Seems like an honorable guy. I wouldn't bet a nickel on who fired first that day. It would be interesting to analyze a video/audio recording though. Speaks volumes about the inability of military to play cops.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The National Guard Commander At Kent State
Speaks Out
By Lisa Daniel
Special to Military.com
Thirty years after he commanded troops at Kent
State University, retired Army National Guard
Brig. Gen. Charles Fassinger still gets hate
mail.
One of the few Guardsmen who talk openly about the rally-turned-riot that left four protesters
dead, Fassinger said he decided early on to speak for those he says were not emotionally
able to discuss it. "I decided, if a troop commander doesn't talk for his troops, who does?" he
said in an interview with Military.com. "I've thought a lot about this in 30 years. I feel
responsible for what they did. They were my troops."
Debate still rages about what went wrong, and the second-guessing is not lost on the man
who was a 40-year-old lieutenant colonel at the scene. "I think a lot about what I did wrong
or what I could have done better," Fassinger said. "The most frustrating thing is that I can't
come up with an answer. If all the conditions were exactly the same, the mood of the
students, the lack of equipment for the Guard, I don't know what order I could have given or
what we could have done differently."
Now an executive with a professional non-profit group in Miami, Fassinger on May 4, 1970,
was in charge of 130 National Guardsmen. For three days, the troops had patrolled the town
of Kent, restoring order after an outbreak of arson and looting. When they arrived on the
campus of Ohio's Kent State University, the troops endured nearly a half-hour barrage of spit,
curses, concrete and bricks from protestors.
Suddenly, the troops opened fire. In 13 seconds, 28 National Guardsmen pulled triggers,
firing a total of 60 rounds. Thirteen demonstrators were wounded, four fatally. Fassinger says
that there was never an order to shoot. Some Guardsmen say they heard a shot fired at them
first, but no investigations proved that. What is certain is that the Guard was ill-equipped.
Even though civil uprisings were common in 1970, Fassinger's troops had none of today's
standard-issue riot control gear: batons, flak vests, shields. Instead, they they went in with
what they had: rifles, bayonets and tear gas.
One thing Fassinger does not second-guess was ordering the soldiers to lock and load after
the riot act was read to the protestors. "I think it is still sound advice to load weapons once the
riot act has been read," he said. "You would never send police in without loaded weapons."
Some have suggested the Guardsmen fired under psychological duress, rather than fear of
imminent danger. Fassinger flatly disagrees. "If any one of those people said they were in
fear of their lives, I have no trouble believing that -- and I was older and a veteran," he said.
"To get 28 people to respond simultaneously to an event...they had to have seen what they
saw."
Asked whether he thought Guardsmen could have been killed in the riot, Fassinger said,
"Absolutely. [The students] were not responding to the display of guns and bayonets, and not
to gas."
Fassinger said he understands the frustration of family members of the students killed. In
December 1970, he received a Christmas card signed, "I hope you enjoy Christmas with your
family. I miss mine, Allison Krause." Krause was killed by a Guardsman at Kent State. More
recently, an email message arrived that called him a "goulish bastard" who "brought in the
death squad."
But some of the comments Fassinger hates most have been underhandedly supportive.
"Some people said, 'Fassinger, you need to take your men out and teach them how to shoot.
They should have killed more of them. Why didn't you bring the machine guns?'
"Those comments made my blood boil," he said. "They were suggesting that we went in
there to kill students. That's obviously not what we were there for."
------------------
"Put a rifle in the hands of a Subject, and he immediately becomes a Citizen." -- Jeff Cooper
"The fact is that the average man's love of liberty is nine-tenths imaginary, exactly like his love of sense, justice and truth. He is not actually happy when free; he is uncomfortable, a bit alarmed, and intolerably lonely. Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty - and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies." -- H.L. Mencken, February 12, 1923, Baltimore Evening Sun
"If God had not wanted them to be sheared, he would not have made them sheep." -- Bad guy from the Magnificent Seven.
"Don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blow." -- Bob Dylan
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The National Guard Commander At Kent State
Speaks Out
By Lisa Daniel
Special to Military.com
Thirty years after he commanded troops at Kent
State University, retired Army National Guard
Brig. Gen. Charles Fassinger still gets hate
mail.
One of the few Guardsmen who talk openly about the rally-turned-riot that left four protesters
dead, Fassinger said he decided early on to speak for those he says were not emotionally
able to discuss it. "I decided, if a troop commander doesn't talk for his troops, who does?" he
said in an interview with Military.com. "I've thought a lot about this in 30 years. I feel
responsible for what they did. They were my troops."
Debate still rages about what went wrong, and the second-guessing is not lost on the man
who was a 40-year-old lieutenant colonel at the scene. "I think a lot about what I did wrong
or what I could have done better," Fassinger said. "The most frustrating thing is that I can't
come up with an answer. If all the conditions were exactly the same, the mood of the
students, the lack of equipment for the Guard, I don't know what order I could have given or
what we could have done differently."
Now an executive with a professional non-profit group in Miami, Fassinger on May 4, 1970,
was in charge of 130 National Guardsmen. For three days, the troops had patrolled the town
of Kent, restoring order after an outbreak of arson and looting. When they arrived on the
campus of Ohio's Kent State University, the troops endured nearly a half-hour barrage of spit,
curses, concrete and bricks from protestors.
Suddenly, the troops opened fire. In 13 seconds, 28 National Guardsmen pulled triggers,
firing a total of 60 rounds. Thirteen demonstrators were wounded, four fatally. Fassinger says
that there was never an order to shoot. Some Guardsmen say they heard a shot fired at them
first, but no investigations proved that. What is certain is that the Guard was ill-equipped.
Even though civil uprisings were common in 1970, Fassinger's troops had none of today's
standard-issue riot control gear: batons, flak vests, shields. Instead, they they went in with
what they had: rifles, bayonets and tear gas.
One thing Fassinger does not second-guess was ordering the soldiers to lock and load after
the riot act was read to the protestors. "I think it is still sound advice to load weapons once the
riot act has been read," he said. "You would never send police in without loaded weapons."
Some have suggested the Guardsmen fired under psychological duress, rather than fear of
imminent danger. Fassinger flatly disagrees. "If any one of those people said they were in
fear of their lives, I have no trouble believing that -- and I was older and a veteran," he said.
"To get 28 people to respond simultaneously to an event...they had to have seen what they
saw."
Asked whether he thought Guardsmen could have been killed in the riot, Fassinger said,
"Absolutely. [The students] were not responding to the display of guns and bayonets, and not
to gas."
Fassinger said he understands the frustration of family members of the students killed. In
December 1970, he received a Christmas card signed, "I hope you enjoy Christmas with your
family. I miss mine, Allison Krause." Krause was killed by a Guardsman at Kent State. More
recently, an email message arrived that called him a "goulish bastard" who "brought in the
death squad."
But some of the comments Fassinger hates most have been underhandedly supportive.
"Some people said, 'Fassinger, you need to take your men out and teach them how to shoot.
They should have killed more of them. Why didn't you bring the machine guns?'
"Those comments made my blood boil," he said. "They were suggesting that we went in
there to kill students. That's obviously not what we were there for."
------------------
"Put a rifle in the hands of a Subject, and he immediately becomes a Citizen." -- Jeff Cooper
"The fact is that the average man's love of liberty is nine-tenths imaginary, exactly like his love of sense, justice and truth. He is not actually happy when free; he is uncomfortable, a bit alarmed, and intolerably lonely. Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty - and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies." -- H.L. Mencken, February 12, 1923, Baltimore Evening Sun
"If God had not wanted them to be sheared, he would not have made them sheep." -- Bad guy from the Magnificent Seven.
"Don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blow." -- Bob Dylan