Troops patrolling city streets becomes the new normal.

For those of you who think that national troops patrolling city streets only happens in third world countries, think again. Since January 2015, french troops have been operating on the streets of France due to the rise of terrorism in their country. Operation Sentinel has seen over ten thousand soldiers and almost five thousand gendarmes (national police) patrolling France. That is HALF of the french army continuing operations in every major city and most minor ones every day.

The french people seem to have accepted it as the price of safety, but now they are chaffing under it due to the "yellow vest" protest that started over fuel prices and have morphed into protests for every minor grievance being opposed by troops. To be fair most of these protests devolve into riots, arson, and mayhem, kinda like most "social justice" protests in American colleges.

Once the precedence has been set, it's hard to argue against it as every "emergency" will need immediate deployment of troops and once the troops are there it's harder to do without them. Soldiers are disciplined and won't tolerate lawlessness in their presence (unless order to), but they are not cops nor are they trained to be cops. Their training is to defeat enemies with firepower, not talking with a "conflict resolution specialist" to mediate a dispute.

Old Europe is walking down a dangerous path and I hope America will take notice of it and walk a different one.

 

We already have SWAT "troops" being used in situations where one uniformed officer would suffice, so it wouldn't take much to scale it up to real military troops. It's coming.

 

Spain lived under military law from '36 for well into the 70s.
Francoist Spain - Wikipedia
If you stepped outside after curfew you could be shot.

 

Not here inless major SHTF or Rev 2.0 kicks off, we have specific laws governing the what and when of this, and it would take a hell of a lot to make it through the hoops to get it going!

 

While I hate to say I told you so, I have slight problems with the police being referred to as Officers, etc, and the non police as Citizens. For most of my 80 + life, the local police were neighbors who were also in law enforcement, often part time, and while they had all the faults of the rest of us did, we could talk to them. Now when they arrive from a few years in the military or from college with a degree in Criminology and go to the Police Academy, they somehow seem to think in a different manner and in their professionalism, I can see them enforcing laws and preforming actions that my old neighbor who was a semi trained policeman would not do. It seems as the big city us vs them attitudes have now reached down to the smallest town and we have went from a chief and 4 part timers, to a chief, 6 full time officers, and a woman matron, while the town population has increased from 4,000 to 6,000, and we have been bombarded with demands for a new 2.5 million dollar police station and are being accused of not supporting out local police when as voters we reject it as our taxes are already out of sight.
It would also seem that the extreme oversight, racial biases, gender biases, etc that the police are subjected to, and the extreme rewards of the pay, benefit, and pension system, both in money value and in age of receiving it, has rendered our present law enforcement system into a very rigid almost inhumane system. Any action that can even be perceived as being outside of the book can result in their losing not only their good paying job, but the ability to get a replacement in the field, and to lose their pensions. In order to survive they have to follow all the rules and not jumping high enough when ordered to do so can have severe consequences. Not a system designed to give complete cooperation between the law enforcement and rest of the community. Best solution has reached the point of staying below the radar and minimize your contact with them. But that in itself is increasing the alienation.

 

As Seawolf said ,,,,, It's coming ,,, just be ready,,,, Israel has had their military walking the city streets , riding around on city buses ,, sporting battle gear for who knows how many years now . I can guarantee at least 40 years . But yes ,, it's coming . I will withhold some further comments at the moment as to my opinions on why it's coming ,, and how to stop it ,,, but it may not be acceptable .

 

SB21 has a good point, are we going to be the Jews carrying the guns or the Arabs being watched? In our system it could be racial, white vs non white, or liberal vs conservative, or urban vs rural. Jury is out and ever one is trying to see that they get the power. Don't have a lot of hope in a peaceful outcome and one election or recession could trigger a level of instability that we haven't had since the Civil War.

 

Yes sir ,, exactly Duane ,,, we have some scary times approaching ,,, and it may be sooner than later ,,, no one really knows when,,,,

 

History is a favorite of mine, hard to believe that when Hitler held his rallies in Nuremberg in 1934 and had 700,000 people there cheering and almost the whole German nation behind him, that 11 years later most of Germany would be in ruins, divided up between the victors, that 30 % of the military and at least 10 % of the total population would be dead. Stalin, Polpet, Mao, and others have made those numbers look like child's play. The mere fact that they think that anyone will win if there is a massive breakdown of our society or economic system for any reason is one of the most frightening concepts I have ever heard.

 

the reason why there's military on the streets - doing police patrol duty in Europe and other world parts - the police aren't up to par for armed duty or the gooberment don't want that impression on the streets ...

one of the rare exceptions in Europe is Germany - goes back to the divided country and the constant threat West Germany was under >>> Briton has gone to mobile gun armories - pass out the guns at an incident and hope not toooo many die waiting >>>> French are still unarmed - still pedal away on their bikes when a gun appears >>>> Denmark across to Finland none of the coppers are armed - barely defend themselves much less the public ....

 

Katrina,
Yes I know things settled down quickly but only because the MIC put out the word his troops would stop looking like a Battle Troop if the townies stopped shooting. Townies/Thugs knew he was serious.
Then we found out that the NOL Police Dept had a large ghost PD and monies were missing.
Sometimes you have to stomp out the roaches.

 

Been done before, many time.

This time around, I think it will be different. The PTB won't be getting poorly/untrained draftees/Nat Guard - but troops with multiple combat tours in a hot combat zone.

I also suspect this will lead to many (ugly) surprises.....

 

Israel is not good example of this as they have troops deployed on it's borders and Jerusalem. When you know the direction you will be attacked from it's prudent to station troops there. I visited Israel in the early nineties (Jerusalem, Eilat, Tel Aviv, ect.) and was amazed at the rifle armed civilians walking calmly down streets or riding the bus along with the occasional soldier going about their way. Soldiers weren't patrolling the streets, just happened to be on the street.

Also the occasional deployment of troops after a natural disaster or social disaster (riot) has always been temporary in America. When we get to the point of troops patrolling our streets for months on end let alone years like France, then there is a serious problem that I don't think talking about will fix.

 

...... in the majority of the countries you cite the average street police officer IS in fact armed with at least a sidearm to include Denmark and France, Finland do but I am not as certain as I am with the others that they do constantly In the UK there are more and more armed police (and not just the ARVs) than ever. Take a stroll around ANY landmark. The most recent attack was ended with a couple of rounds from a G36.

Many assume that Australian police are also unarmed....

 

Nevada Guard soldiers, airmen to deploy for New Year's Eve mission in Las Vegas

as said above been done and doing for many years.

 

Battle Rattle time.

 

BT I think they were ordered out by the governor, once federalized they are restricted, under the Gov they are not.

 

Being from America I find it odd that any police officer would not be armed with a pistol, but find it odd to see an officer armed with a long gun. I only cited France and Israel, so I'm not sure what other countries you are referring to aside from the "Old Europe is walking down..." quote. Sorry I thought you were referring to my post.

 

..... quite OK mate.

Police on the streets with SMGs has been common place in Europe for decades, I recall family flying into Italy/Germany/UK and other parts of Europe in the 70/80s and commenting on the SMG carrying officers at the airports and on the streets (at the height of the Red Brigade/Baader-Meinhof-Gruppe activities and the like). In many of those countries SMG were accepted far more readily than shotguns (which were considered barbaric). I remember landing at LAX on Sept 14 2001 and seeing all manner of longarms being toted around the streets there by various agencies and on my departure around 1 Nov 2001 there were National Guard with M16s helping (standing back and laughing at mostly) the private security types that later became the TSA.