In regard to latest terrorist shooting at Pensacola, I pick up that the guards were not armed. In fact, like all military bases within the United States, firearms are not allowed. This is why we had the tragedy at Fort Hood and other shootings on bases that have highly trained warriors in residence. I am not sure what the logic is except for misplaced political correctness that has reached the level of the absurd. Maybe it is from misplaced fear of a military coup or some such nonsense. This is a recurring problem in our military. You can’t protect yourself from a guy with a gun if you only have a smile. We see the same type of thinking in our schools.
It comes down to a problem with ROE or rules of engagement. Soldiers, marines and airmen have carefully worded rules and parameters that determine when they can respond with force and how much force is allowed. Police have the same restraints. Notice I said “carefully worded” not “carefully thought out”. They are not carefully thought out. Usually they are political statements of convenience.
When I was in Vietnam, we were not allowed to load our rifles on guard duty. If we were caught with rounds in the gun the best we could expect was what was called an Article 15. This is the lowest level of court marshal. Understand, we were in a war zone. We were on guard duty. We were not allowed to load our weapons. In fact our ROE started off with calling the command bunker if we were being attacked and ask for permission to load and fire a few rounds into the air. I remember toward the end of basic training I was assigned guard duty at an all night laundromat that had a machine that vended candy and snacks. My orders were to keep anyone from using the machine after 10:00 at night. That is 22:00 for you military types. Really? Really. I dealt with this threat to national security by walking around the corner any time someone approached the candy machine.
Or take Iraq. We hear a lot about the surge and how that changed everything. It certainly helped but even more important was a change in the ROE. Our soldiers were suddenly allowed to defend themselves.
Pensacola was a tragedy that did not need to happen. It was terrorism by invitation. It is the result of the forces of the progressive, anti-gun culture. It will happen again as long as our military bases continue to be gun free zones.
homo unius libri
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Comments are welcome. Feel free to agree or disagree but keep it clean, courteous and short. I heard some shorthand on a podcast: TLDR, Too long, didn't read.