reply to post by ABNARTY
Perhaps I was mentally defining "successful" too narrowly, you have good points.
I was thinking tactically while laying this out, and from a tactical point of view, success is defined as reaching the point you are heading for as a
coherent whole despite any attempts to prevent it.
From a strategic point of view, once there, the goal would be to shut down access to the area until your demands are addressed in an acceptable
manner. Stopping normal commerce can be quite effective. That means once you're there, wherever
there might be, you have to stay for as long
as necessary to achieve your goals.
For instance, what if a few thousand ( or tens of thousands) folks flooded New York's financial district and prevented the financiers from either
coming or going? Of course, that means sacrifice, hunger, and discomfort, but with sufficient logistical planning, that can be ameliorated to a small
extent. Water, portapotties, and food, in that order of priority, are required to sustain the position. also a method to reinforce and resupply the
original group.
Strategically speaking, you have to select a
there that is crucial to the functioning of a particular industry, governmental organ, or city. It
all depends on what the problem is in the first place what you target. but once selected, it must be attained and
held long enough to cause
severe discomfort to the target. That means from a strategic point of view you actually need two masses, the first to take, and the second to
resupply, the second would be pretty much the same as the first, but each member of the second would be carrying backpacks filled with the necessary
supplies.
If the correct target is selected, TPTB will either cave or overreact, either of which outcomes is acceptable (again strategically speaking). If they
cave, you're done with the beginning of the process and can move on to the next step.
If they overreact and send in the tanks, then public opinion can be swayed against them (costly in lives and injuries, perhaps, but no-win for them).
If the protest group stands strong and simply parts and allows the first few tanks through, then closes behind them to prevent any ground support
(infantry, foot police) to support the vehicles, the tankers will get extremely nervous about being isolated, and more amenable to discussion, if that
discussion is non-threatening. Tanks or other vehicles surrounded by a mass of people are far more vulnerable than you might think: every
air-breathing engine requires an intake and an exhaust, plugging either will kill the engine. A tank with a dead engine is pretty much a dead duck. If
the crew chooses to fire, they would be swarmed. In that scenario, spray paint would be an extremely effective weapon against tanks: spray the
viewports and it is not only stalled but blind as well. As any tanker you might know and ask how they'd feel stuck in a crowd blinded and stalled.
This tactic supposes a reluctance on the tankers' part to kill, a fairly safe bet when you're dealing with the military most times. Police would be
different, they are far more trigger-happy and willing to kill citizens, and would have to be handled more ruthlessly if they showed any aggression.
So I guess an anti-tank team would consist of about 5 or 6 people equipped with rags, quickset industrial glue, spray paint, and heavy-duty cojones.
The rags and glue would be stuffed into any openings, and the glue poured over every hatch, and the spray paint on every porthole. Against wheeled
vehicles you'd need caltrops in addition to the other gear; although most police vehicles are equipped with run-flat tires, the caltrops might
disable a few, and are easily hidden. Hmmmm, just thinking out loud here.... a strong lever crew would be handy, too: you'd need something that was
strong, quickly assemble...perhaps pipe sections connected by inserting smaller pipes into bigger ones to hold them together, and something to act as
a fulcrum, acouple of those long enough would enable a crowd to flip wheeled vehicles on their sides, or high enough to jam blocks under the chassis
and keep the wheels off the ground.