Posted on 09/04/2005 12:45:08 AM PDT by Anti-Bubba182
The National Guard was slow to move troops into New Orleans because it did not anticipate the collapse of the city's police force after Hurricane Katrina, the guard's commander said.
Lieutenant General Steven Blum said the New Orleans police force was left with only a third of its pre-storm 1,500-person strength.
Some police had families caught up in the disaster, others were unable to make it back to their precincts because of the flooding, and yet others left their posts after deciding the situation had grown too dangerous.
"The real issue, particularly in New Orleans, is that no one anticipated the disintegration or the erosion of the civilian police force in New Orleans," Blum told reporters here.
"Once that assessment was made ... then the requirement became obvious," he said. "And that's when we started flowing military police into the theater."
On Friday, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin angrily denounced the slow federal response as too little, too late, charging that promised troops had not arrived in time.
"Now get off your asses and let's do something and fix the biggest goddamn crisis in the history of this country," the mayor said in remarks aired on CNN.
Blum said that since Thursday some 7,000 National Guard and military police had moved into the city.
But he said any suggestion that the National Guard had not performed well or was late was a "low blow."
The initial priority of the Louisiana and Mississippi National Guard forces was disaster relief, not law enforcement, because they expected the police to handle that, he said.
"We were pulsing forces in in very degraded infrastructure -- airports had reduced capabilities ... in some cases we only had one road in because of lack of bridges, flooding, loss of infrastructure," he said.
"So we couldn't rush to failure on this thing and we had to take a more measured approach on this thing than any of us wanted," he said.
When it became apparent that disorder in New Orleans should be the most immediate priority, the National Guard waited until they had enough forces in hand to make an overwhelming show of force, he said.
On Friday, while President George W. Bush was touring the stricken city, 1,000 military police and National Guard stormed the convention center where street gangs mixed in with thousands of others awaiting rescue had created a volatile situation, Blum said.
"Had we gone in with a lesser force we may have been challenged, innocents may have been caught in a fight between the guard and military police and those who did not want to be processed or apprehended," he said.
Bush, under intense criticism for the slow federal response, on Saturday ordered an additional 7,000 active duty and reserve ground troops to reinforce the National Guard.
That would raise the level of US military forces committed to the relief effort -- active duty as well as national guard and reserves -- to more than 50,000 by the end of next week.
Blum said that on Saturday there were 27,000 national guard troops in Louisiana and Mississippi. That number will grow to about 40,000 within the next week, he said.
There were varying estimates of the number of active duty troops already in the area as part of the relief of operations before Bush's order.
Major General Joseph Inge, deputy commander of the US Northern Command, put the number of active duty forces already on the ground at nearly 5,000 while Blum estimated the active force at 7,000, including sailors aboard navy ships.
The additional troops ordered in from the active force include 2,500 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division, 2,700 from the 1st Cavalry Division and 2,000 from the 1st and 2nd Marine Expeditionary Forces.
BRAVO, well done, great post!
I've heard of "suicide by cop." I guess there is "suicide by mod?"
"Only the uneducated use the term, 'censor' "
I believe the above is called a "personal attack". It's also apparently against the "rules". Mustn't violate the rules. Otherwise you may be censored.
Just...wow.
Looks like it, doesn't it? :-)
Are you intending to argue that you have no clue who Stalin is?
Hint: If he didn't like you, he didn't let you leave.
In any case, the "censorship" you are referring to is proper formatting, not content. The Moderators have not complained about the subject matter of your post.
"Not only are you a whiny, arrogant ..."
OH NO!!! More personal attacks. So much rule breaking is going on here. Where the heck is the moderator(s)?!?
P.S.: The Hayes Code, instituted in 1934, was not gov't imposed censorship. It was censorship imposed by the film industry upon itself.
How on earth is asking members to post in a way that allows us to be organized, economical and user friendly Stalinist?
I thought it was called "good customer service."
You learn something new every day.
Add the state govt in that statement. You know, Howlin', more and more this debacle looks like a Dem black balling of Bush. New Orleans....local response near zero; state response....wait one....the governor is out to lunch. However when the cameras show up it's time to bash the administration.
I'm right here
watching
The only liability that normally stands up is differential services that violate civil rights (such as systematically protecting members of one race and not another).
If you have a guy with a gun to your head, and the police don't bother to come until hours later because they were behind in their paperwork, that is legally justifiable. The consequences of not showing up in a timely manner are political, not legal.
"The Hayes Code was not government censorship"
That was exactly my point. I guess that means we agree.
There is something just not right about this story. Something we're missing.
A collective group of people just cannot possibly be this stupid.
Thank you, I was googling it trying to find info.
I am not home, so am unable to look the exact particulars up and post them, but trust me, you don't know what you're talking about!
What.....no refutation on my post about the BLUE LAWS? :-)
Hey..........you are no "victim" and a statement of fact, isn't a "personal attack." You've been whining about your threads being pulled, the supposed "censorship" here, and how the rest of us are STALINISTS or worse, since you got here. Those are the facts.
Sir or Madam, if it will stop your complaining, I will cheerfully agree to anything you say.
Uh...that would be in case something breaks FCC obscenity rules which is an entity of the government which has the force of law behind it.
So if we decided to take a marker and write comments on your forehead, should you be expected to leave them there as part of our free speech? If you washed your face, would you consider yourself guilty of censorship?
Pleeeeease...
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