GIVEN THE ease and speed of modern communication, it is pretty much inevitable that a story will not only be reported on, but will quickly be broadcast into living rooms, offices, and anywhere else with internet or TV access. Moreover, given the apparent unfriendliness, or at least critical nature of the modern news media to anything involving police, the military or the government in general, it is all the more likely that an "incident" involving one of these groups will soon take center stage. As a result, police and military officials are constantly aware of how quickly their actions and faces can make it to the front page, just for doing their jobs. This, when combined with unclear policies from superiors, significantly hampers their ability to do their jobs and safeguard this country.
Take, for instance, two seemingly unrelated recent events: The first involves an incident over the weekend when "approximately 300 protesters were allowed to take the [Capitol] steps and began to spray paint" various symbols and epithets, according to The Hill. The second incident involves the ongoing investigation into the withdrawal of Arizona National Guardsmen upon meeting an armed illegal immigrant group while patrolling the U.S.-Mexico border. In both of these incidents, U.S. officials were denied the ability to act and to do their jobs by the protocols and rules currently in place.
According to anonymous sources quoted in The Hill newspaper, when "protesters [who] were seeking confrontation with the police" approached the Capitol building steps last weekend, police officers, who had formed a line in front of the building were simply ordered to fall back. Even when these protestors began to spray paint the Capitol,police "had to stand by and watch."
This incident poses an ethical dilemma, because while First Amendment rights must be protected, we must also protect our national treasures -- most especially the Capitol, which is the symbol of our country. One of the anonymous sources quoted by The Hill was right in saying "it was disgusting" that protestors were allowed to do this, and the incident shows how radical and ridiculous the anti-war movement can be. More deeply, however, this story tells of a failure to act by the Capitol police leadership, and in citing First Amendment reasons for not moving in, Capitol Police Chief Philip Morse is merely seeking a way out. The bottom line is that it was his job to protect the Capitol building, not to decide on the legal limits of free speech. In choosing not to act rather than risk being wrong, Morse failed this country.
The second example, involving the Arizona National Guardsmen on January 3rd, is similar to the Capitol Hill incident. According to Fox News, a unit of Guardsmen was forced to pull back from its patrol near the U.S.-Mexico border after "12 [armed] men assaulted the Guard position." The Guardsmen then contacted the Border Patrol, who tried unsuccessfully to locate the group.
The important thing here is not that the Guardsmen chose to withdraw, but that their standing orders ruled out any other option. According to Fox News, "Under existing rules of force signed by the Department of Defense and border state governors, soldiers are not supposed to stop, arrest, or shoot armed illegal immigrants." Instead they are merely "to look, listen and report their location to the Border Patrol." As this story shows, however, the result of this policy is that a group of armed illegal immigrants was allowed freedom of movement within our country. This is not meant as a criticism of the Guardsmen, but as an illustration of how ineffective their current orders are.
Though no one has admitted as much, it is clear that the motivation behind both of these inabilities to act is the desire not to provoke an incident that might bring bad publicity. Capitol Police Chief Morse chose not to act and fulfill his duties, while the National Guardsmen were under standing orders not to take action to safeguard this country. At very least, a lack of consistent and logical rules of engagement combined with a lack of leadership embarrassed the United States and put it at risk.
Allan Cruickshanks' column appears on Wednesdays in the Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at acruickshanks@cavalierdaily.com.
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