Police militarization

 

By Jim Killebrew

[August 23, 2014]  A lot has been said in the news about the "militarization" of the police forces across the country. In Ferguson, Missouri many were complaining about the police using riot gear and heavy equipment handed down from the military. The thought was it created intimidation and fear among the people even though they were looting, throwing Molotov Cocktails and burning buildings.

Through that Ferguson experience we learned the federal government through the military has been giving military vehicles and armaments to local police forces throughout the country. The criticism has begun by the media and others the "look" of the police force is more militarized and has no place in a community even where a crime such as what happened in Ferguson. It brought to mind another incident earlier in Boston when two brothers bombed the Marathon causing death and injury. Through the federalization of the search the military was actually brought in.
It is all well and good the suspected bombers in Boston were stopped from taking more lives, injuring more people and doing more damage. There is no doubt those two brothers were identified, found and neutralized in a record amount of time. We saw the people in the neighborhood cheer and applaud as the law enforcement, federal agents, state police and local police left the arrest site.

There is just one thing to remember regarding this incident. Local and state police were federalized, the government stepped in and "locked down" an entire American city, military-like tactical gear was brought in to a city with heavy armored vehicles and automatic weapons of war, they marched through the streets, closed down the entire city and went from house to house searching inside without warrants. If it wasn't called martial law it resembled it so closely one could scarcely tell the difference.

Without a doubt people rested easier when the suspect was found and apprehended. Yes, the law enforcement agencies along with the federal and state agencies coupled with the military saved the day. One lesson we should have learned, however, was that what we witnessed in a five-day period after an horrific incident, the capability of military-like armaments and law enforcement under the leadership of the political structure can so easily and quickly come together to enact a martial law type of control that immobilizes citizens in a sequester to their homes and subjects them to searches without the benefit of warrants from the court. This should give us pause to realize this action is not so difficult to accomplish in America given the right circumstances.

Looking at the two incidents, one in Boston and the other in Ferguson, Missouri we also need to remember that one incident coincided more with actual police activity, while the other was clearly a terrorist act. As the federal government has gone through the process of winding down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the weapons of war have been divvied up to local law enforcement agencies rather than being mothballed, the tenor of our world now seems to be gathering force to produce more incidents like Boston than incidents like Ferguson.

One only has to look at the Middle East and Northern Africa to note there is a powder keg ready to explode. What we have been hearing from the likes of ISIS or ISIL is a warning that newly radicalized terrorist groups are ready and willing to attack our homeland. ISIL is sophisticated and well-organized as Secretary of Defense Chuck Hegel stated the other day. They have murdered and begun their efforts to enact genocide as well as boasted they will fly their flag over the American White House. They have been reported to have the means and the funding to continue their march from Syria, through Iraq establishing their caliphate and a base of operations for terror reaching out to other nations around the world.

Now, as this build-up continues we must realize there are several factors that must be considered and watched closely by Congress and the courts. The kind of war that is being fought in our world today is not exactly the same as was fought in the two world wars, the Korean War or the Vietnam war. Even the Gulf War and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were different than what is now developing with a formidable terrorist group. This will be a multi-front war with terrorists not so much dispatching their forces from a nation-based format, rather from basements, warehouses, neighborhood houses, from within clubs and other organizations in a covert fashion. We have seen their type of warfare: look back at Boston where bombs are hidden in large-crowd venues.

Therefore, local police have to build up their means and methods to fight the fight to protect and serve the people in their local areas. They have to protect the people against robberies, murderers, rape and other felonious activities. But they also have to have another garage somewhere in their backyards to gear up for those who are bringing the terror war to our shores. Captain Ron Johnson said that someone in the demonstrator crowd asked him why the police officers have to wear helmets and face shields since that is so "intimidating" to the crowd. When someone in a crowd in Ferguson, Missouri has to ask a police officer that question and yet at the same time is thoroughly convinced conditions are not fair between the city police and the population, one has to wonder what definition of "fair" is being used.

What is fair is a police force that is prepared to protect the people against the bad guys, but also in the best shape in which they can be to protect themselves while they are protecting us. Further, what is fair is for the police, whether federalized or not, has the materials and equipment to protect us against those who sneak into our country and perpetrate terror on us. If that takes armored vehicles, riot gear and specialized teams for neutralizing riots and snipers or bomb-setters, so be it.

[By JIM KILLEBREW]