FORT HOOD massacre, viewpoint

There’s now no shortage of comment in the bloggosphere about the US Army major who allegedly shot some of his ‘comrades’.

It’s not surprising that someone actually did, what is surprising is that it took this long.

In the ‘Independent’ this morning a comment was made to the effect that perhaps some (just some—?) of the casualties may have been victims of ‘friendly fire’.
I’d say that one’s a no-brainer, Americans can be wildly enthusiastic with weapons and they believe whole-heartedly in spreading good cheer when they think that they’re on the side of angels. There’s absolutely no doubt that some of the victims fell to the guns of their rescuers, but that’s for the coroner to decide and I doubt that we will ever be told the truth.

In the meantime one of the top bloggers of WordPress has bleated long and loud about the ‘cowardice’ of the good major, who chose unarmed troops to pop off at—unarmed people lined up who couldn’t defend themselves.
He’s ignoring the fact that the major made excellent military sense — isn’t this exactly why the Americans have so much treasure invested in tanks (so that soldiers safely behind armour can loosen up near-naked fighters out in the open) and B52s (so that soldiers safely five miles up in the sky can carpet-bomb fighters, villages etc without fear of retaliation) and so on? Cruise missiles from ships hundreds of miles out to sea, how can a raghead with a rifle compete with that?

I love the American mindset, the same as any other blind fanatic—especially when they couldn’t even begin to see the similarities between what happened to them (microcosm) and what they cheerfully do themselves to innocents abroad with the full arsenal of a modern superpower (macrocosm).
I refer especially to the ‘hero’ sitting at a desk—get this, in Washington—firing Hellfire missiles or 500 pound bombs into weddings, funerals, crowded markets, sleeping villages etc etc half a world away.

But that’s just me. If I were God (I’m not, so we’re all lucky) I’d reverse the course of any weapon loosed against the innocent; intentionally or otherwise* .

In the meantime, here’s a site worthy of a quick peep if only for the statistics—

Fort Hood: The world’s largest military base

# Fort Hood, near Austin, Texas, is the world’s largest military installation, occupying 340 square kilometres.

# It is home to more than 65,000 soldiers, civilian personnel and family members.

# Two armoured divisions are based there, and up to 40,000 US troops.

# It was opened in 1942, as a place to test anti-tank guns that were crucial to combating German blitzkrieg tactics.

# 75 troops at the base have committed suicide between the invasion of Iraq in 2003 and July this year – more than at any other army post.

# The base is home to III Corps, the official counteroffensive force, who are known as “America’s Hammer.”

# In January 2003, then President George W Bush addressed 4,500 troops at the base, and told them to be ready for war.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-army-post-shooting-rampage-leaves-13-dead-1816095.html

—and the Americans wonder why their once great nation is going broke? (Some of them do. The majority have a child-like faith in the power of empty promises to save them) (fiat currency).

KISMET
* Think about it …