Guard’s Plan to Help LAPD Calls on Los Alamitos Team

The California National Guard is prepared to deploy as many as 3,000 soldiers to help quell any civil disorder during the Democratic National Convention.

In addition to supporting law enforcement, the troops are also ready to assist local firefighting agencies under a preparedness plan that includes the use of the Los Alamitos-based Weapons of Mass Destruction team to combat acts of chemical, biological or nuclear terrorism.

Maj. Gen. Paul D. Monroe Jr., the Guard’s adjutant general in Sacramento, said the preparations are precautionary and not a response to expected acts of violence. Soldiers and equipment can be deployed within 24 hours of a request by local officials, he said.

“The Los Angeles Police Department is running the security program for the DNC. We were not included in the [local] planning,” Monroe said. “It’s felt that they have enough law enforcement personnel available to them to handle any problem. But we would be negligent if we didn’t plan for any eventuality.”

In preparing for the Democratic convention, the LAPD will be supported by the Los Angeles County sheriff, the California Highway Patrol and officers from various police departments in surrounding counties. The security teams will also include federal agents assigned to protect Vice President Al Gore and other U.S. officials.

California authorities are still smarting from the 1992 Los Angeles riots, which caught the Guard unprepared. Political indecision and lack of coordination in Sacramento led to delays in mobilizing the Guard, and some soldiers were sent to the riot areas without ammunition.

This time, Guard officials began preparing in January for just about any situation during the convention, including brownouts in downtown Los Angeles and fires in the surrounding hills. The plan went into effect last Friday and will remain in place through Aug. 18.

“For the past two years, there have been concerns from the electric utilities regarding a severe drain on the power system in the summer months. Brownouts are a very real possibility, as is a heat emergency in the Los Angeles area,” said the 31-page operational plan.

The warning about possible power shortages is especially timely in the wake of the hot weather that has led to high electrical usage and taxed the state’s power grid.

“Nobody can predict what’s going to happen,” said Monroe. “But we prepare for the eventuality in case we’re called.”

But preparedness does not mean that soldiers will be quartered in local armories during the convention.

“We have not been asked to stage forces or to be prepared that way,” Monroe said.

Instead, the Guard’s plan said that “on 24 hours’ notice . . . [it] will deploy up to three 1,000-person response teams to the Los Angeles area in support of civilian authority.” The troops will likely assemble at Camp San Luis Obispo and the Armed Forces Reserve Center in Los Alamitos and convoy to Los Angeles.

In 1992, large numbers of soldiers were sent to the Los Angeles riots without locking plates in their M-16 assault rifles, preventing the weapons from being fired as fully automatic. This time commanders were ordered to have locking plates “installed and functional” by July 31.

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