Chinese style, right? Sweep the streets with machine guns, flash bangs, tear gas - tanks.

Do you have any idea how difficult it is to deal with an unruly, violent, out of control mob? Even putting a stop to a minor incident of this kind isn't a slam dunk.

Once, during my career as a firefighter, a mob of maybe 300 people gathered in the middle of the busiest section of the city. I don't recall what their problem was, but the temperature was getting close to a r**t. Things were heating up, the protesters were throwing bottles, beer cans, wh**ever they could get their hands on at the police. Damage to vehicles and property was minimal early on, but things were getting broken.

The police called us for assistance. They wanted a pumper with a mounted water cannon and a ladder truck. I happened to be the ladder truck tillerman on that occasion. (At the rear of the ladder truck is a steering system for the rear wheels of the trailer. This allows the driver and tillerman to work together negotiating tight turns and heavy traffic.)

We had been instructed in using a fire dept ladder truck for crowd control, but merely as a concept, we never trained for this. Crowd control is one thing, stopping a r**t is another.

When we turned onto the street, we saw that the mob was angry and growing more violent. The police had established two lines, one on either end of the street boxing the mob in. Our battalion chief and the police incident commander had apparently decided to try the ladder truck first, followed by the pumper with the water cannon.

So, my good buddy, Norman, up front driving the tractor and I on the tiller cinched down our helmets and sallied forth. Norm drove the tractor to the left side of the street (4 lanes) and I steered the tail of the trailer to the right. The idea was to create a kind of grader blade that would force people down the street toward the far police line behind which the police had assembled paddy wagons, cruisers, and dozens of cops prepared to bust some chops and make arrests. Police units stayed on our flanks to fill that gap, and the pumper, with the water cannon manned and charged, was right behind us. (Drew you a picture.)

Within seconds of moving into position, we started getting hit. I got hit hard with a full can of beer right upside the head. Fortunately, my helmet absorbed most of the blow. The mob wasn't having any of this, all we did was piss them off even more than they were. I knew instantly this was a really dumb idea. However, less than a minute later, the water cannon opened up and it did dampen their spirits a bit. Less than five minutes after we started this fiasco, the police commander ordered us to back off.

Point is, it took one hell of a lot of the city's resources to disperse a crowd of 300 or so people. Some arrests were made, but it took the police something like 6 hours to diffuse the situation.