The AtlanticWire, to which I have become hopelessly addicted, had a good rundown yesterday on what a few military blogs have been writing about the massacre at Fort Hood. Military bloggers have rightly been incensed at the meme that PTSD or more generally the “stress on the military” had something to do with this. It is as wrongheaded, at this point, as assuming that he did it because he’s a Muslim. Both notions just use Major Hasan’s madness to advance an ideological argument. In general, there’s been a predictable rush to assign blame. We need to have an explanation for something so horrifying, so people reach for logic: He was a psychiatrist treating PTSD so he must have had some kind of “secondary PTSD” ; or he shouted “Allahu Akbar!” as he began shooting so he must be a lone jihadi. But logic isn’t very useful when you’re dealing with a psychotic killer, which is clearly what we’re dealing with here. We may find out as the pieces of this puzzle come together that one of these explanations is correct, but for now it’s all just speculation. PTSD is real, but this is obviously not a case of it since Hasan had never deployed. Radical Islamic terrorism is also real, but let’s not confuse it with plain old madness. We may never know why Hasan did what he did. Sure, he’s alive to tell us at some point, but I’d be suspicious of his explanation, if he even has one. One of the bloggers that the Atlantic cited, John Lilyea from This Ain’t Hell, gets at this:

Here’s a theory I have, that won’t be very popular; Hasan was/is a cheesy pogue pussy. He liked the amenities of being stationed near his home and living in the big city with a Major’s salary and suddenly he found himself at nasty-ass Fort Hood (I spent two years there and every minute trying to leave) looking at a deployment to a nastier place.

I don’t think he did it because of his faith (but he’ll use it as an excuse), or because of PTSD (ditto). The Army doesn’t train their psychiatrists to shoot rooms full of people, so it’s not the Army’s fault. It’s this spoiled little rich kid (by the way, he ignored his father’s advice when he joined the Army – listen to your father), who couldn’t stand the thought of being uncomfortable.

What? Too simple? No room for anyone to use him as their poster boy? Exactly.

I don’t know if Lilyea’s explanation is right or wrong, but his point is right on the mark.