# Fort Hood Shooter Hasan: Coward? \[edited title\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 12, 2009, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305 "2009-11-12T12:44:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Pashnish\_Ewing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8797f3/32.png) [@Pashnish\_Ewing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pashnish_Ewing)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/21 "2009-11-13T16:26:34Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > He is very content letting some poor brainwashed person or young kid blow himself up. If blowing oneself up for a cause is good why isn’t Osama blowing himself up? Isn’t this a little like calling Gen. Patton a coward for not putting himself on the front lines? ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/22 "2009-11-13T16:37:02Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > It is my understanding that Muslims consider Jesus a Prophet, just that Muhammad got the story straightened out by some angel of God who dictated a book to him. Gabriel. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/23 "2009-11-13T16:40:36Z")
I don’t think it is accurate to call bin Laden a coward, afteral he has been living for almost a decade on the run from the US and living in caves. He believes in something and has taken extrordinary risks to realize his vision, whether you believe in his vision or not. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/24 "2009-11-13T16:42:45Z")
Contemporary accounts seem to indicate he did actually fight the Soviets in Afghanistan in the sense of picking up a rifle and shooting at them. ---
**Author:** ![glee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5a626/32.png) [@glee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glee)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/25 "2009-11-13T17:04:33Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > It made me wonder why we do not call the So Called Terriosts, just crazy cowards. What courage does it take to go into a room of people you know are not armed and open fire on them? Osama is the biggest coward of them all, he keeps himself hidden and lets some poor misguided person (or even a kid), go into a crowd of innocent people and blow them up. They cover their faces because they are afraid to be known, or act like they are one of the armies that are against them, but would’t think of wearing something to identify themselves as a Muslim when they do their cowardly act. > [@monavis](#): > > Yes, peace loving Muslims try to follow a god ,but those like Major Hasan who go into a room of defenseless people and kill them in the name of their god is not bravery, he may believe it is a good thing but in human terms it is a cowardly act. > > If the USA wanted to they could bomb all the people off the earth, our culture doesn’t think that way,and they should be grateful that we are not like them, they go on and on if by accident some inncocent people are killed in a war, but they think nothing of killing at random and even killing some of their own people as Major Hasan did. > > Some of the people in the Twin Towers were Muslims but that didn’t stop the suicidal ones from killing all the innocent people, some who may have even sympathized with them. I certainly condemn terrorists (having been a few hundred feet away from an IRA bomb when it exploded in London), but I don’t think that making clumsy insults is helpful in understanding and dealing with these people. 1. Major Hasan was despicable, but there’s no reason to call him a coward. He knew he was going to be shot eventually. Similarly the evil 9/11 bombers were prepared to die for their beliefs. 2. The USA has bombed many countries, killing civilians as well as military in the process. The reasons for use of atomic weapons at the end of WW2 has been discussed many times, but it is not correct for you to say ‘our culture doesn’t think that way’. **And of course people object ‘if by accident some innocent people are killed in a war’.** This happens regularly even to US soldiers and allies: - [A U.S. F4 Phantom aircraft dropped a 500 lb. bomb on the command post of the 2nd Battalion (Airborne) 503d Infantry, 173d Airborne Brigade while they were in heavy contact with a numerically superior NVA force on 19th of November 1967, at 1858 hours. At least 45 paratroopers were killed and another 45 wounded - American A-10 during Operation Desert Storm attacks British armoured personnel carriers killing nine British soldiers. - During the Battle of Khafji, 11 American Marines are killed in two major incidents when their light armored vehicles (LAV’s) are hit by American missiles fired by a USAF A-10 - In the Black Hawk Incident, two U.S. Air Force F-15Cs involved with Operation Provide Comfort shot down two U.S. Army UH-60 Black Hawks over northern Iraq, killing 29 military and civilian personnel - In the Tarnak Farm incident of April 18, 2002, four Canadian soldiers were killed and eight others injured when U.S. Air National Guard Major Harry Schmidt, dropped a laser-guided 227-kilogram (500 lb) bomb from his F-16 jet fighter on the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry conducting a night firing exercise near Kandahar - American aircraft attacked a friendly Kurdish & U.S. Special Forces convoy, killing 15. BBC translator Kamaran Abdurazaq Muhamed was killed and BBC reporter Tom Giles and World Affairs Editor John Simpson were injured]([Friendly fire - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendly_fire)) And to innocent civilians: - [The Pentagon today promised a joint investigation with the Afghan government into what could turn out to be one of the highest civilian death tolls yet from US coalition bombing. Afghan officials estimated that at least 30 and possibly more than 100 were killed near the village of Ganjabad in Bala Baluk district, a Taliban-controlled area near the border with Iran.](http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/05/us-afghanistan-civilian-deaths-coalition-bombing) - [The two American “smart” bombs worked perfectly, striking what the Pentagon had identified as an Iraqi command and control center during the 1991 Gulf War. The 2,000-pound laser-guided bombs burrowed through 10 feet of hardened concrete and detonated, punching a gaping hole in the Amiriyah bomb shelter – and incinerating 408 Iraqi civilians.](http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/1022/p01s01-wosc.html) ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/26 "2009-11-13T19:29:21Z")
Ben Laden is fighting the most powerful country in the world ,with a small army, much weaker weapons . Yet he makes tapes thumbing his nose at us. That is not cowardly. He knows he can not defeat us, just outlast us. Then he will be a hero. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/27 "2009-11-13T19:54:04Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Ben Laden is fighting the most powerful country in the world ,with a small army, much weaker weapons . Yet he makes tapes thumbing his nose at us. That is not cowardly. He knows he can not defeat us, just outlast us. Then he will be a hero. Osama bin Laden is probably dead already. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/28 "2009-11-13T20:15:05Z")
> [@mswas](#): > > Osama bin Laden is probably dead already. Seems like every time someone says that, another video pops up. When was the latest one, January? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2009, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/29 "2009-11-13T20:19:58Z")
I doubt he’s dead, for the simple reason that he’d be worth much more as a martyr than as a beardy guy decrying America and financing bomb plots. All they’d have to say is that he was assassinated by a Pakistani secularist in Waziristan, and that way they incite anger against non-Islamist forces in Pakistan _and_ turn him into a martyr _and_ make sure the US is seen to have failed, all at once. ---
**Author:** ![BuickGNX1987](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b487fb/32.png) [@BuickGNX1987](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BuickGNX1987)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/30 "2009-11-14T00:28:01Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Seems like every time someone says that, another video pops up. When was the latest one, January? [http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/03/world/main5058482.shtml](http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/06/03/world/main5058482.shtml) Looks like May or June. I haven’t had the internet for a few years, but when I did, it seemed like his tapes were very vague which made me think that he was dead and the tapes were made much earlier and then released when they seemed to fit the current situation best. However, with this one referencing Obama, which would have been pretty hard to predict in the early 2000’s, that idea is out the window. Until this, I would’ve guessed he died within a couple of years after 9/11. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/31 "2009-11-14T13:10:29Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Whether or not he has done any good for the Muslim people doesn’t factor in to whether or not he is a coward. Since Bin Laden is not the head of a government and hides, he is sure acting like a coward. If a person has some one else do their dirty work and hides because he doesn’t want people to know where he is, that is a cowardly act. To send someone else to kill a bunch of innocent people is the act of a coward. You can honor such actions but I do not!! ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/32 "2009-11-14T13:23:57Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Way too broad a brush to make sense, dude. You mean that you’d rather be a slave in the antebellum South than be a Muslim in a repressive theocratic Islamic society where the women are treated like slaves. > > The status of women in Islamic societies ranges from conditions that, as you note, are little better than slavery (as in Taliban Afghanistan) all the way up to full equality of legal rights (as in Turkey). > Partly it’s just the universal tragedy of apathy or timidity on the part of the well-intentioned that lets the evil-intentioned get their way (you can supply the Burke quote for yourself). > > And partly it’s that we in the west don’t hear much about Muslims who **do** stand up against radical fellow Muslims advocating or committing violence. [This list](http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/muslim_voices_against_extremism_terrorism_part_ii_statements_by_organizatio/0012210) of a hundred or so official pronouncements by Muslim organizations denouncing radical Islamist violence and terror, accompanied by a list of Muslim-organized demonstrations and conferences protesting violence and terror tactics, is a good place to start if you want more exposure to the pro-peace Muslim voices. I am mainly referring to the Muslim women that have no choice. If they choose to wear Burkas and let their husbands keep them from expressing them selves that is their right, but the ones who are killed or beaten is a different story. In some instances such as the Taliban,etc. women have little rights and need to have a male escort to even go out. It doesn’t speak well of Muslim men who are afraid to trust their wives with out them, or to let another man see them. The one’s in the USA and some other countries can have some freedom, but the radicals in other countries,like Iraq, Packistan , and Afghanistan are pushing to have only their way accepted. That is what I am referring to, not the moderate Muslims who are for peace. Some in other countries are held back by fear. A Christian in Iraq is not allowed by the radicals to even attend their services, there are many who were lucky enough to get to the USA and some of the more Moderate Muslim countries. Many in California fear the need to return to Iraq because there are no jobs for them here in the USA. At least that is what some of them were saying in a TV show I watched on Sunday. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/33 "2009-11-14T13:25:41Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > I don’t think it is accurate to call bin Laden a coward, afteral he has been living for almost a decade on the run from the US and living in caves. He believes in something and has taken extrordinary risks to realize his vision, whether you believe in his vision or not. You could give the same excuse to Hitler, he believed he was doing right for Germany and it’s people, tha tsure turned out good didn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/34 "2009-11-14T13:27:59Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > Ben Laden is fighting the most powerful country in the world ,with a small army, much weaker weapons . Yet he makes tapes thumbing his nose at us. That is not cowardly. He knows he can not defeat us, just outlast us. Then he will be a hero. No, he thumbs his nose at us on film, keeping himself out of harms way. And letting some poor snook do his dirty work. ---
**Author:** ![Skylark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Skylark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skylark)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/35 "2009-11-14T14:42:30Z")
It feels better to call Osama bin Laden a coward and a phony, but the story of his life is one of a man who has walked the walk. Abu Musab [al-Zarqawi](http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,194260,00.html) he ain’t. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/36 "2009-11-14T18:47:05Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > Since Bin Laden is not the head of a government and hides, he is sure acting like a coward. If a person has some one else do their dirty work and hides because he doesn’t want people to know where he is, that is a cowardly act. To send someone else to kill a bunch of innocent people is the act of a coward. You can honor such actions but I do not!! :rolleyes: Engage your brain for a second here. Nobody is “honoring” bin Laden. Soldiers wear camouflage during combat, and _hide from the enemy_. Does that make them cowards? Bin Laden may not be doing any fighting himself at the moment, but neither does a military general - and bin Laden did plenty of fighting himself during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Is he a sick bastard? Absolutely. Do I hope he suffers? Certainly. Is he a coward? Not under any reasonable definition. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/37 "2009-11-14T19:00:42Z")
Reminiscent of a line heard many years ago… “When you get to Viet Nam, you will meet some of the bravest, most determined, most resourceful people you are ever likely to meet. And you will be there to kill them.” ---
**Author:** ![Skylark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Skylark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skylark)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2009, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/38 "2009-11-14T20:19:15Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Reminiscent of a line heard many years ago… > > “When you get to Viet Nam, you will meet some of the bravest, most determined, most resourceful people you are ever likely to meet. And you will be there to kill them.” “The man in the black pajamas, Dude. Worthy fuckin’ adversary.” -Walter Sobchak. ---
**Author:** ![Stoneburg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@Stoneburg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoneburg)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2009, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/39 "2009-11-15T01:01:14Z")
Why this fascination with cowardice? Why is it so important to some to label these people as ‘cowards’? I don’t see what it matters or how it is relevant, not to mention you have to re-define the word with a pneumatic drill and a sledgehammer to make it fit. I’m sorry, but Osama has huge balls. Instead of living a life of luxury he has devoted himself to his ideals and has willingly become the most hunted man on the planet. Those ideals happen to be irrational and evil, but that doesn’t come into the equation as far as bravery goes. The complaint is that he is hiding, and that he has people carry out his orders. Let’s take the second part first. Is any leader who doesn’t carry out his own work a coward? Sorry but that is just stupid and an unsustainable position. Does hiding make you a coward? Anyone fighting a superior enemy does best in using guerilla tactics, and that’s just a pretty way of saying hide. Barack Obama isn’t out in the Pakistan mountains hunting Osama with a knife, does that make him a coward? Just because you’re an evil, disgusting person with despicable ideas doesn’t make you a coward. Let’s not try to fit every negative lable in the dictionary on him, just stick with the ones that are true, they are enough. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2009, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305/40 "2009-11-15T01:15:52Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > You could give the same excuse to Hitler, he believed he was doing right for Germany and it’s people, tha tsure turned out good didn’t it? I’m not sure what point you are trying to make. I am not talking about whether bin Laden’s goals or methodologies are “good.” I’m responding to the idea that he is a coward. He most demonstrably is not a coward. He has taken real risks to his safety to follow his beliefs, that is not cowardice. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fort-hood-shooter-hasan-coward-edited-title/517305.md?page=3)