What the hell is with the civil unrest chain?

[Person012345]

More specifically, the ending. I'm playing a location in Britain so I have no idea why the Massachusettes National Guard or whatever even has jurisdiction in the first place but putting that aside, I'm not american and don't know how to deal with the national guard. Being not-american, I don't worship the military and intuitively the correct course of action as a dispatcher does not seem to be to pull police away from incidents unrelated to the rioting so that the militay can come in and murder some people. From a player perspective I am essentially being told to stop playing the game. And the penalties for saying "but I want to play the game" are absolutely ridiculous. Is this event chain from a DLC or the base game and is there a way to disable it (aside from fully disabling a DLC if it is related to one)?

[Engineer Gaming TURBO]

I promise, not all Americans worship the military.

The National Guard functions as a law enforcement agency in the context of civil unrest.

The guard is required to undergo annual riot control training.

They will arrive with proper riot gear, just like municipal police would arrive with for a riot.

Their use of force continuum will be the same as civilian law enforcement agencies once they are deployed. Unless rioters decide to use force against the guardsmen, no one is getting shot.

The US hasn't had serious problems with National Guard use of force since the 1970s.

In real life, you're probably safer with the guard deployed in the USA than you are with local law enforcement.

Try to find a newspaper article related to an unlawful or unjust shooting of a US civilian by an element of the National Guard in the last couple of decades. I bet you won't be able to.

Now, if you're talking the odds of the national guard injuring NPCs in the game vs dispersing a riot vs effecting an injury-free arrest..........

Well, I still don't understand the exact interactions of NPC hit points vs weapon DPS and officer training/levels. I can't speak to game dynamics.

[Person012345]

Well you see, I didn't know any of this since I really have little reason to investigate the workings of the US military and it's routine employment as law enforcement (something that strikes me as a particularly terrible idea). My problem is more with the absurd punishment you get for failing it rather than the course of the event itself. If I had had this event early on whilst playing, the punishment probably would have made me quit and never come back.

I do wonder how many times they've actually been deployed in this role since the 70's and what the context was. Having the military act as law enforcement is an absolutely terrible idea in any context and whilst Police in some areas may not be much better in terms of viewing crime as a military situation, it's at least possible for them to be reformed (whereas you don't want to reform a military unit not to think like a military unit).

[Engineer Gaming TURBO]

To clarify, the National Guard units are state agencies and their primary report is the the state governor.

They only report to the US President and his agents in the various armed forces in an emergency.

Think of the various states' National Guard units being the state forces that the governor calls out when local emergency management agencies are overwhelmed.

Coincidentally, when the US military gets swamped, the guard gets deployed to help them.

The military is, in fact, legally prohibited from conducting law enforcement actions directed towards US citizens on American soil.

Now, we *do* have reserve units that are elements of the US military. In time of peace (which I'm actually old enough to remember) those guys stay home and work regular jobs. US Army Reserve soldiers can, likewise, not engage in domestic law enforcement.

I would totally understand you getting the two confused.

[Person012345]

I don't think that changes anything about what I said, they're state military forces (I already knew they were state agencies). That's sort of like japan trying to pretend the JSDF isn't a military. They're designed as a force that can fight a war. Not necesarily conduct large scale global warfare, but fight an invading military for example. And US states are generally equivilant to a country anywhere else. In fact I'd say it really strengthens my point, the US DOES recognise what a terrible idea it is for the military to take the role of law enforcement which is why it's generally banned (although I believe you can still institute martial law right?).

Althought this is certainly straying away from the topic, as Isay Idon't have a problem with the event per se, if it's realistic, just the penalty for getting it "wrong".

[thehitman4uall]

Well the first thing wrong with this post is the outside perspective of what the National Guard is.

As an outsider to Britian, my knowledge may be off, but you had until not long ago a Territorial army that acted along the same warrents if I remember, did you not?

What you don’t have is the Posse Commitatus Act. What that does is prohibit the use of federal military personnel for use in a law enforcement role unless the Insurrection Act is invoked.

Having these units fall under the state governors, rather than to the Executive Branch, allows such assets to be available to states if and when they need them.

The National Guard is deployed by the state if a State emergency is called. This includes the Riot Control training as well as such incidents like hurricane relief/ forest fire efforts/ and other large scale disasters like earthquakes and floods

Most of the national guard units are heavily transportation based and they don't have the actual "Military Hardware" I feel you are thinking of them. They don't roll in tanks and heavy IFV's.

They have Humvees and semi truck and trailers with some troop transports and HEMMETs like fuel carriers and such. Mainly so they can move equipment like bulldozers and cranes as well as transport personnel or evacuate injured across non paved or off road to reach areas not accessable by common road bound vehicles.

The National Guard in the U.S.
While having to pass basic training like all military members, acts more like a labor pool for disasters and relief efforts then an actual "Police Force" They can only be called in or requested by the state to act in.

Most states have never had to deploy their guards as a "protection" because the larger population ones have enough emergency services in line on their own.

The goal of most Guard deployments is to establish an area for shelter/food/water/and to amount light rescue operations or assist with specialized forces such as forest fire fighters to get fire lanes bulldozed, to get supplies in hard to reach areas or to provide as stated above, to establish a zone of control for other services to operate out of.

Look into the hurricane reliefs and flood relief for what is more in line with their actual use.

While they have served WITH the Military forces overseas, they have always served as a support or guard role.

The US has what outsiders would refer to 3 levels of military structure.
The ACTIVE Military: these are the active full time members of the various branches
The RESERVES: These are those who are supposed to fill in second line defences or reinforce frontline forces that have sustained heavy casualties but need to keep pressure on an enemy.
The National Guard: Serving both state and able to be called upon in times of war or if needed, They are typically used to guard rear echelon locations or convoy's moving behind friendly lines in a war theatre.

The reason with the three part system is to be able to pull more combat trained personnel from the back and have the other parts take those roles instead.

So while the National Guard is technically a State military force, it is not like having your regular military being called on to deal with things.

[Usher]

sorry, Boston National Guard should only appear in Boston, during a campaign, just as the final call. This will be removed in next update.

[X-SR71]

You just follow their orders, pull your police and let them handle the riots. +50 reputation.

[Person012345]

Originally posted by X-SR71:

You just follow their orders, pull your police and let them handle the riots. +50 reputation.

My point was that this isn't really obvious and the penalties are very high. In many countries the military doesn't have authority simply because it's the military (as noted above - The US included, although this apparently doesn't apply to the national guard for various reasons that have been explained, which is where it gets more complicated). The military has a role, and typically that role is not in policing the civilian population and the punishment for not knowing the relationship of the national guard is extremely harsh. Too harsh was my point. Obviously though it's a bug that it appears outside the campaign so that's getting/been fixed.

[OffGridYid]

Maybe not 100% important to the discussion, but I want to step in and correct some things said here. National Guard elements in the US are almost fully integraded into the rest of the Army, and yes, do serve in combat arms roles. Yes, the National Guard does have tanks, APCs, and other heavy fighting vehicles, and yes, the National Guard does deploy to hot spots and engage directly with the enemy. Most importantly, the National Guard has its own Brigade Combat Teams and serves more often in combat arms positions than in support or rear echolon roles. It just depends on what the mission calls for and what capabilities the unit can offer to the commander of the battle space. Or in same cases, its actually the National Guard that controls the battle space.

Having said that, National Guard units under Title 32 Orders are under direct authorization of the governor of their respective states to respond to an emergency in their communities; however, the authorization has to be there and there is a huge restriction placed upon them. For example, National Guardsmen do not have the athority to make an arrest. They can; however, suppliment local, county, or state law enforcement agencies and can be pulled into the services of those agencies for limited roles. And those roles have a huge range depending on how comfortable the local agency is in giving power to the Guard.

Source: Served in the National Guard as an MP. Activated in support of Hurricane Irene 2011, and deployed to Afghanistan 2012-2013.

[Person012345]

So my original post and reaction (although admittedly, looking back, maybe worded a little bit combatively) was closer to the mark than has been made out in this thread? Essentially, I felt it was recklessly irresponsible and not legally required for me to withdraw all emergency units back to base whatever they were doing just on the say so of some guy from the national guard (not having been informed of their deployment through any other channels mind you). So I told him I couldn't do that. And I lost a massive chunk of my reputation and enough money to put me well into the red as a result. And so I got kind of butthurt and made this thread.

Funnily enough though there was no mention of me being "fired" as is reported in some of the other threads about the event chain. Maybe that is simply because it happened outside of the campaign, but the report text actually said that my supervisor judged my decision as being reasonable, I still lost the stuff though. I don't know how much of all this was bug and how much was intentional.