Why America has militarized its police and crushes protests

Summary: Journalists have dissected the events in Ferguson, and now turn to the important question of police militarization during the past 20 years. We see the standard analysis: pictures of their equipment, pictures of SWAT in action, excessive focus on the details, and faux outrage over the story they ignored for so long. Here we ask the question they ignore: why? Why the militarization of police? Why brutal crushing of protests?

“When I was sixteen, I went to work for a newspaper in Hong Kong. It was a rag, but the editor taught me one important lesson. The key to a great story is not who, or what, or when, but why.”
— Elliot Carver, in Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

Contents

1. New police for a new America
2. The police are not fools
3. About activities of our new police
4. Conclusions
5. For More Information

(1)  New police for a New America

Now the next phase of the Ferguson drama begins: journalists explain what the police should have done.

1. “After Ferguson, how should police respond to protests?“, Radley Balko, Washington Post, 14 August 2014
2. “Policing Protests Like Soldiers Makes Everyone Less Safe. Even Police“, Conor Friedersdorf, The Atlantic, 15 August 2014 — “Yet Americans perpetuate the military approach by recruiting for and celebrating it.”

Both conclude that militarization of police and their massive use of force to suppress protests are stupid mistakes. It’s over my pay grade to assess their conclusions as right or wrong, but it’s clear that both commit a serious analytical error by assuming that the police leaders — civilian and uniformed — share their goals and values.

What are the goals of those running our police forces? How can we infer the goal of an individual or group? First, see the effect produced. Assume that what they got is their intended result. Is that logical?

Second, as a check on this, consider the analysis of critics like Balko and Friedersdorf. They say the police committed obvious errors. They are journalists, and so easily assume that police leaders are mouth-breathing neanderthals. That’s a false assumption, and voids much of their analysis.

(2)  An alternative theory, assuming the police are not fools

A Minister of State goes to his king and says: ‘Sire, in your new budget I notice you spend billions for weapons and not one penny for the poor.’ The king replies: ‘Yes, when the revolution comes, I’ll be ready.’

— From Go Tell the Spartans , Jerry Pournelle and S.M. Stirling (1991)

America’s police bulked up, with DoD’s assistance, on military equipment. They developed units trained and equipped in military-style tactics. They oriented their departments’ recruitment and training around application of force. It forms a consistent picture of organizations evolving from community-based law enforcement to security services whose primarily focus is maintaining public order — with protests by minority or politically dissident elements as inherently illegitimate and potentially violent.

Order not justice is the new goal of our police (a shift in emphasis). As such, massive displays of overwhelming force are a logical way to deter protests. Should they occur despite this, then massive use of force is a logical way to prevent their re-occurrence. The crushing of the Occupy Movement’s camps and the Ferguson protests are the natural result of new policing in our New America. As so often the case with the evolution of societies in history, new forms have precedents from that people’s past (people often build new futures by rearranging elements from their past).

The New America is a multi-cultural society designed for high and rising inequality, plus low and falling social mobility. Our elites are not fools. Preparing for large protests was a prudent (even prescient) precaution.

That does not imply that the police over-reaction in Ferguson was planned, down to the arresting and assault on journalists. An effective strategy does not imply that the resulting tactics are well-executed. Maintaining control of rioting police requires excellent organization and command skills. The Ferguson PD failed at this, and created a public relations defeat.

(3)  Deductions about activities of our new police

We can make some deductions about the methods of our new security services. They’re probably using the tools security services have usually used:  widespread surveillance and agent provocateurs (there is anecdotal evidence of both across the country, and during the Occupy protests).

Another difference between law enforcement and security services: a greater desire for secrecy. Security services are secret services, as they do things the regime prefers that the “inner party members” (i.e., the politically active middle classes) can pretend not to know. The proles are on the receiving end of the security services actions, and so know them quite well.

(4)  Conclusions

America is changing. The America-that-Once-Was is dying, with a New America being erected on its ruins. We prefer to close our eyes to this in order to minimize cognitive dissonance — the conflict between our desire for an easy life — and our responsibility to preserve the Republic that our forefathers fought (and often died) protecting.

As I have documented in scores of posts on the FM website since 2008, our actions show which side of our natures is winning.

(5)  For More Information

(a)  Other posts about the events in Ferguson:

1. Our elites smile at events in Ferguson, MO. They’ll cry if it pushes Blacks to try 4GW., 14 August 2014
2. Will the Ferguson protest force development of African-American leaders?, 15 August 2014
3. Why America has militarized its police and crushes protests, 16 August 2014
4. The protesters at Ferguson might have won, but choose to lose, 18 August 2014
5. Events from Ferguson explain why we are weak, 19 August 2014

(b)  About police in America:

1. Fear the enemies within America more than those without, 21 December 2011
2. How to Fund an American Police State (aka Weaponizing the Body Politic), 5 March 2012 — Militarizing the police
3. We are alone in the defense of the Republic, 5 July 2012
4. Do not talk to the police (important advice in New America), 4 August 2013
5. Look at the protests in Wisconsin to see how America has changed, 31 August 2013
6. Murder by police. If these incidents do not anger us, then what will?, 19 January 2014

(c)  About the Occupy Movement:

1. Occupy Wall Street, another futile peasants’ protest, 5 October 2011
2. Occupy & Tea Party are alike, both saving America through cosplay, 18 October 2013
3. The last prosecution from the Occupy movement: guilty! Reformers beware – suppression works., 6 May 2014
4. Lessons from the failure of Occupy Wall Street, its lasting legacy, 7 May 2014

(d)  About protests:

1. How to stage effective protests in the 21st century, 21 April 2009
2. How do protests like the TP and OWS differ from effective political action?, 26 October 2011
3. Look at the protests in Wisconsin to see how America has changed, 31 August 2013
4. The Million Vet March, a typical peasants’ protest. Does it portend more serious protests in our future?, 13 October 2013