Sniper learned to kill in U.S. military
Bradley K. Sherman
The thread that binds the killers like John Williams/Muhammad,
Buford Furrow and Tim McVeigh is military service.
I realize that it's obvious, but from the talking heads one
would think that it's not even part of the puzzle.
--bks
hjkl
wrote:
I don't think it's a significant piece of the puzzle. The ability to
kill is much easier to come by than the willlingness to murder.
John
news:apbf5p$fo0$1...@panix1.panix.com...
No... the thing that really "binds" them is intense hatred (besides almost
all mass murders just being sad and sadistic losers).
In the latest case Muhammad was an obvious Osama sympathizer that had an
intense hatred for America itself (according to Muhammad's close "friends").
It appears those friends were right too since he demonstrated hate for ALL
types of Americans, at least based on the random nature of the victims.
That is exactly what Osama's gang did... they didn't give a rat's patoot who
they killed, including themselves or fellow Muslims in the WTC. Some
fanatics and zealots are like that. They have no respect for other
individuals or life itself.
In fact, you should be careful yourself. Trying to blame the military
(which many millions have served in honorably) demonstrates that you might
have a problem yourself with irrational hate. You should probably get help
soon. (MHO)
John
John Robicheau
the thread that binds Colin Powell, Gen Franks and GW Bush
is military service
>
John
news:3db9...@news.pghmail.com...
....and George Washington, FDR and JFK (among many others of course).
And your point? Nevermind... you don't have one.
John
Bradley K. Sherman
John <Jo...@nospam.com> wrote:
>"John Robicheau" <baxbruck...@vaughnwilliams.uk> wrote in message
>news:3db9...@news.pghmail.com...
>>
>> "Bradley K. Sherman" <b...@panix.com> wrote in message
>> news:apbf5p$fo0$1...@panix1.panix.com...
>> >
>> > The thread that binds the killers like John Williams/Muhammad,
>> > Buford Furrow and Tim McVeigh is military service.
>> >
>> > I realize that it's obvious, but from the talking heads one
>> > would think that it's not even part of the puzzle.
>> is military service
>
>....and George Washington, FDR and JFK (among many others of course).
>
>And your point? Nevermind... you don't have one.
Well what do you think had more to do with his
choice of the AR-15; that he's black, that Malvo
is an illegal immigrant, that he converted to Islam,
or that he was in the Army for 10 years?
--bks
Shepherd
"John" <Jo...@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:1_bu9.10896$iV1....@nwrddc02.gnilink.net...
Also getting about half a dozen years older may help him grow up.
Shepherd
Shepherd
How about a good gun-shop salesman.
Gun magazines
Gun shows
And just maybe the N.R.A.
As I understand it he served in the army as a mechanic, not as an
infantyman.
He probably had very little to do with rifles or any kind of weapons after
basic training.
Shepherd
Bradley K. Sherman
Shepherd <sticksnorstones@.att.net> wrote:
> ...
>He probably had very little to do with rifles or any kind of weapons after
>basic training.
You might try re-reading that sentence.
--bks
John
Who needs AR-15's? Box cutter knives and hijacked airliners work even
better as mass murder weapons.
So... I suspect that blind hate (perhaps his "version" of Islam) had much
MORE to do with it. Guns don't have "feelings" at all... they kill whoever
they are accurately pointed at. John Muhammad proved that for all to see.
I ask again... what does his military training have to do with his blind
hate? Answer... nothing at all. Most veterans don't go around slaughtering
innocent civilians.
Why do you wish to blame the military for a fanatic murderer like Muhammad?
Do you have blind hate for those that defend your country??
Pretty strange opinion if you ask me (unless of course you hate your country
like Muhammad did).
John
Cowboy Neal
news:1_bu9.10896$iV1....@nwrddc02.gnilink.net:
> "Bradley K. Sherman" <b...@panix.com> wrote in message
> news:apbf5p$fo0$1...@panix1.panix.com...
>>
>> The thread that binds the killers like John Williams/Muhammad,
>> Buford Furrow and Tim McVeigh is military service.
>>
>> I realize that it's obvious, but from the talking heads one
>> would think that it's not even part of the puzzle.
>>
>> --bks
>
> No... the thing that really "binds" them is intense hatred (besides
> almost all mass murders just being sad and sadistic losers).
>
> In the latest case Muhammad was an obvious Osama sympathizer that had
> an intense hatred for America itself (according to Muhammad's close
> "friends"). It appears those friends were right too since he
> demonstrated hate for ALL types of Americans, at least based on the
> random nature of the victims.
>
Personally I think when all is said and done we'll find that this was much
more a result of a borderline personality pushed over the edge by events in
his life (involuntary discharge from the service, losing his children in a
custody dispute).
If I was a conspiracy buff, I'd also point out that his profile would make
him a perfect tool. But I'm not <g> although I would like to know how a
guy who was reportedly living in a homeless shelter managed to get a $700
weapon.
CN
--
"War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think
they are going to profit from it. Every war when it comes, or before it
comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a
homocidal maniac.". - George Orwell
Shepherd
O.K. I re-read it. The sentence is fine.
I will rephrase it though, just for you.
One must have doubts about your reading abilities and comprehension.
He most likely seldom ever held a rifle after basic training.
Mechanics, unless they are in a war zone, have very little use for them.
Mechanics' "weapons" are a box of tools for servicing and repairing
equipment.
Shepherd
Kris Baker
Shepherd wrote in message ...
Yes, but everyone has to pass an annual qualification, as they can be
subject to call-up in combat no matter what their job -- unless they've
changed it in the past few years. Even our Air Force "desk jockeys"
had annual weapons qualification tests.
Kris
John
news:Xns92B25E1B...@140.99.99.130...
> "John" <Jo...@nospam.com> wrote in
> news:1_bu9.10896$iV1....@nwrddc02.gnilink.net:
>
> > "Bradley K. Sherman" <b...@panix.com> wrote in message
> > news:apbf5p$fo0$1...@panix1.panix.com...
> >>
> >> The thread that binds the killers like John Williams/Muhammad,
> >> Buford Furrow and Tim McVeigh is military service.
> >>
> >> I realize that it's obvious, but from the talking heads one
> >> would think that it's not even part of the puzzle.
> >>
> >> --bks
> >
> > No... the thing that really "binds" them is intense hatred (besides
> > almost all mass murders just being sad and sadistic losers).
> >
> > In the latest case Muhammad was an obvious Osama sympathizer that had
> > an intense hatred for America itself (according to Muhammad's close
> > "friends"). It appears those friends were right too since he
> > demonstrated hate for ALL types of Americans, at least based on the
> > random nature of the victims.
> >
>
> Personally I think when all is said and done we'll find that this was much
> more a result of a borderline personality pushed over the edge by events
in
> his life (involuntary discharge from the service, losing his children in a
> custody dispute).
Well.... very well could be.
In fact, I would argue that most Muslim extremist preaching or acting out
violence and hatred against total strangers are often suffering from a
severe "borderline personality" (among other things... lol). Osama's gang
would definitely qualify. Farrakhan *might" too based on some of his
extreme rhetoric and hateful comments in the past (especially against
"Jews").
Course, obviously they are not the only ones. Some people that irrationally
hate the military as a whole *might* just qualify as well. (MHO of course)
John
<snip>
Shepherd
"Kris Baker" <kris....@prodigyy.net> wrote in message
news:J0fu9.2636$5m1...@newssvr19.news.prodigy.com...
That's right.
I was in the Army, not the infantry, and once a year we had to qualify with
a rifle.
The event for our entire company took about four hours.
Time enough to ascertain we had not forgotten what we had learned in basic
training, but hardly enough time to reestablish our expertise as riflemen.
Shepherd
Bradley K. Sherman
Shepherd <sticksnorstones@.att.net> wrote:
>That's right.
>
>I was in the Army, not the infantry, and once a year we had to qualify with
>a rifle.
>The event for our entire company took about four hours.
>
>Time enough to ascertain we had not forgotten what we had learned in basic
>training, but hardly enough time to reestablish our expertise as riflemen.
It's not the expertise that is an issue, it's the motivation.
Not all people trained to kill do so. But that doesn't mean
the training is inconsequential.
--bks
Demon Troll
saict
His choice of weapons was a poor one, and was almost certainly
influenced by his particular occupation in the Army. His choice to
kill, on the other hand, is completely unrelated to all of the things
you mention.
Shepherd
Your subject line states "Sniper learned to kill in the U.S. military" It
mentioned nothing about it motivating him to kill.
Being taught simply how to fire a weapon does not automatically mean you are
a trained killer much less a motivated one.
Shepherd
Bill
wm...@att.net
"Shepherd" <sticksnorstones@.att.net> wrote in message
news:4Xku9.25857$Mb3.1...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
>
> "Bradley K. Sherman" <b...@panix.com> wrote in message
> news:apc381$6df$1...@panix2.panix.com...
> > In article <V6gu9.25463$Mb3.9...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>,
realise there a millions of military that have been trained to shoot but
less than a hand full that terrorist murders.
It is not the training but the motivation that is the problem. If soemone
wants to kill but lacks a gun they can always resort to poison, explosives,
knives etc.
> > Shepherd <sticksnorstones@.att.net> wrote
Dwacon Texas Rancher
women and children...
--
What does your watch say?
It don't say nothin. You gotta look at it.
http://www.dwacon.com
Biff Anderson
jackasses.
"Shepherd" <sticksnorstones@.att.net> wrote in message
news:4Xku9.25857$Mb3.1...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
>
Shepherd
Shepherd
"Biff Anderson" <bl...@barf.net> wrote in message
news:a%Ru9.639$Bi1....@cletus.bright.net...
TdN
> Just where did you say that?
>
> Shepherd
He actually did use that particular language, but it was clear from
the context of his posts that he assumed the snipers to be Arabs, not
one African American Black Muslim and one Jamaican Seventh Day
Adventist.
Even the stopped clock is right twice a day, as they say. However,
these guys seem to me to be a more destructive version of Charles
Bishop (the kid who crashed his plane into the building in
Florida)--disaffected losers who incorporated the whole "al-Qaeda is
cool" thing into their psychotic world-view, rather than organized
ideologues.
After all, Charles Manson claimed to be a radical Christian, but I
didn't see anybody tying him to Billy Graham.
"Biff." Hee, hee, hee.
T.
TdN
> (which many millions have served in honorably) demonstrates that you might
> have a problem yourself with irrational hate. You should probably get help
> soon. (MHO)
Well, clearly the original poster is consumed with hate.
However, my uncle (career Army) has said to me on more than one
occasion that there are always a few "bad apples" in every platoon who
joined the Army because they wanted to kill people. They usually wash
out, sooner or later, because they can't control their anger (as
Muhammad appears to have done).
As my uncle says, the best soldier is one who hopes never to have to
kill anyone else, but who is ready to do so if necessary.
I've read books by current and former police officers who suggest that
there are some messed-up people who join the police force because they
think it will give them a license to push others around. Similarly,
the book "New Jack City," by a journalist who worked as a guard at
Sing Sing, points out that the majority of correctional officers are
hardworking men and women who are trying to do a good job, but that
there are a few people who were attracted to the profession by the
opportunities it offered for violence against the powerless.
If Muhammad hadn't served in the military, he would have found some
other way to get sniper training. And there was no reason for the
military not to give him any training he was entitled to; he must have
passed the entrance psychological screening, so they had no way of
knowing he would snap in the future.
The friend who tipped off the police in Washington said he was
obsessed with guns over the past few years (the backyard shooting,
trying to design a homemade silencer, etc.) Clearly, rather than
seeing weapons as a powerful tool (as psychologically healthy gun
owners and users do), Muhammad had romanticized them as part of his
own psychotic narrative.
T.
David Martin
is from Newsday.com, October 26, 2002:
"He told me he could get passports, any type of papers, and that he could
get people into America," said Randy Nelson, a 35-year-old supermarket
manager and barbershop owner who was a neighbor of Muhammad.
Nelson said he was "shocked but not that surprised" when he heard Muhammad,
who converted to Islam after joining the Army, was the prime suspect in the
shootings that left 10 people dead and three wounded.
"The very first time I met him, right here on this porch, he pointed his
hand like a gun at a man standing in the windows of the hospital over there
and said he could take out a man, could hit anybody, from that range,"
Nelson said, indicating a building in the distance.
He said they were talking about guns because Muhammad told him he was in the
U.S. Army and had worked with the FBI and CIA.
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-antigua-us-sniper1
027oct26,0,2275500.story
Compare to:
Another lead not followed up: McVeigh's sister read a letter he wrote her to
the grand jury stating that he had become a member of a "Special Forces
Group involved in criminal activity." (from "The Meaning of Tim McVeigh" by
Gore Vidal, Vanity Fair, September 2001)
http://www.geocities.com/gorevidal3000/tim.htm
--------
DC Dave
Author, "America's Dreyfus Affair, The Case of the Death of Vincent Foster"
"Upton Sinclair and Timothy McVeigh"
"Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression"
http://www.thebird.org/host/dcdave
News group: alt.thebird
"David Martin" <dcd...@erols.com> wrote in message
news:aph3kg$ivv$1...@bob.news.rcn.net...
As Dr. Henry Lee might say, "Something not right here."
Suspects Left a Troubled Trail
Before Attacks, Muhammad Showed Bravado, Talked of Violence
Scott Higham, April Witt and Peter Whoriskey
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, October 27, 2002; Page A01
----
What happened next is under dispute: Mildred Muhammad said he kidnapped
their three kids and ran. He said he had her permission to take them.
A Good Father
John Muhammad and his three children flew to Antigua in late March 2000 for
what their host thought would be a short vacation. (not cheap, ed.)
"My cousin [in Washington state] told me his friend wanted his kids to see
Antigua," said Janet Kellman, who hosted them in her simple wood-frame
cottage.
They stayed with Kellman for more than four weeks. She recalled that
Muhammad would get up early in the morning and run with his son. "You could
tell he was a good father -- he loved his kids," Kellman said.
But eventually, Kellman "threw them out," she said.
The family wound up about a mile away in a neighborhood called Ottos. The
three children began attending Greensville Primary School. People recall
Muhammad as a friendly and outgoing man.
"He was one of the nicest people you could meet," said Nelson, a neighbor.
Nelson remembered talking to Muhammad about his Army service and the
accuracy of some of the weapons used.
While it is unclear how and when Muhammad met Malvo, the young man was
attending the nearby Seventh-day Adventist School. At some point, about
September 2000, he joined Muhammad and his children and told people that his
mother, Una James, was living elsewhere. Janet Harris, principal of the
school next door, said she remembers Malvo as a good-natured boy. But she
was struck by his parents' absence. (How did Malvo, the illegal alien, get
back into the U.S. ? ed.)
"He said his mother was in the States and his father was in the Bahamas,"
Harris said. "I kept asking him. . . . Finally he said, 'You're asking too
many questions.' But he seemed like a happy kid."
While on the island, Muhammad told impressive stories. He variously said
that he was a CIA officer, worked for the FBI or was an international
businessman. He also began consorting with a man who had a history of
running scams in New York and New Jersey, according to island officials and
court documents. (Do we perhaps begin to see some of the real John Muhammand
here? ed.)
But he doted on his children. Muhammad even inscribed their names on the
concrete steps of the Greensville school. For Muhammad, his children
appeared to be everything -- and he was about to lose them for good.
A Mother's Search
Mildred Muhammad was looking for her children. She asked authorities in
Tacoma to help her find them and get them back. She told them that her
husband had kidnapped them and threatened to kill her.
Unbeknownst to her, John Muhammad arrived at the 80-bed Lighthouse Mission
homeless shelter in Bellingham in early August 2001 with at least two of the
children, said the Rev. Al Archer, the director of the shelter. The men's
shelter wasn't set up for families, but he allowed them to stay anyway.
"We help everyone," he said. "We don't screen out people."
The family's time in the shelter was uneventful until Muhammad enrolled the
children in school under assumed names and applied for government
assistance. On Aug. 31, 2001, authorities took the children out of school; a
judge ordered them returned to their mother.
Neighbors said Mildred Muhammad went "underground" with her children. John
Muhammad stayed on in Bellingham, using the shelter as a base. He would
disappear for days only to return and say he'd been out of town.
Not much throws Archer, 65, who has worked with the homeless for 29 years.
But he did not know what to make of Muhammad, who once received a phone call
from a travel agent. How could he afford so much travel?
"That was kind of strange," Archer said. "You don't go to a mission for
recreation. He was doing all this flying, three or four trips that we were
aware of, and he had to have money to do that. Yet he was living in a
homeless shelter. It just didn't all fit together."
Muhammad was conspicuously courteous and compliant, Archer said. "He was
such a nice guy," Archer recalled. "Whatever we asked of him, he would do.
We never saw him angry.
"But somehow he was different. He was just different."
After Sept. 11, 2001, when the newspapers were full of tales of terrorist
sleepers, Archer said he began to wonder whether the quiet and super-fit
Muhammad was one.
In mid-October, Archer did something he had never before done in his three
decades of running ministries to the homeless: He phoned the FBI about one
of his clients.
"I thought that he was involved in some kind of conspiracy against our
country," Archer said. "I thought that he was traveling around and doing
things to promote this kind of thing."
As far as Archer knew, the FBI didn't follow up. (Wonder why? ed.)
-------
Maximum Mayhem
Harjeet Singh, 38, couldn't help noticing how fit Muhammad and Malvo looked.
Singh saw the pair lifting weights three or four times a week at the
Bellingham YMCA, where he worked out.
One day in January or February 2002, the three struck up a conversation
about weightlifting techniques, Singh said. After they exercised, Muhammad
invited Singh to join them across the street for tea and a snack at the
Community Food Co-op, which specializes in organic products.
They hit it off right away, and their get-togethers became a routine. They
talked about exercise, diet and vitamins. Muhammad seemed like an expert on
the topics.
Singh noticed that the pair popped vitamins and supplements that were
supposed to build mass, muscle and strength. When Singh went to the health
food store to buy some for himself, he was shocked to see that they cost as
much as $50 a bottle.
Muhammad and Malvo told their new friend they were father and son. Before
long, he invited the pair to his home to eat dinner and meet his wife and
three children. "They were casual . . . wrestling like normal father and
son," Singh said.
Still, there was an odd undercurrent to their relationship that made Singh
ask Muhammad whether John Lee Malvo was really his son.
"Lee was acting like a little soldier talking to his senior officer," Singh
said. "When John Muhammad asked him something, instead of saying, 'Yes,
Dad,' he'd say, 'Yes, sir.' He was very disciplined and well-behaved."
Singh, who has been a laborer much of his adult life, enjoyed talking about
religion and politics with Muhammad. Muhammad told him that he didn't drink
or smoke because of his conversion to Islam.
Singh and Muhammad shared a critical view of U.S. foreign policy, Singh
said. "I can say out loud that lots of American policy makes suffering," he
said.
But Muhammad went further, speaking in favor of the Sept. 11, 2001,
terrorist attacks. "He said that it should have happened a long time ago,"
Singh said. (And did he hand out leaflets from the Fair Play for Saddam
Committee?)
In April 2002, their relationship took an odd twist, Singh said. Muhammad
asked his friend if he knew where he could get a silencer for a gun. Singh
dismissed the comments as tough talk, he said.
Muhammad left town. When he came back, a few weeks later, he told Singh he
had something to show him. It was mid-May when the three met at the co-op.
Muhammad showed him the steel rod, a book about guns and the instructions on
making silencers.
"He told me, 'Look, we are planning to shoot a fuel tanker to cause a big
explosion and maximum damage on the freeway. We want to hide in the wooded
area along the highway -- just shoot and disappear,' " Singh said. "They
wanted the silencer so nobody would know where the shot came from."
Muhammad also said they wanted to shoot and kill a police officer, then
massacre the officers' mourners by blowing up a funeral home, Singh said.
"I think they were just hijacking Islam to justify their actions," Singh
said.
Afraid of landing in jail for associating with them, Singh told them he
didn't know anyone who could help them make a silencer. He left the co-op
without looking back but said he was afraid to go to the police.
"These people knew where I live," he said.
Over the next two weeks, Muhammad and Malvo phoned him at home. Eventually,
he told his wife to say he no longer lived there.
In early June 2002, Singh was arrested and jailed on domestic violence
charges. On June 5, as a Bellingham police officer took his statement, Singh
told him about his conversation with Muhammad.
The officer left and returned with a detective and an FBI agent. Singh told
him everything he knew. He said the officers acted as if they did not
believe him. (Wonder why?)
Singh entered a plea in the domestic violence case. He was fined, sent to
anger management classes and placed on probation for one year, he said.
Muhammed and Malvo went on the road.
Sniper Suspect 'No Trouble' As Bar Regular
By William Booth
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 27, 2002; Page A15
BELLINGHAM, Wash. -- In his three decades tending bar in the foggy
waterfront taverns here, where the customers down beers and shots of
early-morning whiskey and sometimes pay with quarters and dimes, Wally Oyen
has seen some really rough customers. The suspected serial sniper John A.
Muhammad, for a time a regular, was not one of them.
"Quiet, polite, no trouble," said Oyen, the barkeep and former private
investigator, who knows what trouble looks like.
According to the tavern's owner, Lynne Farmer, this place has served drinks,
by last count, to possibly four notorious serial killers, including Ted
Bundy and the Hillside Strangler from Los Angeles.
But all is sleepy this recent morning. Nat King Cole is playing on the
jukebox, and the night-shift workers from the local paper mill are munching
burgers and drinking beers.
But for a month last year, almost every morning from late October through
November, Muhammad, a convert to Islam, perched his lean and muscular frame
on a stool three seats from the cigarettes and aspirin dispensers behind the
bar, from 7 to 10 a.m.
He drank two or three pints of beer, called "pounders" here -- the $2
Budweisers, to be exact -- and occasionally ordered a shot of whiskey. He
watched television, whatever was on, and did not stand out much, even though
he was a black man in a very white town.
Just passing through, he said. Paid for his own drinks. Never cadged a
cigarette or asked for a loan. Didn't talk politics or religion, the
regulars said. Didn't seem to be hustling for a job. Just sat and sipped his
beers at 8 in the morning.
An intelligent man, some regulars said. Seemed to know what he was talking
about when news interrupted the game shows regularly on TV. Not a hothead.
Not a drunk or a drug addict, the regulars agreed. He did have this big,
khaki duffel bag, but that is not unusual in the portside bars. (Fine devout
muslim. Sort of reminds me of those "hijackers.")
--
--------
DC Dave
Author, "America's Dreyfus Affair, The Case of the Death of Vincent Foster"
"Upton Sinclair and Timothy McVeigh"
"Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression"
http://www.thebird.org/host/dcdave
News group: alt.thebird
"TdN" <triann...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:314a4ba6.02102...@posting.google.com...