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Something that needs to be briefly said about some other "human factors" on the defense side of things. Not only is the Secret Service made up of real people who make mistakes, but also their job is 99% super boring, maybe even 99.99%, seeing as the last actual assassination was so long ago. Seems like a recipe for complacency. Of course, as an aside, it seems near certain we've foiled some other attempts both real and bluster, mostly in the earlier stages - I wonder if today's events change anyone's dial on the old vet killed in an FBI home raid last year who had made explicit sniper threats, owned a similar gun, and had the training to use it, though of course he wasn't going to be climbing on any roofs. No, what I mean to say is that there probably aren't all that many dedicated Secret Service agents in the first place. The threat surface as well as responsibility is enormous. You have someone following family, some following former presidents, keeping an eye on their suburban homes; for the president (and others like former President Trump) you have advance teams, mobile response, counter assault, crowd control, preparation for biological attack, equipment to maintain and transport and man, for all of that you need 24/7 presidential protection which means at least two or three shifts, plus presumably vacation time; and then on top of that you have at least the basics that man the static White House itself that needs all the same protection. It's a lot.
Faced with such a massive manpower requirement, what's normally the solution? Outsourcing. The classic. You may not notice, but at least some significant presence at these events is local or usually state police. Their numbers are welcome, but their training and skillset is very different, and these events don't happen all that often in a given state, much less an incident. I'd say these numbers are very helpful for ordinary law-keeping, and regular level incidents, but this can create problems in a Presidential-level threat environment. The Uniformed Division as a whole it seems about 1200 or more judging by some quick math per this recruiting factsheet (though even that division is subdivided and only a fraction are involved at an event like this) and only 20% of the service overall are veterans, so at least some of the UD are not veterans. Which might not matter, but at least anecdotally a veteran soldier's handling of an often-boring and then massive-adrenaline quick-decision environment is likely a bit different than a civilians, despite training. The point remains, that Secret Service numbers often need bolstering to get the kind of presence they would like.
Why do I bring this up? One theory being thrown around is that maybe someone withheld taking a shot on the shooter on purpose. This is plausible of course and shouldn't be dismissed out of hand. However, there are two things that might need to be taken into consideration as higher-likelihood events. Disclaimer: of course we're still in the realm of relatively low-information speculation here, we have only seen a few chunks and slices of the story so far. One is simple - communication problems. Local/state police might not be fully looped in or on the same radio channels the same way the pros are, and I'm sure there's some institutional issues or bad feelings too. While pro FPS players who have spent years on a single Counter Strike map have named callouts for all buildings and rooftops, I'm not sure that kind of thing is SOP or even practical for this environment, assuming there even was a direct line of communication. We all know how in a corporate environment sometimes you need to speak to three people before communicating something, even professional organizations aren't immune to games of telephone. Second, the local/state police themselves. Although presumably a Secret Service agent will fire first if they see a gun, I'm not completely convinced that local/state police outsourcing would necessarily have the means and mindset to do so in the same fashion, and might even view a threat to the general public as more likely or more dangerous than a threat to the President, and that's not even saying it is a deliberate choice, just a natural disinclination. And furthermore, according to the BBC interview guy, it was precisely these regular cops who seemed confused and indecisive when they had reported the gunman - so perhaps a combination of the both of the two points above.
As a more funny aside, you know who responds almost the quickest of anyone? The media with their cameras, some of whom you can see sprinting to get a good photo or two even before we know the shooter is actually down.
Whether or not they should have pre-emptively shot the shooter is a red herring. Even if they shouldn't have, they were still incompetent, because as soon as they realized a guy who wasn't theirs up on a roof with a rifle, they should have gotten their protectee out of harms way. That's what radios are for. Instead, the close-in protection team knew nothing until the bullets started flying.
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I think it's incompetence and/or unwillingness to make a mistake.
So first the Trump protection team fucks up by not putting an officer on every commanding height or at least a lock on every ladder and staircase leading to the roofs. Then they see a guy there and are paralyzed:
The guy pulls out a rifle
The guy takes aim at Trump
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There have been rumors circling that the Secret Service counter-snipers may have been directed not to fire first. At first that seems silly to me, but I think it makes sense in such an environment with constantly-changing scenery, civilians prone to doing all sorts of silly things, and new law enforcement organizations to cooperate with every week.
Yes, "shoot if you see someone with a gun" seems reasonable, and to be honest I'd probably defend it, but I can only imagine that we're only seeing the one(?) false-negative in my lifetime. I don't think I can point to a case where they did shoot first (or at least without a direct credible threat), either, but I can only imagine that given the complexity of the job they've come close to shots that wouldn't sit well with the public more often than they'll ever admit to us (for security reasons, naturally): Local law enforcement went up on the wrong roof, kids playing with airsoft guns, an unrelated carjacking a block away from the motorcade, suspicious-looking camera equipment, and so forth. It's pretty clear they don't shoot anybody who breaches the White House fence: that seems to happen regularly, even toddlers, and the optics from that would be terrible.
I've seen people (on the internet) saying this, and while I fully understand this policy and the false positives it means to avoid, it still is an unbelievable policy. A USSS sniper team has stricter rules of engagement than a citizen or cop has legal protections/assumptions in a self-defense shooting?
If the USSS is proficient and competent at everything else, then it is justified to centralize the 3-second-decision making in the upper layers of an events chain of command. If communication network at an event is well practiced, well functioning, and efficient. If those in a commanding role are constantly kept in the loop, on top each responsibility with a clear picture of what is going on and familiar with what their subordinates are doing. All the stuff that prevents 3-second-decisions from popping up. Even if all that and more was true, then it still is a major limitation on what sharpshooters can do to succeed in their role.
Apparently, security details are not always proficient and competent at all the things that justify such a policy. It may well be impossible for that to be the case given they frequently work with local officers of unknown ability and experience. If I am under their care I want to empower the highly trained, hopefully veteran counter sniper team to make 3-second-decisions without calling Lieutenant Fuck Up and waiting for his response. I don't know how sniper teams typically operate, but it seems like it has a built in structure that allows for decisions to be checked and calls made by more than one person. The spotter verifies the target and says, "You're good, hit him."
We are not calling in an airstrike. We are potentially trying to shoot man-with-gun before he shoots our VIP. If a sniper kills Joe Shmoe once every 20 years, that sucks, but fine. His career is over, the government writes a check to Mr. Shmoe's family, and the service is smeared and marred. It is still less of a reputational hit than counter snipers staring at an assassin and forcing them to allow the assassin to fire unless they hear back from Lieutenant Fuck Up. Unbelievable or untrue policy that declares POTUS and others under their care are not important enough to take the job seriously.
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Allegedly a local cop climbed up and confronted Crooks immediately before the shooting, Crooks pointed his rifle at the cop and the cop retreated.
Assuming that's true, besides painting the cop in question as being a bit rubbish, it surely indicates that the secret service snipers were not yet aware of Crooks or at least hadn't got him sights. Because surely a bloke on a roof with a rifle pointing his weapon at a cop is reason enough to pull the trigger. Unless the secret service have a categorical policy of never shooting first, which would seem insane.
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Great comment. I'm hesitant to actually advance that as a leading theory, but it is absolutely within the plausible realm and doesn't even require actual malice.
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My understanding is that the shooter openly carried a rifle, climbed up the side of a building in full view of security and the audience, from a range of a little over a hundred yards, posted up and fired shots without intervention on the part of Secret Service or the on-site security.
Speaking plainly, I would not have believed an attack like this was possible under any circumstances, based on all information I've received about the Secret Service and its capabilities. Maybe that's ignorance on my part. Maybe it's even a deliberate strategy on the part of the Treasury Department, deterring assassination attempts by greatly exaggerating their competence. All I know is that I cannot reconcile the reported events with my understanding of the agency's capabilities.
Sheer pedantry on my part (though what are we here for if not that?) but Secret Service has been under DHS for over 20 years now
I'm old. Thanks for the correction!
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Thanks for the pedantry, I was unaware. Looks like they still handle currency counterfeiters as well.
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Sort of. From what I've seen, he was in-view to a crowd outside the event, watching through a fence, and at the side of the building on which Crooks was positioned. There were local cops in this area, one of whom was along the wall of this building and so could not see the roof at all, unlike the bystanders who were some distance away. The angle of the roof was sloped so that he would not have been visible to the security/snipers in the event until he reached the roof's apex. There were also some trees in the area, which may have made him harder to spot from the event, but it's hard to tell.
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I wonder if this will trigger a rush of copycats now their aura of invincibility is gone, or if the widely shared shot of the shooter's body will make people think twice.
They used to have to hang bodies/heads from the walls for a few months to discourage the others, now it's much easier to do it all on the internet.
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Capabilities is the wrong paradigm. The Secret Service is an organization at its core, and with a longer history than most modern corporations. Though their mission is an abnormal one, they are still prone to the exact same kinds of organizational behavior problems that are universal to such.
The aviation industry is one of the few such industries where such considerations are taken seriously. Most organizations do not cope well, much less perfectly, with problems inherently related to communication and outsourcing. The aviation industry is also stress-tested with greater frequency. And in the "who polices the police" kind of situation, who is watching the Secret Service and auditing them? This kind of attempt is fairly rare and even more rare is an attempt leading to actual soul searching.
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I wouldn't expect the Secret Service to have first-rate anti-biological warfare on hand, whatever that might mean. I don't think they'd have some amazing CIWS turret that can shoot mortar rounds out of the sky. That's probably for the White House and sitting presidents. They probably don't have fantastic ECM capable of blocking the best kamikaze drones or grenade droppers, Russia and Ukraine can't seem to block drones reliably.
But I would expect them to have an agent on that rooftop to deal with gunmen. Dealing with gunmen isn't an amazingly high-end skill, it doesn't require creative super high-tech solutions, just friendly men with guns. This isn't exactly a built-up area. It doesn't require much preparation time to put someone on that roof.
Dealing with gunmen is their core priority, I would've thought the Secret Service would have that locked down given history.
Either they're very, very incompetent or there's some funny business going on.
Don't get me wrong, it is absolutely within their core area of responsibility here. If I had to spitball, I'd say the most-likely threats in general that take the bulk of the planning are probably as follows: Crowd member pulls a pistol/concealable, sniper from altitude, bomb threat. Obviously this attempt is on that shortlist. To be clear, I listed the other things as reasons why at least some Secret Service personnel are doing things other than guarding against these core threats from a manpower perspective. I use the word "outsourcing" on purpose, as the same usually practical or (short-term) logic for doing so is usually very short-term compelling.
I'm definitely going to be waiting for and reading closely the official report, or what info is released (secrecy is obviously important to defense, and the Secret Service does deliberately play up its abilities; though a checklist for what's normally done would answer the question well, we probably won't get one -- we will hear from someone who looked at it, though). I wonder if there were some cops on or around the roof of the building, maybe on the other side? and the Secret Service said "oh that's fine/sufficient". Or if they used to have more sniper teams but cut personnel down to one or two. Or if they expected cops to put a sniper up there, and the cop got sick or was too fat to climb up or something. It could even be something as simple as the Secret Service saying to the State Police "okay, this building is your responsibility" and assuming they would take care of it, and then they just... didn't. That's common in organization behavior, the "not my problem" mentality is something not even the Secret Service is immune to. Like, if they show up on site and there's no sniper on that roof after all, maybe they only travelled with equipment for the one team behind Trump, or assumed in their response model that the sniper team would be fast enough to respond (which maybe almost was the case? We think at least some of the response shots came pretty fast, through ATM we have about zero clue who fired the shots that killed the assassin, which is pretty important info).
The thought has also crossed my mind, in the 'plausible' realm here, that the Secret Service doesn't like placing too many cops with guns near or looking at the protectee. Because one might get the call of the void and take the shot. So it's at least plausible that state police didn't set up a sniper position on that roof because of that reason, a hesitance to put unknown people in the "trust envelope", so to speak.
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FWIW, the "outsourcing" to local PD has been going on for decades (at least). I have a relative who was a cop who was assigned to Hillary's security detail during some cross-country campaigning trip or something along those lines that Bill and Hillary did back in the 90's, when they made a stop in my relative's jurisdiction.
I mean, it even makes a lot of sense! But also an easy avenue for a slippery slope of over-reliance.
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