Militarization of our Police Force

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"True, but the press has had one or maybe two occasions where they have not presented all the facts of a story correctly."

Okay, when they get around to passing out the awards for the best example of an understatement, you win ... hands down ... ;)
 
I'm of the "if I can't own it, then the police should not be issued it" camp.

If I can't legally purchase a post-86 machinegun, then it should not be available to law enforcement, either.

Practically speaking, I don't mind if the police have AR-15 style rifles. Every cruiser in an urban area should be equipped with a 10.5" or 14.5" AR-15 with an optic of some sort. It might not be appropriate to carry all the time, but I don't mind if they have them readily available. I don't think of it as "militarizing" the police, because heck, I own an AR-15 too and I keep it within easy reach. ;)

However, I would also expect the officers to be properly trained in the use of their rifle. I wouldn't require the same of civilians, but I'm not paying Joe Civilian to keep the peace, either. If you want the job, I have a higher standard I expect you to meet.
 
I don't see anything wrong with this. They're removing surplus rifles to improve the firepower of the police, and at a minimum of cost. Sounds like an ideal situation to me.

Read the article; these rifles were made in 1978. You could feasibly purchase one.
 
My other question would be if there are actually A-2's in 1978 and upgrade took place when the rear sight and barrel was changed to 1 in 7. The article says they are 1978 vintage. If they are semi auto converted I have no objections to that but again the article does not indicate that. When this program was initiated I thought they wanted to unload their A1 uppers.

Why?

1 in 7 affects the type of ammo you should be using.

Also i'm of the "if I can't own it, then the police should not be issued it" camp. It's a balance of power thing.
 
"I'll bet you're a good shot at the range too. However, if we take away that paper target, and replace it with a live person who is moving and shooting a rifle at you, I doubt you would do any better than those cops."

DMF, I have been trained for and passed the "real world" test of fire under stress (US Army 88-96). I can be done, not everyone automatically dumps every round they have when the SHTF.

It just requires intense training not to do so. It is simple the the LEOs in my town do not train the that level. Put a fire team of new Marines up against a full platoon sized LEO force and see who prevails.

Am I overly critical of my local LEO's shooting ability? you bet! I might the one down range from the bad guy they are trying to shoot at.
 
I don't think police should have LESS firepower than us, but definitely not more. If civilians can't have "assault" weapons and full-auto, well, police don't need it either than. Civilians can have full-auto, but only in certain areas and must be treated like criminals and pay top dollar. Police dont have to do this.
 
If you were a deputy in a small department in a rural area where backup wouldn't arrive for quite a while and you're called to a "domestic dispute" and as you pull the car up the driveway the bad guy comes out of the house with an "assault weapon"...

What do you want to hide behind your car with while you call backup?

A.) Your .40 S&W sidearm
B.) A Model 870 12 ga.
C.) An M-16 with at least 3-round burst fire capabilities and 2 30rd. magazine

I'd prefer an M-4 myself, but that's neither here nor there.

At the same time, I feel if they (Law Enforcement) can have the guns, we should be able to have the guns.
 
full autos for LEO gun control for us mutts. Why is it I think that our founding fathers didn't mean for things like this to happen?
 
LEO guns....

i'm all for the cops getting good, sound, operable firearms w/which to do their job. i know they have some problems w/training, knowledge, the god syndrome, etc. so in that vein, i support the right of these departments to get MilSurp weapons & ammo!!! i want them to get shipped ONLY Mosin Nagants, Mauser 98s, or any other manually-operated rifles available. any thing else is STRICTLY prohibited, wouldn't want another WACO goin' on because some cop-simpleton got hairy!! :cool:
 
Read the article; these rifles were made in 1978. You could feasibly purchase one.
Click to expand...
Not true. As military surplus weapons, none of those rifles were registered prior to 1986 with the ATF per the National Firearms Act of 1934 as amended by the Gun Control Act of 1968 and the Firearm Owners Protection act of 1986. It doesn't matter what year those guns were made, they would be illegal for me as a private individual to own.
 
I believe most police agencies could have full auto now if the Chief wants to buy them.
I doubt if many think they are worth the money.

If the Feds want to loan some PD's some older M16's, more power to the local LEO's, go for it I say.

Hopefully they will get the proper training for the rifles, whether, full or semi auto configured.

Just because there are goofy laws restricting my ownership of Title II weapons
is no reason for me to restrict LEO's in the performance of their job. To me the only
question is "Do the LEO's need long guns for their job?". To me, the answer is
in most cases is yes.

allan
 
molonlabe wrote;
My other question would be if there are actually A-2's in 1978 and upgrade took place when the rear sight and barrel was changed to 1 in 7. The article says they are 1978 vintage.
Click to expand...

The M16A2 was adopted by the USMC in 1983 and by the Army in 1985. There were no A2s in 1978. This so called militarization is not new at all. Browning marketed a version of the M1918 BAR to police departments under the trade name of Monitor. This was in the 1920s and 30s IIRC. There are more Thompson submachine guns, Reisings, M2 carbines and other old military weapons floating around in arms rooms and closets of even very small rural police departments then most people realize.

During the era of the interstate bank robbers in the 1920s, the feds even provided surplus military weapons to banks.

There is really no legitimate use for full auto fire in law enforcement. Heck it has limited military uses. Given their druthers, most chiefs would rather have their men armed with semi-automatic weapons. The training and liability issues are much less. But you good taxpayers often would rather not pony up the money to buy AR15s. So DOD has stepped in and begun transferring surplus weapons to civilian agencies. Like I said, this is nothing new...they even gave surplus weapons to bankers years ago.

Jeff
 
they even gave surplus weapons to bankers years ago.
Click to expand...

Back before bankers all turned evil and untrustworthy like now. :rolleyes:

I want a Monitor, I promise to use it only for good... and some high-spirited hijinks. :evil:
 
I don't know if the DOD did this with the surplus M16A1's but the Air Force converted the M16A1's to the M16A2 by replacing the trigger group giving the semi and 3 round burst.
 
Can't speak for the rest of the country, but the few shooouts our police have been involved in, the cops went into "spray & pray" mode. They play the footage on TV and it sounds like the opening sceens of Saving Private Ryan. Not too mention the sea of brass laying amongst all the cop cars. One incedent comes to mind, we had a guy get into a shootout, he had an SKS and the cops all had thier side arms. Of over 500 rounds fired by the police, only like 20 hit the guys truck that he was hiding behind. Now, pistol shooting is tough and requires training, but methinks more is certainly needed.

That's the problem with police. They all panic when someone is shooting at them and trying to kill them and then they can't hit anything.

Now, you take your average guy, who watches TV some, drinks a lot of beer, reads a bunch of gun mags, and goes to the range some. Now, when some crack dealer opens up on him, he is going to calmly set his beer, (remote control, whatever), down, pull out his trusty pistol, sight in carefully, and put one round right between the headlights of that loser.

He's then going going to blow the smoke off of the end of his barrel, look around, and tell the cops it's okay to come out, because Bubba has TCB.
 
I can't realistically think of a reason why a cop would need to use a full-auto M-16. Our police are supposed to be peace officers, not infantrymen. It is disturbing that the police feel they need to arm themselves as if they were going onto a battlefield everytime they take to our streets.

It is even more disturbing that they feel they need this sort of firepower, while at the same time denying the rest of us the same options.

I have no problem with police officers as individuals owning and using any weapon they want in their free time. They're citizens just like the rest of us. They ought to have the same rights we ought to have.

But it's another matter entirely when the local authorites feel compelled to send machinegunners into our midst everyday. There simply isn't any justification for that.
 
Anybody want to point up the irony that, as we're discussing this, we are currently spending millions to develop less-than-lethal weaponry so our highly-trained combat troops can be used as policemen?

Anybody?

:rolleyes:
 
That's the problem with police. They all panic when someone is shooting at them and trying to kill them and then they can't hit anything.

Now, you take your average guy, who watches TV some, drinks a lot of beer, reads a bunch of gun mags, and goes to the range some. Now, when some crack dealer opens up on him, he is going to calmly set his beer, (remote control, whatever), down, pull out his trusty pistol, sight in carefully, and put one round right between the headlights of that loser.

He's then going going to blow the smoke off of the end of his barrel, look around, and tell the cops it's okay to come out, because Bubba has TCB.
Click to expand...
Group9, I love that sarcastic sense of humor. :evil:
 
No matter what they end up doing, I hope securing the weapon will be a considerable part of their training.

I would hate to think a bunch of BGs would come to look on police cars as a quick and easy place to pick up something full auto.....I don't put anything past BGs.

On the other hand I can remember reading a few news items over the years where officers lost or misplaced their weapons and a private citizen found and turned the weapon in. Bad is it's a Glock but worse if it's a FA AR.

There are PDs out there now that have hardware almost as heavy as the Marines. I wonder if that is really justified in the highest % of cases.

Otherwise, if they can have it we should be able to have it.

S-
 
Just thought of another issue.

I wonder, in this sue crazy world we live in, if some LE decision makers will decline the offer or at least only let special teams have the weapons to control liability.

If some BG (or heck by accident some civilian) gets gunned down with a FA weapon and the depart. is sued wouldn't it increase the likely hood the next of kin would win and win bigger because of the weapon used?

There may be trust issues between civilians and LE (us vs them) but I bet the higher ups in most departments don't even have a realtionship that good with the officers.

Just a thought.

S-
 
The easy solution to the whole problem is to only allow police departments to purchase weapons that are civilian legal in their jurisdiction. Law enforcement agencies are government run civilian agencies. They should not get a pass on every firearm law that the rest of the civilian populace has to live with.

I think that a lot of people around here would be less upset about this if they could run down to the gun store and buy themselves a surplus M16A1.
 
If I was a cop I'd take a free M16 just encase.

I'd take one now for free (cost to much to buy) but I don't think I could afford the ammo on full auto.
 
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