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. . . as I'm rushing through my city, guns blazing, with 100 armed system protectors pursuing me . . . I know there is a 80%+ chance I am going to die during the operation. . . .
-Breivik1
The term "pseudocommando" was first used to describe the type of mass murderer who plans his actions "after long deliberation," and who kills indiscriminately in public during the daytime.2 He comes prepared with a powerful arsenal of weapons and has no escape planned. He is sometimes described as having the intent to die in a "blaze of glory." Since glory has been defined as "a state of great gratification or exaltation," the cliché to go out in a blaze of glory would seem to be a perverse turn of phrase, considering the unfathomable pain and tragedy these individuals cause. This article briefly explores what is known about the mindset of the pseudocommando mass murderer and how he transforms his desire for revenge into a perverse sense of honor, which allows him to justify his actions.
On July 22, 2011, Norway experienced the immeasurable fallout from a pseudocommando whose perverted sense of honor and grandiose narcissism obliterated more than 70 innocent people. Anders Behring Breivik, a 32-year-old Norwegian extremist perpetrated a dual attack in Norway: the bombing of government buildings in Oslo that resulted in 8 deaths, and the mass shooting at a camp of the Workers' Youth League of the Labour Party on the island of Utoya where he killed 69, most of whom were teenagers. 3 Breivik composed a 1492-page manifesto he published hours before his attack.4 He was apprehended alive, and his mental state was being examined as this article was being written. After his capture, Breivik requested to be evaluated by Japanese mental health experts because "the Japanese understand the concept of honor better than the Europeans [emphasis added]."
Research
Mass killings by such individuals are not new. The news media tend to sug- gest that the era of mass public killings began in the 1960s, ushered in by Charles Whitman atop the University of Texas at Austin tower, and henceforward became "a part of American life in recent decades.5" But research suggests that news media have heavily influenced the public...