The Pentagon said it will execute Nidal Malik Hasan by firing squad, turning one of the most notorious cases in recent military history toward a method the United States military has not used in more than 60 years. Sean Parnell said Pete Hegseth suggested the execution method and Donald Trump approved it.
Hasan is the Virginia psychiatrist who killed 13 unarmed U.S. soldiers and wounded 32 others at Fort Hood in 2009. He is one of four prisoners on the U.S. military death row, and the case has returned to public view now because the Pentagon has chosen a punishment that carries the weight of a first since the end of World War II.
The attack on 5 November 2009 took place in a medical building filled with soldiers waiting for medical exams and vaccinations before deployment. Hasan later admitted in court that he was the shooter and apologized for any error, but during his 2013 court-martial he also said he believed he was protecting Muslims and the Taliban in Afghanistan. The attack was the deadliest ever on a U.S. military base outside combat.
What happens next is not automatic. A military execution requires the approval of the president of the United States, appellate review and a final ruling on its legality before it can be carried out. The secretary of the Army will determine the date and place, but the exact moment is still open.
That gap matters because the military death penalty has its own legal history. The Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces ruled it unconstitutional in 1983, Ronald Reagan restored it in 1984 through an executive order, and today most executions in the United States still happen at the state level. Twenty-seven states, the armed forces and the federal government retain capital punishment as a legally available option, but only a narrow path now stands between Hasan and the firing squad.
