Taya Kyle, widow of Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, whose story was told in the movie "American Sniper," tells
Newsmax TV that the attack in Garland, Texas on Sunday on a "Draw the Prophet" contest is just one of many such attempts that the public would be shocked to know about.
"Most people who are dealing in that world know that it's always a threat and that the American public is very fortunate to be ignorant to a lot of things that are stopped and thwarted every day in this country, let alone around the world," Kyle said Tuesday on "The Steve Malzberg Show."
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Chris Kyle would not have been surprised the attack happened, she said, but added that anyone like him would have wanted to be in the fight to try to stop them and protect Americans.
"I don't think they're going away," she said.
Islamic State (ISIS) militants
have claimed credit for the attack that ended up wounding one security guard, but left the two gunmen dead. Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi drove 1,000 miles from Phoenix, Arizona, to the event that was held in response to a pro-Islamic event at the same site earlier this year.
Tara Kyle has written a book,
"American Wife: A Memoir of Love, War, Faith and Renewal," and told Malzberg that how she reacts to watching the movie about her husband changes. Chris Kyle, who has the most documented kills of any sniper in U.S. history during his time in Iraq, was killed in 2013 by another veteran he was trying to help.
She told Malzberg she fought to see her husband's body because she had been through many injuries and surgeries with him that had left him in bad shape and had seen other soldiers with horrific injuries.
"I knew there was just nothing that could happen to his body that would make me not want to see him alive or dead," she said. "It just felt like a natural thing.... I know I can't fix it and I know the spirit isn't there, but I had to be with him."
She now has the ability to laugh, she said.
"Grief is such an interesting thing," she said. "It's a long journey and I feel like I learned a lot in my life with Chris. Part of that was you have to find the time to laugh, and you have to joke about things or you really won't make it."
Kyle said she gives Joint Chiefs Chairman Martin Dempsey the benefit of the doubt over comments on U.S. Iraq strategy he made in April saying Ramadi, where Chris Kyle fought, is "not symbolic in any way."
Debbie Lee, mother of Marc Lee, the first Navy SEAL killed in Ramadi, took offense, and Dempsey later apologized for his words.
Kyle said she gives Dempsey the benefit of the doubt that he meant no disrepect.
"I don't know if there was something strategically that he was referring to or if he really meant that everything that ever happened in that place didn't matter," she said. "If that's the case, clearly he couldn't be more wrong."
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