Army "Civil Disturbances" training manual from 1975

Mark Pilkington, who is documenting for Boing Boing his strange trip through the mythic landscape of the American Southwest, picked up this useful manual at an army surplus store in Albuquerque, New Mexico. You too can master the "butt stroke." See more pages over at Mark's blog: "Civil Disturbances (1975)"

• [anonguest7619]

  thankfully, we’ve come a long way as a country and a military since 1975.

  • [SoItBegins]

     In which direction?

    • [Mighty Blowhole]

       Well… the manual’s a lot nicer -looking now…

    • [mrtut]

      - seven times as many prisoners
      - five times as many prisoners on death row
      - six times as many black males in prison
      - a third less black males in university
      - four times higher expense on penal system (vs. 13% decrease for higher education)

      Right now, a quarter of the world’s prison population is in the U.S.

      I hope all these people are held in sane conditions and with consideration for their reintegration into society…
      (commence prison rape jokes)

• [Kevin Pierce]

  Here’s the whole thing:
  http://www.aclu.org/files/projects/foiasearch/pdf/DODDOA008742.pdf 

• [Antinous / Moderator]

  Would it have killed them to hire Tom of Finland?

  • [David Pescovitz]

    HAHHAHA! Perfect.

• [safedoc]

  Here are links to full copies of a number of different versions of the manual, going back to 1945

  Domestic Disturbances (1945)
  http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm19-15.pdf

  Army  Civil Disturbance Manual (1972)
  http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/army/ar500-50.pdf

  Civil Disturbances (1985)
  http://www.aclu.org/files/projects/foiasearch/pdf/DODDOA008742.pdf

  Support to Domestic Civil Authorities in Civil Disturbance Operations: Intelligence Requirements and Doctrine (1994)
  http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a284659.pdf

  Training for Operations Other Than War (1996)
  http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a323247.pdf

  Army Civil Disturbance Manual (2005)
  http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm3-19-15.pdf

  U.S. Army Military Police School Civil Disturbance Operations Course (2006)
  http://publicintelligence.net/usamps-civil-disturbance-operations/

  • [Lemoutan]

    Have they lost the one for 1776 or something?

• [Just_Ok]

  We can eliminate all civil disturbances by not being civil.

• [Matthew Carrick]

  Would that be a Vertical or Horizontal butt stroke?

• [bkad]

  My question is, as a non expert: is this good training? Are the more recent versions of the manual better training? What IS the right way to manage a civil disturbance? That would be an interesting thing to read about.

• [Giraffes Can Swim]

  I’m going to guess it’s a lot more hit hard and fast and a lot less ‘policy’ and ‘health and safety’.