[Peace-discuss] Purposeful domestic resistance

[C. G. Estabrook]

[Mort posted an article the most valuable part of which was the following 
account of an Army report.  I'm reminded that in quite different circumstances 
President Johnson was told by the Pentagon in 1968 that if it sent more troops 
to Vietnam, it might not have enough left to put down domestic unrest within the 
US.  --CGE]

...The specter of social unrest was raised at the U.S. Army War College
in November in a monograph titled "Known Unknowns: Unconventional
‘Strategic Shocks' in Defense Strategy Development." The military must be
prepared, the document warned, for a "violent, strategic dislocation inside
the United States," which could be provoked by "unforeseen economic
collapse," "purposeful domestic resistance," "pervasive public health
emergencies" or "loss of functioning political and legal order." The
"widespread civil violence," the document said, "would force the
defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend
basic domestic order and human security."

"An American government and defense establishment lulled into
complacency by a long-secure domestic order would be forced to rapidly
divest some or most external security commitments in order to address
rapidly expanding human insecurity at home," it went on.

"Under the most extreme circumstances, this might include use of
military force against hostile groups inside the United States.
Further, DoD [the Department of Defense] would be, by necessity, an
essential enabling hub for the continuity of political authority in a
multi-state or nationwide civil conflict or disturbance," the document
read.

In plain English, something bureaucrats and the military seem
incapable of employing, this translates into the imposition of martial
law and a de facto government being run out of the Department of
Defense. They are considering it. So should you.

Adm. Blair [Obama's spy-chief, the Director of National Intelligence]
warned the Senate that "roughly a quarter of the countries
in the world have already experienced low-level instability such as
government changes because of the current slowdown." He noted that the
"bulk of anti-state demonstrations" internationally have been seen in
Europe and the former Soviet Union, but this did not mean they could
not spread to the United States. He told the senators that the
collapse of the global financial system is "likely to produce a wave
of economic crises in emerging market nations over the next year." He
added that "much of Latin America, former Soviet Union states and sub-
Saharan Africa lack sufficient cash reserves, access to international
aid or credit, or other coping mechanism."

"When those growth rates go down, my gut tells me that there are going
to be problems coming out of that, and we're looking for that," he
said. He referred to "statistical modeling" showing that "economic
crises increase the risk of regime-threatening instability if they
persist over a one to two year period."

Blair articulated the newest narrative of fear. As the economic
unraveling accelerates we will be told it is not the bearded Islamic
extremists, although those in power will drag them out of the
Halloween closet when they need to give us an exotic shock, but
instead the domestic riffraff, environmentalists, anarchists, unions
and enraged members of our dispossessed working class who threaten us.
Crime, as it always does in times of turmoil, will grow. Those who
oppose the iron fist of the state security apparatus will be lumped
together in slick, corporate news reports with the growing criminal
underclass.

The committee's Republican vice chairman, Sen. Christopher Bond of
Missouri, not quite knowing what to make of Blair's testimony, said he
was concerned that Blair was making the "conditions in the country"
and the global economic crisis "the primary focus of the intelligence
community"...

http://lists.chambana.net/mailman/archive/peace-discuss/2009-February/021331.html