The Maryland National Guard will be deployed in the violence-hit city of Baltimore as soon as possible, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said Monday, after rioters smashed police vehicles and ransacked stores.

"Too many people have spent generations building up this city for it to be destroyed by thugs," Rawlings-Blake told a press conference, saying that state Governor Larry Hogan had agreed to deploy National Guardsmen "as soon as they are available."