Brigade Combat Team From Iraq Said to be First Active 'Dedicated' Assignment by U.S. Unit to Northern Command
'May be Called Upon to Help With Civil Unrest, Crowd Control' Beginning in October, According to Military Paper...
By Brad Friedman on 9/24/2008, 12:38pm PT  

From Democracy Now!...

Beginning in October, the Army plans to station an active unit inside the United States for the first time to serve as an on-call federal response in times of emergency. The 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team has spent thirty-five of the last sixty months in Iraq, but now the unit is training for domestic operations. The unit will soon be under the day-to-day control of US Army North, the Army service component of Northern Command. The Army Times reports this new mission marks the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment to Northern Command. The paper says the Army unit may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control. The soldiers are learning to use so-called nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals and crowds.

The report from Army Times is certainly troubling, given the timing and the Constitution-hating evil-doers still allowed by Congress to continue holding the reins of our military. Back in 2005, an AP report headlined: "Bush: Boost military role in domestic emergencies" discussed the Constitutional issues that would block such domestic deployments of the U.S. military. Guess they got that all worked out? Or Bush just decided that following (and defending) the Constitution is a bit too quaint for him at this point in his failed "Presidency".

The brigade, according to the report, will be "known for the next year as...Consequence Management Response Force." Rest easy, kids!

(Hat-tip BRAD BLOG commenter "KestrelBrighteyes".)

UPDATE: Glenn Greenwald has more on this and its legal provenance. Hat-tip Melissa at Shakesville.

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