Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Clarendon, said Friday he believes the shooting spree at Fort Hood, Texas the killed 13 people was "a terrorist event.

"It was a cold, calculated murder based on a perverse dedication to Islam," Thornberry told members of the Times Record News Community Editorial board during a stop in Wichita Falls.
He said he based his opinion on information about the incident that has been made public, and on information he has gained through his congressional connections. He did not elaborate on his confidential information.

Thornberry sits on the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and on the Armed Services Committee.

He said while accused shooter Army Major Malik Hasan might have acted on his own, it was likely "he was in contact with a wider network."

The congressman said all information on the incident ought to become public eventually.
"The families (of the victims) need to know, and there are lessons to be learned here," he said.
"Did parts of the government have information it didn’t share with other parts?" he asked of Hasan’s background.

Hasan is accused of killing 12 military personnel and one civilian when he opened fire Nov. 5 at a Soldier Readiness Center at the sprawling Army post near Killeen. Twenty nine other people were wounded in the attack before security guards shot and wounded Hasan. He is charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder. The officer’s civilian attorney, John Galligan, said Friday Hasan is likely paralyzed from the waist down.

Army officials have said they believe Hasan acted alone when he jumped on a table with two handguns, shouted "Allahu akbar" and opened fire.

President Barack Obama has ordered a review to determine whether warning signs were mishandled about contact between Hasan and a radical Islamic cleric who encouraged Muslims to kill U.S. troops in Iraq.

Obama said Thursday he wanted all intelligence related to Hasan preserved and reviewed to determine whether it was properly shared and acted upon within the government. Members of Congress also are pressing for a full investigation into why Hasan was not detected and stopped. Thornberry said the House Intelligence Committee will have questions.

A joint terrorism task force overseen by the FBI learned late last year of Hasan’s repeated contact with the cleric. The FBI said the task force did not refer early information about Hasan to superiors because it concluded he wasn’t linked to terrorism.

Months before the shootings, doctors and staff overseeing Hasan’s training reported viewing him at times as defensive and argumentative in his frequent discussions of his faith, according to the military official familiar with several group discussions about Hasan. The official was not authorized to speak publicly about the meetings and spoke to the Associated Press.

The Pentagon lists 1,977 self-professed Muslims on active duty in the U.S. military and others in reserve and guard units.

Thornberry pointed to five instances of radical plots thwarted in the U.S. since the first of September as indications the U.S. is vulnerable to extremist acts such as those that have plagued other parts of the world for years.

"We don’t want to fool ourselves into thinking we’re immune," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report