Recognizing the November 5, 2009, attack on Fort Hood, Texas, as an act of radical Islamic terrorism and Jihad.

Mr. Speaker, 13 adults and one unborn child were killed and 31 individuals were wounded in a shooting attack at Fort Hood, Texas, on November 5, 2009. Since that time, the Department of Defense has taken no steps to award combat benefits to the casualties or even officially recognize the attack as a terrorist incident.

The House and Senate have included two reform measures in the NDAA, which we just passed, while additional attacks have been attempted by similar high-profile radical Islamic terrorists. It is past time for the government to deliver on this act.

Mr. Speaker, here we are almost 3 years later, and there's been a recent report that has come out; and in that report, it references this incident of this slaughter of American troops on Fort Hood soil in Texas. It references that it shall be taken up as part of workplace violence.

The Obama regime calls the Fort Hood shooting ``workplace violence.'' Sure, it's workplace violence: it's where they work and it's violence. But we have a concept of what workplace violence is. And your normal workplace violence is not preceded by a shout by the shooter, ``God is great,'' in the Arabic language. It's not preceded by discussions by the alleged perpetrator. It's alleged because he hasn't been convicted yet. And we, in a free American world, take the position that all are innocent until proven guilty. So we will call him the ``alleged'' shooter.

But there's clear evidence in reports by the Defense Department and by reports by the news media, reports by witnesses on the scene, reports by his fellow soldiers, reports by folks from Walter Reed Hospital where this American-trained, military-trained doctor worked that he had advocated that the American soldier was wrong and that he was contrary, and he spoke and preached Islamic terrorism.

So your normal workplace violence, that's not a part of the factor. Yet this is what happened in this case. Senator Collins on Wednesday blasted the Defense Department, and bless her for it, for classifying the Fort Hood massacre as workplace violence and suggested political correctness is being placed above the security of the Nation's Armed Forces at home.

I've been talking about this now since the day after this happened. We can't have a world where political correctness fails to define the criminal act. By its very nature, whether we're talking about military law and the criminal relations in military law, we're just talking about criminal acts in general, we have to be able to define them. Just to make the system work we have to be able to define them.

But more importantly, we owe a duty and a responsibility to the American soldier to call an event what it is and not try to put a smokescreen over it or cloud the issue or in any way worry about the feelings of groups, because the definition is the definition. This man identified himself that he was committing this act in the name of ``God is great'' in Arabic. He acknowledged when questioned that it was part of his mission. He acknowledged that he had dealt with terrorist spokesmen in the past and that the concept came from his interaction with Awlaki and others.

So this guy is an Islamic terrorist. There's no other way you can describe this gentleman.

But now years after the event as he sits in the Bell County Jail in Belton, Texas, we continue to have reports coming down from our Defense Department that the folks that are responsible for our soldiers and responsible for those who died in this incident want to downplay this to be treated as an incident of workplace violence with all the white bread connotation that that has. To me, we ought to be ashamed of ourselves.

So let's look at some of the evidence we have that connects this to Islamic terrorism, recognizing the November 5, 2009, attack on Fort Hood, Texas, as an act of radical Islamic terrorism and jihad.

Anwar Awlaki connection. Now, Mr. Awlaki is no longer with us. We have taken that boy out. Yet the bottom line is, at the time this happened, they were directly connected.

This man preached, taught, and encouraged violence--Islamic terrorist violence: ``Hasan's presentations to the DOD on jihad justification.'' He would argue with his fellow soldiers about the justification for having jihad against the American military. Mr. Hasan was a member of the United States Army. He was a major. He had been serving in the Medical Corps as a psychiatrist. He was trained with American taxpayer dollars, but he was preaching jihad to soldiers, and there was lots of evidence.

I had a bill, which was included in this recent defense bill that we just passed. It said that this guy was telling people that he'd believed in this kind of thing since medical school. Now he's a major, serving as a psychiatrist, advising our soldiers.

``Hasan purchased and practiced with high-capacity firearms prior to the attack.'' He went out and he bought firearms. He bought them at a local gun store. Of the guns that were used in the killings, one of them was a semiautomatic weapon with a large magazine capacity. He went out to the firing range and familiarized himself with these weapons prior to this incident.

You can't think of this as some guy who goes postal all of a sudden. This guy was planning this whole event. He shouts, ``God is great'' in Arabic, before he starts shooting, but they refer to it in the context of the broader threat of workplace violence. I think there is a very good argument that the evidence shows this was a premeditated act on the part of Major Hasan; and I believe when this case finally gets to trial that the evidence will be overwhelming that it was premeditated.

At the time of the event, Lieutenant General Cone, the III Corps Commander at Fort Hood, told NBC's ``Today'' show on the Friday after the shooting that the soldiers who witnessed the shooting rampage that left 13 people dead reported that the gunman shouted, ``Allahu Akbar''--which means ``God is great''--before opening fire at the Texas post.

The day after, it was being reported that he did this. Yet, in the initial report that came out from the Defense Department, the man's name didn't even appear. The relationship to any Islamic terrorism was not referenced. It was like any major from any outfit just wandered in and started shooting soldiers, like he was having a bad day or something.

Now we get another comment saying that we're going to treat this in the bigger scope of workplace violence. Certainly, we want to prevent workplace violence in every workplace, but

the connotation is that this is just something that happened. It's not something that just happened because, quite honestly, since that time, others have been caught who reportedly were trying to imitate this shooter, Mr. Hasan.

We introduced a bill, the Fort Hood Families Benefits Protection Act. It would award both military and civilian casualties of the Ford Hood attack with combat status to ensure full benefits and eligibility for the Purple Heart and other awards and for the civilian award equivalence to the Secretary of Defense's Defense of Freedom medal.

Now, why did I ask for that? Because there was a precedent for it. When they flew the plane into the Pentagon on 9/11, this is what was the finding of the Department of Defense--that it was an act of terrorism, and therefore they should be treated as combat casualties, and those two medals were awarded. This didn't just come off the top of my head. This is what happened with the first terrorist attack in our country and with the second or third or whatever attack this one was.

When this man walked into that room, there were people in civilian garb, and there were people in uniform. He went out of his way to shoot the people in uniform. The civilians who were injured were injured because of misfire or misdirection. As he walked down that line, his target was all of those soldiers who were doing nothing more than either coming back from being off post and out of the country--or wherever they'd been--or preparing for their next duty stations, wherever they may be going--Iraq or Afghanistan. They were being processed and they were in this big room. He walked down the line, shooting everybody in uniform.

Now, when you're killing our combat soldiers and when you're crying out slogans of the jihad terrorists, why wouldn't you think it's a terrorist attack, and why shouldn't these people who died in the line of duty be treated like those at the Pentagon who died in the line of duty?

In fact, except for what we were able to put together in circumstantial evidence after the fact, at the time of the incident, we had no idea who flew that plane into the Pentagon. We just made an educated guess. In this case, before this shooting started, the guy identified himself and what his mission was.

For some reason, in this world of political correctness, someone has the idea that this is good for the morale of our military soldiers or that it's good for something as, I think, the Chief of Staff said when this happened: Oh, this is sure going to hurt our Islamic outreach program.

Whether it's good for that or not, I hold nothing against the Islamic people nor does anybody at Fort Hood; but we hold a lot against Islamic terrorists who kill soldiers, and the Department of Defense should have the guts to step up and to stand up for these soldiers.

I see my good friend and colleague from Texas, former Judge Louie Gohmert, has joined me here.

Congressman Gohmert, I yield such time as you may require.

He was Chief of Staff of the Army.

Correct.

When you read the reports on Major Hasan, he was acting erratically. In the months before the attack, he promoted radical Islamic views while at Walter Reed Hospital. He exchanged email with Anwar al-Awlaki, a Yemeni cleric with terrorist ties. All of those references also pertained to the soldiers you were talking about right there. It is all part of a network.

Now, is every Muslim that is involved in the United States military involved in this? Absolutely not. I went to the National Training Center in California, and I met loyal, truly loyal and patriotic Muslim Americans who are helping our soldiers understand the nature, the language, the concepts, everything that they might be facing as they interact with Muslim civilians over in Iraq. And they do it in constructed villages.

I met a guy who was a former cab driver from Chicago who said, Man, I've come up in the world; I'm now mayor of this town, because he was negotiating with a mayor and city councilman for our soldiers as they came into the National Training Center. These people are patriots. They are living out in the desert just to help our soldiers understand.

I'm not anti those folks, but you can't have a world where you refuse to identify evil, and this is what you do when political correctness overcomes the truth.

Janet Napolitano personally testified: Violent Islamic terrorism was part and parcel of the Fort Hood killings, Homeland Security Napolitano said on February 24, 2010, about 3 months after the event, 4 months after the event, in a Senate Homeland Security Committee. She testified--accurately--and I praise her for it, that this was a terrorist act.

And yet we continue to have from the Department of Defense the soft- soaping of this whole issue and the disguising of this whole issue. And now with their statement that they are going to deal with it as they would deal with any workplace violence, you know, it just never stops.

The shoe bomber, the Christmas following this incident, the shoe bomber who did exactly what Major Hasan did, reading back what the press reported, acted erratically before his attack, promoted radical Islamic views, and exchanged emails with Awlaki in Yemen. He did all of those things. And when caught, referenced Major Hasan as one of his heroes. He got caught before he blew up an airplane. Praise God. Thank goodness.

So, you know, over 3 years since the incident, the Defense Department is still taking the position that this should be treated as normal workforce violence or something to that effect.

I yield to the gentleman.

Don't you wonder have we changed so much since the attack on Pearl Harbor that we don't recognize an enemy attack on us and we just want to stick our head in the sand and act like it didn't happen?

Here's an interesting report from Time magazine. They are asking the question, and they state: The U.S. military just released a report-- this is that first report--not once mentioning Major Hasan's name or even discussing whether the killings had anything to do with his Muslim faith. The fort ignores the elephant in the room.

That's what I said. And it's true. It does ignore the elephant in the room. If before the first bullet is fired, a man shouts, Allahu Akhbar, that elephant is in the room. And all of the cover-up and all of the writing of the reports with reference to typical workforce violence, or treat it as workforce violence, it doesn't make sense. It was an attack on American soldiers in uniform.

I yield to the gentleman.

This exhibit here is from the San Francisco Chronicle: Political Correctness on Fort Hood at the Pentagon. Political correctness is alive in the Pentagon. Witness the protecting the force lessons from Fort Hood. A Department of Defense report released last week on the November 5 shooting, if the report's purpose was to craft lessons to prevent future attacks, how could they leave out radical Islam? Ignoring Hasan's pro-terrorist Web postings, the report instead focuses on workplace violence programs to prevent workplace violence such as the post office's Going Postal program and the stress imposed on military health care providers.

The whole point of that San Francisco Chronicle article is to point out, I think, the irony of what we are teaching our soldiers to protect them from events like this and what we are excluding from the evidence. And I think that's blatantly not in the best interests of the soldier.

Yes.

I thank the gentleman.

You just referenced in your poster and showed us a picture of Mr. Abdo, the man that was saying he couldn't go to war. That was back on July 28, 2011, after the workplace violence. Another soldier made the same claim, and Abdo was also referenced in this story.

More and more of these folks are stepping up and saying they can't be deployed because they are Muslim and can't kill Muslims, and they reference Hasan, this man who is sitting in the Bell County jail awaiting trial probably this spring and is, I understand it, awaiting trial on a death penalty case, a potential death penalty case.

Everybody knew what it was when they attacked the Pentagon. What happened to us that we decided when, in front of 50 witnesses, somebody shoots a bunch of people and we can't recognize what that was? This was a surprise attack like Pearl Harbor. That was a premeditated murder like you and I have dealt with in the past with more witnesses than you could put on a stand. I mean, this is not going to be a hard case to prove because, fortunately, he didn't kill everybody in the room. In fact, he left an awful lot of witnesses there to testify.

He is just lucky he didn't get killed in an active shooter program that our two police officers used to respond effectively to his slaughter.

Mr. Gohmert, let me read to you a resolution, H. Res. 495, which I dropped yesterday. It's a resolution recognizing the November 5, 2009, attack on Fort Hood, Texas, as an act of radical Islamic terrorism and jihad:

Whereas the United States Army Major Nidal Hasan is

reported to have communicated on multiple occasions with

radical Islamic terrorist, Anwar al-Awlaki, on the topic of

justifying jihad on the United States and its Armed Forces;

Whereas Major Hasan delivered addresses to the Department

of Defense personnel concerning the justification of jihad

against the United States Armed Forces;

Whereas Major Hasan is reported to have planned and trained

for an attack on unarmed members of the United States Armed

Forces at Fort Hood, Texas, with the specific intent to kill

and injure those troops before the deployment to overseas

theaters of war;

Whereas Major Hasan is reported to have declared his attack

to be an act of jihad in defense of Islam, shouting ``God is

great'' in

Arabic while gunning down unarmed military personnel and

civilians;

Whereas Major Hasan is currently charged with murder of 13

and attempted murder of 32 United States citizens during that

attack;

And whereas the Department of Defense submitted

correspondence to the United States Senate Committee on

Homeland Security which referred to the violent Islamic

extremist attack on Fort Hood, Texas, in the context of a

broader threat of workplace violence: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, that the House of Representatives recognizes the

attack on Fort Hood, Texas, as an act of radical Islamic

terrorism and jihad against the United States Armed Forces.

I have submitted this to the House, and I'm going to be seeking support for this resolution.

I wonder sometimes what our Forefathers would think of how far we've gone out of kilter in recognizing who's our friend and who's our enemy, or how we are so concerned about what the speak police or the voice police would say to us about some language we use that we would be willing to put those men and women who wear the uniform of our armed services at risk rather than make a statement that might offend somebody.

I think our grandparents would look at this country and say, what happened, what happened to the United States of America that I fought for in World War II or Korea or Vietnam? When did it become evil for Americans to speak the truth? Why would people who have four stars on their shoulder, who we highly respect as leaders of our armed services, tolerate being instructed in this concept of political correctness and be treating this as if it were an ordinary incident of workforce violence? How do we justify that? Where is the common sense in this effort? We're worried about hurting other people's feelings, and other people are killing us. I mean, this doesn't make any sense.

And most of all, let's not forget--because I attended the funeral of one of the civilians. I have met with some of the wives and children of these dead combat soldiers and talked to the parents that looked me in the eye and said, how do I figure this out? My kid was there to be deployed for the fourth time. He stood in harm's way for our country 3 years already, and he goes over to the deployment center for a routine matter dealing with paperwork and he gets attacked and killed in Texas, just right down the street from where he lives. And his children and his wife are without a brave American soldier who had proven his worth in combat in three deployments already.

This is something that his parent sits there and says, how could anything like this ever happen? I mean, I know to be praying every day for my child when he's in combat. This is the profession he has chosen; I respect it. I fear for him; I worry about him. I want to make sure-- he or she, because our ladies are fighting just like our men. And now I get the word that my son is killed down the street from his kid's elementary school while he's going through a routine act of filling out paperwork in the Army?

And then what do we tell that parent when later we find out that a report has come out from the government saying ``routine workforce violence''? Come on, come on. What's wrong with this? I think it's just tragic.

I introduced a bill that just said, look, acknowledge it for what it is. Nothing will draw disrespect for the Purple Heart, or others who are wounded in combat in a combat theater, to just acknowledge that these innocent people got attacked on their way to their next deployment, or on their way back from their last deployment, on our soil, on our military base, in our State of Texas. Can we at least give them the respect to acknowledge that they're part of the war effort, that this guy shot them because we are at war with terrorists? Give them combat credit. Give them the honor and respect that comes from that. But we're still not able to get that done.

We're going to keep trying. I have people call me from all over the country and say, how are we doing? You know, my kid at least ought to get a Purple Heart. My daughter ought to get a Purple Heart for the wound she received, and now she's debilitated and has to go out of the Army. My son, who's going through constant therapy for his head wound, he ought to be recognized by the Army for what happened to him, the reality of what happened to him.

And so we won't make the easy acknowledgement that these folks were in combat. And the only reason they didn't fight this guy is because they were not armed. And the reason they were not armed is because you're not supposed to be armed on post. This guy attacks them. If they would have been armed, it would have been over when the first bullet fired. These are combat veterans.

But no, we are very strict--oh, we're now going to change this designation the Army has or that designation the Army has. But we aren't going to call this guy a terrorist. Don't mention the word ``Islamic.'' Don't recognize his relationship with an Islamic terrorist. Ignore all that evidence, ignore the testimony of 50-some- odd witnesses and say we will treat it within the concept of workforce violence. What does that say to the wife or husband of that soldier, or the father or mother of that soldier, or the brother and sister of that soldier that was killed or wounded with a debilitating wound--many of which are still struggling with their wounds, just like they do in combat.

Yet we conveniently define things in that situation, but refuse to define the act that caused the situation. This just is not right. That's why I'm very grateful my friend Mr. Gohmert and I came down here to talk about this. This is all about trying to just set the record straight. You know, let's call it like we see it, and let's don't think we have to protect anybody.

And it has absolutely nothing to do with the Muslim religion. If he was a Baptist and was shouting Baptist slogans as his reason for shooting somebody, we ought to call him a Baptist.

This is a tragedy. It's a terrible tragedy because these were soldiers, all of whom had been willing to go in harm's way on behalf of our country, and most of whom had gone into harm's way on behalf of our country and suffered through that miserable weather and those dark lonely nights, and all the other things that soldiers suffer through when they're addressing terrorism around the world.

I say around the world because we've still got plenty of places we're addressing terrorism, not just Iraq and Afghanistan. To have us be willing to soft-pedal what happened to them is an American tragedy, and I'm going to continue to talk about it.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank my friend, and I appreciate his taking the time to discuss this matter of national security.

I have the quote directly here from Army Chief of Staff General George W. Casey, Jr., who was the Chief of Staff at the time of the Fort Hood attack. He came out and had this prepared quote to give.

Chief of Staff of the Army.

This is a quote that, obviously, he and those helping him had prepared to give in response to 14 people being killed. We know one was an unborn child and that one of the people was a pregnant woman--a female soldier. So here is the quote that they had prepared after 13 of his soldiers lay either dying or dead at Fort Hood:

``I'm concerned that this increased speculation could cause a backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers . . . Our diversity, not only in our Army but in our country, is a strength; and as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that's worse.''

This is a general who is charged with leading soldiers and directing soldiers in war and in battle with an avowed enemy. Well, we have an enemy who has sworn to be at war with us. And one of those enemies was Major Hasan at Fort Hood, who went off on a shooting spree.

Now unfortunately, our leaders did not bother to monitor the security of our own soldiers, such that when Major Hasan made actual pronouncements in advance that he could not be deployed and be a Muslim because, in his interpretation of the Koran--thankfully it's not all of our Muslim soldiers in the U.S. military that have this interpretation--but his interpretation was that he could not be deployed because that might require him to kill Muslims in a foreign country without cause.

And under the belief of some Muslims, like Major Hasan, if he were to kill a Muslim without cause--for example, in his way of thinking, it is appropriate cause, say, if a Muslim were to become a Christian, then that is a cause, in his mind, worthy of killing the individual, if they committed this horrible crime, in his mind, according to the Koran, of becoming a Christian. That's worth killing them for. But since he couldn't be sure that in a foreign country in a battle with Muslims that he might not be required to shoot someone who had not committed apostasy and not committed some act that justified murder under the Koran, then he could not be deployed. And if he were deployed, he would have to kill American soldiers to avoid having to go kill soldiers overseas.

It is interesting because you would think that the military would be concerned about this issue and that we would try to make sure that this incident that happened at Fort Hood would not happen again. You would think that when this private showed up on al Jazeera in uniform and told al Jazeera basically the same things that Major Hasan had, that people like General Casey would be concerned. But apparently, he was more concerned about our diversity than he was about the lives of his own soldiers.

So when you see this private on al Jazeera--and it's not hard. You can go online and find this on YouTube, his interview--he spoke in English. But the story was done actually in the language that al Jazeera prefers, and it's not English. He explained basically what Major Hasan did. And this is a line from al Jazeera, ``I can't both deploy and be a Muslim.'' And we have the transcript of what he said, the transcript of the story. But basically, he was letting people like General Casey, that would bother to worry about the--well, not General Casey, because he is worried about diversity, and the safety of his soldiers is secondary to that. But for those who are concerned, number one, about the safety of those in this country and making sure that their own soldiers are tantamount, in their minds, they would be concerned when you have another soldier saying the same things Major Hasan did before the killing spree.

So we know that there are people in our special ops, in our military that noted this, that saw this, that said, This is a guy we had better watch. But because the people at the top are more concerned about diversity than they are about our soldiers' safety--I mean, it's bad enough that they put their lives on the line. They're willing to do that in combat. But you would think that there would be more concern for their own safety in their own units. Nothing was done about this private.

And despite this Justice Department trying to vilify gun dealers whom it forced into making sales to criminals who carry guns across the border, and despite the efforts that were made to maybe--and in fact, names were produced, pictures were produced of gun dealers out of the Fast and the Furious program--despite that, it was not General Casey, not one of his subordinates, not one of our own people in the military that reported this guy. No. Nothing was done, even though they knew he was ready to pull a Major Hasan, he could not be deployed, nothing was done. And it was not until he went to a gun dealer. The gun dealer became suspicious. The gun dealer reported him. Thank God for Americans like that gun dealer who realized, We've got our own soldiers' lives at stake here. He reported him.

Then locally he was dealt with and interdiction occurred, and he was not given the chance to kill the soldiers he wanted to, again at Fort Hood. Because if it weren't for the gun dealer and those intervening-- not the military, not our intelligence, who surely monitor al Jazeera and would surely note a soldier in uniform with the screaming eagle patch on his arm, and that this is something we need to worry about.

But because we have become so politically correct, to the detriment and death of our own soldiers, nothing was done from intelligence, from State, from Justice. It took a local gun dealer to protect our soldiers at Fort Hood. And you wonder how many more times this is going to have to happen.

Heck, this soldier--you can go on Facebook, and you can find that he notes his activities and interests. CAIR, the Council on American- Islamic Relations. CAIR is named in the Holy Land Foundation trial as a coconspirator. There was evidence produced that showed that CAIR was also funding terrorism, funding Hamas, participating in that venture with the Holy Land Foundation, as found by the Fifth Circuit when they refused to eliminate CAIR's name from their pleadings. He identifies CAIR as one of his interests and activities. And our intelligence, our military, they didn't pick up on that. Why? Because that would be politically incorrect and might hurt our diversity.

We've got outstanding Muslim soldiers serving in our military who love and care about this country, like all other soldiers. But it is insane and I believe a violation of the commitment and oath that every officer takes--like I did when I went in the military--not to keep your eyes open and protect those people who are put to your service as your charges.

So here he is, Nasser Abdo. He went on al Jazeera. He makes it clear, he may have to kill American soldiers. He cannot allow himself to be deployed as a Muslim. He requested conscientious objector status. And all we can do is thank God for the gun dealer that did what his superiors should have done in this case. It's time to end political correctness when it costs the lives of those protecting us.

I thank my friend for yielding.

I think it is particularly interesting that this determination by the Army came, or our military leaders, came here in December. We just observed--it wasn't a celebration--we observed the anniversary of Pearl Harbor. As Judge Carter pointed out numerous times, the victims of the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon have been recognized as victims of warfare. They were attacked by people of the same belief as Major Hasan, that he secures a place in paradise if he is killed while killing infidels like his soldier friends.

In fact, those soldiers that he was also hired to counsel as a counselor at Fort Hood, a local imam for Fort Hood, and yet one cannot help but wonder if these same folks who declared the deaths at the hands of a Muslim extremist at Fort Hood, if these same people in charge today had been in charge on December 7, 1941, then there is nothing to indicate their reasoning would have been different. All of those soldiers killed at Pearl Harbor, those entombed in the Arizona, those killed in that horrific surprise attack, actually they were at their duty stations. They were at work and someone came and killed them. Therefore, apparently under the reasoning as applied at Fort Hood, those killed at Pearl Harbor could also be considered as having been killed in workplace violence. It was violent. It was their workplace. Therefore, our mental geniuses that decided Fort Hood was workplace violence could say that about Pearl Harbor.

With regard to that very issue, we know that in the 9/11 Commission there were hundreds of mentions of Islam, jihad, all of these type things that we know were involved. And again, we thank God that the vast majority of Muslims love this country like we do. They are not about to kill Christians, Jews; but there are those in the radical element that believe otherwise. And we ought to be able to talk about it. We now know that this administration has seen to such a purging of our training material for Defense Department, Intelligence, State, that in the current lexicon from which the FBI, our intelligence folks are trained, there are zero mentions of Islam, zero mentions of jihad, zero mentions of the very things that created the worst attack on American soil in American history.

As one of our own officers told me: We have been blinded in this war with those using terrorism. We're not allowed to see our enemy. We're not allowed to describe our enemy. We're not allowed to talk about who the real enemy is. We're just expected to protect America with our eyes closed and our mouths shut. That's no way to protect America.

Will the gentleman yield?

There is an article dated February 9, 2010, in The Washington Times by Bill Gertz that says, the Army was warned about the jihadist threat in '08. It says:

Almost 2 years before the deadly Fort Hood shooting by a

radicalized Muslim officer, the U.S. Army was explicitly

warned that jihadism--Islamic holy war--was a serious problem

and threat to personnel in the U.S., according to

participants at a major Army-sponsored conference.

It references Patrick Poole, Army Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Myers, and Terri Wonder as individuals that participated. It says:

The shooting at a recruiting center in Little Rock,

Arkansas, in June and the November shooting at Fort Hood,

Texas, that killed 13 people have exposed the problem of the

Army's deficiencies in understanding the nature of the

domestic Islamic terrorist threat, Mr. Poole said.

The incidents have raised questions about whether the Army

made any effort to ``operationalize'' the threat warnings

from the 2008 conference and develop policies to counter the

threats. ``The answer quite clearly is no,'' Mr. Poole said.

And then it goes on to discuss this whole problem, and Mr. Poole said:

I noted because of our lack of understanding of Islamic

doctrines, Islamic jihad and my view that our

counterintelligence function is broken, outdated, being

usurped in some cases by public affairs and equal opportunity

officials, we were going to get soldiers killed in America on

our own bases for that professional ignorance.

This is the kind of thing that should not be happening. This article was in 2010, before at least two other individuals had gone on Al Jazeera in uniform blasting our military and indicating they could not ever be deployed in a Muslim area.

It's also worth noting that the term ``Islamophobe,'' that I'm sure is being generated right now about the two of us here talking about this issue, actually originated with the Organization of Islamic Conference, the OIC. They came up with the terms ``Islamophobia'' and ``Islamophobe,'' and there is an ongoing effort to brand anybody who attempts to identify those by their beliefs who have gone about killing Americans, terrorizing Americans as an Islamophobe or as having Islamophobia.

We know that there are places like Harvard where a professor from India who wrote an article about the attacks that are ongoing on his homeland in India by Muslim extremists and how that should be dealt with, he was fired because Islamic activists at Harvard do not believe we should have free speech anymore. And as I mentioned on this floor earlier this week, one of the 2005 10-year goals of the Muslim Brotherhood here in America is to subvert our Constitution to sharia law by 2015. That effort is ongoing.

And when they continue to brand professors, soldiers, and intelligence officers as Islamophobes and that we need laws to prevent people from describing radical jihadists who want to kill our own American people, as long as that's being done and that's being allowed, then our First Amendment rights are being subverted to sharia law, and we're well on our way to their meeting their 2015 goal as more and more good folks have been won over into this idea, this thought, that, gee, if you say anything about radical jihadists and radical Islamists, you're the sick one and you need to be stopped.

This is an ongoing effort around the world, and we cannot allow it to overtake America. We should be able to recognize those wonderful, patriotic Muslims in America for who they are, but we should also be able to recognize and talk about those who want to kill us and destroy our way of life for who they are. They're radical Islamic jihadists.

If the gentleman would yield.

Well, my friend the judge indicates he was lucky, unfortunately, in his perverted way of thinking. That also is a way of thinking that confounded Thomas Jefferson when he was negotiating with the Islamic Barbary pirates.

He actually believed he would have gone to paradise and had dozens of virgins at his disposal if he had been killed, so he doesn't necessarily think of himself as lucky. Nor would those in Iran, once a nuclear weapon or nuclear weapons are assuredly procured, be any different. They would believe, if they were to go up with the nuclear weapon that they carried into some place where lots of Americans were or Israelis were, then they would be assured of instantly being transported to paradise. Some of us have a different view of what they would find when they meet their Maker after this life, and I think they're going to be terribly surprised.

But our job and our oath is to our Constitution. It's to provide for the common defense against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And when someone presents this kind of danger to our troops, it is just unfathomable that our military leaders would become so politically correct and so militarily neutered that they would not stand up for their own troops, for those whose care has been put under their service and attention.

I thank my friend for yielding.