FORT LEAVENWORTH, KS — Army officials have confirmed that Nidal Hasan was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel yesterday in a small and solemn ceremony in the gathering room of Fort Leavenworth’s maximum security prison.

The alleged mastermind behind the Fort Hood Shootings was ecstatic about the crossing of a major milestone in his military career and thanked all those in attendance. Meanwhile, protests were held outside the base, with people chanting “justice for the victims” and “don’t promote." One participant stated that this ceremony was a “slap in the face of all the victims” from the massacre. Base officials refused to comment, declaring that Hassan’s promotion was decided months ago by personnel management officials.

When asked about the promotion, Maj. Gen. William Hewitt, Commanding General of Human Resources Command (HRC), stated that Hasan’s personnel record was not negatively flagged by the chain of command and that by regulation the “Army had no choice but to award promotion to the service member.” When asked to elaborate about how such an oversight could occur, the general stated that the Army’s electronic human resources systems were undergoing upgrades that may have affected Hasan’s status.

“HRC has been physically migrating its systems to a new building at Fort Knox [Human Resources Command Headquarters] after the discovery of asbestos and mold in the current data storage warehouse. Unfortunately the files have been moved to a computer system that is not yet Y2K compliant. This might have affected the records of hundreds of personnel, including Hasan."