Would YOU have fired your rifle?

This question is based on a real incident that I witnessed in the 1960s, when my mother and I were at The Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery, to witness the Changing of the Guard ceremony.

While there, a female toddler probably 3 – 5 years of age, wandered under the velvet rope, toward The Sarcophagus. The Sentinel on duty aimed his rifle at her (as his orders stated) and yelled, “I ORDER YOU TO HALT!” Fortunately, the little girl’s father reached over the rope, grabbed his daughter by her hair, and dragged her back to the proper side of the rope, and the Sentinel lowered his weapon and resumed his cadence, as if nothing had happened.

I was told that, had the little girl gotten too close to the monumnet, that she would have been shot, as the instructions given those guards are absolute and inviolate, and are not age restrictive, even if the sentinel knows that the person is really a toddler.

A USAF buddy told me, “Yes, he would have fired at her; those are his orders.”

Would YOU have fired, if she had gotten, “too close?”