Posted on 06/25/2012 2:37:32 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
Late last week and through the weekend, citizens of St. Louis, Mo., were told not to be alarmed should they see military tanks roll by their home. Even with this warning, though, some wondered why the U.S. Army was taking the vehicles off the base and to the streets in the first place.
According to KSDK-TV, Army specialists from Fort Meade came into town for a training exercise for members of the 354 NP company. As the reporter states, this “drivers’ ed.” for tanks will take place on city streets and the highway.
Watch the KSDK report:
As noted in the video, the military is warning onlookers to steer clear of the tanks should they be seen on the road. Still, this caused Brandon Smith from Alt-Market in a guest post for Zero Hedge to wonder why the military is really conducting this training in public at all, saying it “makes very little sense to me.” He poses these questions:
U.S. Army troops all the way from Maryland running open exercises in armored personnel carriers on the busy streets of St. Louis? I know Maryland is a small state, but is there really not enough room at Ft. Detrick to accommodate a tank column and some troops? Are there not entire fake neighborhood and town complexes built with taxpayer dollars on military bases across the country meant to facilitate a realistic urban environment for troops to train in? And why travel hundreds of miles to Missouri?
(Excerpt) Read more at theblaze.com ...
Are the roads able to handle that load?
I see huge potholes in the future.
It helps determine which troops are ... ummm ... “reliable”.
I think we all know why this is happening.
Training? Bull Shi!. Some heads should roll. This is a clear picture what America is becoming.
Ping.
The military did lots of in-city training under Clinton. Helicopters, tho, not usually armor.
Lots on FR about it, naturally.
According to the Blaze.
I wonder how much coverage this “supposed” incident would get if Glenn Beck weren’t getting money for showing it to you.
“It helps determine which troops are ... ummm ... “reliable”.”
That was my first thought. Call me a kook but I can’t think of any other practical reason for such a military excercise.
Q: “Why are Army Tanks Rolling Down Residential Roads for Training”
A: To give the pilotless drones something to shoot at for practice.
To get to St. Louis from MD, they needed to roll right past Fort Campbell which has some great urban combat and artillery training environments. Something doesn’t smell right here.................
This was a regular occurence when I was young. I would sit on the porch...thinking I could attract these gorgeous hunks. Alas...I was 12....No takers.
I hate when people make profits.
Which troops are reliable...
...just how much will U. S. Citizens tolerate?
IMO, get used to it folks. Soon these won’t be training exercises any longer.
The decision to dedicate one division of the military to inside-border enforcement should make just about anyone sit up and take notice.
These aren't "tanks", they are M1117 Armored Security Vehicles.
That point having been made, it's still wise to question the need to conduct this "training" in a civilian area when such training could have been accomplished on a military reservation just as easily.
I hate it when they play folks for fools.
When I was a young trooper, we roadmarched an M113 APC and an M551 Sheridan through Louisiana for a Memorial Day display. People were happy to see us and loved the equipment.
When I was in the Army Reserves in the 80's, we would roadmarch our wheeled vehicles to Ft Campbell of Ft Knox for our annual summer training. It was no biggie back then.
Maybe they can clean up the North side of the city and then roll in to IL and clean up East St. Louis. But my guess is that Obummer will have them roaming the streets of Clayton, Ladue, Frontonac and Town & Country where the really bad citizens of the St. Louis area live. If he would just clean out these people, their homes and bank accounts there would be no problems in the US.
St.Louis is a far worse place then Chicago where they are killing each other every day.
This is something they woulddn’t even do in base housing when I was a Brat.
Send them to Detroit to clear some old houses while they are at it. ;-)
I see huge potholes in the future.
That was my thought also. I thought they couldn't take tanks onto residential streets because they would tear up the roadway. There are dedicated bases/facilities for this type of training - why aren't they being used instead?
Depends on the definition of "policing capacity"... There hasn't been such a major need for military tanks to manuver through suburbia in the past. Other than a muzzy usurper in the WH, what has happened to change that?
Getting ready for the election in November? Maybe BHO is planning on announcing there will be no election (national security reasons) and he’s getting the Army ready for the ensuing riots. Just a thought.
‘Makes Very Little Sense’: Why are Army Tanks Rolling Down Residential Roads for Training?
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It would be real interesting if someone could post their observations on just what the armor and associated troops are doing:
Are they going in and out of buildings or aiming cannon at them?
Are there discernable fire zones?
Do those zones point generally outward(a) from a core facility or (b) toward outskirts of the city?, or inward (c) toward a salient facility or area or (d) from outskirts to city core?
Are they setting up check points/outposts, or decontamination centers...or compounds?
Are they running around in bizarre suits and/or gas masks?
Or are they just buying souvenirs and trying to meet girls?
My bet is that other police outfits will be getting some of the ol' M117's used in Iraq. It usually works that way.
hunnerd bucks says somebody gets hammered, watches kelly’s heroes and flips a molotov down a hatch for kicks and grins. The more often this kind of crap goes on in close proximity to residential areas instead of manuever training areas, the greater the likelihood there’s an incident. be kind of interesting to see what kind of rules of engagement they’ve got for the homeland, versus the restrictive crap in afghan t.o., etc.
I always wanted to be an NP when I was a little kid.
There is no such unit listed at Ft Meade, MD, however there is a reserve unit listed from St Louis, MO that is the 354th MP Company.
I guess I'm just too used to armor going all over hell and creation in Germany. Tiny back roads, autobahns, wherever. Just can't get worked up over this.
The drumbeat of Obamanation rolls on: regulate -— control -— destroy -— Regulate -— control -— destroy -— REgulate -— control -— destroy -— REGulate -— control -— destroy -— REGU
There are extensive expensive large fake cities for training purposes. Fort Knox is one of them.
There is no good reason for this display of force.
Not that much TEA Party presence in St. Louis, is there?
This is just something cops don't need.
A St Louis cop called into Alex Jones Sunday show and then today another ST Louis cop and a firefighter called in. What they had to say was not reassuring.
The cops are being told that in Oct some horrendous thing is going to happen and they will be fighting the militias etc. and protecting the upper class neighborhoods. Its pretty bizarre.
Think about that statement for a moment........
They have huge blind spots.
Military service should be zero defence against a manslaughter charge.
I'm sure that the MP's would prefer to go and train 354 NP's (just not how to drive).
It’s far worse in STL because the shootings tend to be congregated in a relatively small part of North St. Louis. In Chicago, the shooting is far more wide-spread. Most of St. Louis is totally fine.
“When I was in the Army Reserves in the 80’s, we would roadmarch our wheeled vehicles to Ft Campbell of Ft Knox for our annual summer training. It was no biggie back then.”
Then came Waco.
I’m not a great fan of Beck, but he is selling a product and a lot of people are interested in buying that product. Why do you care how others spend their own $$$?
Now that would make sense.
So the question is merely where in the St Louis area they did the training...in a smaller community, with locals fully aware and even participating, it could be a real good thing.
Sorry, but no way is St. Louis worse than Chicago. No way. The reason it looks that way in the lying statistics is that “St. Louis” is the inner city, with a population of about 300,000. The entire metropolitan St. Louis area is close to 3 million. The population of the independent city of St. Louis is about half black and half white. When you hear things like St. Louis is the most dangerous city in the USA, that’s because, unlike most cities, it doesn’t absorb its more peaceful and safer suburbs, which helps other cities to dilute their stats. It would be like using the Boston “combat zone” to represent the entire city of Boston. Most of the crime is in the northern half of the city of St. Louis. There are some cities/suburbs within the St. Louis metro area that have far worse crime rates.
Most readers won’t know that the wealthy cities of Clayton and Ladue are NOT “St. Louis” (They have crime, but mostly of the non-violent type). They’re in another county altogether, confusingly called “St. Louis County.”
The city of St. Louis is NOT within St. Louis County. In any case, what I saw on the news is that these tanks or military vehicles are going to be driven on the highways around north St. Louis. There’s been zero in the newspaper about it. I read on a blog that the National Guard post in St. Louis is only now getting these vehicles and the guys from MD are coming in to train the guys in MO how to drive them.
The army has no business ‘training’ in American cities... or on city streets. It’s wrong in so many ways.
“The cops are being told that in Oct some horrendous thing is going to happen and they will be fighting the militias etc. and protecting the upper class neighborhoods. Its pretty bizarre.”
Food stamp and welfare assistance checks cease. Walmart better have contingency plans for a sudden decrease in revenue.
My bet: much less restrictive. See the NDAA.
Interesting.
I wonder if it's in October that the USSC will issue out a ruling holding ObamaCare to be a-ok. That would stir civil discontent.
(Though that's supposed to be ruled-on and released this week.)
Another fun one would be Fast And Furious; if it got out into the general public, with the full understanding of a) just how many government organizations had to be involved, and b) that it is nothing less than state sponsored terrorism. That too could have an effect.
More likely than either of those, I think, is the unveiling of "Surrender your Sovereignty" treaties, or perhaps the seizing of people's 401Ks.
Do you have anything in specific that these police/firemen were told/saying?
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