Secretary McCarthy had asked General LaNeve to convey, the same one Colonel Hunter and law enforcement had already chosen earlier. Major General Walker said, "the only way [Lt. Nick] could have got it was listening to the VTC, which I was on."[359] He further said, "I never saw General LaNeve on the [video teleconference] . . . I didn't hear General LaNeve's voice."[360] Lt. Nick said he had it penned at much later—at 5:09 p.m.—"as the time they received the orders" to deploy.[361]
Major General Walker certainly did not act as if he had been given authority until, fortuitously, General McConville—who had heard about the 4:35 p.m. call—walked by the teleconference screen and was "surprised" to see the commanding general sitting idly at 5:09 p.m.[362]
Major General Walker agreed the first time he heard he had the authority was from the lips of the general: "General McConville came back into the call and said, Hey, you're a go."[363]
Lt. Col. Reinke's QRF and Captain Tarp's second shift got on the bus at 5:10 p.m.[364] They left at 5:15 p.m.[365] Lt. Col. Reinke said they didn't arrive at the Capitol Police parking lot until 5:55 p.m.,[366] although official timing from the Army and Department of Defense put their arrival time at 5:40 p.m. and from the DC Guard at 5:20 p.m.[367] At the earliest, the troops arrived in the vicinity of the Capitol grounds at 5:29 p.m., when Lt. Col. Reinke texted Colonel Hunter: "Apparently we pulled into the wrong lot, trying to reroute to LOT 16 now."[368] He said they sat around for 20 minutes once they arrived, and then were sworn in, before relieving an entire line of officers.[369] Captain Tarp said they remained idle for 45 minutes waiting for Capitol Police to come "bus by bus to swear-in the officers. It was a long wait. Frustrating—we're sitting a mile from where we['re] going."[370]
Captain Tarp said, "By the time we got there, we were just holding back the people who remained past the curfew."[371] The height of the riot had passed.
Colonel Hunter estimated that—had his preparations been approved—the DC Guard could have arrived as early as an hour and a half earlier than they did.
"Within one hour, I'd say I could've had 135. So the [about 40] coming from Joint Base Andrews, if they would've headed directly to me at the Capitol, and then the 90 I had on the street and the 4 that were—including myself," he said.[372] "[S]o I arrived at the Capitol at 3:10. So, if I would've recalled everyone by 3:30, 3:40, we could've been—had gear on and walking towards the Capitol."[373]
He further stated: "I would give them another hour. So by 4:40 I should've had at least 250 coming from the Armory . . . That includes the second shift as well as full-timers."[374]
