Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

[Ghent12]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

I've received lots of AT training, including riot squad member/team leader and the like. I wouldn't put any credence in this story whatsoever.

1) AT training, especially level 1, is basically awareness training. It is designed to enhance a service member's perspective by introducing several scenarios or possibilities.

2) Not all of DoD CBT is what you would call a "quality product" and there is a debate on whether some of the worst of it is created by monkeys walking on an open laptop in the zoo or if a human being actually devoted the nearly 20 seconds necessary to cough up garbage. Of course some of the courses are decent to pretty good, but many are lacking.

3) DoD stance is absolutely not that protests are low-level terrorism. It could leave open the consideration that riots, depending on their incitement, are. Regardless, here are two words of advice if you do want to protest a military establishment or anything really: a) none of us is as dumb as all of us, and b) take careful stock of who is leading the pack, because if incited to a riot then the typical response is riot police, and nobody wins then.

[metalman]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

there is a debate on whether some of the worst of it is created by monkeys walking on an open laptop in the zoo.

mish's economic forecasts

3) DoD stance is absolutely not that protests are low-level terrorism. It could leave open the consideration that riots, depending on their incitement, are. Regardless, here are two words of advice if you do want to protest a military establishment or anything really: a) none of us is as dumb as all of us, and b) take careful stock of who is leading the pack, because if incited to a riot then the typical response is riot police, and nobody wins then.

solid advice.

peace.

[D-Mack]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Not true apparently.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/20...rorist.-Really.

You'll need to find the "Antiterrorism and Force Protection Level 1 Annual

Refresher Training Course"


Kos talks about "Level 1 Antiterrorism Awareness training program"



I'm still fascinated that people read this CIA loving site

Here’s a little secret I don’t think I’ve ever written about: But in 2001, I was unemployed, underemployed, unemployed. You know I was in that . . You all have been there “dot com” people? Kinda like, in between jobs, doin’ a little contract work and . . . kinda. So, you know. That’s where I was: in this really horrible netherworld of ‘will I make rent next month’ and . . .
So, I applied to the CIA and I went all the way to the end, I mean it was to the point where I was going to sign papers to become Clandestine Services. And it was at that point that the Howard Dean campaign took off and I had to make a decision whether I was gonna kinda join the Howard Dean campaign, that whole process, or was I was going to become a spy.

http://www.commonwealthclub.org/arch...iga-audio.html

http://www.thehollywoodliberal.com/2...ia-connection/

Nevertheless



an older NBC report

The Defense Department document is the first inside look at how the U.S. military has stepped up intelligence collection inside this country since 9/11, which now includes the monitoring of peaceful anti-war and counter-military recruitment groups.

The Department of Defense declined repeated requests by NBC News for an interview. A spokesman said that all domestic intelligence information is “properly collected” and involves “protection of Defense Department installations, interests and personnel.” The military has always had a legitimate “force protection” mission inside the U.S. to protect its personnel and facilities from potential violence. But the Pentagon now collects domestic intelligence that goes beyond legitimate concerns about terrorism or protecting U.S. military installations, say critics.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10454316

[dummass]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Yea, just give him your lunch money.

[wayiwalk]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

So it is OK to protest at home, but if citizens of another country occupied by US forces protest, it is not?

Who were you declaring independence from, again?

No - not at all.

Not sure if you have kids, but if you do, you'll realize their percpetion of "safe" and "dangerous" is very different than the generation of kids raised the 70's or earlier.

The current generation, those now making up a good proportion of the military, are to a degree - pretty naive. How do you develop street sense when your entire life is about being shuttled to activities by soccer mom, and playing video games?

I see it as part of an attempt to get people's heads around the fact that what is a crowd at a mall in the USA compared to what is a crowd in a merchant district in Bagdad that might get really ugly in a matter of minutes, and if you're a soldier patrolling that area, you must be able to see crowds in the context of the country overseas, not your old mindset. In the USA, if there is a protest, there usually aren't bombings taking place at the same time - you wouldn't want to rule out that possibilty elsewhere.

[radon]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Sorry, I don't follow. Didn't the massacre happen after tank guy?

Too bad the students were unarmed. There might have been a very different outcome.

[Diarmuid]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Too bad the students were unarmed. There might have been a very different outcome.

Sure - ten times more dead students and a few dead soldiers. Gandhi, Martin Luther King et al have already shown the way for the most effective and moral type of resistance to subversive regimes.

[fallout]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Followup-
DOD admits to equating protest with "low level terrorism", removes question from annual training course.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,527181,00.html

I knew I'd seen it, but like many here on base thought of it in terms of training for those traveling to other countries. However one could view such as a chilling move here at home, with lawful protests now considered "unpatriotic". Wasn't just the ACLU that was incensed, conservatives, legal scholars, and Tea party protesters were just as ticked.
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/bl...vel-terrorism/
However, the DOD spokeman quoted in this article lied blatantly, every single employee of the Conus AFB I work on (all 11,000+ of them) are required to take this same training course annually, and I strongly suspect it is the same throughout most of the DOD.

[radon]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Sure - ten times more dead students and a few dead soldiers. Gandhi, Martin Luther King et al have already shown the way for the most effective and moral type of resistance to subversive regimes.

Rubbish, it they had been living in China you never would have heard of either of them. They would have been jailed, a media blackout enforced and their supporters quietly rounded up afterwords. Your idea that passive resistance will garner some sort of sympathy from a regime without a conscience is as misplaced the idea that your vote is worth anything more than paper money. As soon as those governing you decide they will no longer honor it what recourse do you think you will have. Being defenseless will bring nothing more than contempt from a government like that.

The way it worked out they accomplished nothing. The hardliners used it as an excuse to consolidate power and students today get feed the revisionist version if they hear about it at all. It would have been more productive if they had prepared for an armed conflict because they got one anyway and indeed nothing else would have made any difference.

[Diarmuid]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Rubbish, it they had been living in China you never would have heard of either of them. They would have been jailed, a media blackout enforced and their supporters quietly rounded up afterwords. Your idea that passive resistance will garner some sort of sympathy from a regime without a conscience is as misplaced the idea that your vote is worth anything more than paper money. As soon as those governing you decide they will no longer honor it what recourse do you think you will have. Being defenseless will bring nothing more than contempt from a government like that.

The way it worked out they accomplished nothing. The hardliners used it as an excuse to consolidate power and students today get feed the revisionist version if they hear about it at all. It would have been more productive if they had prepared for an armed conflict because they got one anyway and indeed nothing else would have made any difference.

Your opinion is respectful noted, I will however retain my own outlook regarding the power of non violent resistance.

[dummass]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Peaceful protests can and do work. But in general, not without the implicit threat of...something...not necessarily violence.

Protesters can be disruptive in many ways. In Latin America they are common and generally disrupt commerce. Blocking roads in key areas can bring transportation to a stop. Most protests don't need to be violent; they need to attract attention to their cause, which can be enough.

In support of the violent element, however, I doubt very much that Martin Luther King could have had any success without the implicit threat of violence that came from other militant groups, such as the Black Panthers, which also had a following at the time. From the view point of those in power, much can be gained by rewarding the peaceful group to defuse a potentially violent movement. It makes for a better writing of history.

[D-Mack]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Peaceful protests can and do work. But in general, not without the implicit threat of...something...not necessarily violence.

Protesters can be disruptive in many ways. In Latin America they are common and generally disrupt commerce. Blocking roads in key areas can bring transportation to a stop. Most protests don't need to be violent; they need to attract attention to their cause, which can be enough.

In support of the violent element, however, I doubt very much that Martin Luther King could have had any success without the implicit threat of violence that came from other militant groups, such as the Black Panthers, which also had a following at the time. From the view point of those in power, much can be gained by rewarding the peaceful group to defuse a potentially violent movement. It makes for a better writing of history.

And still the Army had a back up sniper team for his assasination, not sure if it's mentioned here, but youtube is down

[Diarmuid]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Peaceful protests can and do work. But in general, not without the implicit threat of...something...not necessarily violence.

Not always and I hold in fact it is the peaceful nature of non compliance that is is its greatest force, the power of the idea can be both a fearful destructive force or a divine peaceful force but either way the idea will imo always be the far greater then the gun, for it is the idea which can motivate and move nations.

http://europeforvisitors.com/germany...tions-1989.htm

East Germany's Peaceful Revolution didn't occur overnight, but the Monday Demonstrations of September and October, 1989 brought matters to a head in Leipzig and other cities of the German Democratic Republic, or GDR. After months of "Peace Prayers" in Leipzig's Nikolaikirche and other public protests, some 70,000 people gathered in the streets of downtown Leipzig on October 9 to demand reform from the SED (German Communist Party) regime.

Thousands of police and military personnel were on hand to stop the demonstrations, and soldiers with machine guns were posted on rooftops to intimidate the protesters. Fortunately for the citizens, cries of "No violence" were heeded, and one organizer's ploy was particularly effective: The pastor of the Nikolaikirche suggested that marchers carry candles, which require two hands: one to hold the candle, the other to protect the flame from blowing out. With two hands occupied, protesters wouldn't be tempted to throw rocks!

A 20th Anniversary press release by Andreas Schmidt, Leipzig's PR Manager for Tourism, describes what happened next:

"The 8,000-strong security forces were opposed not (as expected) by a few 'gang leaders,' but by a great part of the population. This made violent dispersal of the demonstration impossible. In the following weeks, the SED tried in vain to hinder the public from further protests. The people of Leipzig were not satisfied by cosmetic changes. Through their courage, their determination, and rejection of violence, the people of Leipzig made history with the Monday demonstrations. Pictures of the protests of autumn, 1989 spread throughout the world. Determined people demanded democratic basic rights in an encrusted community. Leipzig--the poor cousin of the GDR--used peaceful means to express itself and laid the foundation for German reunification by means of a Peaceful Revolution."

[ASH]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

"Anti-terrorism (AT) and Force Protection (FP) are two facets of the Department of Defense (DoD) Mission Assurance Program. It is DoD policy, as found in DoDI 2000.16, that the DoD Components and the DoD elements and personnel shall be protected from terrorist acts through a high pirority, comprehensive, AT program. The DoD's AT program shall be all encompassing using an integrated systems approach."
The first question of the Terrorism Threat Factors, "Knowledge Check 1" section reads as follows:
Which of the following is an example of low-level terrorism activity?
Select the correct answer and then click Check Your Answer.
O Attacking the Pentagon
O IEDs
O Hate crimes against racial groups
O Protests
***
The "correct" answer is Protests.
A copy of this can be found on the last two pages of this pdf.

http://open.salon.com/blog/dennis_lo...ef=patrick.net

When I took a low-level "terrorism awareness" class in the military a few years ago, in connection to force protection, it was very clear that the context of this question is service in a foreign country. I think I even took this test, or a version thereof. They're not talking about protests in America by American citizens. They are talking about anti-American protests in countries that can escalate from street marches to rock-throwing to acts of mob violence (which are sometimes state-organized, such as with our embassy in Syria a few years ago). The point of this training is to get an 18-year-old guy with a high school education to understand what comes next after the chants of "death to America" and the crowd starts setting tire fires. That's all.

You guys need to understand that military training that is meant to be consumed by ALL ranks, including junior enlisted personnel, gets dumbed down to the simplest terms. Especially multiple-choice quizes. They don't have a lot of caveats, conditionals, or context in these questions, because they are trying to get some poor kid who isn't necessarily that scholarly to remember what he was taught -- this isn't synthesis or essay-writing, this is rote learning of information. It's something the military does a lot of.

I try to stay out of these threads for the most part, because frankly they frustrate the hell out of me. A lot of you folks are way too eager to see storm-troopers in everything.

[jwonks]

Re: Protests are acts of terrorism, says DoD

Anyone heard of fusion centers? Google them. Fun times. NSA, Patriot Acts and now fusion centers. Big brother keeps getting bigger.

If you're an anti-abortion activist, or if you display political paraphernalia supporting a third-party candidate or a certain Republican member of Congress, if you possess subversive literature, you very well might be a member of a domestic paramilitary group.

That's according to "The Modern Militia Movement," a report by the Missouri Information Analysis Center (MIAC), a government collective that identifies the warning signs of potential domestic terrorists for law enforcement communities.

..

MIAC is one of 58 so-called "fusion centers" nationwide that were created by the Department of Homeland Security, in part, to collect local intelligence that authorities can use to combat terrorism and related criminal activities. More than $254 million from fiscal years 2004-2007 went to state and local governments to support the fusion centers, according to the DHS Web site.

People who supported former third-party presidential candidates like Texas Rep. Ron Paul, Chuck Baldwin and former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr are cited in the report, in addition to anti-abortion activists and conspiracy theorists who believe the United States, Mexico and Canada will someday form a North American Union.

"Militia members most commonly associate with 3rd party political groups," the report reads. "It is not uncommon for militia members to display Constitutional Party, Campaign for Liberty or Libertarian material."

Other potential signals of militia involvement, according to the report, are possession of the Gagsden "Don't Tread on Me" flag or the widely available anti-income tax film "America: Freedom to Fascism."

Barr, the 2008 Libertarian Party presidential nominee, told FOXNews.com that he's taking steps to get his name removed from the report, which he said could actually "dilute the effectiveness" of law enforcement agencies.

"It can subject people to unwarranted and inappropriate monitoring by the government," he said. "If I were the governor of Missouri, I'd be concerned that law enforcement agencies are wasting their time and effort on such nonsense."

Barr said his office has received "several dozen" complaints related to the report.

Mary Starrett, communications director for the Constitution Party, said Baldwin, the party's 2008 presidential candidate, was "outraged" that his name was included in the report.

"We were so astounded by it we couldn't believe it was real," Starrett told FOXNews.com. "It's painting such a large number of people with a broad brush in a dangerous light."

Michael German, national security policy counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, said the report "crosses the line" and shows a disregard for civil liberties.

"It seems to implicate people who are engaging in First Amendment protected activities and suggest that something as innocuous as supporting a political candidate for office would mean that you're harboring some ill-intent," German told FOXNews.com. "It's completely inappropriate."

German, who claims the number of fusion centers nationwide is closer to 70, said the centers present several troubling concerns, including their excessive secrecy, ambiguous lines of authority, the use of data mining and military participation.

"No two are alike," German said. "And these things are expanding rapidly."

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/firs...litia-members/