"The US doesn't have much institutional experience dealing with rioters or massive protests of this nature."
Surely you're joking! Grab a history book. Now where would you like to start? I'd suggest you begin 1861 (or a little before) when US Americans went on a four-year mad spree to kill each other which they did in such huge numbers that the death toll tallied more than that of all other wars the US has fought in (WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, etc.).
(From my observation of the present troubles, it seems to me that many of the issues that caused the 1861-65 War Between the States still aren't resolved 155 years later.)
A riot is not a civil war. And I doubt that any law enforcement agencies would be able to tap a civil war veteran's experience, even if it were.
Crowd control - especially when that crowd is being adversarial - is its own art, separate from the typical functions of law-enforcement, and one rarely called upon. My point was that few LEOs have experienced real riots/unrest or regularly trained for that function, because it is such a rare occurence. Most of those who have are likely retired, and their successors largely operating on second-hand knowledge.
Surely you're joking! Grab a history book. Now where would you like to start? I'd suggest you begin 1861 (or a little before) when US Americans went on a four-year mad spree to kill each other which they did in such huge numbers that the death toll tallied more than that of all other wars the US has fought in (WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, etc.).
(From my observation of the present troubles, it seems to me that many of the issues that caused the 1861-65 War Between the States still aren't resolved 155 years later.)