Lawmakers are divided on Fort Hood hearings

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Lawmakers are divided on Fort Hood hearings
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Nov 11, 2009 19:01:55 EST

Congress is divided about how — and even whether — to move forward with independent investigations of the recent shootings at Fort Hood, Texas.

The Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee already has launched its own investigation, centered on the question of whether an officer allegedly opening fire on fellow soldiers on a military base is a case of domestic terrorism. The committee plans to hold public hearings as early as next week, although witnesses have not been announced.

The Senate Armed Services Committee seems content, for now, to get closed-door briefings from Army leaders about what they have discovered. Army Secretary John McHugh and Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey Jr. are scheduled to provide an update on the Army’s internal investigations in a closed briefing with committee members late Monday.

House Armed Services Committee leaders are divided about what to do. Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon of California, the panel’s ranking Republican, is pushing for a two-part committee investigation that would look at the actual shooting to determine if there are steps that can be taken to prevent a similar event, and whether commanders failed to notice warning signs in the alleged shooter, Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan.

“We owe it to the men and women in uniform, and their families, to better understand how and why the tragic incident took place; whether this was a terrorist incident; and whether there was sufficient actionable information available to Army and government authorities to have prevented this tragedy,” McKeon said in a Nov 10 statement. “We must take a close look at the command environment, which allegedly failed to respond to repeated warnings raised within Maj. Hasan’s chain of command.”


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/11/military_forthood_congressionalinvestigation_111109w/