Is It Time To Arm Our Police Officers ?

ShootersHillGuru

I understand from reports that the Metropolitan Police Armed Response Unit took twenty minutes to arrive at the horrific scene at Woolwich today after the first 999 calls were made. Now I have no idea whether this twenty minutes is good or bad in response time but my gut instinct is that its far too long. It would seem from what I have heard so far is that after the dreadful killing that these terrorists engaged with onlookers and had no intention to continue the attacks on anyone else other than the unfortunate victim but just suppose they did. There were apparently Police officers on the scene but these were unarmed and unable or unwilling to confront the perpetrators. I don't condemn them for that. Isn't it about time that our police service was routinely armed ? I realise that is a huge leap but it is increasingly obvious that our streets are perilous places and ordinary law abiding citizens cannot be kept adequately safe. Is it too much to offer our serving police officers the protection they need for themselves in order to carry out their jobs and to enable them to offer protection to you, I. And our families.

LoOkOuT

Armed drones are more likely on the agenda. Incident happens, drone deployed to scout and/or "neutralise" offenders. The merits of this, of course, are up for debate!

Lincsaddick

This occurred to me as well .. if the villains were of a different persuasion they could have been miles away from the scene before the armed police arrived. However, I would not like to see the firearming of all policemen. I don't think that the country has yet gone so far down the road to perdition that this is necessary. Although, never say never.

se9addick

No, not yet. Wouldn't have prevented this anyway.

AllLeftFoot

The armed police response was less than 20 minutes.

nth_london_addick

These filth wanted to be killed to become martyrs

Not killing them has harmed their agenda

ShootersHillGuru

AllLeftFoot said:

The armed police response was less than 20 minutes.

That's not what was reported on the news.

[Deleted User]

More guns more Gun Crime. Not the answer IMHO

BlackForestReds

it is increasingly obvious that our streets are perilous places

Our streets have always been dangerous - but many nations arm their police (US, Germany, France etc) - are their streets by comparison any safer?

Would armed police have prevented today's incident?

AFKABartram

Honestly don't know.

As said, it will never stop these incidents

Lincsaddick

another thought .. tasers are a good compromise and perhaps the issuing of them could be increased .. they are of course not really suitable for use against armed, possibly drugged, religious fanatics

North Lower Neil

My instinct says we've got it right - ARUs but not all police having guns. Otherwise I can see more criminals taking guns on 'jobs' and that's a danger to bystanders.

ShootersHillGuru

I think most violent robbers and serious villains are carrying weapons anyway. I just now feel that our police are not being given the support to do their job either safely or effectively.

rananegra

I'd say no. Those coppers who are armed regularly end up shooting people they shouldn't, like the guy carrying a table leg, or the Brazilian on the tube. I also think it changes the relationship between police and public, to the point that I think a majority of police regularly say they don't want to be armed. (Could be wrong on this, but it's always been my impression).

ShootersHillGuru

rananegra said:

I'd say no. Those coppers who are armed regularly end up shooting people they shouldn't, like the guy carrying a table leg, or the Brazilian on the tube. I also think it changes the relationship between police and public, to the point that I think a majority of police regularly say they don't want to be armed. (Could be wrong on this, but it's always been my impression).

This was always my position but I think that the relationship between police and public has shifted anyway. The police are no longer the George Dixon force of my childhood and in many respects more like a para military force in dress and unfortunately attitude. I accept they have an impossible job to do these days and I don't blame them for becoming the cynical and defensive group they now are. I still think on the whole our police service is honourable and well trained. I do not believe wider carrying of guns by trained officers would make our streets more like Brazil but I do think that they might given the quality of our police officer make our streets more akin to other great European cities.

LilAddick

To fight fire with fire just creates a bigger blaze. The police need to douse the flames, but not with violent means. If Britain were to arm the police, tensions would just rise.

nolly

with all the corruption in the police force of late defo not

cafckev

Its not the time it takes for the Armed Response Units to arrive, its the briefing before they go forward from the RPV to the scene that takes the time. The corner where the incident took place has many cctv cameras so I would guess the cctv operator would be watching and should they have done anything else, they would have moved in quicker.

Steve Dowman

it is time they were routinely armed, it is likely to happen very soon imho. we are not living in the 50's anymore and cannot expect them to defend themselves with stab vests.

Addickted

You're kidding yourselves if you don't believe that the MPS are armed.

In Feb 2012, 2044 Police Officers are routinely armed with a gun in the MPS on a day to day basis. That was the equivalent of 5.2% armed.

alan dugdale

I'd say no to arming all but increase the amount of Trojan units on duty. There's usually only a couple to cover south of the river

BDL

Simple answer, no.

stop_shouting

Simple answer, yes.

BlackForestReds

stop shouting said:

Simple answer, yes.

How would armed police have prevented today's atrocity?

Stig

I don't see what good it would have done in this case. These two could have still got away if they'd wanted, even if every copper in London was armed. Unless there's already a policeman within viewing distance, crims would still always have the option of running away. It's not is if there's a cop on every street, is it.

Anything that scales up the arms-race is likely to be bad.

stop_shouting

BlackForestReds said:

stop shouting said:

Simple answer, yes.

How would armed police have prevented today's atrocity?

Did I say it would have? As dowman says, this isn't the 50's. Liberal attempts at stopping tooled up nutters is putting officers at risk. The streets are a war zone BFR and the police have to be properly equiped to deal with it.

ShootersHillGuru

BlackForestReds said:

stop shouting said:

Simple answer, yes.

How would armed police have prevented today's atrocity?

Absolutely correct to say they couldn't have prevented what happened today. My initial post speculated that had those two monsters decided to carry on their murderous spree that it was twenty minutes before a policeman with any means of stopping them appeared on the scene. I think the public deserve more protection than is currently being afforded.

se9addick

ShootersHillGuru said:

BlackForestReds said:

stop shouting said:

Simple answer, yes.

How would armed police have prevented today's atrocity?

Absolutely correct to say they couldn't have prevented what happened today. My initial post speculated that had those two monsters decided to carry on their murderous spree that it was twenty minutes before a policeman with any means of stopping them appeared on the scene. I think the public deserve more protection than is currently being afforded.

Maybe - but surely arming police officers won't provide that and in fact may well make things worse. There might be other solutions but arming them for the sake of it isn't the solution and actually we'll probably lose a hell of a lot more travel we gain.

ShootersHillGuru

Armed police officers are the norm in practically every other country on earth. Are we so different that it can't be made to work or is everywhere else that much worse than here ?

stop_shouting

ShootersHillGuru said:

Armed police officers are the norm in practically every other country on earth. Are we so different that it can't be made to work or is everywhere else that much worse than here ?

Because we bend over for the pc brigade spouting their human rights nonsense.

se9addick

ShootersHillGuru said:

Armed police officers are the norm in practically every other country on earth. Are we so different that it can't be made to work or is everywhere else that much worse than here ?

I can't speak to the nuances of policing in every other country but firearms are not used as much in the UK as most of the rest of the world (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0AonYZs4MzlZbdExSbktqRWpLMjNUMkFGVk5VODRyTnc) it just isn't part of our culture and I don't know why we should have to give up our culture. Either way I'm not entirely sure what it is that arming police will solve, it certainly wouldn't have averted today's tragedy.

stop shouting said:

ShootersHillGuru said:

Armed police officers are the norm in practically every other country on earth. Are we so different that it can't be made to work or is everywhere else that much worse than here ?

Because we bend over for the pc brigade spouting their human rights nonsense.

Give it a rest, it's ridiculous that in this country that when it comes to a debate there are some people who will label any right wing view as racist and equally as ridiculous that any left wing view is dismissed as "pc brigade" (whatever that means). There are lots of good opinions for and against on this thread, not one mentions that we shouldn't arm cops because it would be "politically incorrect" - don't be so ignorant.