From our buddy, Aunty Brat, comes the news that the FBI is finished investigating the way they handled, or rather didn’t handle the Nidal Hasan investigation prior to him blasting scores of soldiers at Fort Hood nearly three years ago;
Fox News reports that that the FBI was aware that Maj. Nidal Hasan, the Fort Hood shooter, was in touch with Anwar al-Awlaki, the radical U.S.-born cleric who was killed by a CIA dron last August. The FBI was also aware of proclamations by Hassan that suicide bombing against Americans was justified. In fact, Hasan’s statements became a problem because his fellow students at Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington, D.C., were so alarmed by them, that some fled the classroom.
Still, in summer 2009, the FBI’s JTTF decided not to interview Hasan’s Army supervisors because they were concerned about hurting his career.
Yeah, because one soldier’s career is worth more than the lives of the people he ended on that morning. For the last few weeks, I’ve been knee-deep in “The Black Banners” written by Ali Soufan, an FBI agent who was conducting the investigation of the USS Cole bombing when 9/11 happened and he was switched to that investigation. You can see how the CIA aided the 9-11 terrorists by not sharing information and Soufan lays that right at the feet of the CIA in his book.
So apparently, the FBI didn’t learn the lesson, because the biggest reason Hasan got away with, or even thought he could accomplish his bloody operation, was because no one questioned his actions and communications with al-Awlaki. Maybe if they had just asked him about it, he would have been discouraged.
The whole book, The Black Banners, is about the destructive potential of compartmentalized information in the government and among our so-called allies. Yet here we are again, looking down the barrel of the same gun again.
[Representative Frank Wolf (R-Virginia)] also said both the Clinton and Bush administration ignored warnings before 9/11. “I fear that now, as was then, the government is not doing enough to learn from past threats and attacks to prevent and prepare for future threats. People died in the attack on Fort Hood. We have to learn from this tragedy.”
The department of Homeland Security was supposed to be a pancea for that problem. WTF were they? I guess they couldn’t worry about it because it had the potential to be a workplace violence case.
Until our alphabet agencies figure out that job and power protection is going to mean loss of innocent life, this scenario will continue to play out over and over again.
Concur. I wouldn’t mind seeing a lot of that budget-cutting Congress talks about being done in these agencies.
Like someone who’s been “institutionalized” by being imprisoned for most of his life and cannot function in normal society, I believe that these agencies are suffering from a similar condition. They’ve been so infused with politics at all levels that they’ve lost sight of their mission.
We need to find a way to de-politicize them and rebuild them with fresh minds. People willing to put the mission above everything else.
Dear FBI,
Please investigate background of POTUS Obama – his lifestory doesn’t seem to square up with MSM’s slobbering accounts. Why seal your records? Seems like slowly but surely as more people start digging, the carefully woven story of Barry Obama is starting to unravel. Too many half truths, embellishments, and outright contradictions are coming to light. If MSM went after BO with same fervor they went after Sarah Palin, he would have been disqualified a long time ago.
Some interesting reading:http://www.wnd.com/2012/06/now-we-learn-obama-raised-in-singapore/
http://www.wnd.com/2012/07/record-shows-obama-at-columbia-only-1-year/
#2 your last sentence rings true with me. After meeting a few OGA super secret squirrels and seeing their work ethic and that mission first mentality….maybe the named 3 letter agencies should and could hire out of there.
Politics in agencies and departments that are supposed to be safeguarding our freedoms, lives, and national interests is/are inherently counter productive.
Sad to read they were worried about Hasans career. Makes me ask what career? Poisoning peoples mind with his hate??? Or killing actual soldiers defending our beautiful country?
Shame on the army for allowing this jihadist to pass what ever schools he had to pass to get his position. He should have been escorted out when he talked about suicide jihadist being justified. After he was escorted out of his school at reed he should have been on everyones watch, no fly and terrorist lists. Another example of the new army just not caring about jack shit unless its numbers. The numbers they care about are changing due to shrinking but they are still worried about numbers.
Sad all the way around. God bless America…the armed forces and hopefully our brothers and sisters murdered by hasan are resting peacefully.
Today’s FBI is living off of a well deserved great reputation. Unfortunately reputations fade and one must DO SOMETHING to maintain its good name. The FBI’s whining/excuses of: “The US Attorney won’t let us”… “My supervisor won’t let me”… blah blah… blah. Right is right, and wrong is wrong. They are too PC’d and “Affirmative actioned” to do the right thing in a timely manner. How these agents sleep at night with a clear conscious is mind boggling. There are a few good ones… but most are lame careerists who are ate up. I’ve dealt with many, in many offices, and not impressed.
An 11B private, in Division, has earned more respect from me, and I hold him in higher esteem.
Part of the problem here is that many of the people in high-ranking positions that probably handed down the decision about not hurting Hasan’s “career” are appointed positions. These people are hand-picked by some bureaucrat or presidential aid because they will toe the line that these people want. I believe government should run like a business, pick the best guy with the best record and the best vision for the agency and its goals, not to protect some stupid political ideology (left or right). It’s their job to protect our nation and our people from those who would harm us, and I think they left that behind a long time ago.
One of the BIGGEST failures I saw with the US Army and the Army National Guard was that the officers would take care of the officers. In several cases where an officer did something -in Bosnia, Iraq or at home…that would have gotten an NCO or enlisted in deep kimchee, they did everything they could to protect the officer.
Even former officers who were reduced in rank to NCOs for one reason or another seemed to get this protection.
It made me sick seeeing it.
Have to say I have a very different take on this. I don’t see this as politics per se. I see it as a combination of political correctness run amok, bad leadership, and the age old conundrum of wide or restricted access to sensitive information.
Obviously, political correctness was a factor. Even though radical Islam declared jihad on the West 15+ years ago, we feel we can’t do the common-sense things that that fact suggests we should do. That would be “profiling” – even though it’s fully justified by objective fact.
Second, poor leadership. Good leadership would have been asking for periodic updates on critical indicators (like Hasan’s communications with known extremists) and would have spoken up – and taken appropriate action. They’d also have encouraged their subordinates to do likewise. Obviously, both the Army and FBI failed here.
But the third point is IMO the hardest to call. When dealing with this type of information, there are always competing demands. Control and security argue for minimum dissemination. Operational effectiveness argues for wide dissemination. It’s a helluva hard tightrope to walk. Err on the side of too much restriction and you miss a Hasan – and end up with friendly casualties. Err on the side of too much access and you get a Hansen or a Manning – and friendly casualties.
The first two issues seem reasonably straightforward to fix, albeit the fix may be very difficult to accomplish (they both involve changing an existing organizational culture). The third? As of now, we depend on potentially fallible individuals to make the right call concerning how widely to disseminate certain sensitive information. I’m not sure there is a better answer.
Good luck getting rid of hackery in the government…no matter how dedicated a field agent is, a manager who is also an empire builder will screw the pooch every time to add to their little fiefdom….
When there is no real oversight and you just keep adding agencies to resolve the problems of other agencies you will never actually accomplish the mission of either…there’s a reason it’s still possible for inspectors to beat the system at the airports around the nation, it’s called accountability…we talk about accountability all the time in the public sector but it’s a meaningless discussion because the only folks held accountable are not in senior management….when you are responsible for a team and that team effs up…in the private sector you get popped and someone else comes in and takes your slot managing the team…in the government the same sad sack POS who couldn’t manage the first team gets to sack the team and start over…until we actually address that in every place we see it, nothing changes.
The people who saw what Hasan was doing and sat idly by are cowards.
Keep in mind, I can’t condemn their cowardice. I know how it is. The first person who complained that there was a wackjob jihadist in an army uniform would have been told to shut up and quit being so Islamaphobic. I doubt any action would have been taken, so what’s the point?
I’ve worked with some incredibly lazy black people. They weren’t lazy because they were black, they were lazy because they slacked off and let other people work harder. There are some white people who do the same. The difference is that white people are usually called out on their laziness whereas blacks are not. The first person to say something about a black person’s laziness will be accused of racism, something nearly as bad as being a child predator in our society.
I have seen people twist themselves into pretzels trying to avoid the appearance of bias. Failing to do so can be hazardous to your career, whether in the military or civilian worlds.
This is the root of the problem.
I’m still so upset about the Fort Hood massacre.
It is truly wonderful to read comments so serious (actually mature) and important, and from men younger than I (I suspect !!) .
Dr_Brett…kind of getting to be a bit older these days…not thrilled to get my AARP notifications…..
No. 13:
Ha !!
It’s NOT YOUR FAULT — and it’s better than the alternative (curtains).
Please excuse me for the change of subject — this “thread” (post + comments, if I understand correctly) is deadly serious, literally. And it is nearly unbelievable, that the American government’s Security Intelligence Forces have fallen to such a state of incompetent, foolhardy disregard for precious life .
Certainly the mission of coordinating intelligence gathering and sharing is a monumental task, Hondo is on point with the problem more logistical then political perhaps…
I do think all these bureaus guard information they gather though as “their” information. Homeland Security was supposed to become a clearinghouse for the gathered information and disseminate appropriately to each organization to complement their unique missions…his point about deciding what is wide versus narrow dissemination is also probably right on target, but HSA should be the arbiter of that not the individual agencies…empire builders might hang on to things they should be releasing…which compounds the problem when it happens at every agency…and factoring in PC problems means everyone is trying to avoid being called the racist organization….but facts are facts and at the end of the day one type of individual commits suicide bombing/suicide attacks regularly….other groups plan and execute their version of terror but not usually involving intentional suicide of the perpetrator. Profiling Islamists is the right step and divulging radical speech amongst these organizations is also a right step, at some point we have to start believing the people who say they wish to kill us and understand them as our Israeli allies do, that Islamists are serious, dedicated, and deadly to those whom they identify as infidels…
#5…what’s wrong with a division 11B private? I understood what you meant, but a different comparison probably would have been better because a private of any MOS has more respect from me than most of the rest of America and an 11B private even more so because I was one at one point
#13…I got my first AARP piece of mail when I was 31. I’m 33 now and get one every two or three months for some reason
#16… not a slam at all on 11B “Division” privates whatsoever. Privates (at times) are treated like idiots due to poor leaders countermanding or tweaking idiotic orders from above… then they (privates) get the shaft for doing what they were told to do because a higher up didn’t want it done in the first place.
The FBI is suppose to be thinkers and investigators. I hold “Division 11B” privates in high esteem. They, 11B (IMO), of all Army MOSs fucking tell it like it is! The FBI hides behind their skirts and points fingers. The only finger pointing an 11B does is with his middle finger- or trigger finger when in combat.
#17 Ouch….I’m a couple decades past you, I expect getting them…and to be honest saving a couple of bucks on a car rental or hotel room from time to time is ok as well…I just don’t like signing up for a cruise and discovering seniors are 55 and over and my wife and I now qualify….of course we take the savings, we’re not stupid…but it doesn’t mean we have to go quietly….
I intend to completely wear out all my working parts before I am gone….
This thread does NOT appear on the Facebook (Farcebook ??) side.
No. 16:
IF ONLY — SELF-respect, IN REALITY — would become fashionable .
KTRH Houston had an identical question posted this morning on Farcebook. They wanted to know what the public would recommend so I took a swipe at it and said “Keep the FBI out of military law enforcement and let USACIDC handle the Army’s problems instead”. It might be a bit of a stretch but I am certain there are most likely more than a few warrants and NCO SA’s that are plenty capable of doing the frahking job…Oh wait, CID has civies working in it, I forgot that part…
“Today’s FBI is living off of a well deserved great reputation.”. There’s a lot of people who might disagree with you, Beretverde.
Once upon a time, they did have that “well deserved great” rep, but things like this chip away at that rep. http://www.woodtv.com/dpp/news/target_8/FBI-had-bank-robbers-under-surveillance
@22 You are absolutely correct.
To accept AARP membership, “for the perks”, is their reasoning. This organization is batshit crazy liberal. I am 71 years old and cannot afford what AARP would offer. When I am asked if I have an AARP card, (for a discount), I counter with telling them my true age and ask if they discriminate against those who choose not join AARP. Works EVERY time.
No AARP for me, ever.
#1 – Do not join libturd AARP. If you want to join a senior organization, join AMAC (Association of Mature American Citizens), very conservative.
#2 – “Sorry” don’t feed the bulldog – or resurrect the dead.