Major Hasan -- A True Believer

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who killed 13 people at Fort Hood in November 2009, was:

a) Part of a terror network that had planned attacks on the United States since the 1990s;

b) A deranged psychotic who snapped under the pressure of treating soldiers returning from Iraq and who happened to be a Muslim;

c) A prime example of "The True Believer," the lonely, frustrated individual who attaches himself to an overarching cause as a way of compensating for personal disappointments.

The answer, of course, is "c," the true believer. There is no sense in searching his computer for ties to al Qaeda, or combing the psychology textbooks for a diagnosis, or listening to the journalistic sages such as Newsweek editor Evan Thomas, who says he "cringed" to discover that such an obvious lunatic as Major Hasan also happened to be a Muslim. The text for understanding Major Hasan's actions is Eric Hoffer's 1951 classic, The True Believer, written as an explanation of the appeal of secular religions in the 20th century. Hoffer's book also explains why there will be many, many more Major Hasans.

Almost completely forgotten now and rarely encountered in the college curriculum, The True Believer was a dazzling explanation of why 20th century totalitarian creeds appealed to so many seemingly ordinary and non-descript individuals, particularly among the intelligentsia. A self-educated migrant worker who spent many years living on skid row, Hoffer had been endowed with a love of reading after losing his eyesight temporarily as a child and then regaining it again as a teenager.

” Probably this is because, unlike all the other major religions, Islam embraces polygamy. Allowing the most powerful males to take multiple wives produces a shortage of eligible females, which in turn leads to the purchase of wives (the “brideprice,”), the hoarding and sequestering of females as valuable commodities, arranged marriages with girls that have not even reached puberty, and — most important of all — the creation of a large cohort of unattached adult males who serve as the fertile breeding ground for religious fanaticism.

Major Hasan was one of them. Unmarried, isolated in a foreign culture (even though he grew up here), he was obviously prime material to become a foot soldier in a higher cause. Jihad offered a better life, in this world or the next.

So the Fort Hood massacre will likely produce no “smoking gun,” no bank transfers or detailed instructions from a worldwide network of radical imams. Islamic fundamentalism is no secret conspiracy. It is something much more obvious — an open doctrine appealing to frustrated men in a culture that specializes in producing men with frustrations. To such a cohort, the stable, satisfied — even happy — lives of people living in a successful culture can only be the objects of venomous hatred.

Major Hasan was only one. There will be more to come. “

How many more “Self-radicalized” unexploded weapons are out there right now?? The most dangerous terrorist conspiracy we face may have no conspiracy at all...

I’d go for A, personally. All Muslims see themselves as frustrated and mistreated, so it does tend to attract personalities like that. But at the same time, Hasan had no reason for being frustrated: he had received a fully paid expensive education, he was getting promotions, he was obviously free to carry on his bizarre Islamic proseletysing activities among his patients, and he was making good money.

But for years he had clearly been contributing that money to terrorist groups abroad and certainly, while he may have contacted AQ directly only in the last months, he was connected with a known terrorist imam and also, even though he was American-born, regarded himself as a Palestinian who had no loyalties to the US.

I’d say his “root emotional problem” was his belief in Islam, and I think we will find out that he had been in contact with terrorist networks for some time. As for the fact that he did this particular act alone or at least without a supporter present at the time, this was part of the strategy urged on Muslims only a couple of years ago by some of their terrorist leaders. Unpredictable and unexpected lone-wolf actions...great for spreading terror, and they have already been used several times in this country.

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