A question about cops

[Serconea]

Is Britain the only country where beat cops do not carry guns?

[Riddimach]

I think that in Russia, they don't, but cops are allowed to mame suspects. ;D

[Sheynat]

Beat cops carry tasers in Japan. Pretty much only the Japanese military and their local counterterrorist team can carry guns. But here in America, cops have a sidearm, generally either 9-millimeter or .38 caliber, on their person and a shotgun in the cruiser. Guns are just too plentiful here to not have it be that way. And I'm pretty sure Russian cops carry guns, just very low caliber ones.

[Bad Infinitum]

Yeah, but you'll never beat MP's walking around with .223 caliber assault rifles.

[Bonaduce Alander]

You should've been in Boston during the DNC. That was CAR-AZY! Cops everywhere. I could like look around and there was a cop. Cop here cop there cops every where. I was walking along there was like 10 cops just across the street from another like 15. Way too many cops.

[Riddimach]

It's supposed to be even tighter in the RNC.

[TheSensitiveNewAge]

To my knowledge, it is largely an Anglo thing for the cops not to carry serious firepower. Hearing that Japanese police officers have light firepower sounds like an influence from American occupation after War World II. As guns go, 9 milimeter and 12 gauge shot guns are respectable, hefty for civilians but light compared to military firepower. In Latin America and Italy, the normal police carry assault rifles and such.

In the States, tasers that shoot electrodes something like 20 feet are being developed. People complain that these can kill suspects with heart problems. They do not realize that this sort of weapon is used instead of an outright leathal firearm.

[Sheynat]

Actually, in San Diego, the fuzz keeps MP-5 submachine guns in the trunk of their cruisers, and regular LA police have assault rifles available to them, but don't regularly carry them. That's about as heavy as regular police firepower gets in the US.

[New Dracora]

I don't think cops in Aus carry any guns normally although I have seen a few on rare occasions.

[TheSensitiveNewAge]

Whoa Sheynat, I live in a college town. I guess I was not thinking about large cities. Thanks for the information.

[Sheynat]

Yeah, you're pretty much right though. Where they can get away with it, the cops in most Anglo-influenced countries go light on the firepower.

[Otupia]

no matter where you are in the world youll hear me yell OINK OINK

nothing personal to any cops on here i just dont like your Profession

[TheSensitiveNewAge]

Don't give cops a hard time just for being police, some are are honest men and women serving the world, others are corrupt and are far more vile than the average criminal. You cannot judge a group that easily and still be fair to them.

[Serconea]

British police go around with truncheons or extendable batons. We have armed units, such as SO-19 in London's Metropolitian Police who tend to carry around MP-5s.

[Taureska]

New said:

I don't think cops in Aus carry any guns normally although I have seen a few on rare occasions.

Australian cops carry sidearm pistols.

[Perugio]

We think we can trust our cops in the UK more because they don't carry guns, normally, and some people get very scared going to France and places, stopping a gendarme to ask for directions and then seeing a massive pistol in his holster!

[aranisland]

I don't think the Dutch police are usually armed. Then again, its a pretty civilised country all round.

[Otupia]

I lived in Dutch land as i know Call it.

There Armed i was Chased by them twice

[TheSensitiveNewAge]

I have to ask Otupia, why were you chased on two different occassions?

I know in Italy, the equvilent of the National Gaurd and the State Police are one and the same, whereas in the states they are two distinct. I think this may be why the average cop in the US has light firepower. Is this American system similar to Australia, Canada, New Zealand, or England? Or any other nation for that matter?

[Otupia]

umm I was doin stuff I wasnt sposed to...to be blunt

More like skating in certain places and spitting off a overpass.

[Otupia]

By the way,
They didnt catch us ( as in Friends included)

[Perugio]

Lucky!

[TheSensitiveNewAge]

Minor hologanism! I understand, fortunely I've never been spotted.

[Perugio]

What have you done?

[Eterne]

haha...you can't beat my schoolmates when it comes to being chased by cops...
one night during the orientation week of school, about 600 of us from the batch gathered outside the Esplanade theatre to do our school's mass dance. And The Policemen Came. i guess we were asking for it...but they just shooed us somewhere else.
and yes, policemen in Singapore carry guns...my teacher from the UK was unhappy that a policeman who can stop him on the street also has the capacity to kill him.

[Perugio]

No chance of that in Singapore!

[TheSensitiveNewAge]

Fountain diving, my friend and I can pay for Creamery (Penn State) ice cream from it. Also, wandering about in public buildings closed for the night. Again, minor holiganism.

[Perugio]

Too many hooligans here!

[TheSensitiveNewAge]

But that's why we're all so much fun!

While we're discussing the police, in America, we have local cops based either on a city or a county. Then we have state police who patrol the highways and deal with state problems (i.e. local cops need back up for a riot or something unusal like SWAT). Lastly, we have the FBI and ATF (Alcohol, Tobaccos, and Firearms, it grew out of Prohibition) to govern federal offenses such as tax evasion, smuggling, and kidnaping. Do other nations have the same sort of structure as America police agencies? If not, what is the set up and what is covered by which group?

[Toshliness]

I'm a cop in the uk and have been for 18 years now. We don't carry guns generally but some specialists do. Knowing some of the folk I do it would be scary to see them with a gun. Some of the older cops I would take their baton off them. Some the younger ones are too Rambo like as well. I've had to face some folk with a variety of weapons over the years and if I'd had a gun prison would have a few less in the population now I'm glad I dont carry one at the moment but we are getting more gun crimes now than when I started and the day when we all carry one is getting closer.