Give me a scenario where the First Brigade Combat Team of the Third Division will be deployed...

[Postman]

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/sep2008/mili-s25.shtml

[tekisui]

1. Suspended/Canceled Elections with riots in the streets?

OR

Bread/Gas Riots?

[Postman]

2. There are 4000 soldiers in the unit.

Will there be rioting in every corner of the country or would it be localized? Would 4000 be a large enough number?

[tekisui]

5. I was wondering the number. How many people could 4000 control?

If they squash one large riot through excessive violence, fear would squash many more.

[lurky]

8. Or just to have a visible display of force.

To discourage Bread/Gas riots. Heavily armed guys in Humvees patrolling the streets of NY, LA, etc, would certainly make potential rioters a little more cautious.

[Postman]

11. The power of TV.

If something happens in Town X, Nebraska and is broadcast nationwide...well then, we all just experienced the same thing as if we were those poor people in Town X, Nebraska...

A good book titled "The Science Of Fear" covers this aspect....

[lurky]

14. Agreed. Appearances have to be a big part of it.

I mean, local police and the National Guard have been handling civil unrest for centuries without help from the US military. This is to let people know that the boot is coming down. Maybe roll them into major hotspots or high-profile areas, make sure the cameras are rolling, then America can feel appropriately safe/terrified.

[tjwash]

21. "Heavily armed guys in Humvees patrolling the streets of NY, LA..."

Yeah, that's a normal Wednesday in L.A.

What do US Army soldiers have to do with this?

[lurky]

32. Touche...

[soulcore]

3. perhaps...

To quell dissent from the masses once the corporate welfare bailout is passed?

My bet is on canceled/postponed/stolen elections though.

[HeraldSquare212]

6. I'd bet on stolen.

[Taverner]

4. Remember remember the fifth of November...

[Subdivisions]

7. Well, because that's their orders as of Oct. 1. n/t

[Postman]

9. Okay. How about a scenario?

[Subdivisions]

15. You're asking under what scenario would they be deployed. Their

orders are to deploy. No scenario needed.

[arcadian]

10. It's easy to get around 4000 soldiers.

Merely operate where they aren't.

[EstimatedProphet]

12. In a country of 300 million, 4,000 soldiers won't do a whole lot

They could be overpowered with bubblegum.

[tuckessee]

13. There's plenty more where they came from. n/t

[EstimatedProphet]

17. Maybe, but let's see evidence of it before we buy into it.

I'm not saying it can't happen, I'm saying that rotating 4,000 soldiers home on an internal security mission can't be assumed to be the beginning of martial law.

[Name removed]

23. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[EstimatedProphet]

25. Don't you dare pull out that good Germans crap!

BULLSHIT! "Good Germans" didn't ask for evidence before they made a decision, they denied anything was going on!

If you have REAL EVIDENCE that this means a declaration of martial law, then fucking post it! Because you have to be very bad at math to think that 4,000 soldiers could enforce martial law on 300 MILLION people!

[Subdivisions]

29. Whoa! I did dare. I didn't say this was martial law. I was simply

saying that Germans then, just as Americans now, hoped for the best and got the worst. How many of those 300 million people do you think the 1st BCT, 3rd ID, would have to confront? How many Blackwater troops are there? There is also thousands more combat soldiers and several combat units as well as the National Guard from which to increase forces.

If you think this can't happen, then you're living in a dream world.

[EstimatedProphet]

30. And I didn't say that it couldn't happen! READ MY POST!

Especially the part where it says "I'm not saying it can't happen"! It is still ridiculous to assume the worst just because it is posted on a message board, and asking for evidence doesn't make me a "good German"! Take it the fuck back!

[Subdivisions]

31. You took this way too hard. Ok, I take it back. Now, as far as I am

concerned, the deployment of this combat team to US soil IS THE WORST CASE SCENARIO!!! First, it's illegal. Second, they have bigger guns than we have. Third, their mere presense puts our Constitution in danger. And I'm sure I could come up with more, but I think you hate me now. So, I won't waste my time.

[Winterblues]

19. Most will not take up arms against their fellow American

There is always some that will but the very great majority will not. That is if enough Americans decide to just say NO. ~ ENOUGH. ~ I think our soldiers will actually side with the majority.

[tuckessee]

20. That's a fallacy. A dangerous one at that.

Most troops will open fire on their fellow citizens without question or hesistation, especially an all volunteer force already numbed by combat.

I base my opinion on history (American as well as other) and the fact that the vast majority of troops I know (and I know a lot of them) have explicity stated that they would do so when asked.

Many are actually chomping at the bit to do it (kill commies, hippies, n*ggers, traitors, whatever).

As one multi-tour vet told me "In a civil war at least I'll know who I'll be killing for a change. I like that idea."

[tjwash]

22. That only works when your country is geographically small like Bosnia.

Realistically...the US empire is in its final death throes, just like the Soviet Union in the 80's. Historically, the last act of emperors before they flee their former land has always been to loot the treasury, which is what these bail outs are about.

If it comes down to it...the US is just too big to go out in a civil war. Just like the Soviet Union did, the US will splinter and fragment into several former pieces of itself.

[tuckessee]

24. I never said there would be a civil war.

I was addressing the point that the majority of US troops WILL fire upon their fellow citizens whatever the reason.

I merely related to you what one officer said.

[bushmeister0]

26. I agree, it didn't stop the US Army from routing the Bonus Marchers

who were themselves military, Vets from WWI.

"On the 28th of July 1932, commanded by Gen. Douglas MacArthur, the 12th Infantry Regiment, Fort Howard, Maryland, and the 3rd Cavalry Regiment, supported with six battle tanks commanded by Maj. George S. Patton, Fort Myer, Virginia, formed in Pennsylvania Avenue while thousands of Civil Service employees left work to line the street and watch the U.S. Army attack its own veterans. The Bonus Marchers, believing the display was in their honour, cheered the troops until Maj. Patton charged the cavalry against them — to which action the Civil Service employee spectators yelled: 'Shame! Shame!' against the charging cavalry.

After the cavalry charge, infantry, with fixed bayonets and adamsite gas, entered the Bonus Army camps, evicting veterans, families, and camp followers. The veterans fled across the Anacostia River, to their largest camp; President Hoover ordered the Army assault stopped, however, Gen. MacArthur—feeling this free-speech exercise was a Communist attempt at overthrowing the U.S. Government—ignored the President and re-attacked. Hundreds of veterans were injured, several were killed — including William Hushka and Eric Carlson; a veteran's wife miscarried; and many other veterans were hurt.

The Posse Comitatus Act — forbidding civilian police work by the U.S. military — did not apply to Washington, D.C., because it is the federal district directly governed by the U.S. Congress (U.S. Constitution, Article I. Section 8. Clause 17). The exemption was created because of an earlier 'Bonus March'. In 1781, most of the Continental Army was demobilised without pay, two years later, in 1783, hundreds of Pennsylvania war veterans marched on Philadelphia, surrounded the State House wherein Congress was in session, and demanded their pay. The U.S. Congress fled to Princeton, New Jersey, and, several weeks later, the U.S. Army expelled the war veterans back to home, out of the national capital."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonus_Army

Maybe, the Army is really afraid of an army of Timoth McVies? . .

[Winterblues]

27. I was stationed at Fort Stewert in 1970 and we were put on alert

to head to Savanah to put down a possible riot at a huge anti war demonstration on a local campus. The entire unit I was in refused to go. There was no disciplinary action taken. Granted those were mostly draftees in my unit at the time but still it was an eye opener for a lot of people.

[tuckessee]

28. Yep, that was a draftee unit and

it occurred at a time when the war was becoming rather unpopular even with the military.

I bet if those orders had come in 1965 or 1966 there wouldn't have been near as many refuseniks.

[OneBlueSky]

16. um . . . isn't this out-and-out illegal? . . .

do the words "Posse Comitatus" ring a bell? . . . from Wikipedia . . .

"The Posse Comitatus Act is a United States federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1385) passed on June 16, 1878 after the end of Reconstruction. The Act prohibits most members of the federal uniformed services (the Army, Air Force, and State National Guard forces when such are called into federal service) from exercising nominally state law enforcement police or peace officer powers that maintain "law and order" on non-federal property (states, their counties and municipal divisions) in the former Confederate states.

"The statute generally prohibits federal military personnel and units of the United States National Guard under federal authority from acting in a law enforcement capacity within the United States, except where expressly authorized by the Constitution or Congress. The Coast Guard is exempt from the Posse Comitatus Act.

"The Posse Comitatus Act and the Insurrection Act substantially limit the powers of the federal government to use the military for law enforcement."

[lurky]

18. Let's see... torture, warrantless wiretapping,

ignoring subpoenas, lying to congreass, invading countries on false pretenses. There are laws against all of these things. Not only has it not stopped them, but nobody in a position to stop them has even bothered to put up a real fight.

Yes, I think it is illegal, but here they are doing it, and I don't see anyone in congress or the major media making a fuss about it. Therefore, it looks like one more example of the Bush-does-whatever-he-wants-and-gets-away-with-it doctrine.