Security forces Airmen from the District of Columbia Air National Guard’s 113th Wing are part of a new D.C. National Guard activation to help safeguard monuments in the nation’s capital amid persistent civil unrest stemming from George Floyd’s Memorial Day death in police custody, the wing confirmed to Air Force Magazine on June 24.
“We have about 400 D.C. National Guard members activated to support U.S. Park Police, under the request of the Department of the Interior and approved by Secretary of the Army, who will be unarmed,” DCNG spokesperson Senior Master Sgt. Craig Clapper wrote in a June 24 email to Air Force Magazine.
This new activation comes just days after the wing recalled the last of its Airmen who’d been backing-up law enforcement response to civil disturbances within the district.
The wing on June 22 began transitioning those approximately 150 Airmen, support personnel, and the rest of the wing’s technicians and Drill Status Guardsmen who were still on orders back into business as usual.
113th Wing spokesperson Staff Sgt. Anthony Small told Air Force Magazine the wing is not disclosing how many of its Airmen are part of this new activation due to operational security concerns, noting that the DCNG’s current tasking involves a “smaller mobilization” than the previous one.
He also declined to identify which monuments its Airmen would be protecting, though he noted that they’d be stationed at more than one landmark.