Trying to survive getting a knife plunged into you is a little more involved than “defusing a situation”. Talking a guy down from a ledge is defusing a situation.
Nah. I’ll tell you what, I’ve been to England twice, but never dealt with any Bobbies. In fact, except for at the airport I don’t even recall seeing very many police. Could just be memory fog caused by all the beer I was drinking. (probably some of the best in the world).
But I know of a half dozen police officers that went over in the late 80’s/early 90’s on some kind of internship exchange. I believe they each spent about a month working with them. I don’t recall the full details of the program, as I wasn’t involved in it, it wasn’t even offered to me, but I do specifically recall every one of them coming home and telling stories about situations they saw, and proclaiming that the Brit cops were nuts for not being armed. Sorry, but I’m taking their word for it.
The mere fact that you didn’t see many police pkbites simply illustrates just how law abiding the UK is compared with the USA.
Our coppers keep a low profile but they are out and about and are just as ready as any US police to deal with situations as they arise. No need to patrol endlessly just on the offchance of encountering Billy the Kid holding up the stage
Might I suggest that you’re not presenting quite the standard of evidence one might normally hope for. From your “don’t remember” comment, it appeared you were making a point. When that point was addressed, you claim it was merely an anecdote about your memory. Which is it?
If you go to Heathrow, you see a great number of armed cops carrying semiautomatics (I think), all over the place - more specific info on firearms carried. I don’t know if you were there before or after 9/11, but there are definitely more of them since 2001. One reason you might not have noticed them is that you’re used to seeing armed police. I’m not, and it does stand out to me, as someone who never normally sees a gun in daily life.
Did you bother reading the Police Federation quotations cited upthread? I’ll summarise in case you’re too busy: A. The cops want more specialized armed units; B. 82% of the cops themselves don’t want to be armed. It’s quite clear to me what they’re saying.
Another thing you might be surprised to know, but there is an enquiry every single time a police weapon is fired. Police + guns is not a subject taken lightly over here.
I had an MTI back at Basic who mentioned that he was a cop in a previous life, and they were trained in talking down situations. Mind you, the extent of this training could vary wildly from one police department to a next (each city has its own police force, and some, such as Houston, even have at least two separate forces).
That said, in the US, you might not call it “reasoning” if it’s someone threatening you with a weapon. It might still be reasoning, but we’d have a really manly phrase for it, with “reasoning” having too much connotation of happy-fuzzy-ness. Also, the scenario presented seems to imply that the knife attack is, for whatever reason, already in progress. At this point, it’s too late for talk and time for the defensive beat-down, but it’s clear the preferred policy is to defuse the situation BEFORE it turns into an open attack.
Now, as far as shooting a man attacking you with a knife, the problem here is either A) The cops don’t have a proper response to a knife attack, so they have to go straight to the next level of violence (firearms) to defend themselves, leading to a disproportionate response, or B) The cops may not be trained or competent enough to recognize that the gunplay isn’t warranted yet.
When I was in Basic, they had a class where we had to play perimeter guard. Our instructors would would roleplay some kind of intrusion, and we’d have to response appropriately. A LOT of trainees resorted to deadly force (ie: “Shooting” our instructor with a fake rifle) far earlier than they should have, and a few others even more frustratingly refused to give any kind of response other than to weakly say “Halt!” over and over again, sometimes as the instructor pulled a gun and walked straight up to them. I imagine this stuff isn’t easy at all, and takes a lot of the right kind of training and mindset to do properly.
Oh, another thought, it was mentioned that in the UK cops travel in pairs. That possibly has a large influence on cops being attacked too. You’re always more than twice as safe if you travel with a wingman, as buddies are force multipliers. If nothing else, your partner would be an extra set of eyes to see trouble coming.
In the US, it’s not uncommon to see cops patrolling singly, due to the manpower requirements of all the patrolwork that is required. Cops travel in pairs on cop shows because it makes for more interesting dialogue than watching the one cop talk to himself or constantly having conversations on the radio.
In Ireland, the police are unarmed. And remained unarmed all thru’ a significant terrorist campaign. There was a court case recently where an unarmed Garda (Irish policeman) apprehended and arrested 2 armed bank robbers who had already shot someone. I suspect that if the police here were armed that episode would have resulted in fatalities, possibly the Garda’s.
It would help by letting them know that a revolver is a type of pistol, and “pistol” is just a synonym for “Handgun”.
No, no it won’t. It’s really not that hard to make a gun safe- keep your finger off the trigger, open the action, and, if possible, remove the magazine. A cocked and potentially loaded firearm bouncing around in the boot of a car is so stupefyingly dangerous it defies belief.
Just because I don’t recall seeing any police outside of the airport does not in any way prove the law abidingness of anyone. If anything it proves I wasn’t paying much attention.
I wasn’t suggesting driving over speed-bumps with a loaded gun the boot.
But in term of making sure no-one gets shot - from a law enforcement point-of-view - locking a gun in a car boot until the experts arrive will stop people getting shot with it.
Not necessarily- a loaded, cocked gun could still go off if improperly handled. Like I said, it’s not that hard to make a gun safe, and provided you’re familiar with the five basic firearm actions (Bolt, break, lever, semi-auto, revolver), you shouldn’t have any problems with any of the major types of firearm that you’re likely to encounter.
No… A revolver is a handgun with a variable number of revolving chambers (usually 5 or 6), and a “pistol” is just another name for “handgun”, ie any firearm which is designed to be carried on ones person and held & fired with with one hand.
A handgun with a magazine in the butt/grip is a “Semi-automatic”, FWIW.
Thank you for actually trying to answer the question. I appreciate that.
This was a simple question about if British police get basic firearms training. Not enough to become experts, but enough that they won’t shoot themselves in the foot if handed a gun (or wait for an “expert” to be able to unload a gun, it doesn’t take an expert to be able to do that).
Thanks to everyone else for fucking up a simple GQ question.
