At a 10:45pm EST news conference, Lt. Gen. Mark Milley, III Corps and Fort Hood commanding general [above] revealed that Fort Hood shooter Spc. Ivan Lopez, 1st Battalion, Warrior Transition Brigade [click here for a picture] served four months in Iraq in 2011. Although Lopez was not diagnosed with PTSD he was “undergoing behavioral health and psychiatric treatment” for depression and anxiety. He was taking psych meds as part of his treatment. Lopez murdered his fellow soldiers with a .45 caliber Smith & Wesson, which was not registered on the base. Sixteen others were wounded. A female officer (a.k.a., a “good guy with a gun”) drew her weapon on Lopez, who then turned the gun on himself. Milley also said he is against military personnel carrying firearms on base for personal protection.
The killer Ivan Lopez was a driver (88M?) assigned to the WTU. He was not a transitioning soldier.
Que media burial.
And the good General is A-OK with a 10-15 minute response time ON BASE versus legal concealed carry. Does he own stock in Bates Caskets?
Again, how would registration have stopped this? I’ve had soldiers who had PTSD and owned guns and were never a threat to anyone. I know a few that would have been more depressed losing their guns and their ability to go shooting than how to PTSD made them feel.
The argument that the antis will make (and it is wrong) is that if it was registered then A) the command structure would be aware B) being aware they could remove the firearm if they saw a need or C) the ID scanners at the gate could be cued to flag him as a risk for extra scrutiny when entering the base.
They will argue by knowing and having the authority to remove or more closely monitor him that action could have been taken to prevent this. When in all likelihood attempting to remove his firearms or causing more “random access measures” to stop him at the gate would have pushed him into a bunker mindset.
CNN uses the term “not YET diagnosed with PTSD”.
I dunno, but I think that those PTSDers are as prone to violence as Asperger’s patients…..
It’s sad these things happen. Regardless of the laws about weapons on base it breaks my heart whenever a veteran loses the battle against PTSD. It doesn’t justify what he did, but it’s still tragic that it came to this. I’ll keep the shooters family in my prayers along with the victims and their families.
EDIT: I misread the part that said he was NOT diagnosed PTSD. Still his family will be in my prayers as this will still be difficult for them.
There are a bunch of old forts from the Indian and Buffalo soldier days scattered around down here in Texas. I can’t fathom a soldier from that era not having an SAA holstered at all times.
I just watched the 3-star base commander drone on about their no weapons policy and their great law enforcement on base. They don’t get that high in the food chain without being utter lackeys. Obviously nothing will be learned this time either.
Well, here it comes. Proposal for national handgun registration in five….four….three ….two….
seriously jumping the fucking gun here bud, no pun intended.
The last time I went shopping, SWR and Silencerco were two separate companies. I found a Youtube on the two, side by side, and the SWR was noticeably quieter than the Osprey. Not what I was expecting. They did an accurate side by side comparison, in a controlled indoor environment, with calibrated decibel meters, and the SWR reduced the db level the most. Size isn’t everything.
Here it comes….
The General’s statement may have absolutely nothing to do with his personal opinion. Whatever he says will fit with the policy of the chain of command, or he will be replaced with someone who does. My guess is that he personally doesn’t want carry of loaded weapons on post either, but we will probably never know.
In some ways, commissioned officers have less freedom than enlisted men. Nobody cares what a private says, because nobody listens.
“Lt. Gen. Mark Milley, III Corps and Fort Hood commanding general … also said he is against military personnel carrying firearms on base for personal protection.”
We will never know what his true opinion is, because he is smart enough to know that a senior officer should never publicly disagree with the Commander In Chief.
“Undergoing psychiatric treatment”. Anybody STILL think he wasn’t on SSRIs?
Military bases, gun free zones!
Thanks Wee Willie Clinton!
Another damaged human almost certainly filled with drugs that made things worse. Tragic for everyone involved.
The antis have been waiting with baited breath for a chance to disarm what represents their most hated adversary- ex military and veterans.
You see, there is no accepted place in the socialist utopia for men and women who keep arms for defense of the community. Every man and woman in uniform represents a walking, living reminder that their philosophy is void.
Conincidentally, veterans represent people most dedicated to the defense of the Constitution as it’s written, which is again incompatible with the Great Socialist Plan.
Disarming this category of society represents both a philosophical and practical goal for the opposition, which is why we cannot permit it to happen. We may not be able to do much about the circus on 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, but Congress is where lasting damage can be done. We should remember there are many antis there who would use this incident as a fulcrum.
Reasons like this are why I would be worried about seeking help if I needed it in the future. They want to remove the stigma from seeking help, yet the act of seeking help could cause you to lose your gun rights or more.
Sooo…. you wouldn’t receive help that could potentially prevent a violent encounter in the future because you don’t want to lose your right to bear arms? You would rather risk jail time, or yours or someoneelses injuries instead of get help just to own a gun?
How could Lopez murder his fellow soldiers? Aren’t U.S. Military bases “gun free” zones? Mentally unsound, murderers, and Muslim jihadists obey the rules don’t they? They can read the signs and they know the rules and none bring guns on the bases because that is against the rules, right?
The most fertile ground for mentally unsound, murderers, and Muslim jihadists are “gun free” zones such as U.S. Military bases, schools, universities, shopping centers, and various cities in the U.S. led by Democrats.
If there’s one thing that liberals hate almost as much as guns it’s veterans.
Is the Pope Catholic? Yes they will use anything they can to deny anyones right to self defense.
“Get to the bottom of it”?
Why don’t you tell us the results of your no doubt deep and insightful Benghazi investigation? If there’s any bottom-getting here, you can bet one thing for sure, POTUS didn’t have shit to do with it.
I spent the day with my family and missed the news. I hate to sound calloused, but I really, really really hope the gunman used a 1911 instead of a high capacity death gun
Simple answer- yes. By executive action. Y’know, a pen and a phone.
Look at the spineless, hapless, lapdog leadership of the VA,
under the leadership of “The Most Transparent Administration Ever”:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/mar/31/outrage-v-hides-names-hospitals-where-vets-died-de/?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS
and
http://www.forbes.com/sites/rebeccaruiz/2013/09/06/the-daily-show-takes-on-bonuses-for-va-staff/
Elizabeth is only 17? Bummed…
I’m in the Midwest. These people all looked pretty normal to me. Except I don’t know many people with guns.
Yet Another breach in the magic-fairy land of the Gun Free zone.
The real tragedy is that those men/women that were fired on never had a snowballs chance in hell as the weren’t allowed to defend themselves
The push to prohibit the “dangerously mentally ill” from owning guns is a frightening gray area. Think about the intensity of grief that anyone feels when a loved one dies. I can foresee a world in which the government chases ambulances to build the no-fly list.
If you want to buy a gun, eap a handgun, that makes you mentally unatable. It’s crazy! Mentally unstable people should not own guns. Its simple, rught?
I feel terrible for the people that got shot and for their families. I can’t imagine what they are going through right now, but they should also be outraged. For it is the government that turned these great men and women of our armed services into, as the anchors on FOX described, “sitting ducks in a shooting gallery”.
Of course. Never let a good tragedy go to waste.
Maybe if we put our heads just a little further up our own asses and ignore reality just a little harder, then maybe… just maybe we will be safe.
We can’t give the grieving families a full 24 hours before waving the bloody shirt?
Way to sink to their level TTAG.
Who the hell is Mike Malloy? I am a talk radio junky and have never heard of him.
Obviously, some commenters here know their history better than this radio bloviator. The Night of the Long Knives was largely a purge WITHIN the Nazi Party, that had the goal of consolidating Nazi power. And the murders of the SA members were largely conducted by the SS and the Gestapo. So, Mr. Malloy seems to endorse politically-motivated murder carried out by secret police and paramilitaries in the name of deepening an immoral tyranny. Charming.
Sigh.
Perhaps it’s an echo-chamber or selection bias, since I get most of my gun-related news here. But it seems to me the “disarmament” crowd is a lot more rhetorically violent than most gun owners. Besides this, there’s the whole I-wish-your-child-was-dead thing, the whole die-of-cancer thing, and so on.
When was the last time you heard a pro-gun commentator wishing that gun owners would, say, kill all anti-gun politicians? Can you imagine the reaction?
Of course this jackass could say “well of course I’m not serious.” But he did say what he said.
If these folks abhor violence so much, where’s the public censure for comments like this? Oh, wait … they’re not anti-violence so much as anti-gun. I think I get it now.
if only government followed it’s own rules…
Question of the Night: Will Gun Control Advocates Use the Fort Hood Shooting to Deny Veterans Their Gun Rights?
Does a shark sh!t in the ocean? The answer to this question answers the previous question.
MILF’s Demand Action and MAIGots were in Tallahassee yesterday opposing a couple of our Bills. These are some of the most rude and obnoxious people I have ever encountered. 10s of thousands of members my a$$.
Ask Boehner, who just said that there is no question that the mentally ill should not own guns.
Now if our military members can get some protections for when we move to a restrictive state like NJ, NY, MD, so that our legally purchased firearms don’t make us felons when we get stationed in one of those states.
Tom Bostic is also working on an XM8 conversion for the sl8. For an hk guy it is seriously spectacular.
G-damnit, how many times to I have to tell you about the clip/magazine thing.Aa magazine is not a clip and a clip is not a magazine,
Oh, you said M1… never mind.
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