Mattis, Esper oppose use of active duty military to fight unrest. Why?
While the president has the authority to call in active duty forces to quell riots – though not peaceful protests – top United States military officials widely agree that it’s a prospect they don’t relish.
Former Defense Secretary James Mattis, a retired four-star general, explained why this week. Militarizing the U.S. response to demonstrations “sets up a conflict – a false conflict – between the military and civilian society.”
In an effort to avoid this, military leaders tend to cringe at any hint of martial swagger when used with respect to Americans on U.S. soil. “America is not a battleground. Our fellow citizens are not the enemy,” retired Gen. Martin Dempsey, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, tweeted.
On the heels of these censures, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper this week broke with President Donald Trump and acknowledged that his call for troops to “dominate the battlespace” was perhaps a poor choice of words. Active duty forces should not be sent to control unrest in American cities, he said, except as a “last resort” in a “dire situation.”
Some elected officials doubled down on President Trump’s Monday
Little Rock desegregation“Break out the military”
