Advance warning: There will be ranting in what follows. And many folks will disagree with me.
So... before I begin, let me set a few things out. First -- I'm a cop. To be specific, I'm a gang detective. I've had more than 100 hours of gang training, participated in numerous interviews, arrests, search warrants, and prosecutions, and convictions of gang members. And I still wouldn't consider myself an expert. (In fact, the guys I call experts don't consider themselves experts, generally, either.) I've dealt with Latino gangs (MS13, 18th Street, SSL, and more), black gangs (Bloods, Crips, Gangster Disciples, and more), white supremacists (Aryan Nation, Peckerheads, Skinheads, and more), hybrid gangs, organized criminal enterprises, and neighborhood gangs.
As much as gangs have spread nationally -- they are also regional phenomena. Their is national (and international!) coordination and communication, and some gangs (especially prison gangs) have very strong national organization. But the "rules" for a gang in one area are not always the same in another. MS is big in my area; in parts of California -- it's barely noticed. You don't see gang neighborhoods in my area anymore; we've worked hard to stomp them down, with combined local, state, federal, and regional approaches. They still control neighborhoods just a few miles away...
Meet the street gangs of the late 2000s.
Trained by the U.S. Department of Defense, financed by the American taxpayer, hardened on the Arab street.
Let me steal from a colleague whom I've had the privilige to meet and discuss gangs in the military with, Hunter Glass. He's a former Army soldier and retired police officer from North Carolina. He's been sounding the alarm on this issue for years. Gangs have been in the military for decades; the military is only today beginning to barely acknowledge it. Hunter uses the example of an elephant in this manner: If I show you pictures of a trunk, grey hide, big ears, tusks, hanging around with other huge critters with long noses, big ears, etc. ... Most of us would look at that, and say "elephant." Not the military; they'd say it might be an elephant... but we'll only call it an elephant if it says it's an elephant, and acts like an elephant.
HBO did a special on Antonio Fernandez (King Tone) of the Almighty Latin Kings; one thing that really bothered me was in footage of a multi-clique meeting -- several people were present in military dress uniforms.
Bangers are in the military. They're learning military urban warfare tactics. And they're bringing them home when they get out -- whether they're kicked out or get an honorable discharge.
And you're not going to change them. People don't join the services and become Baptists or Catholic or Hindu or whatever; they (generally) maintain the religious choice they had when they joined. Well... bangers aren't going to stop being bangers just 'cause you change their uniform, either.
The Washington bank robbery carried out with dare I say military precision by a group of Rangers last year is just the first of a whole series of headaches for law enforcement.
It's not the first. It's nowhere near the first. Andres Raya, a Norteno banger, killed one and wounded another police officer in Ceres, CA, in 2005 using military tactics he'd learned and practiced in service in Iraq as a US Marine. And I'm sure if I did some research I could probably find some others, even earlier.
We in law enforcement are doing our best to prepare for the reality that bangers and other criminals are coming back from military service with experience under fire. I'm not going to detail everything we do; let it suffice to say that we have cops who are vets returning, and we are always improving our training methods. But there's still nothing like real world experience. So -- yes, we're very worried.
My only question is, Why are we so surprised? In my day (USN 71-75) gangs as we know them today were at an inchoate state. So we had race riots instead ('being down for yours' meant being divided by color, rather than turf)--kind of a predecessor to formalized, ritualized gang behavior which grew out of it. What did I witness the military do? Mop up after the violence. I was involved in some of that mop up. Very ugly. This problem has been brewing a long time.
Gangs have been around a lot longer than is generally realized. Chicago street gang culture goes back, easily traceably, into the early Fifties, at least. The Gangster Disciples were formed in the late Sixties; the Bloods and Crips formed not much later. MS is a relative newcomer, having been formed in the Eighties. The Zoot Suit Riots were in 1942; they involved gangs.
Doesn't the military do back-ground checks first ?
No -- they don't. And only "active gang membership" is a disqualifier, and my understanding is that even that isn't an automatic disqualifier! Funny thing... I've participated in the interview of quite a few bangers; many of them consistently deny current membership -- even when we catch them in groups, in "uniform", flying their colors. The military denies "current gang activity" even when soldiers tag up their areas, and even acquire new gang tats! I've seen video of soldiers throwing up their gang signs outside of Fort Bragg, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Europe... and more.
Absolutely. You cannot underestimate the sophistication in today's gangs. They are not the groups of thugs that roam the streets as the movies portray. Todays gangs are criminal syndicates that are on the fast track to becoming the American Mafia.
The popular media has glorified the "gangsta lifestyle." It's ********. Bovine excrement, since I know the filter will catch that. Gangsters are thugs. Some are smarter than others; some are more organized than others. But, as the saying goes... the white stuff that floats on top of chicken crap is still crap.
. As you have sewn, so to shall you reap. This sucks. I am depressed. Incoherent rant over.
Wouldn't it just be easier to go the old route and re-invoke the draft? Just kidding. Bad joke. It's a horrible dilemma, and there are parallels to Vietnam. Back then if you had some semblance of a pulse, you were in.
