Genuine U.S. Military questionnaire: Would you obey an order to fire on U.S. citizens ?

For the sake of argument and discussion I can only see ONE way American troops could be turned on and expected to fire on American civilians. It would likely work, too ...for a short time.

If power/communication/internet dropped at once across the US from whatever. Natural, man-made or just flipping switches deliberately. Then, in an instant and with no warning or time to talk to anyone ahead, everyone's world of news becomes line of sight or 'someone told someone who told me'. There is radio, but that's largely been centralized and consolidated for control.

In that condition, troops wouldn't have any certain way to know what is right and what isn't. With some agitation in advance? Citizens in towns or small cities could also be worked up into enough of a problem to appear as dangerous on meeting as troops are told in a B.S. story they've become.

Instant conflict when mixed...and neither side would have meant that to happen but for being played with from above.

The problem is....the military would figure it out quickly enough and the rage would turn away from the average people with a terrible viciousness, IMHO.

reply to post by Krazysh0t


Maybe a few kids (30 and below)would do it.but they wouldn't last long.Tanks,nope homemade thermite.Planes ,nope bases would be hit.
Maybe YOU think like that but we cold war pukes PRESS THE ATTACK,we don't wait for supportAKA we are more aggressive...and we partied ,sue us.We fight about like football,we just can't run so well.
The modern troops are good but WAY too few and WAY under gunned compared to US gun owners.We haven't got therms but we will if you use them.

All it would take is one incident and we would have a new civil war.Once the loyalist troops are attrited who will fill their ranks? How would you get supplies when your log pack was jacked?
Our PSYOPS would be Viet Nam wet.
You may have served in the sand like me but you are not an authority on squat.

reply to post by tadaman


I think also people forget about sleepers and the fact that many a travesty has occurred with only one shooter much less what a guy locked in a bunker will do ,,pushing buttons on a drone or nuke control? If a drone can be piloted by an iPad do you really think the good soldier would be in that position ? Let's get real-- no one wants this , that's why we are here on ATS . If anything it would probably hold true that military persons would not do this,,, at this juncture . But what's to say what tomorrow holds. Let's keep up the fight to be good !

OK so here is some context to that questioner. In 1994 we were looking at Clintons push on gun control. We were also seeing a drawdown in military forces. That commander used a questioner to see what soldiers generally understood about government an constitutional rights probably during or before some long lecture and training session. How do I know? Because I was a E-2 at that time. Every unit was mandated on educating soldiers on the issue. On what was perceived to be lawful and what actually was lawful.

It sparked debate in my unit. Many young soldiers wound up getting a bit of education. Hell most of us owned guns ourselves and so did our family's. The questioner is being taken completely out of context. The assumptions on where it was leading to are completely wrong as well.

reply to post by Snarl


LOL. 85% might initially shoot or fire rounds at citizens,
but after citizens were firing back and inflicting fatal
causalities on their fellow soldiers, they would quickly change sides.

I bet less than 2% of current armed service persons would fire on American citizens.

reply to post by Krazysh0t


did you do anything to clean up the military while you were in or did you sit on the sidelines and watch bad stuff happen and not do anything about it.

if you sat and watched then I would consider the source for any of your comments as tainted and not realistic.

here is a poem that reflects my attitude about apathy:

Mourn not the dead that in the cool earth lie
Dust unto dust
The calm, sweet earth that mothers all who die
As all men must;
Mourn not your captive comrades who must dwell
Too strong to strive
Within each steel-bound coffin of a cell,
Buried alive;

But rather mourn the apathetic throng
The cowed and the meek
Who see the world's great anguish and its wrong
And dare not speak!



Ralph Chaplin, Mourn Not the Dead

put that in your pipe and smoke it
you whippersnapper

Three pages of argument about a website that offers nothing but hearsay as evidence. It's not even a very complicated or nice looking website. I could probably whip a website together in the same way and get it to say whatever I want, too. There is no copy of the survey in question. It's just all html and two pages. Most teenagers could make something better than that...

You're arguing over hearsay and poorly done hearsay at that and disrespecting the vets who are calling out b.s. on it. Think about that, please.

Regardless of what you think, there will be members of the military that will fire upon citizens. I don't know the percentages and honestly, I don't care but the fact remains they will.

As evidence, I provide several things.

First, the Oath of Enlisted Personnel

I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God."

So it's already legal and A-OK, if presented in the right context.

The Commissioned Officers Oath

I, _____, having been appointed an officer in the Army of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of _____ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservations or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God."

Again, it's legal as long as it is put in the right context.

Next, examples of military firing on or attacking US citizens. Just from the last 100 years and the list isn't comprehensive, it's just from the top of my head.

Colorado Mine strikes in 1914
The Bonus Army
Zoot suit Riots
Detroit Riots in the 60's
Kent State

Also, there are plenty of Federal Agencies that, although are not part of the military, are an extension of the Federal Government. They have shown the willingness as well in the past to fire on US citizens.

In my opinion, there will be plenty of active service and NG personnel that will NOT do it but there will be a portion, great or small, who knows until it happens, who will gladly follow the orders when given.

The strength of our military are the people of America who love them.
Lose that and you lose all, period and of course you said it yourself,you don't know.
Vets know more,we can stop it from working and I for one will or die trying.That's how we are wired.
We have seen what dictator's countries are like FIRST HAND,and we won't let that go down here.no way in hell.


"I'll go in with a pocket knife if I have to..." Gene Hackman "Uncommon Valor"

That's MY propaganda programming along with a healthly dose of heavy metal to make me crazy enough to try tricks that could be fatal.

reply to post by Krazysh0t

You are making some assumptions there pal.

As are you.

You have no idea what I did or didn't do or what I did and did not witness.

It doesn't matter. The context is clear. You witnessed unlawful orders being given and carried out and yet here you are complaining and making it quite obvious you did nothing about it.

Regardless of that, you and I both know that these people you are disgusted with exist in the military and just because you are aware of them doesn't mean that they will just disappear.

You mean malcontents who either sit on the sidelines and do nothing, preferring to complain, or those who are involved?

They are the swing votes when a handful of the soldiers in a squad obey the order to fire on civilians, they will be the ones to complete the herd mentality to bring it up to the oppressing levels that can get the full squad to participate.

Oh yes, the track record of spineless soldiers who do nothing to prevent criminal activity will suddenly change.

It's nice that you believe that you wouldn't fire on civilians, but then again you are posting anonymously on a conspiracy website. I may not have talked about it much in this thread, but I also have history on my side.

It's not a matter of belief. It's matter of right and wrong. It's a matter of having enough of a moral compass to draw a line in the sand. I hardly consider my posts anonymous. Anyone with enough time on their hands can find out who I am and it doesn't bother me. History is indeed replete with instances of military force used against the citizens of a home country. And while I certainly do believe that some would follow those orders, I have YET to meet someone in the army who would.

Let's analyze this from another perspective. You are a low ranking soldier with doubts about this order and are standing on a street in Anywhereville, U.S.A. staring at a bunch of people unwilling to hand over their firearms. Who are you going to voice your dissent to? Your line Sergent? Your platoon leader? These are the guys who gave you the order to begin with. What's going to prevent these same people from ordering the rest of the squad to just execute you for failure to obey? The only option you have left is to go A.W.O.L, good luck getting away before getting shot in the back.

That's not an analysis. That's conjecture at best.

Do you have any idea how many of us are private weapons owners?
The premise is ludicrous and hardly thought out.

Maybe a few low ranking soldiers will do the same, but they will either have to go A.W.O.L., get executed, or just get arrested. No one will remember them. Meanwhile, while this is going on, the officers with less scruples will just echo the order down the chain of command and those units will remain loyal.

Where do I get this idea from? A little thing called the Civil War. What is one of the first things people mention when describing the Civil War? Brother against brother. So to say that it won't happen here is idiocy, it has happened before, therefore it will happen again.

More conjecture. You can HARDLY draw a straight line from the mentality of what led to the Civil War, the society that existed then, to the one that exists now. Soldiers don't exist in a vacuum. It is obvious to boot. I have access to the same information you do, and while you seem to have this idea in your head that there are no individuals thinking in the military, I assure you, your continued assumptions, baseless conjecture, and out of context history lessons are wrong.

Regardless of my opinion, there is one thing I can say for sure.

If it came down to it, project, the dude that posted right above me, would be one of the good guys that would refuse. I've known him, and of him, since his time here at ATS. At one point, for those that don't know, he was a mod and I got to see him in a manner that most of you haven't. What his choices would be, I don't know but I do know, and can say with a high level of confidence, that he wouldn't be pulling the trigger on citizens if ordered.

Those who can't or won't do, often attempt to to characterize those who do beneath them,either because of ignorance or jealousy.
We tell you because WE know,Why would we back those who,through out our history ,have a long record of betrayal? Most of which we are only now finding out about because the administrations secrets are be leaked BY SOME OF US.
Progs talk a big game but they sure as hell can't play it,we have to when these morons screw up or they are directed to by sources unknown,or worse their own PARTIES.It isn't YOU on that line it's us.And anyone who is outside rendering ANY form of conjecture is a fiction writer.
We have stated without pause these pukes threaten us and America while YOU keep electing them.Now you think we have some "programmed" response to orders?
HA! Americans at war going by the book? Only if that is what it takes to win and we will win.Until a politician shows up and snatches defeat from the jaws of victory. We don't like them.I challenge you to find me a shooter who does.
And today more and more our anger is being expressed.In a civil war it won't be brother against brother this time because those who would support the bad guys will quickly run out of dirty tricks to survive when the only experts in the arena of combat out number them 1000 to 1.Sugical ops mostly will put them behind walls very shortly.Then it is a seige. If they go underground and nuke us then it would only show how bad judgement put them there.
When media,food,goods and shelter are forcefully removed from the equasion as the result of a large scale deliberate act ,it will be on.
What I would like to know is since those who can't do are also at stake will they feed and clothe us?
Will they give us medical support and intelligence in disputed zones?
What sacrifices will THEY have the guts to make to help us stop them?
We will no doubt be on our own...again.
If so don't bitch to us if we run things until they are fixed BY OUR STANDARDS.

We may find out soon enough.

reply to post by GAOTU789


If there is a rampaging large mob approaching, if they are armed and targeting anyone in a uniform, and randomly firing in the direction of a position held by law enforcment, and/or military... Those who say they would not return fire would have no choice.

Kill or be killed.

In urban areas there are a number of scenarios where it could happen this way. In fact, in a completely collapsed economy, with essentials running out, even if only temporarily, people will get violent and eventually could grow into large mobs, rioting looting and indiscriminately killing while discovering their strength in numbers.

You may say you would not, but you may find yourself on the wrong side of things with no choice.

Good luck.

And what does this law firm in India have to do with this document?
How did they get the document?
Did they make it up?

www.linkedin.com...

whois.domaintools.com...

This copy of the questionnaire is different.

April 14 2009

web.archive.org...://www.29palmssurvey.com/survey.html

reply to post by cavtrooper7


Acknowledged ,but that will never characterize the entire conflict.South central LA,Detroit,Chicago and places like that come to mind,involving such a scenario.
We don't back them nor defend them. I am talking about an overt attempt to subvert the US as a republic not a civil skirmish here.
Also we wouldn't want to fire on our own who are sill in uniform,we aren't indescriminate combatants you know.

I think the real question is.. if foreign troops are brought in to "help", would they have any issues with firing on American citizens?

Not at all.

As I recall, the percentiles re shooting U.S. Citizens was 80-20 against when the questionnaire was directed at traditional forces and an opposite 80-20 when directed at spec-force personnel.

As this is about 20 years old, the percentages may have altered somewhat, but, there isn't enough spec-forces to effect a significant, nation-wide result...Especially if negated/countered by regular troops.

I doubt the percentiles are much different in any nation.

Nationalism is a two-edged sword....

reply to post by TwiTcHomatic


What country would be inclined to try?
Not any western countries,they know better.China or Russia.No chance of winning without WMDs.
The rest of the world COMBINED couldn't do it conventionally.

reply to post by cavtrooper7


Inclined to try?


Let's not forget the countless reports of foreign troops being brought in to "train" with U.S. weapons and tactics.

I am not talking troops coming in unasked, but invited.