let me underscore a point made by general keane. my military experience in combat units, in a combat unit, actions like this, have been picked up much faster than in the individual professional activity of a psychiatrist even though in military service. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> an important exchange. after the fort hood massacre i received a call from a friend of mine to confirm what you said and to go to your points we have great respect for the diversity of religion but not a cover for bad behavior. this officer said to me that if the army and the rest of the services made clear that islamist extremist behavior is not tolerated and you have an obligation to report it right away, you will be doing an enormous favor to the other muslim american soldiers who served under me, because without that, this officer said to me that i worry the non muslim soldiers are going to have hesitation to have what we have to have in combat which is blind trust in one another. that is an important point. so far as we focus on the extremists, we

>> i agree completely with general keane. it is ignorant. it lacks the basis of knowledge.there is a very small extreme wing of islam, but there are extreme wings of other religions which are found to be deeply offensive to the vast majority of the leaders of those religions, just as fundamental extremism is to islam. the vast majority of people, muslim or not, should take great offense at this statement. >> thank you very much for raising that last question. i agree that not only was an outrageous, but it hurts our efforts to succeed in this conflict. the other senators who came earlier it had to leave. i think senator collins and i will do one more quick round. i wanted to ask you some hypothetical said. if the new york police department was doing a court order surveillance of somebody in this city, who was known to be involved in islamist extremist activities, and as part of that surveillance came across a member of the nypd communicating with that individual, what would the reaction -- let's assume first that the communications were of a religious nature, not particular

. >> host: as you began -- you were already well under way in the kean trilogy of the time and. >> guest: as i was. started in washington and finished in baltimore. >> host: was the next book project? >> guest: right now i'm trying to make a film at hbo out of the three civil rights books out of the king books and so i'm working in a different medium. i have a couple of books on the drawing boards but they will be on the other side. i hope we can finally bring the civil rights story to the screen. the ones on the drawing board have more to do with the founding fathers, i've been collecting material for a long time and some of those kind haven't been shipped but that's what i'm working on. >> host: who are some of the big influences on you as a writer? >> guest: i dedicated this book aside from my mama to five people who had a lot of influence. >> host: gary wills. >> guest: hannah arendt's, i took a class from hana the philosopher back when i was in graduate school. shelby hero the narrative history of the civil war which convinced me that narrative history pin be a dramatic form. john h

in investigating the september 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the commission led by tom kean and lee hamiltoncovered vital information scattered throughout the government, confined by agency silos that might have prevented the deaths and destruction of that terrible day. if only the dots had been connected. in the wake of the mass murder at fort hood, we once again must confront a troubling question. was this another failure to connect the dots? much has been done since 9-11-2001 attacks. we have additional task forces and fusion centers. we revised information-sharing policies and promoted greater cooperation among intelligence agencies and law enforcement. and the results have been significant. terrorist plots, both at home and abroad have been thwarted. the recent arrest of zazi demonstrates the benefits, the tremendous benefits of information-sharing and joint efforts by the nctc and other intelligence agencies as well as federal, state and local law enforcement. but the shootings at fort hood may indicate that communications failures and poor judgment calls can defeat the systems intende

general keane, it's a greater honor for you to be here. >> thank you, i truly appreciate you inviting me to testify this morning on a subject of national importance that directly affects the american people, and equally important our soldiers and their families. how pagemu÷ painful and ironic that our soldiers were gunned down at fort hood. as we are rapidly become aware. the preliminary reports suggest that major hasan himself is an extremist, and as he cried out the refrain. and it appears that likely major hasan's targets and radical beliefs are directly related as we chose to kill those who were "destination -- destined to fight. we welcome the agencies of government and this congress are conducting to determine who was major hasan, what were the patterns of his behavior and attitude, what did he know about what appears to be his extremist beliefs. what did we know about what appears to be his extremist beliefs, how did we share that information and what actions did we take or fail to result as a result. and most definitely, what must we do to prevent such incidents in the future.

general keane, do you have any response to that? is there more that we should be doing to protect the security of the bases generally even in the u.s. from terrorist attack? >> well, i think we have dramatically changed security on our bases post 9/11 for obvious reasons. i am confident the military goes through continuous reviews to ensure the protection is of the rigor that it should be. it comes from within as opposed from without, and in that problem lies the issues that we have discussed here. it is more up to the members of that organization within to deal with that issue than it is to guard at the gate or others who are dealing with force protection issues as associated with a military base. and certainly the other thing that goes hand in glove with this is cooperation with law enforcement agencies and intelligence services in terms of stopping these incidents before they actually take place. that is crucial, and that is what has prevented certainly most of these incidents from taking place, is the tremendous work that law en

general keane said that this is not about muslim american soldiers, this is the question of jihadism. the best thing that we could do to protect an honor muslim american soldiers, if there is an occasion that somebody goes extremist, that we catch the sign and stop that person from acting. i have to run three and. -- i have to run. >> i'm not going to give you much. i will give you one sentence, and that is it. >>we just had a long hearing wih the department of defense representatives, talking about the procedures that are in effect relative to reporting suspicious statements or activities and whether they are adequate. where the army is in terms of those procedures, we're in the middle of a series of briefings which will lead to hearings. i cannot say anything which could undermine the prosecution, which is now under way because we want the prosecution to take place without being negatively affected by anything we say or do. we have a responsibility. these -- the armed services committee will focus on any actions or activities which should have signaled something to them which did no