"Mobilization Reaction Times? (Hypothetical Red Dawn)" Topic

This is a hypothetical Red Dawn scenario question. In the event of an airborne drop what would be the earliest possible reaction time for a unit to mobilize and repel the threat? I know there are tons of variables to that question like type of unit, alertness level, weather, base location nation etc… At what point could the airborne expect a counter attack that consisted of more than a couple of trucks with some guys thrown on them?

In the US, right?

And assuming the planes were not being tracked already, and that a potential drop off site was not guessed?

Here's the beginning of the film, Red Dawn:

YouTube link

All I see is a single chopper coming out to meet the enemy.

Dan
TMP link
TMP link

"What's more, given the present mindset of a lot of folks in the country today, I suspect there would be more armed resistance sooner from the locals, even if it was pointless."

Good point.

But at least the local militia will know about every nook and cranny in the area. And know who really lives in that area and who is sneaking in.

Dan

Depends on the location, but without prior warning, at least a week. The US government doesn't trust their own troops enough to keep weapons AND ammo in the same place stateside. Very few NG and USAR armories have more than a very limited supply of small arms ammo. Even most major military base inventories are limited to local training needs. If there was a single attack, the alert units are Ft. Bragg could probably counter attack, via air drop, within hours or the next day. But against more than one attack, mobilization will take time, assuming the enemy attack is on a small town in Colorado. Now if the bad guys hit one of our handful of ammo depots, we are screwed for quite a while.

"The US government doesn't trust their own troops enough to keep weapons AND ammo in the same place stateside."

Or returning veterans, for that matter:

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At least some militias get to play with real ammo every once in a while:

YouTube link
YouTube link

Dan

Small numbers almost immediately.

Larger units would probably take a week or so to organize, and get to the region.

As mentioned, air and helo units would be first responders.

Ya gotta take into account all those Nicaraugans who infiltrated as gardeners…

I think a key thing to remember is assuming the bad guy paratroopers secure their LZ and even take down an airfield, once we were alerted NONE of their resupply is getting through. Even with a heavy drop their tactical mobility is going to be VERY limited from the get go, and will worsen quickly.

All we need to do is contain them until the guys from Stewart or Hood can root them out and squash them at will.

I know a number of those 'militia' or NRA types and their knowledge of weapons, actual military tactics and their local terrain (even for hunting) would result in most of their deaths fairly quickly and without much of a strain on any organized and trained military force.

The percentage of actual ex-service types in the US, assuming they were actually trained as combat troops at one time in their military careers, is about 2-3% of the total population since the draft ended nearly 40 years ago (and that includes some fairly old guys…smile).

I'd not hold my breath.

Dan

When I was NG the bolts for our M-16s were kept in the Police Department HQ. Not in our Armory. It was just down the street, but still another potential hiccup in rolling out.

I'm just glad that my neighbor buddies are all recent veterans (from Desert Storm to today's conflicts), with current weapons training, and keep up their gun collections.

Of the six of them, I've nicknamed one Burt and another Gummer. Gotta come up with nicknames for the other four.

Good people. But ready for anything.

Dan

"Gotta come up with nicknames for the other four"

And get figures in 15mm to represent them all so we can game this out!

Jake

LOL.

Well, now you've got me looking up my house on Google Map, just to see if the terrain can be duplicated in miniature.

Dan

I'm guessing a lot of HO scale stuff would be useful for terrain/buildings.

It will have to be LOTS of HO scale houses, if I want to do our subdivision (Southwest of that elementary school):

link

The creek to the south of us should be easy to replicate.

Dan

"I know a number of those 'militia' or NRA types"

I am inclined to agree with your entire statement and each of them thinks they are some kind of Green Beret. If I was a resistance cell leader I would attack chicken coops or lone guys defecating until I could whip them into shape. I would also expect to lose most of them in my first engagement. If we had to run maybe all of them…

I have seen what Spectre gunships can do and I doubt could survive in the wilderness with an armed mob.

Maybe focus on a section of the local airport, or the county law office.

My area ( link ) is pretty easy. I think the pasture and cleared area by the pond are the DZ…

Yes I know Spectre gunships are American.

And they don't opperate in daytime when they can avoid it, and never opperate where we don't OWN the air. Seeing as NORTHCOM can scramble fighters pretty darned quickly I doubt the bad guy version has much of a chance of supporting the air drop after the first hour or so.

Having said that, one fo the coolest Tshirts I've seen is a Spectre shirt: link

Well, the invasion does make D-Day pale by comparison…..

I'm pretty sure my old NG unit (2005) would have been able to mob in three days in an emergency. Our personal weapons are stored locally (although without much ammo as stated above) and the vehicles and much more ammo is stored a couple of hours away at our training facility. Figure one day to get the unit alerted, one day to get to the vehicles, one day to form up. We often would be on the range Saturday morning after starting the weekend with a Friday night formation. Of course that's with prior knowledge that drill was that weekend.

I know a number of those 'militia' or NRA types and their knowledge of weapons, actual military tactics and their local terrain (even for hunting) would result in most of their deaths fairly quickly and without much of a strain on any organized and trained military force.

Years ago I ran into some of the Missouri militia and without going into great detail, they wouldn't last one hour against a trained military, much less elite airborne troops.

I think it is closer to 10 days for from a standing start. However, I suspect that tensions would be such that somebody would have at least put out an alert. The biggest issue is getting from the assembly area to the target area. The US is BIG. It can take the better part of a day to cross most states (and that is at 60 MPH) and if you throw in tactical factors more like 3 or 4 days. Mobilizing the logistics is not a quick task.

This is also assuming a Brigade size force (probably the smallest that could operate independantly). Local NG and USAR forces might be as large as a Battalion, more likely single companies (and nothing more than small arms).

Oh, and why they did not get shot out of the skies? Because they were disguised as civilian airliners.

In Southern California, the Los Angeles Police and Los Angeles Sheriff are between them 20,000 strong of light infantry. Most have rifle training and all have shotgun and handgun training, and are fully motorized and even have some light armor.

During the North Hollywood shooting they mobilized over 600 officers when they suspected about five or six shooters. They even got at least three armored vehicles on site in less than a couple hours.

During the Rodney King Riots they got the National Guard deployed in a couple days. I suspect most National Guard units could be on the move in two to three days and then it's just travel time.

Large Air Force bases can scramble fighters in minutes, and even bombers can be airborne in less than a day. With the massive civilian air fleet in the US tens of thousands of troops could be ferried almost anywhere in a day.

Look at the buildup in Saudi Arabia after the Invasion of Kuwait. The first US troops were there pretty fast. With the massive road network, rail network and air fleets here, it would not take long from a cold start to move tens of thousands of troops to any part of the US.

Mike "Bunkermeister" Creek
bunkermeister.blogspot.com

Don't remember from Red Dawn how/why the planes carrying the troopers weren't engaged…

America's Strategic Air Command was crippled in a surprise attack by undercover Cuban saboteurs, and Soviet airborn forces that dropped into the town were among those released from fake commercial airliners. This was done in order to seize key positions in preparation for subsequent massive assaults via Mexico and Alaska.

This is also assuming a Brigade size force (probably the smallest that could operate independantly). Local NG and USAR forces might be as large as a Battalion, more likely single companies (and nothing more than small arms).

Try again. 116 Cav (Idaho's NG unit) has M1A1HA Abrams, and it's less than a mile from the interstate *following the roads*. Same location has a squadron of A10s and Apaches. Now, some of their supporting units are scattered all over the state (cav scouts are 5 hours away in one direction, and the engineers are 6-7 hours in another), but that's still a lot of hurt that can be delivered in a short amount of time.

Yeah, my Cav unit had a platoon of M1 tanks at the time. That doesn't sound like much until you take them against airborne troops.

I drive by that tank park once a month or so (not on drill weekends), and there's a full Abrams company there, plus Bradleys. That's a very rude surprise for the airborne troops.

Just look how long it took to get military units moving towards New Orleans after the hurricane, and that was after weeks of prior knowledge that it was coming, and having some idea what would happen and how bad it would be, and with nothing trying to keep them from coming (avoiding Blue Fez comments here).

Not a good example: Military support has to be formally requested by the civilian government(s). Once that request was made, less than a week for troops all the way in Washington *state* to arrive in Louisiana. It's a 4+day drive for equipment to get there, so that's only 2-3 days max for local organization.

Remember, the military isn't generally trained in Search and Rescue, so there's some jobs that they take longer to accept. As far as a combat drop on a major US city, expect that reaction to be measured in HOURS.

Lion – I completely agree with that assessment. There are a lot of rules that people follow in peacetime (even in a disaster), that would be completely ignored in a war situation. Bullets flying, so to speak, puts the military in the mode of "just get it done".

"What? The US government can't just send thousands of helicopters and pluck those people from their rooftops within a couple of hours? Where's the cavalry, for goodness' sake?
Mr. President, where on earth could you have misplaced all our military choppers? Do you need help finding them? Also, any idea where all our national guard soldiers are? We could really use them right now for the type of thing they signed up to do like helping with national disasters. How come they weren't there to begin with?"

Ooops. Wrong major metropolitan event.

But the fact is still the same. Even in catastrophic emergencies, the public is supposed to be self-sufficient for at least 72 hours, which sounds pretty reasonable. But, no matter how fast you mobilize, the loudmouths will always say it wasn't fast enough.

Now, in the event of an invasion . . .

. . . self-sufficiency takes on a whole new meaning, doesn't it? Goes beyond just having water, food and meds for your family and pets, right?

C'mon. Armed civilians are certainly NOT as efficient as real troops but, face it, they can distract the enemy a bit, until the real soldiers come to the rescue.

So, I suspect that, in areas where people are more prone to be self sufficient (such as outside urban areas) and where some neighbors still care about other neighbors and share and protect each other, there will be a little bit of immediate action, even if it consists mostly of sabotage and minor skirmishes.

Therefore, get plenty of figures of armed civilians to start the fight against the invaders.

In urban areas, however, where people expect the federal government to immediately teleport with troops and goods, even though they constantly criticize the government, the people there will probably become more of the problem than the solution. So, even if troops sent in arrive within a couple of days, they will likely have to assume law enforcement duties and engage the anarchists in those "hot zones" first (looters, drug dealers, etc.), before they can go on to repel the invasion.

So, get plenty of figures of anarchists that capitalize on the chaos, until the troops come in and have to deal with them and the invaders both.

Either way, there are plenty of potential gaming scenarios. :)

Cool discussion, by the way. Glad to see that most sides get to voice their opinion.

Dan
TMP link
TMP link

Red Dawn was where I got the idea in high school to keep a foot locker full of camo, web gear, Mini-14 and @500 rounds of ammo.

Damn! They never came.

;)

LOL. And people say that the Cold War fears of our time are an exaggeration.

Despite how real or fictional such an invasion may seem in hindsight (and we all know that hindsight is 20/20, depending on who's reporting it today), it was plenty real and plausible for us back then.

Dan
TMP link

Un-uniformed armed civilians are franc tireurs, and by all the Laws of War, can be shot on sight.
That's what the Geneva Convention says. No, really. Look it up.

John,

Were there incidents of "friendly fire" of French Resistance fighters, as Allied troops came in?

Or did they know that they were all on the same side?

Dan

I don't know about that.
The Hun certainly had a phobia of franc tireurs from the Franco Prussian war, though.
They shot a lot of armed civilians (an probably some not all THAT armed) in the Great war, in France and in Belgium.

Sure, it's nice to take up arms in defense of your country, but legally you can be shot out of hand.
Whatever the Bad Guys did in Red Dawn, most of it was not illegal.

"Whatever the Bad Guys did in Red Dawn, most of it was not illegal."

And invading us was? :)

Dan

So it's illegal to invade sombody else's country now huh….

LOL. Are you talking about the Allies invading WWII Germany, or about the Russians invading the US in Red Dawn?

Us invading them, legal. Them invading us, not legal. :)

Dan

Doesn't matter. Armed people not in uniform are *targets* under the Geneva Conventions. It's too bad the US hasn't been able to capitalize on that fact since about 1950, but it's been politically expedient to allow (armed) people-not-in-uniform the same rights as (unarmed) civilians in the international media since 1960. *sigh*

And until 1945, invading someone else's country was actually 'legal' under international law. More precisely, there wasn't an agreement saying that you *couldn't.*

Lion: "Armed people not in uniform are 'targets' under the Geneva Conventions. It's too bad the US hasn't been able to capitalize on that fact since about 1950, but it's been politically expedient to allow (armed) people-not-in-uniform the same rights as (unarmed) civilians in the international media since 1960. *sigh*"

Lion, you are a wise man.

I say, overthrow Mediacracy*!!!

They should never allow media anywhere near the action. And, never, never, never do media embedding to follow a unit in and out of action, or to stay with them after they return to camp.

War should be fought like war, without the demoralizing effect of constant media access.

Dan
* link

During the Rodney King riots, my active duty unit at Camp Pendleton was mobilized and on the road to help out the LA Police & Sheriff within a day, with no prior warning (recall that the scope of the riots surprised everyone; no one had a clue that active duty military may be needed.)

And we were a Combat Engineer's Battalion. Two companies went out quick (about 660 troops), with another company following the next day.

I imagine infantry units either on the hotseat as next in the deployment rotation, or recently back and still somewhat "geared up" were ready within 12 hours, never mind the military police.

Any invaders would have to find a way to neutralize the reaction from the various military bases, because a substantially hard-hitting force can be mobilized within days for at least local deployment.