Posted on 07/25/2006 3:42:04 AM PDT by Marius3188
POLICE could be forced to shoot members of the public to maintain order in the event of a terrorist "dirty bomb" or biological attack on Britain, it was claimed yesterday.
The Police Federation annual conference in Blackpool was told that so few officers have been trained to deal with a chemical, biological, nuclear or radiological strike that they would have to resort to "very unsavoury but necessary" crowd control.
Bob Elder, the chairman of the constables’ central committee, did not refer specifically to officers firing on civilians, but sources within the organisation said it was clear police could have to resort to firearms to stop contamination being spread by fleeing victims.
The government had failed to explain how important it would be to keep the public inside a cordon after such an atrocity, Mr Elder said.
"This is not about creating mass hysteria," he said. "This is about the opposite. The public has a right to know.
"The natural reaction from the public caught up in such an incident will be to get as far away from the scene as possible. This could, of course, only extend the problem."
In another reference to the possible use of firearms to keep control of an area, Mr Elder added: "We will be the ones who would have to carry out that containment and we would be the ones held responsible for our actions - whatever those may be."
Asked if he could foresee officers firing on civilians, he said: "It’s an option the government is going to have to consider. We haven’t got enough cops trained to deal with full-scale containment and it’s putting everyone at risk."
A spokesman for the Home Office insisted police would not have powers to shoot the public to enforce a cordon in the event of a chemical, biological, nuclear or radiological strike attack.
"Police have the right to detain people if they present a risk to the public," he said. "There are no circumstances in which police could operate some kind of shoot to kill policy under the law."
If they would have "detained" the AIDS population early on we wouldn't have the so-called epidemic.
| Bird flu spiraling out of control in Indonesia |
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| Posted by Toidylop On News/Activism 07/24/2006 5:36:57 PM CDT · 16 replies · 408+ views BirdFluDefense.com ^ | July 24, 2006 | NewsTarget BirdFluDefense.com printable article Originally published July 24 2006 Bird flu spiraling out of control in Indonesia(NewsTarget) While Indonesia discovered its first bird flu outbreak fairly late in comparison to some other infected countries, it has endured one of the fastest spreads, with 42 human H5N1-caused fatalities reported since the first case was confirmed a year ago. Until the latest Indonesian death was confirmed yesterday, Vietnam topped Indonesia as the country hardest hit by bird flu with 42 deaths since 2003 -- but Vietnam has not had a single human case this year. The disease continues to rage out of control... |
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Too bad their concept of "containment" doesn't extend to the Islamists in their midst.
Appease the perpetrators, shoot the victims. Sounds like a plan. /sarc
Don't you know? The government made the HIV virus to get rid of Africans and homosexuals! </sarcasm>
The British people haven't learned a blessed thing in 230 years:
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation...
...But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security...
I'll sell you a clue for a quid, John Emglishman.
First shoot the lawyers then the anti war libs.
Maybe instead, the police should seek out every mullah for miles around and shoot them. Would work wonders to stop terrorism.
Perhaps members of the public shold shoot the police to maintain their lives - oh wait this is Britain. The public is disarmed. Baaaa
How many cases make a panic?
But don't shoot the bomber ... he got rights.
Too bad their concept of "containment" doesn't extend to the Islamists in their midst.
Appease the perpetrators, shoot the victims. Sounds like a plan. /sarc
= = = =
INDEED.
Perhaps members of the public shold shoot the police to maintain their lives - oh wait this is Britain. The public is disarmed.
I guess were are seeing one consequence of the results of disarming the public.
Sure points out the lie of the arguement "the police will protect you".
If you had a deadly plague, wouldn't it be better to stop the plague early rather than shoot people trying to escape it's predictable effects?
Sounds like The Scotsman took a reasonable statement at a police conference -- that the cops should plan for extreme and unlikely contingencies -- and ran amok with it.
Here's my read -- in the event of a dirty bomb, an area will have to be contained to halt its spread to the degree possible. The officers doing the containing will be have to be armed. And charging the cordon would be a Very Bad Idea. I don't see anything shocking there, but it's good to get the word out to idiots who might otherwise think about trying to break out of containment.
British police have plenty of practice at containing an unruly crowd without wantonly mowing people down, between The Troubles (especially the Orangemen's marching season) and the English national pastime -- no, not football, which is a close second, but drunken hell-raising in the streets after the match.
I don't think bird flu would pose the same challenge as a dirty bomb, because it wouldn't be as concentrated. By the time a case is detected, the horse is probably out of the barn. You're talking about quarantining patients and those in direct contact with them, not whole neighborhoods or towns.
A better analogy would be to something like anthrax, smallpox or ebola, which would erupt very quickly and might have some hope of containment if the cordon goes up quickly enough. Any halfway-competent emergency agency should have a contingency plan in place at least since the 2002 anthrax scare.
Yep - sure does. The police protect ... the police. Remember the "heroic" Columbine swat team that let civilians bleed to death while they waited until they thought they'd be safe.
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