[Peace-discuss] Today in the Military *Military.com*

[John W.]

On Tue, May 27, 2008 at 3:21 PM, Stuart Levy <slevy at ncsa.uiuc.edu> wrote:

On Tue, May 27, 2008 at 02:54:39PM -0500, John W. wrote:
>

> > On Tue, May 27, 2008 at 2:27 PM, Barbara kessel <barkes at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > "The Hague restrictions do not apply to Law Enforcement Agencies,
> > > however. Ballistics expert Gary Roberts said that is an inconsistency
> > > that needs to be remedied, particularly at a time when so many other
> > > types of destructive ordnance are allowed in combat." from the article
> > > in the N-G today. (Great follow up for Memorial Day, don't you think?)
> > >
> > > Can someone explain to me what this little apparently parenthetical
> > > comment means in an article that is all about military weapons in
> > > combat? Is this referencing the Iraqi police, perhaps? Or our police?
> >
> >
> > Given that they're discussing the Hague Conventions, which is/are an
> > international agreement, and the article specifically says that the Hague
> > restrictions do not apply to law enforcement agencies, I'd say it's all
> > police anywhere in the world which are NOT included.  Thus they are
> > individually free to decide whether or not to use hollow-point bullets.
> >
> > American police definitely use hollow-point bullets.  The idea is, as
> > previously stated, that if you've reached the point in a "situation"
> where
> > it's either your life or your assailant's, you want ammunition that will
> > stop your assailant in his/her tracks, not just infuriate him/her
> further.
> >
> >
> > > This technical/neutral-sounding tone is always there in discussions of
> > > weapons and tactics in the local and state law enforcement agency
> > > settings as well, where it is not a previous assumption that "killing
> > > is their business" as it is in the military.
> >
> > In law enforcement, the use of force is an integral part of their
> > "business".  I don't understand why any of this is surprising.
> >
> > To use an analogy, do you expect every scientific discussion of, say, the
> > relative merits of wind energy vs. solar energy to include an elaborate
> > discussion justifying the use of alternative energy sources in the first
> > place?
>
> Well, considering what kind of force can be appropriate
> should surely be prominent part of the discussion when looking at
> new levels of force.


And that seems to me to be precisely what the article about the military is
discussing.  What level of force is appropriate in close-quarters combat?  A
discussion of the merits of different types of ammo is one aspect of that
question.



> Barbara cuts to an essential issue --
> killing *is not* supposed to be the business of the police.


No, but stopping a person who is armed and dangerous IS the business of
police.  Is that distinction merely a semantic one?


If the article were talking about how desirable it would be for
> the police to carry machine guns to ensure their own
> safety when acting in dangerous situations (crack houses?
> rowdy night clubs?  you never know what someone at a loud party
> might be carrying), would you think that was unsurprising?


I would think that an article discussing the advantages and disadvantages of
machine guns would be entirely appropriate.  Would I prefer to see it in the
pages of a police magazine rather than on the front page of the
News-Gazette?  I honestly don't know.  What value do you place on "the
public's right to know"?  Don't you as a citizen WANT to know if the police
are considering carrying machine guns?  Don't you as a citizen WANT to know
how the SWAT team is armed, and what its parameters are?


We see over and over again that measures which are supposed to be used only
> in the most urgent situations come to be used routinely.  So tasers,
> offered as a safer alternative to deadly force, get used on a student in
> the
> UCLA library who refuses to show an ID.


Absolutely correct, and this tendency needs to be discussed and emphasized
in the public square, the marketplace of ideas.  My only point was that one
article cannot possibly discuss all aspects of a situation, and there's a
place in the discussion for more scientific or technical articles, just as
there's a (necessary) place for the moral, ethical, and social-science
arguments.

I do understand Jan's and Barbara's concern about how "matter-of-fact" the
article seemed to be, and it's certainly appropriate to raise that point.

I guess what I find problematic is morality based on squeamishness.  It's a
dangerous, vicious world we live in, with only the thinnest veneer of
"civilization".  To take another example, I personally find hunting
revolting, but a great many people have been doing it for millennia, and
many articles are written every year about the delights of bow-hunting as
opposed to hunting with guns.  I don't read the articles, of course, but I
think they have their place.  And I would need far more than my personal
revulsion if I wanted to make any sort of coherent case against hunting.

John
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