Leadership

Running Head: LEADERSHIP

Leadership

David Berwanger

Central Texas College

Leadership

Introduction

The U.S. Army has established the largest active-duty armored post at Fort Hood. It was a major hub for troops deploying to or returning from military service in Iraq and Afghanistan. Fort Hood is 100 miles (160 km) south of Dallas-Fort Worth, and near the town of Killeen. Its citizens deal with violence on their overseas missions. They don't ordinarily expect to encounter carnage in their home base, which lies in the pleasant hill-and-lake country of central Texas. Carnage is just what transpired on Nov. 5, 2009.

The Fort Hood shooting was believed to be one of the worst mass shootings ever on a military base in the U.S.; a gunman killed 13 people and wounded some three dozen others (Bergen, 2011). The shooter was a 39-year-old military psychiatrist and was taken into custody after being wounded by base police. Officials identified him as Major Nidal Malik Hasan, a devout adherent of Islam. The incident triggered sharp debate on whether the shooter was a deranged individual, a terrorist, or perhaps both and whether authorities had paid sufficient attention to warning signs in his behavior that might have enabled them to prevent the tragedy (McCullough, 2011). This paper explores the leadership attributes displayed by the officials after the massacre happening.

Part 1

Introduction to Crisis Situation

On November 5, 2009 at Fort Hood, Texas, U.S. Army psychiatrist Major Nidal Malik Hasan opened fire on members of the military, killing 13 before he was shot and arrested (CNN, 2009). The Fort Hood shooting event started at about 1:30 in the afternoon at the base's Soldier Readiness Processing Center (CNN, 2009). The gunman, who was wearing an Army uniform, shouted "Allahu Akbar!" (An Arabic term that means “God is great") before opening fire. He had two pistols, one of them a semiautomatic; both were...