You hear it on all the History Channel’s shows about Area 51 and everyone knows it’s ‘common knowledge’. I was looking at a documentary on Netlix (yeah, I know…) that claims:
What would happen if a guard really did shoot someone? Has it ever happened?
Guards at any military base are authorized to shoot to kill any intruder who refuses to stop. That’s why they carry guns, duh.
The normal procedure is usually some variation of the following:
“Stop!”
“Stop!”
“Stop or I’ll shoot!”
Fire warning shot.
Fire at the intruder’s legs.
Guards can only shoot to kill if their or someone else’s life is in immediate danger.
Cite? As I recall from my mishmar ezrahi training (:o) that is the Israeli police procedure if you are in danger - actually, loading the gun was somewhere in there too. I doubt American military police are as restricted.
Yep. That’s why they have these big ass signs hanging on the fences or gates that say in big red letters, “use of deadly force authorized”. I’m sure they’d try to restrain you first, but as soon as it became apparent that the only way to stop an intruder was to shoot them. They’d shoot them.
Not all areas of a base have those signs, however. Only the most sensitive ones. I don’t imagine they’d be authorized to shoot you for being caught on the golf course.
Hereis a picture of the sign.
Well, my response was based on Israeli military procedure. I’m just assuming that U.S. troops behave in a similar manner.
(Guards always have their magazines loaded; a round is chambered for the warning shot, or if the soldier feels threatened).
I would imagine that they have the authority to do so, but that they - in practice - don’t engage in that.
It seems the more likely course of action would be to detain the intruder.
In the United States, if national security is an issue - for example, preventing unauthorized access to state secrets or nuclear material - I don’t believe the military security personnel are required wait until someone’s life is in immediate danger before applying deadly force.
Area 51 has all kinds of highly classified activities going on, one of the most famous being the program that produced the F-117 stealth fighter. According to the Wikipedia article, “Deadly force is authorized if violators who attempt to breach the secured area fail to heed warnings to halt,” although there have reportedly been no such incidents.
Sure, that makes sense - but what if the intruder refuses to comply, and is getting close to a point where he can take photos of top secret prototypes, and possibly transmit them to someone else waiting outside the secured area?
Just curious, but has this ever been put to the test? Has anyone ever been shot trying to enter Area -----CARRIER LOST----
Note that part of the definition I gave for “non-deadly” force also included shooting at the intruder’s legs - which can often have fatal results.
It’s all a distraction engineered by them. The real action is in Area 52.
Okay, a little known fact.
When I was younger and my father was an active duty Marine, we’d often take a shortcut from Oceanside to Fallbrook through Camp Pendleton via what was referred to as the “ammo depot” road. There was a gate, where the guard stamped a card that you delivered to the guard at the other end of the “shortcut.” The second guard looked at the time you spent driving through the depot and determined whether you had spend more time than necessary in the depot.
Years later I was told, via rumor, that those bunkers, some of which you could see from the road, actually had nuclear weapons in them. Of course, the government is really sensitive about where the nukes are kept so I doubt anyone who knew for sure ever talked. A few years later, I read a book about a guy who went through sniper training at CP. As part of their duty, they were assigned to a sniper hide overlooking certain areas of that depot, with their sniper rifles and ammunition. When I added the strict “time in transit” requirements, to the rumors of nuke weapons being there, plus the snipers in sniper hides guarding the area, I came to my own conclusion about the contents of that area as well as the possibility of deadly force being used.
I’m sure, there are areas that the government would use deadly force to prevent individuals from trespassing . A nuclear weapon storage facility would probably be one.
This is exactly how we (at least my platoon) were taught to act as guards in the Swedish military.
Any action which entails a high likelihood of fatality or serious bodily harm is considered “deadly force” where rules of engagement are concerned. Shooting at a suspect’s legs would be considered deadly force. Similarly, the PIT maneuver used by police to terminate car chases is considered “deadly force” because of the high likelihood of a crash that may seriously injure the occupants of the suspect vehicle; consistent with police rules of engagement, the PIT is typically only authorized in situations where the car chase is deemed to be endangering the public.
In the United States I believe civilian police are trained to only fire their guns so as to kill; I don’t believe their rules of engagement allow for warning shots or for shooting to injure (e.g. shooting at the legs). Along those lines, I would be very surprised if the rules of engagement for military security personnel allowed them to use their guns in any way other than shooting to kill.
I’m pretty sure that the most important sites have multiple circles of defense. The patrols in the outer circumfrance are ordered to avoid lethal force, while the guards in the innermost areas are allowed to shoot to kill anyone who manages to get past the barb wire, minefields, and dogs that shoot bees from their mouths.
I guess this line of thinking is what got me to wondering. At a base it seems like there would be no shortage of men to physically restrain an intruder long before they got close enough to snap a few pics. Shooting seems like overkill. For example, it seems that if someone was trying to take pics of a prototype there would be a desire to question them to see who they were working for rather than just offing them.
Not in the Navy, and I’d presume not in the rest of DoD. We are taught if you discharge your weapon, you are shooting to kill. No warnings, no leg shots.
Keep in mind, handguns aren’t all that accurate, Hollywood notwithstanding. And in the heat of the moment, it’s even harder.
Agreed. Whenever we were on guard duty, there never was any talk of “warning shots” or “shoot to wound”. I see the poster above me beat me to the punch (I was in the Marines).
I periodically work at each of the 8 sites associated with the Nuclear Weapons Complex across the country. At these, the highest security by far is surrounding the storage of weapons, weapon components, or special nuclear material. While actual procedures are classified and I don’t know them, the understanding is that in the most restricted of these areas, the security detail is instructed to prevent unauthorized access through whatever means possible. Generally, this is understood to mean shoot first, then shoot again, then pick up the bodies, and if time permits, go ahead and ask some questions. However, as noted above, to even get close to these areas, you have to pass through multiple areas of increasingly higher security.
Glenn Campbell’s (not the singer) diary/blog The Groom Lake Desert Rat talks about his Area 51 viewing trips, encounters with security, and the goings on in the town of Rachel, NV. He ended up running afoul of the government security contractors as well as the local residents. Interesting reading.