Army Chief Promises 'Hard Look' at Whether Signs Were Missed in Attack

Army Chief of Staff George Casey today promised the service would "take a hard look" at itself to make sure that incidents like the armed attack on Thursday at Fort Hood, Texas by a military psychiatrist never happen again.
Casey's vow came in answers to questions on CNN's State of the Union and ABC's This Week about whether the shooting spree by Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan could have been prevented given his stated desire to get out of the Army when faced with deployment overseas plus reports of his opposition to U.S. policies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"We in the Army will take a very hard look at ourselves and ask ourselves the hard questions, because we want to, as everyone else wants to make sure that nothing like this ever happens again," Casey said.

Thirteen people have died as a result of the attack and scores more were wounded.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman, chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, said on Fox News Sunday "that while the Army and the FBI are conducting the criminal investigation about exactly what happened and what Dr. Hasan should be charged with, the U.S. Army, the Department of Defense has a real obligation to convene an independent investigation to go back and look at whether warning signs were missed, both of his -- the stress he was under, but also the statements that he was making which really could lead people to believe that Dr. Hasan had become an Islamist extremist."

Lieberman said his committee would launch its own investigation into "what were the motives of Hasan in carrying out this brutal mass murder, if a terrorist attack, the worst terrorist attack since 9/11, and to ask whether the Army missed warning signs that should have led them to essentially discharge him."

The New York Times reported today that investigators had tentatively concluded that the shootings were not part of a terrorist plot in terms of whether Hasan was "directed or steered" into the attack at Fort Hood.

Casey expressed concern that speculation about Hasan and his views and motives "could potentially heighten backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers. And what happened at Fort Hood was a tragedy, but I believe it would be an even greater tragedy if our diversity becomes a casualty here."

Casey acknowledged the strains on military personnel that has led to record rates of suicide and post-traumatic stress disorders - problems that Hasan, in his role as a psychiatrist treating troubled soldiers, was exposed to firsthand.

Speaking of the multiple deployments for troops because of the demands of Afghanistan and Iraq, Casey said that the Army has "been out of balance" for two and a half years "and we have been working very hard to bring ourselves back in balance, balance being a point at which the soldiers are deploying at sustainable rates. We've made progress towards that but we still have a way to go."