Why did the Army want to keep Major Hasan

There’s plenty of information being put out that Major Hasan had problems, not just with his ideology, but also with his provider skills. So, people ask, why would the Army want to keep him and place him counseling returning or deploying personnel, send him to Fort Hood, and prepare to deploy him. There have been several articles which explain how hard it is to get out of the military, especially if you are a medical professional who was educated at taxpayer expense. I’m not sure this is something that will be fully developed at Major Hasan’s court-martial. But this article in the Washington Post gives a general idea.

U.S. soldiers’ morale down in Afghanistan: Obstacles to getting mental health care cited in Army survey, by Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post Staff Writer, Saturday, November 14, 2009.

Meanwhile, soldiers in Afghanistan are having greater difficulty getting help for psychological problems, for a variety of reasons, including a shortage of psychiatrists and other mental health workers, the survey showed. The Army had about 43 behavioral health personnel in Afghanistan when the survey was conducted from April to June, or about one for every 1,100 soldiers. The Army is working to improve that ratio to one for every 700 soldiers, and to assign more mental health providers to brigades and battalions. As part of that effort, the Army has activated some reserve combat stress units, including one that was preparing to deploy from Fort Hood, Tex, when Army psychiatrist Maj. Nidal M. Hasan allegedly went on the Nov. 5 shooting rampage there. Hasan was scheduled to deploy to Afghanistan before the end of the year to serve with a combat stress unit.