Lesson: use decisive force, be strong.
I have directed our military commanders to make every preparation to use decisive force if necessary to maintain order and to protect our troops.
"The French have decided not to use decisive force and get boxed in and have told rebels not to go further," he said.
Mr. Tanner, the security analyst, said that 11 years after the Tiananmen Square protests, security forces were ordered to handle protests cautiously, but that if rioting broke out, officers and paramilitary troops could use "decisive force" as long as senior local officials had given approval.
The regime has laboured for years to portray the Shah as a bloodthirsty tyrant who shot at peaceful demonstrators, yet at the same time it is also generally accepted that the Shah lost his throne because he blinked and failed to use decisive force early enough.
It did deliberately use decisive force to enhance regional deterrence and demonstrate that it had restored its military edge.
The military appeared eager to use exemplary, decisive force against a group of protesters in the misguided belief that this might help to deter further disruptive protests.
"The rise of Iraq, as an example of moderation and democracy and prosperity, is a massive and long-term undertaking," he said, promising that America would use "direct and decisive force" against attackers.
They were meant to be used as a decisive force in the battle, thus prompting an old Roman saying: 'It comes down to the triarii' (res ad triarios venit), which meant carrying on to the bitter end.
And so when something like this clearly is going to get beyond the capacity of whoever caused it, get beyond the capacity of local authorities, I think the federal government has to move in quickly and move in with, to use my favorite expression, decisive force and demonstrate that it's doing everything that it can do".
