Project- Influences of Roman military on modern day riot control

[JHCS]

Hello! We are two students from New Zealand currently doing a high-school research project for our Classics/Latin class. Our project is based on the following question:

To what extent has Roman military combat equipment and accompanying tactics influenced that which is used in modern day riot control?

One criteria of our project is that we have to have an account of some sort stating "The modern day x was directly influenced by the x used by the Roman Military" or something similar. This must be from a qualified person, (ie. an archaeologist). As this forum has many members with professional experience in archaeology, we would like to ask for your expertise on this subject.

We believe the scuta may link quite well with the modern day riot shield as with the accompanying tactics. However, we're unsure whether any other aspect may have carried over and how it has done so as we are unsure on the intermediary phase of the 'evolution'.

If any of you have any suggestions, comments, ideas or any information, your help will be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks,

Callum and James.

[Timus]

We believe the scuta may link quite well with the modern day riot shield as with the accompanying tactics. However, we're unsure whether any other aspect may have carried over and how it has done so as we are unsure on the intermediary phase of the 'evolution'.

Not an archaeologist or even an historian but I do have a few remarks.
- riot tactics, training, procedures, equipment, rules of engagements actually vary a lot across time and countries. Even for a given place and time, they may change depending on the local security/political context.
- however, you do see a trend in the last xx years, where riot police in developed countries are moving away from "roman army looking" tactics towards the use of more complex tactics and equipment. Typically, they do not want to "defeat" the crowd but simply to keep it under control. So if you're looking for roman army inspired stuff, you'll probably have to go back in time a bit rather look at modern day riot police.
- even so... what may look like roman inspired tactics and equipment may be more along the line of a similar answer to a somewhat similar problem.
- though, the real threat for riot police is quite different than from ancient warfare. It has more to do with the throwing of incendiary devices, getting hit in the head by a stone, a single man being pulled into the crowd, etc. Bottom line: there is very little risk of facing a barbarian horde or Macedonian phalanx intent on defeating you head on.
- Symmetrically, the sort of physical trauma that using roman army "tactics" and equipment might cause is, thank goodness, unacceptable nowaday in our countries. So typically no thrust to the face or guts, no shield-bashing (actually a little bit here in France, but it's limited by the shield grip), no javelin throwing before a charge, etc. Typically rioters will afterward complain about "slash" to the limbs, the use of tear-gas and pepper spray, the use of various type of concussion grenades, etc.
- And finally, one last remark about the shield. When looking at one, you probably ought to start with the grip. And most modern day police shield have a 2 point grip instead of a single central grip like the roman scutum. So they do have a somewhat similar shape, but obviously modern day police don't intend to use their shield in the same way as the roman armies. Its main function is definately defensive, it's meant to allow the police form to hold its position when facing projectils and a crowd trying to push through. I'd argue it functions more like an argive aspis than a roman one.

similar discussion available here: 
http://www.romanarmytalk.com/thread-23502.html

[Dan D'Silva]

Just a thought: It seems to me this is less a question for Classicists and archaeologists than for the police themselves who developed modern riot control tactics, and perhaps for historians who specialize in recent history.

[Bryan]

The scutum may share the overall shape of shields used by many riot forces but the reality is that they are quite different, namely due to the manner in which they are held. Most riot shields are strapped to the arm, using a method more familiar with an aspis, kite, or heater shield, where as the scutum/thureos was held with a single hand holding a central horizontal grip. This method of holding the shield completely changes the dynamics of how it is used, as strapped shields can not be used offensively in the manner in which scuta can be, which is more dynamic, like a buckler. Strapped on shields are typically held close to the body and used to block strikes and block missiles. Scuta could do that and more, it was more versatile but harder to use defensively because of the tilting aspect of the shield profile. 


Next is weaponry. The riot police weapon for shield bearing security personally is typically a baton, wood, metal, lead, bamboo, etc., which deals out damage through blunt force trauma, typically by striking with a slashing blow with enough force to cause said blunt trauma. The Romans employed swords with sharp points and edges, which don't require that much force to cause significant trauma, especially with thrusts, which is what Romans are reputed to prefer over the cut. Based on evidence I've personally gathered on cutting experiments on slaughtered pigs, it takes very little force to pierce the flesh for a stab (even the rib cage), and slashing blows easily cut open major muscles down to the bone with nothing more than a short wrist flick. 

After that I'd say the mindset between the Romans and modern riot forces are totally different. Riot police are rarely on the offensive, usually deployed to contain a rioting crowd. Even when they do advance aggressively they don't do it looking to kill their enemy (if they did, they wouldn't use riot shields and batons, they'd use guns). Roman infantry would always have the objective to kill the enemy, usually by conducting offensive maneuvers. Occasionally a Roman century/maniple/cohort might be put into a defensive position to hold ground, deployed in close order using their shields more as a shield wall, but this was not the standard deployment method of the Romans during most of their history because it too limited movement, which swordsman need (per Polybius, Caesar, and the descriptions of fighting by Valerius Maximus, Vegetius, and others).

[BlackJack]

Hello! We are two students from New Zealand currently doing a high-school research project for our Classics/Latin class. Our project is based on the following question:

To what extent has Roman military combat equipment and accompanying tactics influenced that which is used in modern day riot control?

One criteria of our project is that we have to have an account of some sort stating "The modern day x was directly influenced by the x used by the Roman Military" or something similar. This must be from a qualified person, (ie. an archaeologist). As this forum has many members with professional experience in archaeology, we would like to ask for your expertise on this subject.

We believe the scuta may link quite well with the modern day riot shield as with the accompanying tactics. However, we're unsure whether any other aspect may have carried over and how it has done so as we are unsure on the intermediary phase of the 'evolution'.

If any of you have any suggestions, comments, ideas or any information, your help will be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks,

Callum and James.

Too cheeky guys. 1165.

[Michael J. Taylor]

As someone who had done riot control training in the US Army, and also worked on Roman tactics, I would say that despite superficial similarities, the differences are enormous.

Firstly, most riot control is about control pretty constricted urban areas. Riot control tactics are about controlling streets, intersections, etc. Movement is channelled and constricted by urban obstacles. While street fighting was not unheard of in the ancient world, most battles took place in open spaces.

Secondly, I think the lethality of ancient battle must also make a big difference. While modern day riots sometimes result in the occasional death and frequently in serious injuries, a riot baton is not a sword. An ancient battle might leave thousands or even tens of thousands dead. As a result, I assume the calculus of participants was quite different. A protesters scuffling with police might expect to be arrested and even quite severely beaten, but would probably not expect to be killed or dismembered. Likewise, police might worry about being injured, but would not expect to see hundreds of fellow police killed. An ancient soldier making attack would know he had a very high probability of being killed or dismembered.

[Timus]

A fairly rare example of riot police maneuvering in a fairly open space. It's quite fascinating to see the way the small units manoeuver one way then another. I wonder to which extent the Romans relied on their 6-10 men tent groups. At around 5 minutes, you see a unit shuffling to the right to make room for reinforcement. And then spread out in a somewhat more open formation to cover more ground but always keeping each small team tight. Which makes me think of that battle in the Anabasis where Xenophon has his men perform something vaguely similar.
https://youtu.be/zFkyR5UQfX8?t=44s

[MonsGraupius]

Hello! We are two students from New Zealand currently doing a high-school research project for our Classics/Latin class. Our project is based on the following question:

To what extent has Roman military combat equipment and accompanying tactics influenced that which is used in modern day riot control?

I think the South Koreans explicitly say they are following Roman style tactics (or there's a YouTube video say that).
The shield just tends to come out in various shapes. The simplest shape is either round, or because the human body is fairly constant in width a rectangle - which for strength is curved.

The main reason for the similarity, is that the police are trying to stop a crowd from breaking through their ranks. The main difference is that the Roman front line would stab with their gladius - however, if you are struggling to push back a crowd, it would be difficult to use a weapon at the same time, so the difference would be much less than some above imagine.

Now we've helped you, where can we see this project when it is finished?

[Densus]

I am not a Roman scholar but I can give you the opposite perspective on this because I teach crowd management. The answer is, unfortunately for you, that Roman tactics have next to no influence on modern crowd management. We simply don't enough about how the Romans fought to draw any lessons from it. If you look at the threads on here about tactics and the academic articles they link to you will see there is no real consensus on how anything worked below the strategic level.

Modern tactics are based purely on what works and, in countries where it is done well, the tactics are designed by experienced people who have had to deal with a lot of violent disorder.

As for shield design I couldn't tell you what inspires most of the people that design them because most of them are fairly useless. There is only one company that I am aware of who got actual users to help them design their shields and what they came up is very different to any of the Roman shields we know of.

[Bryan]

Most modern riot shields are sized the way they are because they are protecting from top to bottom, largely against missile weapons, rocks, bottles, etc., not arrows and javelins. i think a great indicator of how differently the two types operate can be see not only with major shifts in mindset and mission but also how the scutum was used by an indivisible individual, even though it could have been used strapped to the shield arm the scutum wasnt (minus the occasional  problematic icon that shows strapped scutum), it was held by a horizontal center grip which allowed it to be used quite dynamically, as good offensively as defensively. That means on the individual level the weapons differ, shields are night and day, mindset and mission is different too. 

Organization of small units is different. Leadership is much different, not only in methods but number (for most of their history Romans had no known tactical small unit leaders). Terrain is much different. Enemy is much different as are the rules of engagement (Roman soldiers werent worried about cameras recording things lawyers can see). So its no surprise they were different beasts.

[MonsGraupius]

I am not a Roman scholar but I can give you the opposite perspective on this because I teach crowd management.  The answer is, unfortunately for you, that Roman tactics have next to no influence on modern crowd management.

Densus, I would be very interested to discuss the subject with you. In order to understand the dynamics of a Roman line, I have collected dozens of videos showing crowd control which show a variety of techniques being used both by rioters and police, but without speaking to someone it's difficult (from the clips which tend to be snippets) to understand what factors lead to the various formations.

And perhaps then you might share with us what you believe to be the likely depth of a Roman line based on your crowd control experience? (If you wish contact me direct via messaging).

For interest, I was trying to work out the physics involved when cavalry charge a line of people. I couldn't find anything online to help me model it and as it was difficult to work out how it could be modelled, I ran a quick test to see what happens and what factors affect a "horse" charging a line "soldiers" / "police".

Note, the extreme care I took to ensure very lifelike figures - joke! But the weight of the "horse" is roughly in scale to that of the "soldiers".

Real time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fa1oJ77Z42g
Slowed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fk83NUPfR-8

Note my conclusion was that it would need to be modelled as a complex series of collisions of both "horse to men" and "men to men". It's also a question of psychology - if the men are prepared to stand and the line is too deep for the horse, then most horses will refuse to charge a dense line of men. However, if the front lines try to get out the way, the horse will get through even a relatively deep line leaving a hole.

[Bryan]

I am not a Roman scholar but I can give you the opposite perspective on this because I teach crowd management.  The answer is, unfortunately for you, that Roman tactics have next to no influence on modern crowd management.

Densus, I would be very interested to discuss the subject with you. In order to understand the dynamics of a Roman line, I have collected dozens of videos showing crowd control which show a variety of techniques being used both by rioters and police, but without speaking to someone it's difficult (from the clips which tend to be snippets) to understand what factors lead to the various formations.

And perhaps then you might share with us what you believe to be the likely depth of a Roman line based on your crowd control experience? (If you wish contact me direct via messaging).

For interest, I was trying to work out the physics involved when cavalry charge a line of people. I couldn't find anything online to help me model it and as it was difficult to work out how it could be modelled, I ran a quick test to see what happens and what factors affect a "horse" charging a line "soldiers" / "police".

Note, the extreme care I took to ensure very lifelike figures - joke! But the weight of the "horse" is roughly in scale to that of the "soldiers".

Real time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fa1oJ77Z42g
Slowed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fk83NUPfR-8

Note my conclusion was that it would need to be modelled as a complex series of collisions of both "horse to men" and "men to men". It's also a question of psychology - if the men are prepared to stand and the line is too deep for the horse, then most horses will refuse to charge a dense line of men. However, if the front lines try to get out the way, the horse will get through even a relatively deep line leaving a hole.

Riot control horse units have success against rioters and protesters because neither are almost never armed with real weapons of any sort and are rarely formed up in any real manner. Historically, cavalry didn't defeat infantry frontally by running their horses into people full tilt to batter them with the horse's weight, the riders used spears and swords and javelins for a reason. Horses aren't cars, they are made of flesh and blood, and if they run into something hard (like an iron helmet or a shield boss) at a rapid rate of speed they will break or tear something, trip on bodies, etc. Horses are prey animals, their natural reaction is to run away from harm or danger (its why they run so fast in the first place). Stallions are more aggressive, more likely to fight, aggression can be encouraged in animals that already possess it, but it takes lots of training (years) of high quality animals (meaning very expensive, before the years of training) to get a horse that would even contemplate frontally charging infantry (which almost all cavalry in the ancient world never did, let alone train for). Horses and people aren't legos, they are living, breathing, thinking beasts, full of copious amounts of organs and blood, who usually will try to do what they want vs. what another person wants them to.

[MonsGraupius]

Riot control horse units have success against rioters and protesters because neither are almost never armed with real weapons of any sort and are rarely formed up in any real manner. Historically, cavalry didn't defeat infantry frontally by running their horses into people full tilt...

The video is intended to try to work out the physics of what would happen if a horse charged into a line as this is likely a worst case scenario. The same thing applies if a hoard of people charge but obviously with different speeds and masses.  However, it's a bit of a red herring here as I'm unaware of any rioters that have used horses to charge police lines.

What I'm interested to know what factors affect the depth of a police line and the decisions to form up in loose and tight formations.

[Bryan]

What I'm interested to know what factors affect the depth of a police line and the decisions to form up in loose and tight formations.

Size of the crowd dictates the size of the responding riot control. The bigger it gets, the more precincts get called, each of which has to provide a specific number of personnel (they typically don't bring them all, they still have patrol responsibilities). If the crowd is bigger than the police force can contain, additional agencies, like State Troopers or departments from neighboring areas, or even the National Guard (whose riot training is grossly outdated so they are rarely used aside from a show of force) will be brought in to assist. The name of the game is containment, so they will typically keep calling riot control until the riot is contained. 

No one formula exists for numbers, NYPD operates differently than say Middle of Nowhere, Idaho. Shield walls are used because they create mobile walls to contain the rioters, they offer the best frontal protection from missiles, and they allow officers to gain the advantage of close order formations for the psychological effect of group protection. Their depth is usually limited out of necessity, the rioters rarely try to charge the riot control line and break through it, if they do there are better means of controlling the crowd then shield and batons, CS grenades, concussion grenades, rubber ball grenades, paintballs, rubber bullets, ultrasonic weapons, high pressure water hoses, actual firearms for lethal force (rarely used), which are stationed behind the front rank, so they can quickly be used by opening the ranks or used from the heights of a vehicle roof, or thrown over the top of the shield wall. 

Shield walls aren't used because somebody read Polybius, Livy, Vegetius, or Adrian Goldsworthy books. They are used because the size of the shield (usually rectangular body shields) is most protective in a unified in a group by having everyone stand really close to one another, helped since they don't really need to move dynamically, and rarely use batons either (which by and large are not effective weapons in a fight). Cops don't show up to riots hoping to get hurt, departments cant risk cops getting hurt, which is why they give them so much padding and armor, and the big plexiglass (sometimes metal) shields. 

Loose formations are best for offensive crowd dispersal tactics, riot control personnel can rush the rioters and just go to town beating the crap out of the slow ones who don't run away fast enough. Its dangerous because the loss of cohesion and order can make a rioter counter attack dangerous, and command and control is basically impossible. But it rarely happens, because most agencies aren't willing to deal with the repercussions of dispersing rioters with violence in the age of 24 hours news and cell phone videos recording and uploading nasty incidents to social media. Same reason they don't just shoot them anymore like the old days or modern 3rd World countries.  

Normal chain of command exists for the forces. Sergeants are sometimes in the line but usually in the back of it, to better give command and control while monitoring radios and being given commands from the rear, they oversea riot control certified Patrolman. These will in turn be controlled by Lieutenants (who rarely will be included in the line, stationed behind for command and control), Captains, Chiefs, and any other senior officers in attendance (usually its a goat rope, with LOTS of brass, all giving conflicting commands, leading to more confusion and chaos).

[Michael J. Taylor]

I would reiterate the psychological factors: note the youtube videos of the Paris riots, where both sides are abiding by certain norms: the police are not massacring rioters, and the rioters aren't trying to murder police. If violence did take place (a fear I have now more than ever in modern riots), it would escalate to firearms quickly.  While some of the dynamics are the same, the basic fact that neither side is interesting in escalating things to the point of maximum violence is important, as this would have been the starting point of an ancient battle.