KING CASE AFTERMATH: A CITY IN CRISIS : Guard Takes Positions After Delays, Snafus : Response: Residents demand to know why it took so long for the troops to begin protecting them.

Long-overdue units of the National Guard took back and held pieces of Los Angeles on Friday, but their welcome was tempered by bursts of anger from residents who lost their neighborhoods while snafus postponed the deployment of the troops.

“How could it take them so long?” asked a crying Nargas Nadjati, a South-Central resident who arrived at her brother’s grocery store Friday morning to find nothing but smoldering wreckage. The Guard units that had been stationed in front of the store Thursday afternoon were nowhere to be found, and looters had returned during the night to pick through the rubble.

“They are so fast to send troops to the other side of the world,” Nadjati added. “Why can’t they save our city?”

By late Friday afternoon, at least 1,000 guardsmen were still at staging points, awaiting orders from local law enforcement leaders. There was confusion over how many guardsmen were on the street, though local officials complained bitterly that there were far fewer than the 6,000 they had requested.

Frustrated by the delays, state and local officials blamed one another and bickered over who was responsible for a mix-up in delivering ammunition to the units.

Just as the sun set Friday, President Bush announced that he was sending 5,500 military troops and law enforcement specialists to Los Angeles and putting the National Guard under federal command. That order meant that the Guard units fighting rioting in Los Angeles would no longer report to Police Chief Daryl F. Gates or Sheriff Sherman Block.

At locations where the Guard was deployed Friday, the crowds seemed relieved that the troops had arrived. In beleaguered neighborhoods around the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, schoolchildren waved at the Guard’s armored vehicles, and many adults applauded or gave them thumbs-up signs.

“It helps to have them here,” said South Los Angeles resident Michelle Walker. “People have no respect for the LAPD, but when the National Guard got here, people knew that they were serious.”

As the Guard units trickled into positions throughout the city, officials vented their frustrations at the delays, with some suggesting that Gates had not mobilized his Guard troops quickly enough.

Stanley K. Sheinbaum, president of the Police Commission, agreed that it may have been Gates’ “pride” that slowed Guard deployment in the city. And Jesse A. Brewer, another commission member, noted that Gates may have been reluctant to use the Guard because “the chief likes to feel he can handle everything by himself, without any help from anybody.”

Although not criticizing the Guard’s presence, Gates acknowledged at a morning news conference that he was unhappy about the prospect of bringing in federal troops to restore the peace.

“The same hesitancy you saw this morning (from Gates) with federal troops applies with the National Guard,” said Deputy Mayor Mark Fabiani. “No local police force wants to concede that it can’t handle a situation on its own. . . . I think it is clear there is always resistance on the part of local authorities to call on outside sources.”

One department spokesman defended the pace of deployment, saying it takes time to organize a command structure to ensure that the largely youthful guardsmen are properly supervised in the field.

Gates’ spokesman, Cmdr. Robert Gil, reacted angrily when asked if Gates had been reluctant, or resistant, in deploying the National Guard.

“I don’t have any comment and I’m not even going to research it,” he said. “We’ve got the biggest riot in city history and all the L.A. Times can do is try and find dirt.

“You’re trying to place the blame for this at the feet of Daryl Gates.”

Block, who had final authority over assigning the Guard units their missions but did so in consultation with Gates, also spoke up for the chief. Gates, according to Block, had asked for all the help he could get.

“This issue cannot be viewed on the basis of turf,” Block said. “The guard was deployed rationally as needed.”

In the confusion, however, there were even disagreements as to how many Guard units had arrived in Los Angeles. The Guard said 2,800 of its troops were in place Friday evening, while Block said the number was closer to 2,000.

Although residents and many city leaders worried that the process was moving too slowly, some law enforcement authorities warned against hastily deploying the National Guard, even in the face of widespread violence. Although they are trained to respond to civil disturbances, many guardsmen are young and have no experience with volatile crowds such as those rampaging throughout Los Angeles.

“You have to be cautious about the role you put guardsmen in,” said Beverly Hills Police Chief Marvin Iannone, a former top aide to Gates. “They are not professional police officers. They are citizen soldiers. . . . Any field commander who deploys guardsmen without appropriate planning is headed for some real dangers.”

While bureaucratic wrangling held up the Guard for several hours, logistic delays further contributed to the slow response, officials acknowledged. According to Gov. Pete Wilson, the deployments were held up because it took so long for ammunition to reach the Guard units who needed it.

Kassy Perry, Wilson’s deputy communications director, said it is normal procedure to store the Guard’s ammunition away from the armories and ship it as needed. Also shipped separately are the special “lock plates” to convert the guardsmen’s automatic M-16 rifles to semiautomatic.

Wilson initially indicated his intent to call up the guard Wednesday evening, but it was not until daybreak Thursday that a Guard helicopter picked up the ammunition at Camp Roberts, a training base outside of Paso Robles. That delay, said Perry, came because Camp Roberts lacks lights on its Tarmac; therefore, the helicopter could not be loaded at night.

Perry said the Guard’s California commander had conceded that there was a “breakdown in the deployment process.”

The first load of ammunition, lock plates and body armor did not arrive at Los Alamitos until about 2 p.m. Thursday, 17 hours after Wilson had called the Guard to action. By that time looting and fires were spreading throughout Los Angeles.

With the violence continuing to escalate, Wilson said he told the commanders at 2 p.m. Thursday to divvy up the ammunition on hand and send the troops into the city.

State Controller Gray Davis announced Friday he will audit the National Guard to determine what went wrong. “I think it is an outrage that (they) showed up without ammunition. That’s like the Dodgers taking the field without their gloves.

“Lives and property almost certainly would have been saved if they would been deployed sooner,” Davis said.

Even after Wilson sent the Guard in, the deployment moved so slowly that city officials decided to seek federal troops as a backup.

Mayor Tom Bradley’s decision to ask President Bush for those troops “was essentially a decision to leapfrog all of these problems with the Guard deployment, with the LAPD deployment, to get to a body of force that could be projected quickly,” Fabiani said. “You can’t be too safe in this situation. You can’t deploy too much.”

The slow Guard response stood in contrast to the situation in 1965, when nearly 14,000 National Guard troops were on the streets of Watts within 36 hours of their call-up by Lt. Gov. Glenn M. Anderson. This time, the call-up was much smaller and only a fraction of the Guard was deployed that quickly.

Brewer, who said he was surprised by how slowly the units were deployed in the current rioting, nevertheless added that the situation was different in 1965.

“The difference was (the guardsmen) were already together . . . They were on their way for summer camp,” he said. “When the call for help came, they just changed direction.”

This time, guardsmen had to be called from home, and it took longer for them to assemble, Brewer said.

On the street, however, residents and worried police officers were anxious for help, not explanations.

It took roughly three hours for Guard units to reach the Hancock Station post office in South Los Angeles Friday, hours in which LAPD officers nervously eyed the growing, grumbling crowd assembled to pick up welfare and Social Security checks.

“It just seems like a real long time when you are out there waiting,” said LAPD Sgt. James Allen.

Where the Guard was in place, their ranks were sometimes stretched perilously thin. Young soldiers, some barely in their 20s, worried that they could not hold some areas with so few people. And shopkeepers, battered by days of looting, complained bitterly when the guardsmen were assigned to new locations, leaving residents to fend for themselves.

At one Ralph’s supermarket, looting raged for hours before Guard units moved in to restore quiet Friday morning. As the units looked on, cleanup crews worked in peace to scoop mounds of spilled food off the floor and nail plywood over the shattered windows.

Then, early Friday afternoon, the guardsmen were called away, and the looters began to circle again. One man even brought a shopping cart.

“I don’t know why they don’t keep at least 10 people out here,” said Joel Lopez, who owns a gold-trading store across the street. “See that guy with the shopping cart? They’re going to tear this right back down and go in.”

Times staff writers Daniel M. Weintraub, Jim Rainey and Ken Reich contributed to this story.

Dispatched to Duty

Here is a look at some of the law enforcement personnel and troops who have been deployed or await deployment as of Friday afternoon: LAPD (2,500 each shift) (1,800 deployed at any one time): 5,000 California Highway Patrol (700 deployed at any one time. Officers are from all over the state.): 2,300 Outside agencies (Includes L.A. County sheriff’s deputies): 560 California National Guard: 7,600 2,800 deployed on the street. 1,700 in staging areas. 1,500 waiting for missions to be assigned. 1,600 in support and logistics positions. Federal law enforcement personnel (Includes FBI, Border Patrol): 1,000 Federal troops (Awaiting deployment in staging areas): 4,500 TOTAL: 20,960 Compiled by Times researcher Michael Meyers

Geared Up for Violence

The National Guard members on riot duty in Los Angeles are equipped with a variety of gear to handle what they term “civil disturbances.” Among the gear: Gas masks (on belts) Wooden, waist-high riot batons Kevlar helmets with riot shields M-16 rifles 5.56-millimeter ammunition Polyester camouflage uniforms in either a winter or summer weight Bayonets (carried in sheaths) Flak jackets that will stop an M-16 bullet Estimated weight of a guardsman’s gear, not including M-16: 40 pounds Rations (food is being brought in for the Guard, but guardsmen carry a small amount of rations)

LAPD Standard police officer equipment differs from that of National Guard. Officers are now carrying: 9-millimeter Beretta pistols, model 92F .38-caliber Smith & Wesson revolvers Hollow-point ammunition Shotguns Side-handle baton made of solid aluminum Riot shields Bulletproof vests Plastic and metal handcuffs MACE Tear gas (only supervisors are authorized to carry tear gas, and they must receive approval from a superior for its use)

Compiled by Times researcher Michael Meyers