My estimate is that we would have had a move-out alert for a day, with media coverage. And that leaves would have been canceled. But I wasn’t privy to the top levels.
Here’s what happened when Syria attacked Jordan in 1970, per Wikipedia: Syria sent an armored division into Jordan to reinforce the Palestinian forces under attack by [Jordan’s King] Hussein’s army. By July 1971, Syria had broken off diplomatic relations with Jordan over the issue.
Here’s what we saw: The Nixon administration ordered an airborne unit that was in field training in one of our sites in the former American Zone of Germany to pack up and return immediately to their barracks. They did so, followed on the autobahn by Soviet Military Liaison officers who snapped lots of photos, followed by a long traffic jam that made the front pages of the German papers. When our guys reached their base, the staff of the JAG office was waiting with prepared wills for any soldier who didn’t have one, and there was more media coverage. A stereotypical senior NCO was quoted as never having seen such a serious movement since Korea.
I asked some of my friends in Service Company if they had been put on alert for supporting the airborne with various technical skills. Nope. And then there was a pause while the British-trained Jordanians pushed back the Syrians. Diplomatic news was that the Soviet Union was urging the Syrians to back off — and probably showing them 8×10 glossies of the long column of airborne soldiers on the autobahn.
So based on how an outside incident that did not directly involve the U.S. was handled I would estimate that we would have taken actions for preparedness and publicity. NATO is doing that right now in the eastern border countries.
-- rwr