The Exquisite Corpse of Major Nidal Malik Hasan

Nidal Hasan killed 13 people and wounded many others in Fort Hood, Texas in November, 2009. All but one of those killed were fellow soldiers. Born in the U.S. of Palestinian parents, Hasan joined the army in 1995 and was commissioned two years later. Under the auspices of the army, he went to medical school where he specialized in preventive and disaster psychiatry. He is now awaiting execution in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The terrible paradoxes that riddle this story parallel the bigger schizo-narrative of the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.—Mary Patten