Gun control on military bases. What was it like before 1992?

Factual Questions
41

Absolutely. You think we were guarding them against terrorism or the Russians?

I was in a unit in Germany that was standing down. We had to fix all our trucks to turn them over to another unit. No one could leave the unit and go back to their real job until it was done. We had trouble getting spare parts in a timely manner. The Air Force weather detachment had a separate motor pool with beautifully vehicles. Allegedly there were so many midnight requisitions that they had to put a 24 guard on it.

As I said above, how we were armed varied greatly depending on the mission. If you were guarding an ammo bunker you most likely would have weapon and ammo somewhere close by or on you.

You have encapsulated all the joys of command.
Joe is the generic name for your typical private.

42

That doesn’t say much for the brave men and women who defend our country. Or at least the ones who defend our motor pools.

43

It says that some of them are stupid. Some are young and immature. Some just make an occasional mistake when the stakes are high. Just like the population they are drawn from. Raising your right hand does not make you an infallible superhero.

There is a reason why so much time is taken up with safety briefs, unit punishments for violating what was put out in the safety brief, risk management worksheets, death by PowerPoint etc.

Here is a post from the military satire site Duffelblog. Everyone I know who has had command loves this post. It probably doesn’t translate into civilian.

44

Bawahahahaha, absolutely perfectly said. :smiley:

Had a Company Commander once that made a similar speech at formation almost every Friday but more of a lead in to what he would do to us individually & company wide if any of this type of stupidity happened to mess with his weekend.

Early on, there was this one fool that did not believe him.

Between the company wide punishment and his personal added punishment we read to him out of the book. <VEG>

That CO is in the top 3 of all the good ones and good times I had during my active duty years.

45

A relative anectdote about motor-pool/storage area guard duty: I was at Ft Sill approx ~85-'88. Only certain persons/duties were allowed to have weapons at any time anywhere on base. MP’s being one of them, of course. I think it was OK to have personal firearm on-base but stored and registered/locked-up at home as there was elk hunting allowed on certain portions of the Fort at that time. No idea of now, though.

However, during my Basic Training, my Battery Unit was assigned to guard one of the Big Guns storage-area (dozens of the howitzers, etc) a few blocks away from barracks during non-business hours (2 hours on then 4 hours off for each platoon consecutively). The first round of duty my platoon went through, before I came ‘on-shift’, had the M-16’s issued with 5 live-rounds (IIRC) from platoon’s armory. Well, on my platoon’s very first ‘patrol’ of the fenceline, which was thick woods in one area, had one dumbass trainee spot a rattlesnake and he opened fire on it (and missed every shot). That, immediately, was the last of us/others having real weapons issued other than when at gun-range or such. Instead, we had to carry the ‘rubber-ducky lookalike’ rifles during the guard duty. Shoulda seen the look from the Drill who was overseeing the group in the ‘common area’ while we all watched Rambo-like movies or slept when we could over a 24-hour period. Quite an “WTF/Oh Shit” look!

The snake was less than a foot long (pygmy rattler, IIRC), but stupidity galore from the soldier, for sure. I can understand why not having everyone armed is a good choice.

46

Mo rickity scratch = PDQ = So fast you would not believe it, etc…

I have no idea where I first head it, been saying it since maybe 1950. Used by many in the flyover areas I have been in until maybe 1985?

Most male contemporaries seem to know it even if it is not used much anymore. :cool:

47

Translates pretty well, actually. :smiley: I just don’t think it would go over quite so well if a civilian said it.

48

It’s always something: 1995 San Diego tank rampage - Wikipedia

49

I was in the USAF in 1982 and guns were strictly controlled then. As an MP, I carried ONLY when on duty and the weapons were stored in the armory all other times. Personal weapons, same thing, but I don’t know if that applied to all base housing or just dorms.

This idea that everyone in the military runs around with weapons all the time outside of a combat zone is simply not so and I doubt that it ever was so in the modern military.

50

Thanks :cool:

51

You can have a unit of 100+ people, and it only takes one knucklehead to make life miserable for everyone.

One DUI; one lost/misplaced gas mask; one lost/misplaced set of night vision goggles; one negligent discharge that, hopefully, doesn’t hurt or kill anyone; etc. And that’s only counting the militarily duty-related ways he can screw up.

99% of the rest of your unit can be top performers (or even just average-but-reliable performers), but you’ll never hear the end of it from “Higher” because of that one knucklehead.

I can’t tell you how many weekends I (and the rest of our unit) had to give up doing “G.I. Parties” in the barracks, or endlessly sweeping the Motor Pool, etc., because the Commander had a hair across his ass over that one knucklehead in our Company who went out and got a DUI, or got into a bar fight and was sitting in the local pokey, or, :gasp: simply wrote a bad check.

:smack:

52

Not your responsibility, of course, but I suppose something similar might have been said at Pearl Harbor, Marine Barricks Beirut and FOB Chapman.

53

Well, two of those were/are in quasi-war zones, and there were credible threats to Pearl Harbor, just not immediate ones.

54

Past is instructional, future should be modeled on the past with likely future events increasing in frequency and complexity.

Governments are notoriously inept at this.

Punish 100 for the one jerk is a military, herd sport, etc. much practiced event.

It would work fine if the 99 were allowed to read & physically act to cure the one of his jerkness. This is not allowed and the problem remains and total unit performance goes down & down & down.

How does this improve unit condition when the jerk is protected by those punishing the whole unit.

Jerks are not bothered by punishment for the most part.

One solution is illegal re-education by a few of the unit on the jerk. This was done in the past and the blind eye was turned unless death was involved. Now, not so much …

IMO, sometimes the old ways had better outcomes in the long run. ( no, I do not believe in the sanctity of human life no matter the cost )

55

Of course. And in each case, the guards (define them as you will in each example) were not ready for the sudden attacks which were made upon them. All the more reason for them - and those “guarding a motor pool in Kansas” - to be armed and prepared for an immediate response.

56

Back at my EOD Flight, we had a safe with six M9 pistols, a couple of M4s, and a basic load of ammo for each platform. This was for our over-the-road transportation of explosives out to the major Range (for self defense in the case of theft). Everyone knew the combination, and anyone carrying a weapon was required to fill out the sign out sheet on who ya were, where ya were going, and a contact number. I trusted my techs, and we never had an incident. They were government weapons, and the only thing preventing someone nefarious from pulling shenanigans was integrity, and the threat of my wrath backed up with the UCMJ.

That being said, guys and gals would routinely bring in their POFs to the shop for cleaning after a weekend shoot or whatnot. I absolutely allowed it in the shop; we had the rags, and hand tools. So long as the weapon was unloaded and properly cleared (again, I trust my EOD techs), have at it! The gate guards rarely, if ever, asked or searched. On occasion, on a Friday, someone would bring in a pistol or rifle that they’d just bought and would want to tweak or fix up. Again, we were all adults, and ammo and guns ne’er should mix in the shop.

The one time a civilian Firefighter (our sister Flight) got pulled over, and a search of his vehicle by Security Forces found a loaded, concealed weapon in his car. He was a licensed CCW permit holder, and claimed that he had forgotten it was in the car*. He got pinched by Security Forces, and had to go stand tall in front of the Federal Magistrate in downtown SLC for the misdemeanor charge. The installation commander can set rules & regulations which the military have to follow as orders, but it gets murky with civilians (Military Officers cannot order civilians to do anything). That’s where the Magistrate came in, 'cause Federal Courts can hold civilians accountable.

Long story short, the Firefighter got slapped with a $250 fine, and 30 days probation.

*How one loses track of their POFs is a far, far more serious issue to me than having one safely stored and concealed on a military installation. POF: Personally Owned Firearm.

Tripler
Want my C-4? Go ahead and steal it. You’ll have multiple-letter-acronym agencies all over your ass in 15 minutes.