1st Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division U.S. deployment

O.K. I have been commenting on this event for a few days now. So far, I have been pretty tame with it, because I have not had the time to track down the actual story from the Department of Defense. It's not that I didn't believe what I was reading, but I do know how things can be changed from story to story, and key pieces left out. Well now I have the story from Army Times.

Here is the link:

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/09/army_homeland_090708w/

Some of what I read is a bit discouraging, some lightened my concern some. Would you like to read along with me?

Helping ‘people at home’ may become a permanent part of the active Army

This is a bit frightening. An Army is for combat. We should have learned in the African campaigns that the Army is not a very effective 'meals on wheels' program. Armies fight. Armies kill. Armies take and hold ground. Period. So, what is their idea of 'help', and what if I don't want their brand of 'help'? Now they are telling us that this is now a permanent mission of our Army. Hmm. Interesting, to say the least.

But this new mission marks the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment to NorthCom, a joint command established in 2002 to provide command and control for federal homeland defense efforts and coordinate defense support of civil authorities.

Coordinate defense support of civil authorities? How, exactly, is that mission accomplished. Combat brigades are not 'support' units. They are combat units. So, it stands to reason that civil authorities will have the 'support' of combat troops. How does that work? Well fortunately for us, we have some pretty recent history to help us understand this one. Unfortunately, we have an overdeveloped sense of not learning from our history. What happened when WW II Germany deployed SS troops in law enforcement capacities throughout Germany? Tell me....think of all of the images you have ever seen of WW II Germany. In so far as internal affairs are concerned, (You know, rounding up the Jews, confiscating firearms, policing the streets, ect, ect,) have you ever seen a photograph of a police officer? My recollection is of always seeing the enforcer in a Nazi uniform with a rifle.

In the meantime, they’ll learn new skills, use some of the ones they acquired in the war zone and more than likely will not be shot at while doing any of it.

So, they will be using some of the skills they acquired in the war zone, will they. What, exactly, are those skills? And, here is a laughable little nugget, more than likely not being shot at while doing it! More than likely? Do US Citizens have a history of shooting at combat troops? We have to turn back in out history books to the Whiskey Rebellion, and the Revolution for precedent here. Is this what our combat troops are expecting?

They may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios ...

Here we start getting into the chilling part of things. Read that one more time and close your eyes and picture it. Is that pretty? Do you see a positive outcome from that? Combat troops for crowd control? The last time I checked, that is kinda like martial law.

Training for homeland scenarios has already begun at Fort Stewart and includes specialty tasks such as knowing how to use the “jaws of life” to extract a person from a mangled vehicle; extra medical training for a CBRNE incident; and working with U.S. Forestry Service experts on how to go in with chainsaws and cut and clear trees to clear a road or area.

This brought the warm and fuzzies back a little bit. An image of a soldier in full combat gear with an M-16 slung over his shoulder, using the Jaws of Life on a mangled car. Now there's a Norman Rockwell moment. The Commanding Officer yells, "Get him out alive son, we need to water board him!"

...1st BCT commander Col. Roger Cloutier said, referring to crowd and traffic control equipment and nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals without killing them.

Interesting, who gets to decide who is unruly or dangerous? Under the right circumstances, I can be both, as I'm sure you can too. Seriously, who's decision is this?

The package is for use only in war-zone operations, not for any domestic purpose

This straight from the Colonel, yet they are training to use this 'package' here at home. So, either the Army sees US soil as a battle ground, or the Colonel is not being truthful when he says it is not for domestic purpose. Which do you think it is?

“We’ve been all over the world during this time of conflict, but now our mission is to take care of citizens at home ... and depending on where an event occurred, you’re going home to take care of your home town, your loved ones.”

This quote reminds me of the the bumper sticker that has the picture of the gun pointing at you and says, "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help." Yeah, the Army is going to 'take care' of us and our loved ones...that's what I'm afraid of.

Then, at the very bottom of the article, this is printed:

Correction:
A non-lethal crowd control package fielded to 1st Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, described in the original version of this story, is intended for use on deployments to the war zone, not in the U.S., as previously stated.

Hmm, sorry, given the tone of the rest of the article, this strikes me as damage control, and not a truthful response.

Obviously, I have snipped and clipped the parts of the article that pique my interest. It was not my intent to mislead in doing so. Please, read the whole article for yourself and make up your own mind about what this means to you.