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Post by sirchaos on Aug 1, 2014 17:08:40 GMT -6
Hi, everyone,
I have a question, as the title states, about how US armed forces would behave in a certain situation. I am currently writing something that features a situation analogous to the one I´m going to describe, except not involving the US in any way (it´s science fiction; at the time the story is set, there hasn´t been a US for about 900 years). The reason I am asking is, I want a benchmark of sorts for how real world soldiers would react (or should react, according to their ROE, in any case) in such a situation, so I can let my fictional soldiers act in a reasonably realistic way.
Oh, and if anyone here is familiar with how any non-US Western armed forces handle such things, feel free to chime in as well.
The background is this: imagine that the US has an embassy in a capital of, say, a neutral European nation during the Cold War; lately, US diplomacy has been pushing rather determinedly for the nation to give up its neutrality and join NATO. The government is leaning towards going along with this, but the opinion among the population is largely against it, and accordingly, there are public protests about it.
Now, for some weeks prior to the incident in question, protesters (usually a couple dozen) have been gathering in front of the embassy compound more or less every day, holding signs with slogans like "Yankee Go Home" and such; they have so far been peaceful, though not exactly friendly. First question: Would the front gate of an embassy compound in a reasonably friendly but not allied country usually be visibly guarded? If not, would peaceful protests usually be enough to start posting guard (those are usually Marines, right?) at the gate as a deterrent?
On this day, however, the protesters are bit more numerous, say about a hundred of them, and in the morning, as civilian employees start arriving at the embassy gates, the protesters harass them - nothing violent yet, just booing them, calling them names, maybe stand in front of them so they´ll have to detour around the protesters.
A local working for the embassy loses their patience with the harassment and yells insults at the protesters; there is a brief shouting match (in the local language, so any US personnel present does not understand what is said), then a protestor pushes the employee away, who falls to the ground; the employee isn´t seriously hurt, and quickly enters the embassy compound to get away from the protesters. Second question: Assuming it is clear the the employee isn´t injured, there are no further attack against him and nobody prevents him from getting to the safety of the embassy compound, would any armed guards present at the gates intervene here?
A short while after that, a civilian embassy official arrives at the gate from inside the embassy, trying to resolve the situation - telling the protesters that they are welcome to express their opinion, but not to harass people just doing their jobs. This draws angry shouts, a little more nasty than anything before, from the protestors. A small group of them, about a dozen or so, try to enter the compound in order to make a more physical impression on the official. Third question: Assuming the group that actually tries to enter the embassy compound are unarmed and do not significantly outnumber any armed guards at the gate, how will these guards try to stop them? Without weapons or the ability to simply swarm them with sheer numbers, I would assume the guards would not feel threatened enough to use deadly force right away.
Assuming the groups trying to enter the embassy compound is driven off without anyone having been killed or seriously injured, the crowd of protesters initially draw back from the gates, but then somebody within the crowd throws a rock at the gates; it is aimed at one of the guards, but misses and hits a civilian, one of the employees who had been arriving for work. The civilian is knocked unconscious for the moment and receives a bleeding wound to the head, which looks quite a bit worse than it actually is, as head wounds tend to (or so I´m told - I´ve neither had nor inflicted one so far). Fourth question: How would the guards react to that? No more rocks are thrown from within the crowd, and most people in the crowd are too shocked to immediately react in any meaningful way, such as to obey orders they are given by the guards. Whoever threw that rock is hidden in the crowd, though, and whoever might have seen them do it is keeping quiet about it; unless they have any further rocks on their person, it´d be next to impossible to figure out after the fact who did it.
Assume, when considering all this, that protests in general are legal according to the local laws, and local police would have no legal reason to disperse the protest until it turns violent or some other violation of local laws takes place (I have some expertise in such matters; let´s just say my face may not be completely unknown to the personnel of the Chinese and Iranian consulates in Frankfurt); also assume that, even if the embassy calls the police the moment protesters start harassing people, they will not arrive until a few minutes after that rock is thrown.
Thanks in advance for your assistance.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 1, 2014 21:35:47 GMT -6
The State Department determines which embassy or consulate will get Marine guards. The Marines and the State Department will jointly determine how many based on size of the facility and the threats. The Marine guards primary responsibility is to "protect vital documents necessary for the protection of the US", in other words classified documents. Their second responsibility is to protect certain occupants of the embassy. In other words, only certain people are protected. The host nation is responsible for security outside the walls.
First Question: Maybe, maybe not depends on the State Department determination.
Second Question: No, they would not. Remember their first job is to protect sensitive data, not humans.
Third Question: The Marine guards would likely take up positions to protect the entrances to the embassy and possibly, the host nation would be allowed to enter to assist. Remember that an Embassy is considered US soil.
Fourth Question: The Marine guards would probably not do anything, unless ordered.
Keep in mind that the Marines will use the least amount of force to control and end the confrontation, as police do. They will not shoot first and pick the bodies out later. They are on foreign soil and are representatives of the nation therefore how they conduct themselves is important.
Just my opinion, of course.
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Post by sirchaos on Aug 2, 2014 13:06:15 GMT -6
Interesting... I didn´t know that they are primarily guarding documents, not people or the embassy itself.
My only experience with US security arrangements is the US consulate in Frankfurt, which used to be located right between the two university campuses I attended; after 9/11 it was heavily guarded by German police, including checkpoints with concrete road blocks at each end of the street and an armored car in front of the compound itself. On the other hand, the one time I was inside to sort out some visa questions, I cannot recall even a single security guard - at least none in uniform or visibly armed.
The other consulates I´ve seen recently - Chinese and Iranian in Frankfurt, and Cuban in Bonn, aren´t permanently guarded; the Chinese tend to immediately call the cops if any unwelcome visitors show up, while the Iranians tend to ignore you, and the Cubans tend to gather a mob of sympathizers to shout you down. Different countries, different customs, I guess.
Another question: What about attacks on the Marines themselves? I assume they would not have to wait for direct orders to defend themselves, but also that they would have to first exhaust any non-lethal courses of action (like firing warning shots) before they can use lethal force without direct orders - all assuming, of course, they face people throwing rocks from within a crowd, not an armed mob shooting at them and throwing molotov cocktails. I also, I would assume that it makes a great difference if potential attacker is still outside, on the host country´s soil, or if they have enter the consulate and are on US soil.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 2, 2014 15:55:45 GMT -6
Interesting... I didn´t know that they are primarily guarding documents, not people or the embassy itself. My only experience with US security arrangements is the US consulate in Frankfurt, which used to be located right between the two university campuses I attended; after 9/11 it was heavily guarded by German police, including checkpoints with concrete road blocks at each end of the street and an armored car in front of the compound itself. On the other hand, the one time I was inside to sort out some visa questions, I cannot recall even a single security guard - at least none in uniform or visibly armed. The other consulates I´ve seen recently - Chinese and Iranian in Frankfurt, and Cuban in Bonn, aren´t permanently guarded; the Chinese tend to immediately call the cops if any unwelcome visitors show up, while the Iranians tend to ignore you, and the Cubans tend to gather a mob of sympathizers to shout you down. Different countries, different customs, I guess. Another question: What about attacks on the Marines themselves? I assume they would not have to wait for direct orders to defend themselves, but also that they would have to first exhaust any non-lethal courses of action (like firing warning shots) before they can use lethal force without direct orders - all assuming, of course, they face people throwing rocks from within a crowd, not an armed mob shooting at them and throwing molotov cocktails. I also, I would assume that it makes a great difference if potential attacker is still outside, on the host country´s soil, or if they have enter the consulate and are on US soil. They would not have to wait for direct orders to defend themselves although lethal force might be the last resource. They might use their weapons to push or hit an opponent enough to stop him or her. If the attacker uses lethal force, lethal force is always authorized. Outside, well its the problem of the host country as you might expect. There would be someone in command at the scene in direct contact with the consul general or ambassador, if they are present. In turn, they would be in direct contact with the State Department and Joint Chiefs along with the president, monitoring the situation. At least I would hope.
BTW, in Kabul a few years ago, Embassy guards mistook Afghan soldiers unloading some weapons from a truck as assailants and opened fire killing four. As you can understand, in certain countries under siege, things get a bit dicey. Funny story for you. I was assigned as a security augmenter in the USAF back in the 1960's because we were short handed. In an operational readiness inspection, I was on the main gate, when the inspector talked to me, telling me of a situation where someone was walking toward one of our radars but I didn't recognize him. He asked me what I would do. I stated that I would raise my M-16, yell halt, halt, halt and on the third halt, fire and kill the unknown person. That was not the correct answer, but he stated that in an emergency, I was someone he would want on my gate. He never counted that against me or the command.
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Post by sirchaos on Aug 2, 2014 17:26:20 GMT -6
Interesting story. I was never in the military and don´t have even your training in this sort of thing, but my guess at what I was supposed to do in that situation would have been firing a warning shot first, at least if the person appears unarmed, before using lethal force. Of course, it´s always easier to explain why you shot that guy, than to explain how he managed to wreck your radar.
I imagine at least part of the reason the inspector didn´t hold your answer against you might be that you´d obviously given the matter some thought beforehand and didn´t just blindly do things by the book - you can never have enough people in any organisation who are willing to think.
As for things getting dicey... of course there´s always psychological pressure, the more so in a hostile environment, and more pressure means (expletive deleted) happens. And again, it is easier to explain why they shot those guys, than for them and their comrades to go home in coffins. Sure, if they´d had time to think, and calmer nerves, neither would have happened, but time and calm nerves can be luxuries sometimes.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 3, 2014 11:38:29 GMT -6
There is an old saying " don't criticize until you walk a mile in my moccasins". If you haven't been in the line of fire, you have no idea what its like. My father was a WWII veteran. He once told me that war was mostly boredom, but was punctuated by moments of stark terror. He wasn't a philosopher, but frankly that was some of best advice I've ever gotten. I don't know what its like in combat or on the gate of an embassy, but my hats off to those kids that perform that important mission. No matter what nation they belong to.
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Post by sirchaos on Aug 3, 2014 14:15:12 GMT -6
There is an old saying " don't criticize until you walk a mile in my moccasins". If you haven't been in the line of fire, you have no idea what its like. My father was a WWII veteran. He once told me that war was mostly boredom, but was punctuated by moments of stark terror. He wasn't a philosopher, but frankly that was some of best advice I've ever gotten. I don't know what its like in combat or on the gate of an embassy, but my hats off to those kids that perform that important mission. No matter what nation they belong to. The version I heard was "Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in his shoes - because that way, when you criticize him, you´ll be a mile away, and you´ll have his shoes." I wasn´t meaning to criticize you, anyway, just taking a stab at what I thought the inspector might perhaps have wanted as an answer. Sorry if I gave a different impression.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 3, 2014 15:44:10 GMT -6
There is an old saying " don't criticize until you walk a mile in my moccasins". If you haven't been in the line of fire, you have no idea what its like. My father was a WWII veteran. He once told me that war was mostly boredom, but was punctuated by moments of stark terror. He wasn't a philosopher, but frankly that was some of best advice I've ever gotten. I don't know what its like in combat or on the gate of an embassy, but my hats off to those kids that perform that important mission. No matter what nation they belong to. The version I heard was "Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in his shoes - because that way, when you criticize him, you´ll be a mile away, and you´ll have his shoes." I wasn´t meaning to criticize you, anyway, just taking a stab at what I thought the inspector might perhaps have wanted as an answer. Sorry if I gave a different impression. No problem, I understood your meaning and you were essentially correct. This was an important test of our readiness since we were the eyes of the nation, as was put many times. Any Russian aircraft or missiles coming towards the US, would be seen by us first. We were the first responders as they say, so we had little room for mistakes. I do like your version of the old saying, will have tell my family that one.
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Post by nukesnipe on Aug 5, 2014 12:16:19 GMT -6
Sirchaos,
Two reasons why you never fire a warning shot: (1) it wastes ammo, and (2) the noise of the shot is more likely to exacerbate the situation than calm it.
In 1994 I was the Operations Officer of USS LA MOURE COUNTY (LST 1194) when we deployed for a West African Training Cruise (WATC)/UNITAS cruise. Our second stop in Africa was the garden spot of Banjul, The Gambia (no, really; it's called "The Gambia"). We moored on a Thursday afternoon with the intent of our embarked Marines (a reinforced platoon/short company of about 90 Marines) playing with the Gambian military over the weekend.
Friday morning found our CO off the ship with US Embassy staff making Official Calls on various dignitaries within the Gambian government. The XO was off the ship on his morning run, and we had about a dozen or so of our ~250 man crew off the ship doing various humanitarian projects. I was the Command Duty Officer (think "Acting Captain" if you are unfamiliar with the term) when we received word that the Gambian military was in the process of overthrowing the government. We promtly recalled all of our sailors.
A US Ambassador, two Embassy Staff, three Peace Corps volunteers and 47 Gambian nationals (including the President, his cabinet and their families) later, we departed the pier (short six sailors we had to leave on the beach - long story) just as the first APC broke through the gate at the end of the pier. We stood out in the river for several hours while the Ambassador and Gambian President tried to get a handle of everything, surrounded by gunboats the entire time. We uploaded our CIWS to use against surface threats (by manually training and firing the weapon) and all of our Marines were tricked out in full battle rattle.
Our ROE? Don't fire. If threatened, head down river for the open ocean. We could repel boarders, but that was it.
That evening, we set out to sea and recovered our missing sailors two mornings later in a rather exciting and hair raising "rescue" involving one of the ship's small boats and our sailors racing across the beach and into the surf while being chased by Gambian soldiers. The third day following the coup we dropped our guests off in Dakar, Senegal after that country offered them political asylum.
Don't know if that helps with your effort.
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Post by sirchaos on Aug 5, 2014 14:19:32 GMT -6
Wow... not sure if it´ll help, but thanks for telling me this story.
It would make for a great movie, too... just keep it away from Hollywood, they´d just ruin it - although the inevitable and counterfactual big battle scene at the climax would no doubt be a blast.
One question, though: You were deployed without escorts? Even in peacetime, I would have thought the Navy wouldn´t let a landing ship go abroad on its own.
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Post by nukesnipe on Aug 5, 2014 15:34:52 GMT -6
Wow... not sure if it´ll help, but thanks for telling me this story. It would make for a great movie, too... just keep it away from Hollywood, they´d just ruin it - although the inevitable and counterfactual big battle scene at the climax would no doubt be a blast. One question, though: You were deployed without escorts? Even in peacetime, I would have thought the Navy wouldn´t let a landing ship go abroad on its own. I skimmed over a lot of the details in the interest of space; also, the "complete" story is probably still classified (I don't say that to be cute; some of it I really can't talk about in detail). I have to admit, though, it was a pretty exciting several days, and being the Operations Officer I was right in the middle of it. The entire time it was going down I kept thinking of the movie "The Sand Pebbles".... I can't even begin to describe the dry mouth when I picked up FLTHICOM (Fleet High Command radio net) and reported "CINCLANT Fleet, CINCLANT Fleet, this is LA MOURE COUNTY. I have FLASH traffic, over." Yowser. We were part of the WATC/UNITAS 35-94 "battle group", although "surface action group" would probably be a better description. The entire group consisted of a DD-963, two FFG-7s, a SSN-637 and the LST. For about half of the time we had two Spanish corvettes operating with us. We were detacthed to proceed independently for the WATC portion of the deployment; USS GUNSTON HALL (LSD 44) (if I remember correctly) covered the opening "phases" of the UNITAS for us while we were operating in African waters. In addition to tending to our embarked Marines, we were the logistics support ship (read: Poor Man's AFS) for the battle group, so we had 7 MILVANs (shipping containers) of dry stores and 7 MILVANs of frozen stores for the ships in the battle group. When the Gambia thing went down, it was uncertain how long we were going to be delayed, which caused a bit of consternation of the other ships in the group (seeing as we had most of their food!). To your question, Amphibious Ready Groups (ARG) often deploy without escorts in direct support. If there was a threat in the area, we usually had a carrier strike group (CSG) operating within a couple hundred miles of us (indirect support) that we could run toward if needed. The bigger the threat, the closer the CSG. If needed, the CSG would detach escorts for direct support of us. In general, CRUDES Bubbas don't see escorting amphibs as "sexy". Bigots. Before the fall of the Soviet Union, we always steamed in Condition III (Wartime Cruising), which had half of our weapons manned at all times. Afterwards, we began steaming in Condition IV (Peacetime Cruising) which had none of our weapons manned. The steaming posture would change based on the perceived threat. Arabian Gulf = Condition III. SOCAL or VACAPES = Condition IV.
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Post by sirchaos on Aug 6, 2014 2:12:08 GMT -6
Wow... not sure if it´ll help, but thanks for telling me this story. It would make for a great movie, too... just keep it away from Hollywood, they´d just ruin it - although the inevitable and counterfactual big battle scene at the climax would no doubt be a blast. One question, though: You were deployed without escorts? Even in peacetime, I would have thought the Navy wouldn´t let a landing ship go abroad on its own. I skimmed over a lot of the details in the interest of space; also, the "complete" story is probably still classified (I don't say that to be cute; some of it I really can't talk about in detail). I have to admit, though, it was a pretty exciting several days, and being the Operations Officer I was right in the middle of it. The entire time it was going down I kept thinking of the movie "The Sand Pebbles".... I can't even begin to describe the dry mouth when I picked up FLTHICOM (Fleet High Command radio net) and reported "CINCLANT Fleet, CINCLANT Fleet, this is LA MOURE COUNTY. I have FLASH traffic, over." Yowser. "FLASH traffic" is the professional term for "things are getting REALLY serious over here", right? The sort of "really serious" that, in movies, is usually accompanied by "this is not a drill, repeat, this is not a drill"? On the bright side, that meant you knew they´d be coming for you if you got in trouble, see as you had most of their food... ;-) Not sexy, maybe... but I imagine losing a few shiploads of troops and equiment to a third-rate diesel submarine or a squadron of missile boats because they weren´t escorted would be even more of a mood killer. Condition II, then, is all weapons manned, I guess, and Condition I is when there are enemy missiles and the like incoming?
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Post by nukesnipe on Aug 6, 2014 6:55:32 GMT -6
Message traffic has three levels of precedence: Routine (administrative stuff), Immediate (operational stuff), and Flash (OMG stuff). The system is a bit antiquated and dates back to the pre-computer era. If I remember correctly, routine traffic is required to be processed within 6 hours of submission; immediate within an hour; and, flash within 15 minutes.
Message traffic is futher categorized by "type" and "pro-word". In the instance of my story, the message was an "OPREP 3" with the pro-word "Pinnacle"; it was an Operational Report Number 3 (Big Deal Message) directed to the "pinnacle" of the chain of command (read: National Command Authority). Continuing with example, CINCLANT Fleet responded with "This is CINCLANT FLEET standing by for your Flash traffic." I continued with "This is LA MOURE COUNTY. Flash, flash, flash. OPREP 3 Pinnacle. Military overthrow of the government of The Gambia...." I then read them the contents of my message. I'm pretty sure that as soon as I said "pinnacle" all hell broke loose in Virginia. Within the next few hours I'd spoken with flag officers from the Pentagon, CINCLANT Fleet, COMNAVSURFLANT, CINCUSNAVEUR and EUCOM. Pretty heady stuff for a Lieutenant Commander (select) (I was a very senior Lieutenant at the time).
At the time of the coup, we were still "chopped" (assigned) to COMNAVSOLANT. After our report, we were reassigned to CINCUSNAVEUR, so any reinforcement/relief of us would have come from SIXTH Fleet. The UNITAS ships would have continued on their circumnavigation of South America and COMNAVSOLANT would have been responsible for arranging for their logistics. Consequently, it was important to resolve the issue of us as quickly as possible, if for no other reason that to debark our guests and get back to the UNITAS group.
Actually, one of the funnier things that occured during the event was some Air Force Colonel from EUCOM calling and talking to me about how long we could remain on station without support. Seeing as we had a full tank of gas and 14 MILVANs of food in addition to our full store rooms (this was only two or three weeks into the deployment), I told him we were limited by the amount of main engine lube oil we carried (our main engines were diesels that were designed to burn 1 gallon of oil/hour at full power - crazy), but could probably remain on station for about 7 months without logistic support. There was a few seconds of silence before he told me we probably wouldn't be needed that long. You think?
Interesting fact about troop ships: I don't think the United States lost a convoyed troop ship during WW2. They were the highest priority convoy and received an obscene amount of support and escorts. There were a bunch of amphibs lost during assaults, but nothing while being convoyed from Point A to Point B. Sometimes, it's nice being the High Value Asset.
Sorry about the conditions of readiness - I sometimes forget that not everyone knows the lingo. Condition IV is peace time steaming/cruising. Condition III is wartime cruising. Condition I is General Quarters/Battle Stations/Action Stations (whatever you want to call it - the USN uses "General Quarters"). Condition II is sort of a hybrid between Conditions I and III. Basically, you set General quarters for a certain warfare area: Condition II for Air Action; Condition II for Antisubmarine Action; Condition II for Mine Sweeping; Condition II for Amphibious Assault. Just the people assigned to support those activities go to General Quarters. It's a little easier on the ship, if not the people involved.
I hope that clears up some things for you.
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Post by oldpop2000 on Aug 6, 2014 8:03:36 GMT -6
In NORAD, we had five levels of defense conditions or DEFCONS. We had a board that lit up, one side was for exercises and one was for reality. DEFCON 1 was the highest alert condition, in exercises it was titled COCKED PISTOL. Generally on our radar site, we were at DEFCON 3 all the time or ROUNDHOUSE. There were two other conditions, DEFCON 4 or DOUBLE TAKE and DEFCON 5 or FADE OUT. The highest we ever got was DEFCON 2 in my service.
As to the troopships, I believe my dad did make the comment that the invasion forces were well covered by the carrier inner patrols. Submarines were the biggest threat, but by the time of the Central Pacific invasions, they were pretty well disposed of. Any land based aircraft such as those on the Philippines were destroyed by Halsey long before the invasion fleet ever got close. There were no troopships lost after 17 December 1943. Before that eighteen were lost in the SW Pacific. The last was the USS APC-21 lost off of New Britain. We lost two in the area within three months of each other.
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Post by nukesnipe on Aug 6, 2014 13:13:51 GMT -6
As to the troopships, I believe my dad did make the comment that the invasion forces were well covered by the carrier inner patrols. Submarines were the biggest threat, but by the time of the Central Pacific invasions, they were pretty well disposed of. Any land based aircraft such as those on the Philippines were destroyed by Halsey long before the invasion fleet ever got close. There were no troopships lost after 17 December 1943. Before that eighteen were lost in the SW Pacific. The last was the USS APC-21 lost off of New Britain. We lost two in the area within three months of each other.
My information might have been in regards to U-Boats. Hitler's U-Boat War was where I read the statistic.... Oh. I forgot Conditon V - Pierside/At Anchor.
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