Attention "Returning Combat Veterans:" Napolitano Does Have a Clue

I just found this website but it has already made more sense than 99% of the crap on the internet. Keep it up.

Posted by Adam at April 24, 2009 11:23 AM

Adam,

You would do well to stick around, indeed. Gerard makes plenty of sense, and as you pay attention to the twitter feed under his Edge Notes, you'll be pointed to boatloads of similarly excellent stuff.

Posted by Andy at April 24, 2009 11:49 AM

I would assume that those documents exist. That's what contingency files are for, after all. In fact, I would expect to find two very different sets. The first would be in the Pentagon contingency files. If they're not, then someone is delinquent. Being a possible scenarion, it ought to be gamed out.
The other set I would expect to find in the darker corners of the 'Shadow Party'. Contingency planning like that would be extremely difficult for the POTUS to explain. It would, however, be within the scenario-space of a dedicated 'soft' revolutionary movement. Such as the 'Shadow Party'.
Just so show the size of my tinfoil hat,
go here: http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/groupProfile.asp?grpid=6706

Posted by Howard Roark at April 24, 2009 12:01 PM

The American people, at least the majority of the American people, whole-heartedly trust the military...that cannot be said of Obama. The DHS report is a profile of who he considers his enemies. The timing of that report, right before the tea parties, was no accident. It was intentional and meant to scare off the critics, that wasn't lost on the tea party goers...but what he may not have expected is that the tea party goers (who had many veterans among them) aren't at all like his serfs...it had the opposite effect...it just added insult to injury. There's a saying...tyranny is when people fear its government...liberty is when the government fears its people. Then his people say the protests are "unhealthy" and he moves to add a domestic terrorist to the most wanted list, so that we wouldn't miss the point he was making...but then he could only find a left wing terrorist to make an example out of. Laughable, pitiful, shameful.

Only 100 days after a claimed (close)landslide election and more debt than all the president's combined have added to this nation's back, nationalizing-controlling (destroying)the private sector left and right, dissing our friends and sucking up to our enemies, apologizing for how terrible a country we the people are to the whole world in our face, endulging secrets with the enemy and increasing the danger to citizens and hanging out our bravest son's and daughters to threats of prosecution for doing what Congress knew and authorized them to do, flip-flopping depending on the daily direction of his lap-dog's release of gas...why is he so fearful-duh?

Posted by renee at April 24, 2009 12:24 PM

Gerard, you're military contacts are largely correct about the unlikelyhood of armed forces not willing to carry out a President's orders, but for a couple of potential game-changing phenomena:

Individual soldiers during the Bush years "protesting" Iraq, and whatnot, created an opening for military personnel to resist policies they don't like.

National Guard and reserve units are more likely to be vulnerable to loss of nerve when told to confront large numbers of people they know to NOT be extremists, and who resemble themselves as well as their friends, neighbors, and families.

Posted by Roderick Reilly at April 24, 2009 12:55 PM

I've often thought of the military as the trump card for liberty in this country. It is very difficult for me to conceive that the US Armed Forces (largely a Red State organization) would take orders from a left-winger in order to illegally put American citizens under the boot. Rather, it seems to me, the left-winger would quickly find that the joke is on him.

We've sunk to a point where we somehow regard one branch of government (the Judiciary) as being the *only* one who is allowed to step up and defend the US Constitution. Doesn't the military also take such an oath? Deposing a tyrant would simply be fulfillment of duty, especially if said tyrant had issued orders to subjugate the population.

Posted by Matteo at April 24, 2009 3:36 PM

When I was commissioned into the Army, I swore to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same... ." Pledging obedience to the president comes after this pledge (link).

Whether that means the military's officers would actually mutiny against usurpation of power by their commander in chief is something I find highly problematical. Understand that the active officer corps is not paying near the attention to the administration's domestic politics that the blogosphere is doing.

Obama's usurpation will be gradual. There will be no Putsch or October Revolution.

If civil unrest returns, you can expect to see the Guard back on the street corners. I do think that regular Army officers would balk at being sent to enforce civil law (though Eisenhower sure got away with it in Little Rock when he deployed the 101st Airborne there).

I have been writing literally for years that I am convinced I am a member of the last generation in human history that can be called substantially free. G.W. Bush was certainly no friend of freedom. In fact, Obama could not have near the success in shutting down individual freedom except that Bush plowed the road. When either party looks at Americans today, it thinks, "You are the problem."

And remember: If you know how to capture wild pigs, you know how to subdue a country. Obama knows how very, very well.

Posted by Donald Sensing at April 24, 2009 6:40 PM

I listened tonight to a military man speaking to Rusty Humphries on his radio program. I did not get his rank although I gathered it was substantial. He was absolutely sincere in his committment to serve the Commander in Chief and follow his orders, as is every officer I know. But that is not all he said, and since it was said without especial emphasis Humphries seemed to miss the distinction. He said that he was absolutely committed to serving the President of the United States and the Constitution.
When the time comes, they are going to serve the Constitution, and this bedevils the Revolutionaries. They are working on it, I'm sure.

Posted by james wilson at April 24, 2009 8:03 PM

Thank you for your insightful analysis and speculation. There is a fascinating report, written by Charles Dunlap for the Army War College, describing a scenario not too far from what you've described:

The Origins of the American Military Coup of 2012:

http://www.carlisle.army.mil/usawc/parameters/1992/dunlap.htm

Posted by Eric Gagnon at April 25, 2009 7:24 AM

You nailed it right off the bat-- distinguishing *threat to country* vs. *threat to government itself*. Most will fail to see that distinction. Thanks, Gerard.

Posted by Hannon at April 25, 2009 7:56 AM

The truth? Well, you can always tell the truth and shame the devil.

But that isn't politic, is it?

Posted by Mikey NTH at April 26, 2009 10:11 AM

I remember Bezerkeley 1969. It was wild. Crimes of violence were down. Crimes of stealth (drug dealing) were up. The Army is not a police force.

Note: if 2,700 was the requirement to get order in Bezerkeley, I think we are about 10 or 50 divisions short when it comes to pacifying all of America. And Obama & Co. are strangling the military. He probably never had their confidence anyway. And with Janet (why isn't my name Reno?) N. dissing the vets even less so.

Posted by M. Simon at April 26, 2009 4:00 PM