Protecting the military on their own bases
One of the most perplexing, frustrating, and anger-provoking policies of recent years is the apparent disarming of the military while on base and going about their business. With the rise in attacks from terrorists, it makes our military personnel into sitting ducks. Why was it police who ended up stopping the shooting, after several people had been murdered?
After the Pensacola killings, there are calls to reverse this policy, pronto:
A group of U.S. Navy instructor pilots asked top military brass for permission to arm themselves in the wake of the shooting at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Fla., where a Saudi military pilot gunned down three American sailors and wounded eight others.
One of the shooting victims was the captain of the U.S. Naval Academy rifle team, an “excellent marksman,” according to his brother.
“It’s so stupid that on a military base, the shooter was allowed to roam free for so long,” according to one instructor pilot. “In a gun fight, that’s an eternity.” The pilot, like others interviewed by Fox News, did not want his name used because he was not authorized to speak with the media.
One of the pilots said Navy brass denied their request to arm themselves on base…
One pilot called base security at NAS Pensacola and other Navy bases “mall cops,” because protection on the base has been outsourced to private security and many were “fat and out of shape.”
“I have zero confidence the guy I show my ID card to at the gate could save me,” one pilot added. Fox News spoke to three Navy instructor pilots Tuesday.
It’s an opinion shared by many across the military, including the U.S. Army; more than a dozen soldiers and an unborn child were gunned down at Fort Hood in 2009.
“We trust 18-year-old privates in combat with grenades, anti-tank missiles, rifles and machine guns, but we let service members get slaughtered because we don’t trust anyone to be armed back here in the United States,” a senior U.S. Army officer told Fox News.
Insane, it seems to me.
I tried to get a handle on when this policy began, and so far (in what admittedly has been a brief search) I can’t discover the answer. Here’s Snopes’ answer, for what it’s worth. It maintains that Bush I began the policy but it wasn’t really a change from previous policy and it didn’t really disarm the bases because guards and other security personnel were still allowed to be armed.
The real question, I suppose, is why the Navy didn’t have enough armed guards around – and when did such a policy of outsourcing military protection to clearly inadequate private companies begin?
When I’ve debated gun control advocates, it always became clear that the last thing they wanted was for people to be protected from gun attacks by force of arms, at least if those people aren’t rich powerful liberals, like, say, the Obamas.
The more innocent people are killed by gunfire, the stronger gun control advocates can make their arguments — or so they believe. Win-win.
OTOH what a disaster it is for gun control, if some busybody with a carry permit interferes with a perfectly useful massacre.
Sadly, the only naval facilities where you are likely to encounter robust numbers of armed security personnel–Masters at Arms–are facilities where nuclear vessels and/or nuclear weapons are located.
When I was in the Army in the early 80s service members who lived on post had to store their weapons in the unit armory. Making a reservation to get the weapon from the armory was a hassle. Most people I knew found an off-post location to store their weapons. Concealed or open carry was not an option. 98% of the time when you had the weapons that the Army issued to you, they were unloaded with no access to ammunition.
It struck me that the officer corps had two reasons for limiting access to weapons. First is doing the paperwork associated with having enlisted personnel shoot each other would be enormous and ultimately used against them when they were evaluated for promotion (unable to maintain order and discipline and facilitating the destruction of government property). The second reason, the were enough officers who were straight up d**ks that at some level they feared for their lives.
At that time you had serious Miltary Policemen in charge of security.
“Two pilots said the Saudi shooter had 10 minutes to carry out his deadly assault on defenseless Navy sailors at the “API” — aviation pre-flight indoctrination — building.” — from linked article
Yes, 10 minutes is quite long.
I always understood that this (disarming) was a G.H.W. Bush policy. Possibly the base commander can override, but probably never will.
I always thought that it was 100% brain dead policy, but maybe only 95% insane. I’ve never been in the military but spent many years as a civilian employee on base.
War fighting is a fairly different skill set than civilian peace keeping. I’d want everyone who’s carrying on base to have a little training in the latter. I’d also want them to have a basic psych screening and a couple weeks cool-down period when returning from a hot combat zone, before they start carrying again.
Beyond that, I say get them armed. Voluntarily armed.
Another other thing I suspect is true. If service personnel carry their weapons concealed and it’s not 100% common knowledge who these people are, it is a major advantage in neutralizing a threat. If the perpetrator does not know where his threat is coming from or what they look like, that’s a big negative for their assault. Probably a preventative element as well.
There are reasons for not letting all military have weapons on base. A lot of military are very young men. In a normal carrier deployment they lose an average of five sailors to homicide. Personally, I would defer to the military on how to handle this.
But, I would definitely not out-source base security. That just sends the wrong message and must be demoralizing.
I do not know the reason for the policy or when it started.
However, it does occur to me that should a single jihadi or small group of jihadis start firing inside a crowd, and everyone inside the crowd is armed and starts firing back, then you could easily end up with a circular-firing-squad effect where almost every bullet finds some sort of target, with many unintended casualties.
One possible solution is to arm only some of the people on the base. This would diminish the circular firing squad effect. I can also see how the military might prefer to call those few armed people guards, and as time goes by with nothing happening — they are a bureaucracy after all — try to save money by reducing their number. Unfortunately, the only way to find out for sure that you now have too few guards is for some jihadis to decide that it’s time to try their luck.
It would take an unusual sort of military bureaucrat to conclude that sprinkling a few randomly-chosen concealed-carry people here and there on the base would be the best way to stop would-be jihadis.
I was in the Navy from 1955 to 1976. No one was allowed to carry on base. We did have sidearms at our hangars, that we carried when we flew. At the time base security was performed by Naval Master at Arms ratings and Marines. These were basically Navy police who looked after all security on Naval Air Stations. Access to the bases was pretty tightly controlled and the housing, Navy Exchange, and recreation facilities were separate from the operational facilities, which were patrolled by armed sailors/marines. Sabotage was the main worry, not terrorism or mental case shooters. During the 60s and early 70s, when the bases were protested by anti-Vietnam hippies, security was pretty tight. I never worried about being gunned down while on base, but did worry about being attacked when off base in uniform. Had some nasty encounters, but never was physically attacked.
Islamic terrorism has changed all that. While we have been training foreign pilots for many years (I had an Argentinian student in 1961 at Pensacola), the Islamic terror movement would seem to call for very extreme vetting of Muslim pilot trainees. Also, the rent-a-cop movement is bad news. I don’t know when that started. The last time I was at NAS Whidbey, about three years ago, there were Marine guards still manning the gate. I didn’t see any rent-a-cops anywhere. Big training bases like Pensacola probably are more lax about security because they have such a huge turnover of personnel and not much in the way of high value operational aircraft. I think they should go back to using armed Navy or Marine personnel to do base security. And maybe quit training Muslim pilots here in the U.S.
If the threat comes from inside, and they aren’t allowed to describe it, that could be a problem.
Just give up on Snopes. Even placing the word in a post diminishes everything around it. The back brain reaction is to not believe anything that comes from that infected node.
D. Cohen,
If it is voluntary, many won’t bother. Who knows how the numbers would work out, and of course the numbers could be controlled.
The circular firing squad effect is an old notion and sounds logical. Great statistics don’t exist. The track record of average armed home owners shooting innocents is not great. For folks with concealed carry licenses the record is much better.
That’s part of what I meant about “training.” Not shooting practice, but training on when not to shoot. Many carry licensees are required to get such training, though many are not required.
There’s probably a greater concern of accidental or negligent discharges (ND’s) than intentional firings that hit innocents. Another element of training: Don’t mess with your weapon unless it’s required or there’s a threat. A ND injury is usually an injury to the owner of the weapon, but not always.
Example #1: An off-duty Clackamas mall cop had returned to his mall when an active shooter started killing patrons. He took cover behind a concrete pillar then stepped out in a crouched firing stance with his concealed weapon. Both armed men see each other. The mall cop sees that there are innocents in his field of fire, and takes cover again without firing. The perp figures the jig is up and kills himself.
That example is usually chalked up as indeterminant because the mall cop’s original story was false because he violated his employer’s gun free zone policy and might have been fired.
Example #2: An intoxicated FBI agent was break dancing (or some such) late at night at a Colorado dance club. Suddenly, his weapon hits the dance floor. If he had been smart, he would have carefully picked it up. Instead, he thought that maybe nobody would notice the firearm if he snatched it up quickly. In the snatching, he snagged the trigger and shot somebody. Not a life threatening injury.
Long time lurker, first time poster. Law enforcement officers on military installations were outsourced following 9-11. Two primary reasons—increase security presence on lightly secured installations and permit more active duty members to deploy to the war zones. Going to the fight was viewed as a career enhancer especially for young airmen tired of standing at gates. At some point—maybe 10 years ago, the USAF moved away from renta cops and created a civilian security forces speciality. They perform the majority of base gate guard duties. The services all vary in how they handle these duties.
The obvious question is if arms are forbidden on base, how did the shooter bring arms on base? A KSA citizen can not legally buy arms here. So how was he able to be armed?
I was an MP in Italy between ’81-’84. We were not even allowed to have a magazine in our weapons while on duty, much less a round in the chamber. This was at a time when The Red Brigade was extremely active, and we were standing gates that had large, dark, open areas on either side, next to a fairly busy road in Italy. This was due to some not properly clearly weapons and rounds being fired into clearing barrels and the armory. (Yes, it happened, I was standing just outside the armory when it did.) I PROMISE you it was not Bush 1 who instituted these types of policies. It was more likely the military itself. As was customary at the time, we were the only ones who were armed, but that was only when we were on duty. Nobody else was armed at the time. The same types of policies existed when I rotated back stateside. I think these policies were instituted because the military has a general rule that when one person screws up, everyone must pay.
Deb Kirkhuff:
Thanks. That’s interesting information.
But it would seem to me that guards are needed at more than the gates, or else the troops should be able to be armed for self-defense.
Nobody had ready access to their guns on the base when I was on active duty from 1985 to 1990. You stored your personal weapons at the armory on the base or your ship. This is not a recent policy. Also, there was never a shortage of police on any military base that I was ever on.
My understanding is the policy came about due to the number of fragging incidents during vietnam.
J.J. how’s your memory on how tight they were about soldiers being armed during early 1960’s and then early 1970’s after vietnam?
This article does show what it felt like for some of the MP’s during that time period.
https://cisac.fsi.stanford.edu/news/great-draft-dodge-all-volunteer-army
The ending paragraph on this one talks about disarming the troops while on base.
https://www.historynet.com/the-hard-truth-about-fragging.htm
The military has been corrupted, along with the rest of society. I remember the general on the Sunday morning talk show after the Fort Hood massacre insisting “No! Not terrorism as all! Just workplace violence!”
See also- fighting wars for decades in s**thole countries and not winning.
Parker,
It’s obvious he paid no attention to the decal on the entry door with an image of a handgun surrounded by a red circle and a slash through it.
Perhaps he wasn’t informed on the meaning of the decal?
The Snopes link is self-contradictory if read closely.
I take much more comfort from the real info provided by vets posting here.
But outsourcing? Military bases are not shopping malls!
The Obama administration labelled the Fort Hood shooting “workplace violence”, effectively denying casualties the benefits they would have gotten if the terrorist had been properly identified as an enemy combatant/traitor. Since Obama was reelected, either that disgrace was acceptable to most voters, or perhaps they were prescient as to the fitness of Pierre Delecto.
Chang Yee Fong: “J.J. how’s your memory on how tight they were about soldiers being armed during early 1960’s and then early 1970’s after vietnam?”
My experience was all Naval Air. We didn’t have fragging events because our enlisted men were well trained, appreciated by their officers, and mostly unarmed. Also, Navy morale was pretty high through most of the air war against the North. We were pissed that they wouldn’t let us go all out, but until the war ended, we kept hoping that they would take the gloves off.
I did spend some time on special assignment with the Air Force at Than Son Knut Air base in South Vietnam. There were Army, Air Force, and Navy units on base. Just about everybody carried sidearms openly and there were a lot of long guns around as well. It was, after all, a combat zone.
I was bunked in a hootch that was cleaned by a South Vietnamese woman. My Air Force contact told me that they had vetted her, but not to ever sleep without my pistol under my pillow. The VC were everywhere – always probing the perimeter of the base and occasionally creating some havoc, but the Army seemed to have things in hand. I just flew my missions, made sure my enlisted men were well quartered and fed, slept with my pistol under my pillow, and didn’t worry about much else. There may have been some gun accidents, but I never saw or heard of one. Everyone seemed to adhere to pretty good gun discipline. So, no stories to tell. Sorry.
In my time as a GI, 70-75, most blue on blue shootings were MPs playing gunfighter. . As a dependent in the 50s and 60s, that seemed the norm with the odd suicide.
Most ccws have been trained on the when nots and their safety record is better than the coppers.
There’s manifest training course available to enhance the skill set and as for civilians shooting innocents, NYPD has them beat hands down.
I can tell you when and why, but you wont believe me…
Its a consistent part of negating the military for a long while now
here is the directive – signed by atwood..
http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a272176.pdf
here is a newer one:
Implements: DCMA-INST 4201, “Civilian Personnel,” July 20, 2018
Incorporates and Cancels: DCMA INST 551, “Firearms and Use of Force,” August 15, 2014
https://www.dcma.mil/Portals/31/Documents/Policy/DCMA-MAN-4201-18.pdf?ver=2019-01-15-073316-963
you have to understand obtuse military reasoning, and what is going on to put things together..
but the first one had to do with the fact that they were making things more friendly to certain classes, and at the time, those classes did not serve in combat, and so, did not have clearance to carry weapons.. they would appear to be unequal..
has to do with the fact that unless you have training, you cant carry, and not everyone gets training..
1978 certain classes in Navy and Marines allowed to serve on non-combat ships as technicians
1991 and 1992 was the Persian gulf war..
1991-1992 41,000 of these people were deployed to the combat zone..
here, read about what roles they had on the diversity page of the Navy website.
https://www.history.navy.mil/browse-by-topic/diversity/women-in-the-navy/during-desert-shield-desert-storm.html
remember… the military is very funny about training… and they came up with “the risk rule”
but for the most part none of their roles were combat, so few got combat weapons training
and even the newest sheet points out that without traning, you dont get weapons
sooooo… to avoid the gender brouhaha, if they cant carry, no one carries except special circumstances
In January 2013, the US ended the policy of “no women in units that are tasked with direct combat”
much of this has been known for ages… ergo the limitations our past had..
but note… you want to give guns to people, who, with training cant shoot as well?
as far as the military was concerned, this was an accident and cluster f*ck waiting to happen
In 2016 86% of women failed the Marines’ combat jobs test….
https://www.thestate.com/news/local/military/article85009717.html
In the last five months, 6 out of 7 female recruits – and 40 out of about 1,500 male recruits – failed to pass the new regimen of pull-ups, ammunition-can lifts, a 3-mile run and combat maneuvers required to move on in training for combat jobs, according to the data.
as far as the obstical courses and other things, they cant pass them either..
and they get special rules that the men dont get…
They cant go as far, get hurt easier, cant carry as much
and they get leadership positions without having to do the same things
Marine Corps Quietly Drops Major Obstacle to Female Infantry Officers
That was 2018…
i guess its ok… masculinity is toxic and the enemy gives mulligans..
US Navy Sailor vs US Marine FEMALE EDITION | Obstacle Course Challenge 1,881,862 views
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-2LzW3t-1k
now watch how a guy can do it…
Watch a West Point athlete destroy the indoor obstacle course test
https://www.wearethemighty.com/sports/obstacle-course-records
After OCS comes TBS, and this obstacle course
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=7&v=Fqt12VhNX48&feature=emb_logo
for fun..
U.S. Soldiers Run Latvian Military Obstacle Course
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSw6tcW7Xyg
you used to be able to fund videos of women, other than the standouts you can count on one hand, they have all been scrubbed.. 100s of links to the ranger women… zero for regular enlists.. and you used to see them… they even were allowed to help each other…
How do the Marines train women at Parris Island? A former officer shares ‘The Truth’
Read more here: https://www.islandpacket.com/news/local/community/beaufort-news/bg-military/article207900254.html
When she took command in June 2014 of the depot’s 4th Recruit Training Battalion — the Corps’ only female recruit training unit — she noticed a line of chairs had been placed behind a group of women trainees after they finished the Crucible, the grueling final test one must pass before earning her eagle, globe and anchor — and the title, Marine.
The chairs were there in case the women, who’d just endured days of physical and mental strain, needed to sit.
But those chairs weren’t placed behind male platoons, Germano writes.
she nixed the chairs..
And months later she’d find herself out of a job for, as she tells it, challenging the status quo and pushing for higher training standards for, and equal treatment of, female recruits.
now they dont allow chairs
and the women get combat training..
its like the movies… women are archers..
but archery requires high upper body strength
my long bow was over 80lbs at full draw.. (yes, long bow)
at my arm length it went over 100..
and you had to just hold it while aiming…
while some women could draw it, none could shoot it well enough
we live in a world of illusion created by militant ladies
god help us in a real combat against troops closer to our level of skill
but at least there arent that many guns to worry about any more
I was an MP in Italy between ’81-’84. We were not even allowed to have a magazine in our weapons while on duty, much less a round in the chamber. This was at a time when The Red Brigade was extremely active, and we were standing gates that had large, dark, open areas on either side,
The Marine guards at the Beirut barracks had empty M 16s with no ammo. They watched the bomb truck driver come into the garage and detonate and could do nothing.
“A KSA citizen can not legally buy arms here. So how was he able to be armed?” — parker
My general understanding is that any foreign national or legal immigrant can buy a firearm. The media reports on this particular guy was that his firearm purchase was legal, if he had a valid hunting license, which he did.
In my state, CA, you have to pass a firearm safety exam (relatively easy) and have that safety license on hand.
The Snopes piece seemed correct to me, but I’m not particularly knowledgeable of the details. It came into being with Bush I and into effect with Clinton? I suppose base commanders could designate a larger number of carrying officers as “security personnel” and still comply with the directive, but CYA mentality makes that highly unlikely.
Mike K, I meant to mention that incident, but I’m a bit ADD and I got distracted.
This is my third try. I am trying this from my euphemistically named smart phone. So in short bursts.
I was never in a paid flight status in all my 20 years
I was intel. I wasn’t the RIO (Radar Intercept Officer). But it seemed to me at the time, and it still seems to me as at least a valid or defensible position that I should know something about the systems the RIO in TARPS squadron (Tactical Airborne Recconnaisance Pod System) had to work with.
I never got a hop. Our air g group had a flight surgeon nicknamed “No Lock Dock.” He was in a paid flight status. It takes a lot to allow a SU 15 Flagon, a really P.O.S . old former Soviet garbage fighter that unlike many soviet fighters no other country bought, it takes a lot to let that sneak up on a Tomcat.
Or h#ll an F4 Phantom or F8 crusader. It takes a dumbfounding amount of fail to let that happen. “No Lock Doc” had just that amount of fail in him. Nobody who worked with.me on the simulators or whatever (I went through SERE school for G_d’s sake) ever imagined I would allow to happen what “No Lock Doc” let happen. More than one aviator came up to me and said, “Look Holy,” that was my call sign because the first message to my new command misspelled my last name “Toledo,” “we’d love to give you a ride.”
If they gave me a hop, somebody not in a paid flight status, they would have had to explain why they weren’t giving flight time to the air group flight surgeon. Who was in a paid flight status but all the squadrons were lying their @$$ess to refuse him a seat.
I bet at this point you are wondering, “Is there a point?” Remarkably yes there is.
The F14 except for the shortlived “D” version was pretty much a pure fighter. Yes the TARPS versions were competent recon planes but that didn’t interfere with their air warfare capabilities. The pilot had complete control over the cannon, the AIM 9 Sidewinder, and the AIM 7 Sparrow.
But the AIM 54 Phoenix was the RIO’s weapon. The weapon system could track 24 targets and the RIO had 6 fire and forget missiles at his fingertips. And the pilot didn’t have a vote.
Except for one idiot doctor I had all that destructive force in my grasp. No background checks. No nothing.
But the Navy can not trust me with a handgun.
Brit election today.
Do BrExit and MAGA have a psychic connection?
If so we’ll get an important data point
I was active-duty AF from 1976-1996, mostly overseas, and IIRC, the policy of no private weapons on base was the one in force … although, from what I recall, our own SPs were armed. In Greenland, the SPs had a rack in the dining hall to stack their weapons on while they ate. In Greece, there was an ongoing terrorism problem, and I’m pretty certain our facility guards there carried loaded weapons when on duty. I nearly had orders to Saudi for a TDY, and had to take small arms-training. Again, IIRC, it was thought a good idea for female military personnel assigned there to carry.
As of this current thing – I believe that E-6 and above who have personal weapons and have a current CCL ought to be allowed to carry on base – and junior members do so at the discretion of their commander.
And that any Saudi permitted to train in any capacity at a US military facility should be very carefully vetted (by us) and confined to base when not being trained. Just my .02
While is it now all too apparent that the Obama Administration worked to get like-minded lefties hired and promoted, and I’d assume saw to the stalling or demotion of those on the conservative side in the Civil Service, I am not so sure about just how successful that same Obama Administration was in carrying out their own “fundamental transformation” of our military.
I’ve seen reporting that, during the Obama Administration, hundreds of conservative/war-fighting officers and NCOs were given their walking papers, and their positions subsequently taken by leftists who were more to the liking of the Obama Administration.
Reporting is confused on what happened in Benghazi–and very likely deliberately so–but my impression is that two or more high ranking officers who wanted to use their forces to go to the rescue of our people at Benghazi were prevented from doing so, and later relieved of command/replaced by Obama chosen lefties, or “retired.”
So, just how deep does the leftist subversion in our military go?
Retired Navy here. On every ship I was on, when in port, the Command Duty Officer was armed (and with ammo, although chamber empty), as was the quarterdeck/topside watch. On larger ships, perhaps one or two others. U.S. or foreign port: all the same. (’79-’84, ’86-’88) ROE was basically: protect the ship. One Commanding Officer put it this way (in a foreign (NATO) naval station): if you feel unsafe, shoot–I will back you up.
As for current situation, I can think of several possibilities. For example,
(1) Implement a volunteer Concealed Handgun Defense collateral duty (make it volunteer), with specified training and qualifications, including, possibility rank or age requirements (e.g., E5 for enlisted, O3 for officers, age 25 for others). In addition, make the ability to be armed include off-base.
(2) Accept a state’s concealed handgun license, with perhaps some additional training required.
Small monetary and bureaucratic cost for significant increase in security, with minimal additional risk to personnel.
I was in the Navy from 72 to 79. On every base – *every base, including training bases* – ALL personal weapons had to be stored in either the base armory or the ships armory. To sign it out, you needed paperwork that had to be completed at least one day in advance before you took possession of your firearm. And then you had to go straight from the armory to either the range or the gate. This was a monumental hassle, so most of us into the shooting sports stored our weapons off base and used off base ranges.
This policy long pre-dated Obama, or GW and GHW Bush, even Reagan and Carter. Indeed, I can’t say for certain, but I believe the policy was instituted by the military itself and had no political side to it.
The last time I stepped onto a military base was probably 20 years ago, so I must admit to not knowing that our military was now using what are basically “rent-a- cops” to provide perimeter security on some of our bases, rather than military personnel.
I’d imagine that anyone with a modicum of common sense, on finding out that this was our current policy, would judge it to be an absolutely insane, and highly negligent policy.
Who the hell–what Administration–was responsible for this decision?
Some commenters here have offered the idea that such a switch to civilians for security might have been done to free up military forces for service overseas.
I see the security of each one of our military bases as of top priority and thus, if, for instance, providing Marines to guard each one of our bases would require that the number of active duty soldiers in our Marine corps be increased in number then, that is what should be done.
This is an insane and suicidal policy that President Trump should immediately reverse, so that every one of our bases is protected by our own military forces–preferably by Marines– and not by a bunch of civilian rent-a-cops.
P.S.–Its pretty obvious that the Saudis–in the past, when their petroleum was absolutely essential to us–were our temporary “allies of convenience.”
Time for President Trump to take a cold, hard look at whether we should continue to believe in and to treat the Saudis as being our “allies.”
“In my time as a GI, 70-75, most blue on blue shootings were MPs playing gunfighter.”
I worked at Field Station Berlin for three years and we had armed guards. One night they were playing quick draw and one of the guards was shot. After that the ammunition was taken away from the guards and kept in a locker. No more playing with loaded guns.
When I was a AF medic, we did apparently have some military police in for treatment who had shot themselves while playing “quick draw McGraw.”
Knew of a “guard” at one of those armored car companies, who played the same game inside the cab of the armored car, with all sorts of ricochets flying around.
Luckily no one got hurt.
I does seem, though, like there’s a pattern here, doesn’t it?
When I was in — 1970-1972 — the were still MPs guarding the two stateside posts I was at, Ft. Knox and Ft. Holabird. At Armor Officers Basic School, I was assigned as paymaster once. At that time, the Army still paid in cash. I was issued a loaded 1911, chamber empty for that duty, When I got to Germany, I never saw a loaded weapon. Even when we went on alert, we were not issued ammo for our weapons. I don’t know if the real Army (I was in MI) had gate guards but it was still a draftee Army , and there were race riots, fraggings, ADs, not so ADs, and other incidents at Kaiserslauten, Grafenwöer, and other combat arms bases.
USN Submariner 1961 to 1968. No personal weapons allowed on base except in the armory. In port topside watch not allowed to insert loaded magazine into his 45. First real stupidity came during Cuban Crisis. Ship got called back from barrier patrol to load additional warshots, food, and fuel before heading south. Command decided we needed more security so topside watch increased to include two pier-head rifleman but no inserting loaded mags! First time I ever disobeyed an order! Fast forward to this year when the USS Cole visited Fort Trumbull. She had actual designated shooters posted on the pier as well as local PD running metal detectors. She also had an armed inflatable doing waterside security. So, it looks like some sailors do get it!
Yeah, in basic–for me, that would be almost 60 years ago–they had a paymaster with a table and a 1911 on it, pointed at us as we stepped up to get paid in cash.
I have no idea if that 45 was loaded or not, but I’m sure all of us assumed it was.
My President at work. He seems to have addresses a lot of the points brought up by our veterans here.
https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2018/02/23/trump-hints-at-allowing-more-troops-to-carry-personal-weapons-on-military-bases/?utm_source=clavis
https://amgreatness.com/2019/12/12/expel-the-saudis-from-u-s-military-training/
William Patton
Artfldgr, I read your excerpted report about mixed gender USMC ground combat units and their inferior performance compared to all Male units. This mirrors my experience. When the Navy opened combatant ships to women the whole dynamic changed. I felt more like a high school hall monitor than a naval officer. My brother officers would get together and in hushed voices ask each other, “Have you noticed the change?” It wasn’t good change. You mix a bunch of college aged young men and women and head to sea for weeks at a time and you can’t keep the boys and girls apart with a crow bar. It was such a huge issue for us Jo’s and chiefs that we seriously doubted we still had a navy that could sustain combat. But the senior leadership, and this is important as they are the ones who are to blame and NOT the women, would not listen to a word of criticism. Give those inside-the-beltway a hard shove, as in threaten their ability to retire with 4 stars, and they turn into dancing bears. Jump? How high? If Nancy Pelosi wants not only barriers to combat positions removed but a “critical mass” of women in those specialties then they’ll lower the standards to get the fight number.
Again with emphasis. This isn’t the fault of the women. There are the occasional bad apples but the vast majority are patriotic, have a good dose of common sense, and are generally cool people.
I value women in the armed forces. If you don’t understand their value I will tell you. One example; at the outbreak of WWII the British Royal Navy set up a wargaming outfit because German u-boats were nearly starving the nation sinking even heavily escorted merchant convoys. The RN commander who was placed in charge of what I believe if fickle memory serves was the Western Approaches Studies Group defied all conventional wisdom. Instead of staffing his unit with career naval officers he staffed it with WRENs. Female reservists with zero naval experience essentially drafted for the wartime emergency. You can probably guess the Hollywood ending. (Cont.)
https://bearingarms.com/tom-k/2019/12/12/va-dems-threaten-use-national-guard-sanctuary-counties/
Except some of them really do want to go down that road, for whatever reason (and several come to mind).
(Cont.) You guessed it. The girls kicked some serious tail. And when I say girls I mean girls. One girl showed up for her first day still wearing her whatever passes/passed for high school uniform (when she was.told about her role in the war effort she cried but she soon bucked up and turned out to be a genius at the job).
I never would say women aren’t Awesmarter than me. I’ve been getting outsmarted by women my whole life. But I deeply resented the fact I was put in the position of having to shut up or say things I knew were lies. Such as a five foot zero 100 pound petite girl is just as capable of guarding the quarterback as a six foot 22o pound Bos’n’s Mate.
In March 2014 MAA2 Mark Mayon paid for this stupidity (compounded by the mall cop approach to base security) with his life.
He was in charge of a sector of security as Chief of the Pier (one of many per duty section) aboard Naval Station Norfolk. An individual who did work for a vendor presented credentials that weren’t valid outside normal base exchange/commissary operating hours. The DoN civilian police told him he was denied entry. Yet for some reason that no one has ever been able to explain they didn’t make sure he turned around and exited. There were vehicle barriers they could have raised at the touch of a button. They didn’t deploy them. This guy, apparently high on hallucinogens, just drove right on base throgh five layers of mall cop security and went to the pier where petty officer Mayo was maintaining his roving patrol. He got word from several quarterdeck watches about the intruder over his vehicle’s radio and responded. The intruder was mounting the USS Mahan’s brow (gang plank, ladder, whatever you like) and the female Petty Officer Of The Watch was attempting to challenge him. The first rung on the escalation-of-force ladder is to use your command voice.
Ladies, hate to break it to you. I could lie to you like the joint chiefs always wanted me to. A lot of you don’t have a command voice. This petite young woman who I am sure is.a fine person didn’t. The intruder unfazed just walked up and took her sidearm away. MAA2 Mayo placed himself between the disarmed petty officer and the intruder and was shot dead while the OOD killed the intruder.
Bottom line was she was not the deck ape MAA2 Mayo needed at that moment. And it is a loss to the nation that he had to sacrifice himself because literally everyone let him down.
To their credit I know very few women who have lived the life who want to go into ground combat. They know factors like upper body strength (i.e. weapons retention) will be a factor. There are other factors such as dignity. If you are delicate cover your eyes. Dysentary ls just a fact of life particularly when under stress. So you are on patrol with an infantry unit and the explosive diarhea is on you. No time to go behind a tree. You have to drop your pants and squat right where you are standing. Ladies, do you really want to do that in front of a group of leering 18 year old men? You may be thinking, “Oh gross. Nobody could get any pleasure out of that.” I have news for you. You don’t know infantrymen or for that matter sailors. They have certainly been checking out your lower unit. Now you have to bare it under any cicumstance whatsoever? Depending on how long they’ve been in the field or drilling holes in the ocean this is probably the most entertainment they’ve had in months. They’ll probably be cell phone video of the event posted on YouTube by the end of the day.
Ironically the flag and general officers doing all this mindless and stupid social engineering full-speed-ahead at the orders of their political masters cited the fact the military became racially integrated after WWII as if that means we can do mixed gender combat units, gays in the military, transgenders (if you get diabetes you’re discharged because supplying deployed personnel with insulin is a logistical nightmare, now we’re doing hormone therapy?). What is ironic is that the armed forces didn’t just integrate. Actually the navy had been integrated prior to the raging racist Woodrow Wilson who segregated the service. So admirals Nimitz, King, Halsey, etc., already knew black sailors could do the job. But they had to prove it all over again. Search on, “USS Sea Cloud (IX-99): Racial Integration for Naval Efficiency” on the US Coast Guard historian’s web site. Sea Cloud was a converted yacht conducting weather patrol with a USCG crew in the north Atlantic that became a test bed for reintegration the service because racism is just stupid. There were race riots among sailors during WWII and it was one of the rare instances when everyone had a valid point. So the navy brass used Sea Cloud to prove the Navy would be better off if integrated.
You will never see a similar demonstration again. Because that’s the kind of thing you do if you want to know the truth about what does and does not work if you want a force capable of winning wars. And I am not saying mixed gender combat units are impossible (the Israelis recently closed armor to women because they can’t change tank treads) or gays in the military are a show stopper. But at least let’s do our due diligence.
It will never happen because the current crop of flag and general officers rose by playing along to get along. I don’t want to come across as some bold individualist constantly speaking truth to power. I played the, “shut up and try to get promoted game but I did have occasional moments when I just couldn’t hold my tongue and I let everyone within earshot know I was NOT on board.with the program.
So now you know why I was not allowed to be armed with a personal weapon on base. I like most Sailors was not on board with the inside-the-beltway 4 stars’political program. And on occasion I let that fact slip out. This meant they didn’t trust me and if not an actual threat at the very least I was a wild card. And here is the clincher. They had fully absorbed the risk-averse bureaucratic culture. Bureaucrats are terrified of shouldering the blame for anything that goes wrong on their watch. The best way to avoid that blame is to do your worst to make sure nothing at all happens on your watch. A perfect example is the sorry tale of the trap and skeet range at NAF Atsugi. From the immediate post war period through the 1990s not once did a plane on the airfield get peppered with shot. Actually I think it was impossible the small shot in our target shells could even reach the runway. But more importantly if we were legally blind we wouldn’t likely be shooting shotguns at small flying disks. If we could see those we sure as h3ll could see aircraft. So we did a remarkable thing; we stopped shooting until the plane was well past.
After 9/11 I was recalled to active duty and sent back to Japan. And the trap and skeet range was forever closed due to “safety concerns.”
Yeah safety Nazis.
I suppose I should be flattered as the nervous Nellie’s think I can do the impossible like bring down a warplane with light target loads. But again the take away is not only did the people in charge not trust me, they actively disliked me.
I’ve always been puzzled at the deference given and the praise U.S. Governments have heaped on Saudi Arabia and its leaders.
But, if the figures above are correct, and over the course of the last few years the Saudis have purchased 20% of all of our military equipment, all is explained.
The U.S. is, in effect, a car dealership, and the Saudis are a regular and our largest client, who we butter up, and roll out the red carpet for.
But, now that–thanks to President Trump’s efforts–the U.S. has become “energy independent,” it is time, I believe, for us to rethink our relationship with the regressive Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and to determine whether it is really realistic, or actually in the best interests of the U.S., to consider and treat Muslim Saudi Arabia as a true ally of the United States.
Saudi Arabia like Pakistan, has played the two-faced game with us for far too long.
It is pretty obvious, from just the few pieces of information that have managed to leak out, that the Saudis played a major role in, at least, facilitating the 9/11 attacks–and perhaps had a much more direct role–and that past Administrations have protected and covered for the Saudis.
How about the reports about the several evacuation aircraft, full of a reported 140 high ranking Saudis who had been living here in the U.S.—some of them actually relatives of Bin Laden–that President Bush reportedly OK’d to leave immediately–a day or two after 9/11–when all other U.S. Aircraft were still grounded?
Then, we have the Saudi’s major financial support for the export of the fundamentalist and fanatical Wahabi brand of Islam throughout the world, including here in the U.S. where, according to reports, they have been the main source of funding for the enormous growth in the number of Mosques in this country, for their staffing, and “religious” and teaching publications.
See, for instance, the example of the fundamentalist texts and teaching at the Islamic Saudi Academy in Northern Virginia, as translated and reported on in the Washington Post and other publications several years ago.
And now, we have the example, a few days ago, of several of our supposed Saudi “allies”–here in the U.S. to be trained by us–carrying out and apparently filming their terrorist attack in Pensacola.
Time for us to get real, and to treat Saudi Arabia as the enemy that it actually is.
Saudi Arabia is an American ally, not an enemy as Barack Obama imagined it. The Islamic Republic of Iran is an enemy state, not an ally as Barack Obama imagined it.
Thankfully, President Trump knows how to tell the difference, and aligns our policy accordingly.
Steve57 — you don’t rise above O-5 without being a politician, and the higher you rise, the more of a politician you have to be.
In the olden days military bases were protected by MPs (Army), SPs (Navy) and APs (Airforce). I can’t see how outsourcing security on bases could be cheaper than using existing personnel. Sounds like a boondoggle to me.
Steve57 – thanks for the riveting story – confirms most of what I’ve absorbed in general and specific reading over the years (armchair military history fan).
The military of most nations is just a uniformed bureacracy, that occasionally has to get out from behind the desks and fight – which is why IIRC the first order of battle is to fire most of the brass.
https://hotair.com/archives/jazz-shaw/2019/12/11/virginia-dems-gun-confiscation-never-mind/