U.S.
Michael B. Thomas / AFP / Getty Images
It was a rare sight in suburban America: National Guard troops in armored vehicles rumbling through the streets as they arrived to bolster police forces struggling to contain sometimes-violent demonstrations in Ferguson, Missouri, a town outside St. Louis gripped by outrage over the police shooting of unarmed African-American teenager Michael Brown on Aug. 9.
Although Ferguson police have faced scathing criticism for using military-type weapons and tactics to confront unarmed and often peaceful protesters, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon this week called in the National Guard – actual soldiers, some with combat experience, using military equipment.
Yet some hope the National Guard – with its stringent rules of engagement – will serve as a more neutral force than the local police, who are mostly white and had a strained relationship with the mostly black community long before tensions exploded after Brown’s death. Others, though, see military involvement as an unnecessary, dangerous escalation.
Local law enforcement officials have their hands full. Late on Monday and early Tuesday, police arrested 31 people, and two civilians suffered gunshot wounds – not inflicted by police, authorities said. At a press conference on Tuesday, Highway Patrol Capt. Ron Johnson, who has been placed in charge of security efforts in Ferguson, displayed a Molotov cocktail and guns that officers had confiscated during the protests. He hailed police for not responding in kind to heavy gunfire from a small number of “criminals” in the crowd.
During Monday night’s clashes, National Guard troops – who are taking their orders from Johnson’s Highway Patrol – kept their distance from the melee just a few blocks away. But some civil rights advocates worry that the troops’ presence could add stress to the already volatile situation.
The National Guard troops’ duties will include protecting the Westfall shopping mall, where police recently repelled protesters with tear gas. Authorities have turned part of the mall into a “Unified Command Center,” where multiple local and state law enforcement agencies have established their headquarters. By serving as sentries there, the guard will free up local authorities to deal directly with crowd control.
Two attorneys for the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), Chauniqua Young and Jessica Lee, said in a joint statement that one “cannot overstate the mental impact of seeing people in tanks, fatigues, military gear.”
“Having the National Guard in seems to make it even more challenging for the local folks to negotiate and express demands to the police force,” the attorneys said.
The lawyers conceded that the National Guard’s presence after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 upstaged the New Orleans police department’s violent and bungled approach to crowd control.
“The National Guard were much better than the locals, who were literally executing black people,” they said. “But the feeling of being in a war zone in your own neighborhood led to serious backlash and trauma.”
Supporters of the National Guard presence in Ferguson said the troops would be a positive force.
“It’s neighbors helping neighbors,” said John Goheen, a spokesman for the National Guard Association, a lobbying group that advocates for the force. He noted that many of the specifics of their mission were up to state authorities.
“The bottom line is that civilians are in charge. The guard is being called out to augment civilian authorities,” Goheen said. “Nobody’s rights have been waived.”
“You try to use the minimum amount of force necessary,” Goheen said. “We take a backup position, a support role and leave the upfront police work to police.”
The governor’s office did not respond to multiple requests for comment on what procedures the guard would follow if they have to arrest or detain people, or what it would take to provoke them into using their weapons. Neither the Missouri National Guard nor the Highway Patrol responded to requests for comment.
State governments routinely send the National Guard to provide humanitarian aid and security in areas where natural disasters have overwhelmed civilian authorities. In Hawaii, Goheen said, the guard came in after a recent hurricane to help prevent looting.
A U.S. Army civil affairs officer, who works with residents of countries where American soldiers are present, said the strict chain of command would make guard troops less likely to use excessive or deadly force against Ferguson residents.
A military unit would respond with force “only after it is cleared by, at the very least, what I am sure would be a highly hesitant company commander, who would most likely turn to their chain of command for help. Only then would these troops engage the civilians,” the officer said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press.
“If our soldiers would engage with civilians, there would, in my opinion, most likely be major consequences for that unit's command team,” the officer added.
But that kind of violence has happened before. In 1970, at Kent State University in Ohio, National Guard troops fired on students who hurled rocks at the troops while demonstrating against the Vietnam War. A federal judge later dismissed charges against the shooters.
The guard today maintains a detailed how-to, a "force continuum," on using force when supporting civilian law enforcement personnel. The first level of force is simply their presence, which can discourage protesters from disobeying police orders. The next five levels include using bare hands to move civilians, followed by non-lethal means such as Mace or tear gas, and then when all else fails – deadly force. Criminal penalties could await those who fail to follow the rules.
Whether the guard’s presence will soothe tensions or inflame them remains to be seen. But to the civil affairs officer, greater police firepower is not the answer.
“Often one side bringing heavier weapons causes a heavier response from the other side, and it spirals and escalates,” he said. “From a public affairs perspective, the police lost the battle before it even began.”
Error
Sorry, your comment was not saved due to a technical problem. Please try again later or using a different browser.