Technology can be a powerful tool, but it can be just as powerful a weakness

 

 

            The phone call came in just before midnight. 2^nd Lt. David Paul Franken had, while sitting in his comfortable home in Bainbridge, been keeping an eye on the news since the riots had started and was expecting they’d call the Guard out. He wasn’t happy about the callout but his family could use the extra money.

            His duffle had been waiting for the inevitable next to the garage door on the other side of the kitchen. Mona, his wife, had the coffeemaker going despite the thermos being filled; this wasn’t good.

           

            What did he forget?

           

            Glancing at the calendar he saw that tomorrow, no, strike that, today was circled.

           

            oh damn …. anniversary ….

 

Walking over to where she sat, at the same Formica surfaced table that he had once knelt on to propose to her, he wrapped his arms around her, kissing her head and telling her how sorry he was. She didn’t say anything, just holding on to his arm like it was the only way for her to keep from drowning. They remained like that for a time, silent.

 

Moments passed before she spoke, her voice low so that it wouldn’t wake their children, “Is this going to be like Iraq?”

           

            “No”

           

            “How can you be so certain? The radio stations are saying the riots aren’t like anything they’ve ever seen before.”

 

He shifts around so he can look her in the eyes, he’s shocked to see she’s been crying for a while, she must have been listening to the radio while he was getting ready. Wiping her tears away he says, “News reporters are nearly always saying that something is new, terrible or never before seen; they just don’t understand. Americans don’t usually riot for long, when they riot. A few canisters of CS, maybe some rubber bullets and they’ll decide there are better things to do.” He kisses her forehead as she holds tightly to him, “I don’t want you to go … something’s wrong. Something about this isn’t right …” Pushing her away slightly Lt. Franken looks at her, “Don’t worry baby, besides, I’ll be commanding that new riot control cannon, the LRAD and they won’t be able to get anywhere near me. Especially since the major had them mounted on a few of our Abrams tanks instead of the pickup trucks they’d been using.” The young lieutenant gives his wife one last, long kiss before grabbing his duffle and heading out to the car.

           

            As he’s loading his gear into the trunk he hears his wife, inside the kitchen of their three bedroom house, crying as if her heart were breaking. A chill runs down his spine but he can’t find any logical reason to pay heed to it.

           

            So he ignores it ….

 

He gets that same chill as he backs out of the garage and points his car towards the MP unit he belongs to, on East Washington Road, over in Chagrin Falls.

 

During the drive out Lt. Franken thinks about what he’d seen in the footage they’d released of the riots. His wife had been far more correct than she knew; there was a lot about these riots which didn’t make any sense. To begin with there weren’t any demands; no statement of what they were rioting for, or against. Then there was the reaction of the crowds to the measures that local enforcement had used, they’d had no reaction. It didn’t matter what was thrown at them, CS, pepper spray, water cannons, flash/bangs and even rubber bullets; the crowds kept surging forward against the police line. The other disturbing fact he saw, but something that the media seemed to be trying to keep under wraps, was that there were times when the rioters appeared to be attacking the police and sheriffs as soon as they could reach them. Whenever they came close to showing an attack happening, the cameras seemed to do a quick cut to some other action further down the line or even go to an interview with a police official or politician.

 

It wasn’t making much sense

 

But that wasn’t even the worst thing he’d noticed

 

The eyes of some of the rioters

 

He’d stopped the footage several times while he watched events unfolding on his computer, attempting to verify or deny what he thought he was seeing. Even after several hours of trying to get it nailed down with the forensic software he had on the computer he wasn’t certain enough to swear to what he thought he’d seen.

 

The eyes of some of the rioters seemed to be covered by severe cataracts.

 

On the off chance it could be footage that had been monkeyed with by some computer SFX wiz’ he’d checked the histogram of the video; it was clean. The video only had one layer, no special effects were indicated. 

 

If this was true, then how the hell were they able to see?

 

His mother, god rest her soul, had wound up with cataracts during the last years of her life. She’d been upbeat and jovial for the three years prior to that happening, despite the pain and the problems brought on by the cancer treatments. She’d never complained once or let anyone catch her in a depressed state, or even a bad mood, for nearly the complete first two years of her fight against her ‘dread enemy.’

Until the third year when she began to lose her sight

 

She’d been a painter, an artist, for her whole life. Sight and the interpretation of the things she’d seen were the touchstone of her existence. A master of the realism school of painting and a photographer, she was nearly the equal of Ansel Adams, or Thomas Kinkade. His mother had lived for the sights her eyes could bring to her; for her to record her interpretations of what her eyes brought to her and it was all for the simple passion of doing it. A creditable artist in both mediums she had made a respectable living by the doing of it, but the money was secondary.

 

The cataracts had made a bitter, sullen, recluse of her.

 

He’d learned a lot about cataracts as the result of his attempts to fight the disease for her.

 

There was no way that anyone could see well enough to riot with what appeared to be advanced stage cataracts on their eyes.

 

So how were they able to riot?

 

Many thoughts ran through his mind as he made the forty five minute drive to the armory. None of what he’d seen, none of what he knew, seemed to apply this night and it worried him. At the assembly area troops had already begun loading the armored vehicles onto the flatbeds for transport to the riot scene.

 

          They were a good bunch of men and you could see it wasn’t their first time for this sort of action. M-113’s with their M240/B SAW’s had already been loaded and were in the process of being chained down. The machine guns were strictly for effect; as long as the troops followed protocol there shouldn’t be any need for them. Supply vehicles and troop transports led the convoy; they’d be proceeding directly to the assembly area. Walking to the back of the line he found that his driver had lined up the Abrams to load and needed only one of the ground guides to finish the job.

SSgt. Williamson could probably have loaded and chained the vehicle in his sleep, he’d mustered out so many times. The man was well experienced with many tours in the Regular Army to his credit.

The Lieutenant tossed his duffle onto the side of the tank; climbing up easily. SSgt. Williamson waved to him lazily, continuing to smoke his cigarette as the younger man loaded and stowed his gear. Standing beside the turret the Lieutenant began his inspection of the LRAD. It nearly looked as though the unit had been meant to be there, the main gun had been removed and the LRAD mounted in its place, along with a remote surveillance camera. Not only could the operator see what was going on with the tank buttoned up, the commanders directing the action back in the Tactical Operations Center could share the same view.

 

          “Does the Screamer pass inspection, sir?”

 

          So the Sergeant already had a nickname for the boxy looking device, guess that made his acceptance of it official. The Lieutenant grins as he climbs into the Tank Commander’s hatch and begins running the diagnostic routines on the panel inside the hatch, “Well, it looks good so far …” he throws a few more switches and notes the computer’s response before powering everything back down again, “… but we won’t really know anything until we fire this baby up and let fly on those rioters.” The Sergeant chuckles, “Ain’t that the truth of it, L-T, ain’t that the truth of it …” The two men sit there, quietly enjoying each others’ company until the call comes down the line for the officers to report for their briefing. The Sergeant grins as the Lieutenant clambers down and says, “I wouldn’t be in so much of a hurry sir, they might think you’re a junior officer or something if you come running into the briefing …” and he begins laughing raucously. Lt. Franken thinks about it for a moment, then straightens his cap saying, “You know Sarge, I think you may have a point there …” and walks off. As soon as he clears the line he can hear the Abrams firing up its diesel and revving before it drops back down to idle, hmmmm, the ground guide and transport crew must have shown up.

           

          The briefing went pretty much the same as any other briefing for civil unrest except that the Colonel made particular mention that they weren’t to hesitate if it appeared the SAW’s were needed. After the briefing, all fifteen minutes of it, Lt. Franken approached the Colonel and attempted to let him know what he had thought he’d seen on the news reports. Before he’d even really begun to voice his concerns on the subject, the Colonel cut him off with a dismissive wave of his hand and a comment about the lieutenant letting the sight of “miscreants with special effects contacts” in a volatile situation get to him. Lt. Franken, rather than become argumentative about it, simply saluted the senior officer and proceeded out to the troop transport with the rest of the men.

           

           The L-T is so absorbed in his own thoughts and the tacit refusal of his commander to discuss the matter, that he doesn’t see the fear in his colonel’s eyes as he leaves the room.

           

          Contrary to depictions in the movies, the ride out to a trouble spot doesn’t necessarily consist of a lot of macho talk with the veterans telling the greenhorns all manner of nonsense. Among a few who are accustomed to working together you might get that; if they know one of the greenhorns he might get the business but it nearly always gets quieter as you get closer. Unnecessary chatter goes out the window nearly completely as you close on the assembly area. Every one is listening, every one strains to hear what he can above the roar of the diesel. Everyone, absolutely everyone, wants all the information they can get before they step off the truck and onto the firing line. What the movies show you is a lie, the machismo chatter, the rough jokes, are all things done in the comfort of a secured area. Predominant during an insertion is silence, because chatter can block out the cues you get from the surrounding area, chatter blocks out the cues you get from nature, herself.

 

Chatter … cuts you off from information you might need …

 

Information is life

 

A lack of information is death

 

No soldier, anywhere, wants to die

 

A soldier’s mission, according to General Patton, is to make the other dumb son of a bitch die for his cause …

So the men ride in silence

           

          A good part of the ride takes them down I-480 westbound; by the time they get off the interstate and start gearing down for the ride through town a large knot sits in the stomach of each and every one of the men. For the old hands this is a welcome feeling, they know as soon as they step off the truck they’ll be ready. The first timers, the ‘cruits, only know they aren’t real happy and some of them are wishing they hadn’t eaten before boarding the transports.

           

          The rally point is a construction supply place on Brookpark road. It’s the only area close to the scene of the action that’s large enough to handle the vehicles coming in. When they get there they can see their vehicles still on board the transports, waiting to be offloaded. What none of the men have anticipated is what they hear on arrival.

 

Near silence greets them

 

There is none of the usual noise you’d hear at a riot. Instead, off in the distance, they can hear occasional shouts, shots being fired and sometimes even screams. Other than that there is a strange, low pitched moaning and a weird sort of rubbing sound. Nearly what you might expect from thousands of children sliding their feet across pavement in an effort to produce noise. As they prepared their weapons, their riot gear and unloaded their vehicles the men looked at each other uneasily. The officers and non-comm’s circulated among them. Answering questions, making jokes; doing anything they can think of to keep their men’s nerves under control.

 

The problem is that all the little cues saying that this isn’t a normal crowd control operation have come to dominate the minds of all involved and none of them yet believe what they were told about this situation.

           

          Not the officers, not the sergeants; not even the lowest private among them were so unwise as to still believe what they’d been told at their briefing.

           

          Privately, many of them wonder if they’ve finally, actually, inserted their most personal male parts into the meat grinder, as has been so often joked, and pushed the ‘on’ switch.

 

After the last vehicle has been unloaded and all the vehicles are staged, their captain sounds twice on his whistle, summoning the men to gather around him. The non-comm’s float through the area sweeping the stragglers in to where he waits; even the Captain, despite his well known mania for timeliness, was unwilling to hurry on to this assignment. As soon as the men are gathered around him, the captain begins …

“Listen up … as you all know, we’ve got a bunch of rioters who think they’re a bunch of badasses, using special effects makeup, high tech protective gear and a lot of other bullshit to bluff the local cops into thinking they’re fighting some sort of Saturday night movie monsters …” he pauses for a moment, “… but what they aren’t expecting, what they can’t possibly know, is that we’re an even bigger, badder, more effective bunch of monsters, AM I RIGHT?” the men around him give up a rousing cheer, “… The scene of the action, ladies, is about a mile …. about one and a half klicks for you veterans … up the road from here … we will roll in, we will take control of the situation and we will dominate the rioters until they’re all cuffed, stuffed and loaded, IS THAT CLEAR?” The men cheer once more, the Captain’s words are infectious, reassuring, the kind of talk they’re accustomed to hearing before moving in to take over from local law enforcement. He has a record of wins that would be the envy of any police chief and his bravado gives them the feeling that he’s right, that this is just another bunch of punks trying to run a con on them. He holds his hands up and they fall silent once again, “OK, the line of skirmish here is a bit long but it’s not undoable as long as we use the locals to support our line, try to get one or two in between each of you as we move in to reinforce them. M113’s will act as anchors on either end of the line and the Abrams, with their bright and shiny new toys will be on station every one thousand feet, or so. Our line will be a mile long, give or take but we’re going to force them back and into a bottleneck as soon as we’re positioned …” he looks at Lt. Franken, “… Lieutenant, your LRAD’s will sweep down the line before the main group, you’re going to soften them up for us because as you move to take your positions, your LRAD’s will sweep the line with their cannons …” he looks the lieutenant straight in the eye, “… I want the highest safe setting you’ve got … get your beams on them ASAP and keep them cooking while we give the boys in blue a break from the shit they’ve had to put up with ….” The Captain surveys the men gathered around him before looking back at the Lieutenant, “Let’s mount up and move out, LRAD’s on point and let’s see those rioters cooked!” Moving at a fast trot the young officer and his men mounted up on their spanking new riot control vehicles, preparing to give relief to the beleaguered police officers trying to restrain the crowds surging against their lines.

           

          The modified Abrams tanks, now with the nomenclature Riot Control Vehicle or RCV, which were being deployed were prototype vehicles. They were first of their kind; being a radical departure from the M113 APC’s or MWRAPS formerly used by the MP’s for crowd control. Abrams tanks were chosen solely for the purpose of utilizing their bulk to counter-balance the barriers mounted to the front of the vehicles and to provide a stable platform for the massive three hundred fifty pound sound units mounted on the turrets. Slightly beneath the twin speaker arrays of the LRAD’s was a camera unit. The cameras were acoustically isolated from the LRAD by means of what the movie industry once called a ‘blimp’. The men crewing the riot control vehicles took one look at the camera unit mounted below the speakers and came up with a far more prosaic name for the assemblage.

 

One which we need not dwell on ….

 

The cameras, as previously mentioned, allowed both the tank commander and the officers at the Tactical Operations Center (TOC) to see the effects of the cannon on the rioters in addition to providing a second set of ‘eyes’ to whatever takes place at an incident.

Riot barriers mounted to the front of the tanks were meant to work with the standard K-rails being used for many purposes by cities and corporations everywhere. To look at one from the front you wouldn’t see much difference between the barrier and the average K-rail except that the K-rail is constructed from concrete and the barrier itself is crafted from a titanium/steel alloy. There are the usual methods for connecting the barrier to two K-rails, but they’re left with a two inch gap on either side of the barrier to allow for the barrier to be disconnected by simply raising it with the bulldozer style hydraulics.

Last but far from being the least of the modifications, was what the engineers did to the turret to assist with crowd control. The turret’s drive was equipped with a motion control box very similar to what they used on CNC metal working machines. The tank commander had the capability to automatically sweep a crowd with the LRAD if he should decide it was needed. Once the program was set in motion it would continue until either the commander interrupted the cycle or the Abrams’ power system quit.

The only other riot control equipment on board was the usual CS dispersal unit. The engineers had considered it an archaic response, so great was their faith in the vehicle they’d created but they’d included the device due to the insistence of the advisers from the military police companies whom they’d hoped would purchase the units. The engineers had conceded only after they were threatened with having the contracts withdrawn.    

           

          These technological behemoths were the hope of the governor who’d dispatched them to the riot to get order restored before the morning rush hour began. Things had not been going well for the police at the scene. Between the reports of what the officers saw, the raw video footage which was not ever going to be seen by any civilian and the reports beginning to drift in from the hospitals; the governor was rightfully concerned that even these marvels of riot control technology might not be enough.

 

They were, however, the best hope anyone had at the moment.