from the martial-law-play-set-age-79-and-up dept
Trump continues to wield everything he controls like a weapon against his enemies, even when the law says he can’t. Trump sent thousands of National Guard troops (and a couple hundred Marines) to Los Angeles to quell nonexistent riots and otherwise get in the way of local law enforcement.
Of course, it was nothing but a show of force: a petty president doing things to his perceived enemies just because he could. This was met with a lawsuit filed by the state of California, but even having that deployment declared illegal by a federal judge hasn’t made Trump any more hesitant to do the same thing to other places he feels have too many Democratic politicians.
This hasn’t exactly made him popular with the troops. National Guard troops sent to Los Angeles found themselves without beds, much less the guarantee of a steady paycheck, before being asked to do a bunch of regular cop stuff, like hassle randos on the street and/or hang out on the perimeter as federal agents raided marijuana grow operations.
The troops made their displeasure known in the creative way only military members can: they raised objections with their superiors, they sought behavioral health counseling, and… they defecated in Humvees.
You’d think some lessons would be learned from the administration’s failed “War on Los Angeles.” But, of course, this administration expends a lot of effort remaining deliberately ignorant. So, we’re seeing a second act play out which, unfortunately, is somehow even worse than the invasion of LA.
Leveraging the (alleged) attempted carjacking of a former DOGE staffer known as “Big Balls,” Trump claimed Washington DC could no longer capably handle violent crime. Using this one-off mugging of a rich white kid, Trump sent the National Guard to DC — along with tons of federal officers — to turn this alleged criminal war zone into a place where people could safely… I don’t know… gut every single federal agency Trump doesn’t like.
The response from troops now patrolling DC streets is more of the same: we didn’t sign up for this. Those unfortunate enough to get shoved into DC to satisfy Trump’s fantasies are now getting owned by their own. Here’s Schuyler Mitchell, reporting for Mother Jones:
Last week, the soldiers deployed to fight a “crime emergency” instead found themselves completing “beautification” duties on Capitol Hill and patrolling Krispy Kremes. Users on the r/NationalGuard subreddit were quick to give their colleagues a new nickname: National Guardeners.
There’s your first morale hit: people are openly mocking you for being assigned to duties you never wanted, much less asked for. And while there may be considerable overlap with people now claiming they didn’t vote for this, National Guard troops can’t do much about the situation they’re in. Sure, they could just walk off the job, but “you can’t fire me, I quit” tends to be greeted with a court martial and a bit of a cooling off period in the nearest military prison.
Plus, part of the whole military thing is the expectation that you serve the Commander-in-Chief as well as the nation that employs you. Guess which entity has the most power.
The National Guard, as a whole, is pretty much incapable of doing anything but complaining about this. Sure, we might want to see an organized rebellion (or at least a mass walk-out), but people who spend more time tossing sandbags than tossing grenades are in for a hell of a fight if Trump decides it’s time to send in the Marines to tamp down the morale issues bubbling to the surface that his actions have generated.
That’s the worst case scenario. The best case scenario is this: the National Guard is going to continue to bleed experience and talent and won’t even be able to sucker in the requisite number of people capable of fogging a mirror to offset the attrition.
Alex, a National Guard recruiter from one of the states that sent troops to DC who requested anonymity to speak freely, told Mother Jones that the DC mission has deterred potential recruits and pushed already-disillusioned soldiers to their breaking points.
On top of all of this, it’s going to start fucking some troops out of their retirement pay:
[S]hortly after the DC deployment, Alex said, they received instructions not to drill for the rest of the fiscal year (which ends September 30).
“It generally gets like this at the end of the fiscal year, money’s always tight, but not to the point where I’m not able to drill,” Alex said. Without additional drills, some will not be able to log a “good year” toward retirement. Alex put it succinctly: “I’m missing work for the army because the state ran out of money because they decided to send military police to DC.”
And it’s not just Trump who thinks National Guard troops (and other military members) are just handy chess pieces he can use in his “own the libs” games of 4-D checkers. There are plenty of Republican politicians willing to be both the jackboot and bootlicker, like [massive sigh] the current governor of South Dakota, Larry Rhoden:
Governor Larry Rhoden is mobilizing SD National Guardsmen at President Donald Trump’s request.
According to a press release, Rhoden is mobilizing 12 guardsmen from the 129th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment based in Rapid City. The group will “support operations in Washington D.C.,” the news release said.
Know this: Trump didn’t directly ask Rhoden to send in some troops. He merely sent a blanket request for assistance to every Republican governor and correctly assumed a lot of them would bend over backwards to oblige him.
This is keeping with the state tradition of sending the National Guard anywhere but where it’s truly needed, one started by current DHS head Kristi Noem during her tenure as governor. She sent a bunch of South Dakota National Guard troops to the Texas border during her term, while refusing to send the National Guard to help her own constituents when they were being flooded out of their homes.
None of this is about crime. None of this is about safety. It’s just a president thugging out and dragging people who can’t say no without suffering severe consequences along for the ride. And he’s surrounded by power politicians willing to turn people who gave up at least a part of their life in service to their country to serve as nothing more than spank bank material for Trump’s masturbatorial martial law fantasies.
Filed Under: los angeles, martial law, national guard, police state, trump administration, washington dc
