By JOSEPH BERGER
General George Casey Jr., the Army chief of staff, said on Sunday that he was concerned that speculation about the religious beliefs of Maj.Nidal Malik Hasan, accused of killing 12 fellow soldiers and one civilian and wounding dozens of others in a shooting rampage at Fort Hood, could “cause a backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers.”
“I’ve asked our Army leaders to be on the lookout for that,” General Casey said in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union. “It would be a shame — as great a tragedy as this was — it would be a shame if our diversity became a casualty as well.”
General Casey, who was appeared on three Sunday news programs, used almost the same language during an interview on ABC’s “This Week With George Stephanopoulos,” an indication of the Army’s effort to ward off bias against the more than 3,000 Muslims in its ranks.
“A diverse Army gives us strength,” General Casey, who visited Fort Hood Friday, said on “This Week.”
At a news conference in Fort Hood, near Killeen, Tex., the Army announced that 16 of the wounded remained hospitalized, with seven in intensive care. Major Hasan, who was shot by a base police officer, was listed in stable but critical condition.
The major, a 39-year-old psychiatrist, is the American-born son of Palestinian immigrants. He vocally opposed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and seems to have moved toward more extreme religious beliefs in recent years, according to the investigators. Investigators have tentatively concluded that he acted alone and was not part of a terrorist plot.
Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” labeled the shooting spree “the most destructive terrorist act to be committed on American soil since 9/11” and said that as chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee he intended to investigate Major Hasan’s suspected motives and whether the Army “missed warning signs that should have led them to essentially discharge him.”
“If Hasan was showing signs, saying to people that he had become an Islamist extremist, the U.S. Army has to have zero tolerance,” Senator Lieberman said. “He should have been gone.”
Asked whether he thought the Army “dropped the ball” in not responding to warning signs that the major was increasingly radical, General Casey replied that he was encouraging soldiers to provide information to criminal investigators. But he added that the Army needs to be careful not to jump to conclusions based on early tidbits of information.
“The speculation could heighten the backlash,” he said on “This Week.” “What happened at Fort Hood is a tragedy and I believe it would be a greater tragedy if diversity became a casualty here.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Republican of South Carolina, and Sen. Jack Reed, a Democrat of Rhode Island, took also pains on Sunday to say that Muslims have served honorably in the military and at risk to their lives.
“At the end of the day this is not about his religion — the fact that this man was a Muslim,” Senator Graham said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”
Senator Graham and Ike Shelton, a Missouri Democrat who chairs the House Armed Services Committee, were asked why the Army would have assigned a psychiatrist who had a poor performance record at Walter Reed Hospital and ranted about America’s war on terrorism to Fort Hood. Mr. Skelton said he was briefed by the Army and was told it is investigating such assertions.
“Let’s give them a few days to find out just where the ball was dropped, if that’s the case” he said.
Senator Graham’s echoed his restraint.
“I mean does every soldier who shows discontent with the war and every soldier that has had a bad performance report — what are we going to do with those folks?” Sen. Graham said. “At the end of the day, maybe this is just about him. It’s certainly not about his religion, Islam.”
He added: “To those members of the United States military who are Muslims, thank you for protecting our nation, thank you for standing up against the people who are trying to hijack your religion.”
The San Antonio Express-News has reported that classmates in a graduate military medical program heard Major Hasan justify suicide bombings and make radical and anti-American statements. But investigators have said that Major Hasan might have suffered from emotional problems that were aggravated by the strain of working with veterans of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan and by the knowledge that he might soon be deployed to those theaters as well.
General Casey also sought to answer one of the mysteries lingering from the massacre — why did initial reports say there was more than one gunman. He said that soldiers were seen running and some witnesses assumed they were running from the police.
In his appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” General Casey revealed that investigations for the Army and FBI had conducted 170 interviews so far.
“They’ll look at all this and they’ll help us form a judgment,” he said. “But right now it’s way too soon to be drawing any conclusions about what happened or what his motivations were.”
General Casey acknowledged that fighting two wars at the same time have put strains on the Army and its soldiers. But he said the Army had taken steps to ensure that soldiers are prepared for the mental stress of combat and treated well if they suffer psychologically.
“We’ve also worked very, very hard to enhance what we’re doing to — for the mental fitness of the force,” he said on “Meet the Press. “ He cited a “stigma reduction program” started in 2007 that “resulted in about a 40 percent increase in soldiers willing to come forward saying they have some symptoms of post-traumatic stress.”
He said that last year the suicide rate exceeded the civilian rate for the first time and as a result the Army is spending $5 million to have the National Institute of Health study the problem. More recently, he said, the Army has started a program called Comprehensive Soldier Fitness designed to give soldiers skills “to build the resilience to deal with some of the challenges that they’re facing.”
On the base Sunday morning, mourners were asked to pray for Major Hasan and his family, The Associated Press reported.
“Lord, all those around us search for motive, search for meaning, search for something, someone to blame,” Col. Frank Jackson told about 120 people inside the post’s chapel. “That is so frustrating. Today, we pause to hear from you. So Lord, as we pray together, we focus on things we know.”
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