. "The U.S. Army really respects our community and goes above and beyond to understand our community."


SOURCE #1:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2009/12/after-fort-hood-jihad-massacre-us-army-having-more-trouble-recruiting-muslim-troops.html

SOURCE #2:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/2009-12-10-military-recruits_N.htm

[Ret10Echo]

Found this of interest:

Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairman Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., and ranking member Susan Collins, R-Maine, on Tuesday said the Army needs to update its regulations governing the collection and sharing of personnel information, a conclusion they reached after a classified briefing with senior Defense Department officials about last month's shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas.

Lieberman and Collins said the Army appeared to have insufficient information sharing practices concerning Army Maj. Nidal Hasan, who has been charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted premeditated murder in the Nov. 5 killings.

Lieberman said it is time for the Army to upgrade its personnel policies, but added the military must do so in a sensitive way so as to not drive out Islamic soldiers. Army personnel regulations have not been updated since the Cold War, he added.

Collins said the military has policies in place to help detect personnel who might hold white supremacist views. But she said the policies are inadequate for rooting out personnel who subscribe to radical Islamic ideology.

Both senators said they expect a briefing later this week on what might have gone wrong with information sharing about Hasan among officials with the Justice Department's Joint Terrorism Task Force, which is responsible for coordinating the flow of intelligence for dozens of agencies.

While the Army had collected information on Hasan that was passed to the task force, task force personnel determined it did not rise to the level of a threat.

Lieberman said the key questions he wants answered include what was the quality of the judgment made inside the task force, what kind of information sharing occurred between the task force and the Army, and what would have been learned if more information was shared.

But Lieberman and Collins also expressed frustration that the Obama administration has been slow to brief their committee on the investigation into the shooting, and slow to make administration witnesses available to their staff for interviews.

Collins said the administration appears to be "slow walking" the incident when it comes to keeping Congress informed. But Lieberman said an agreement apparently has been reached with the administration to interview officials.

link here (http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/1209/121509cdpm1.htm?oref=todaysnews)

[Dozer523]

"Jamal Baadani, 45, a Marine reservist living in Virginia, is one of them. He founded the Association of Patriotic Arab Americans in Military and often walked around Arab-American communities in uniform. People would ask why he wanted to serve a government "that's going to kill your own kind," he says.

"The U.S. military did not go over there to 'kill your kind.' They went over there to attack a threat that came to this country to attack us," Baadani would respond. "The U.S. Army really respects our community and goes above and beyond to understand our community."

Screw 'em. Round 'em up and put 'em in camps.

[Peregrino]

Screw 'em. Round 'em up and put 'em in camps.

I agree with the "screw 'em" part. Unfortunately, I can't support the rest. Internment postpones resolution and provides a locus to concentrate opposition; e.g., Guantanamo. Solutions need to reflect the reality of a war against an implacable enemy. A war that they imposed on us.

[Ret10Echo]

This is an extract from the letter to Secretary Gates. The full document can be found here (http://hsgac.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Press.MajorityNews&ContentRecord_id=29abdac3-5056-8059-763d-429e7d9b34ee).


January 13, 2010

LIEBERMAN, COLLINS ISSUE PRELIMINARY RECOMMENDATIONS IN FORT HOOD INVESTIGATION
Explicit Prohibition of Violent Islamist Extremism In Military

Updating that approach will protect from suspicion the thousands of Muslim-Americans who serve honorably in the U.S. military and maintain the bonds of trust among servicemembers of all religions which is so essential to our military’s effectiveness.



I. DoD Should Update Its Approach to Extremism in the Ranks Given the Threat of Homegrown Terrorism Inspired by Violent Islamist Extremism.


II. DoD Should Increase Training of DoD Personnel Concerning Violent Islamist Extremism.


III. DoD Should Revise its Policies to Address Violent Extremism Generally and Violent Islamist Extremism in Particular.


IV. DoD Should Ensure that Servicemembers Report Signs of Violent Islamist Extremism.


Clearly, violent Islamist extremism is highly distinct from Islam, and thousands of Muslim-Americans serve honorably in the military. We believe that the changes recommended above will not serve to increase scrutiny of these servicemembers’ religious beliefs or practices or to cause tension with their colleagues. To the contrary: we believe that the opposite will occur. Efforts by DoD to educate its personnel concerning what violent Islamist extremism is and what the warning signs of such extremism are – as distinguished from the practice of the Islamic faith – will increase trust between the thousands of Muslim-Americans serving honorably and their colleagues. Clear policies and training should foster greater respect for Muslim-Americans who serve in the military. We trust that, given the sensitivity of this issue, DoD will proceed to make the revisions and changes outlined in this letter in a manner that seeks to avoid unintended consequences and interpretations of its new policies and training.

We understand that the Department’s initial review concerning the Fort Hood shooting is scheduled to conclude on January 15, 2010. We understand that the initial review will focus on the military’s personnel evaluation system; we plan to review that system in the course of our full investigation. We assume that the Department’s overall review will assess the adequacy of the Department’s approach to violent Islamist extremism among DoD personnel and hope that our recommendations as outlined above will be helpful to your review. As mentioned above, we will continue our investigation and may make further recommendations in this area based on the specific facts concerning Major Hasan and any additional information.

[Warrior-Mentor]

Political Correctness Claims 13 Lives at Fort Hood
by Robert Spencer (more by this author)
Posted 01/14/2010 ET

It’s official: political correctness prevented Fort Hood assassin Nidal Hasan’s Army superiors from acting upon signs of his incipient jihadist tendencies. AP reported Monday that “a Defense Department review of the shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas, has found the doctors overseeing Maj. Nidal Hasan’s medical training repeatedly voiced concerns over his strident views on Islam and his inappropriate behavior, yet continued to give him positive performance evaluations that kept him moving through the ranks.”

Hasan rose to the rank of major even as he turned what was supposed to have been a lecture on psychiatry into a diatribe on the Koran’s punishments for unbelievers and doctrines of warfare against them. According to AP, “he gave a class presentation questioning whether the U.S.-led war on terror was actually a war on Islam. And students said he suggested that Shariah, or Islamic law, trumped the Constitution and he attempted to justify suicide bombings.” He rose through Army ranks even as he justified suicide bombing and spouted hatred for America while wearing its uniform.

His superiors and those around him noted his statements, and were worried about them. “Yet no one in Hasan’s chain of command,” reports AP, “appears to have challenged his eligibility to hold a secret security clearance even though they could have because the statements raised doubt about his loyalty to the United States.”

Why didn’t they?

Because they knew what would happen if they did.

If Nidal Hasan had been removed from his position or even simply reprimanded and disciplined in the months or years before he massacred thirteen people in cold blood at Fort Hood, it isn’t hard to imagine what might have happened. Groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) would have been quick to charge the Army with “bigotry” and “anti-Muslim hatred.” The mainstream media would have embarked upon a full-bore witch hunt about the alleged witch hunt against Muslims in the military, interviewing the weeping mothers of Muslim soldiers killed in the line of duty while fighting for the U.S. in Iraq or Afghanistan. Army generals would have had to answer questions about alleged discrimination against Muslims in the military on the Sunday morning talk shows. And ultimately the President of the United States would order a special effort to make Muslims in the military feel at home and welcome.

Worse still, those who might have complained about Hasan would have faced public abuse, smearing by CAIR and MPAC as bigots, and possibly even disciplinary action from their superiors. Chris Matthews, Jon Stewart and Bill Maher would have subjected them to nationally broadcast ridicule. All Army personnel would have been ordered into sensitivity training, perhaps run by CAIR itself.

It isn’t hard at all to imagine such a scenario, because it has played out in real life more than once. For years now CAIR, MPAC and other Islamic advocacy groups in the U.S. have done all they could to demonize everyone who speaks honestly about the threat of jihad and Islamic supremacism. Nor have they limited their attacks to public figures: CAIR was behind an effort in 2008 by six imams who were taken off a flight for acting suspiciously to sue the passengers who reported the imams to airline personnel. If their attempt had succeeded, Americans would be afraid to report suspicious behavior in airplanes for fear of being sued.

And even thought that effort failed, people are indeed afraid to speak up about Muslims behaving suspiciously. The cost is, for most, simply too high.

And so for CAIR, MPAC, and the rest, the Fort Hood massacre was in a very real sense a mission accomplished: “Islamophobia” was duly avoided. Nidal Hasan was not removed from his post, and no steps were taken to protect anyone else from him. All this cost was 13 dead and 38 wounded. And in response, General George Casey has said the loss of the Army’s “diversity” because of Hasan’s jihad would be worse than the murders themselves -- indicating that the political correctness that got us into this fix is still with us, and still putting us all at risk.

Mr. Spencer is director of Jihad Watch and author of "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades)", "The Truth About Muhammad," "Stealth Jihad," and most recently "The Complete Infidel's Guide to the Koran" (all from Regnery -- a HUMAN EVENTS sister company).

SOURCE:
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=35182

[The Reaper]

I continue to be disappointed with the response of the Army's leadership.

And no comments on why troops trusted with national secrets, armed aircraft, and tanks in a combat zone, making life and death decisions cannot be trusted to carry small arms to protect themselves and innocents at home.

TR

[Monsoon65]

And no comments on why troops trusted with national secrets, armed aircraft, and tanks in a combat zone, making life and death decisions cannot be trusted to carry small arms to protect themselves and innocents at home.

I've been wondering the same thing myself since I enlisted in 1983. I can be trusted with TS info, duties involving aerial flight, the whole nine yards, but heaven forbid if I even had the passing thought about keeping a weapon in my barracks room.