According to sources, [the shooter] Hasan attended the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, MD. He graduated in 2003 with a degree in Osteopathy and later finished his residency as a psychiatrist.

In 2009, Hasan completed a fellowship in Disaster and Preventive Psychiatry at the Center for Traumatic Stress.

WASHINGTON -- Military officials say the suspected shooter at Fort Hood was a psychiatrist at Walter Reed Army Medical Center for six years before being transferred to the Texas base in July.

The officials had access to Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan's military record. They said he received a poor performance evaluation while at Walter Reed.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because military records are confidential.

The Virginia-born soldier was single with no children. He was 39 years old.

He is a graduate of Virginia Tech University, where he was a member of the ROTC and earned a bachelor's degree in biochemistry in 1997. He received his medical degree from the military's Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md., in 2001. At Walter Reed, he did his internship, residency and a fellowship.

"Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison told CNN that the Army Major identified as one of the shooters at Fort Hood was upset about his upcoming deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan".

My heart aches for those who lost their lives and for the people who loved them, who now have to work through this random event for which there will never, ever be satisfactory answers.  

The mass killing at Fort Hood is one more indication that the escalating war in Afghanistan and the continuing occupation of Iraq are straining the all-volunteer US military to the breaking point.

While combat deaths in Afghanistan rose to a record high last month, suicides among US soldiers both overseas and at home also rose precipitously, reaching 16 in October. A total of 134 active-duty soldiers have taken their own lives so far this year. The suicide rate in the military has risen 37 percent since 2006 and for the first time last year surpassed the rate for the US population as a whole.

Military commanders attribute the rising suicide rate to back-to-back combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past eight years.

Families at Fort Hood reported that soldiers from the base deployed in Iraq were frantically emailing and text-messaging home in an attempt to find out what was happening. "Here I am in Iraq, worried my wife and son are in danger in their own backyard," an Army specialist wrote.

The tragic killings at Fort Hood will inevitably have a further demoralizing effect on US troops, who are being thrust year after year into colonial-style wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The unbearable stress that is producing the growing incidents of violence and suicide will only be intensified by the Obama administration's plans to send tens of thousands of additional troops to suppress the resistance of the Afghan people to US occupation.

The man's cousin was on the phone with FOX just now...family is shocked, raised here American style, converted to Islam, can't explain it obviously.  The cousin did say Nidal was tore up about the work and hearing the horror stories...but not a violent guy in the past.