Quick post on the shooting
Jul. 25th, 2005 09:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumDamned stupid.
Every way I look at this it was unconscionable.
It, almost gets worse if he was packing a bomb under his clothes.
This was not a split second decision. They spent not less than 20 minutes following him from the house he left. He walked to the bus, rode said bus, changed for The Tube, was allowed into the station and then chased down and shot.
Plainclothes cops. A gang of men, with guns, chasing him. I don't know what I'd've done, were I him. But it may not have mattered, depending on the actual wording of the shoot to kill directive, and the actual instructions to the officers, he may have been a walking corpse the moment he headed for The Tube.
I know how I'd have run such an operation, if I'd been told to watch/apprehend someone from that building.
Some non-uniforms, to observe the house, and grab him up the moment he walked out the door, if he's a suspect.
We'll take, arguendo, the point of view he's being followed in the hope he will lead them to someone else. At some point they decide he's going to blow himself up (though the MO of this set of bombers doesn't match his behaviour, he had no bag). Stop the bus and take him in.
At the very least they nab him as he gets off.
Ponder this: the BBC reports there were more than 10 (I have seen numbers as high as 20) cops in on this. If they weren't on the bus with him, they were waiting at the Tube, so there must have been some co-ordination, which makes stopping the bus feasible.
Despite this they let a suspected suicide bomber (see above, the lag of a bag/container to leave behind) into a crowded train station. Stupid. Counter-productive and, from the external evidence, not neccessary.
They, according to most reports, had him pinned to the ground when he was shot. That's the part which bothers me most. If he was pinned there was no reason to shoot him, in fact there was every reason not to; dead men can't answer questions. There was certainly no reason to put four rounds into his torso (where there might have been a blasting cap. Blasting caps are notoriously unstable, and they cause HE to go off).
This sort of thing makes the situation less safe. As car alarms created carjackings, I expect this to cause those who are willing to carry out such attacks to create dead-man switches, so that shooting the bomber causes the device to go off. Portable EKGs are just that, so even a head shot isn't protection.
Worse than this is the actual deed committed.
Proponents of capital punishment in the States like to say we've never killed someone who wasn't guilty (though a report last week calls that into official doubt, as opposed to my, mere, moral certainty of it being false). This, on the other hand is a summary execution. What happened in the London Tube is what (in the most favorable light) happpened when the convoy on the way to Baghdad International Airport was shot up. The justification for the liberal ROE there is they troops never know who might be planning to do them harm, so they need to be allowed to kill people who make them nervous.
Britain has said it feels this to be counterproductive, in Iraq, and points to the better relations its troops have in Basra, where they have a much more limited right to shoot people.
But at home they've decided cops on the street are to be allowed to, "Shoot to kill to protect." No trial, no arrest, no chance at appeal. If one of these officers decides you are a threat, he has the absolute right, even duty, to shoot you in the head.
I can't say as this makes me feel any safer.
Every way I look at this it was unconscionable.
It, almost gets worse if he was packing a bomb under his clothes.
This was not a split second decision. They spent not less than 20 minutes following him from the house he left. He walked to the bus, rode said bus, changed for The Tube, was allowed into the station and then chased down and shot.
Plainclothes cops. A gang of men, with guns, chasing him. I don't know what I'd've done, were I him. But it may not have mattered, depending on the actual wording of the shoot to kill directive, and the actual instructions to the officers, he may have been a walking corpse the moment he headed for The Tube.
I know how I'd have run such an operation, if I'd been told to watch/apprehend someone from that building.
Some non-uniforms, to observe the house, and grab him up the moment he walked out the door, if he's a suspect.
We'll take, arguendo, the point of view he's being followed in the hope he will lead them to someone else. At some point they decide he's going to blow himself up (though the MO of this set of bombers doesn't match his behaviour, he had no bag). Stop the bus and take him in.
At the very least they nab him as he gets off.
Ponder this: the BBC reports there were more than 10 (I have seen numbers as high as 20) cops in on this. If they weren't on the bus with him, they were waiting at the Tube, so there must have been some co-ordination, which makes stopping the bus feasible.
Despite this they let a suspected suicide bomber (see above, the lag of a bag/container to leave behind) into a crowded train station. Stupid. Counter-productive and, from the external evidence, not neccessary.
They, according to most reports, had him pinned to the ground when he was shot. That's the part which bothers me most. If he was pinned there was no reason to shoot him, in fact there was every reason not to; dead men can't answer questions. There was certainly no reason to put four rounds into his torso (where there might have been a blasting cap. Blasting caps are notoriously unstable, and they cause HE to go off).
This sort of thing makes the situation less safe. As car alarms created carjackings, I expect this to cause those who are willing to carry out such attacks to create dead-man switches, so that shooting the bomber causes the device to go off. Portable EKGs are just that, so even a head shot isn't protection.
Worse than this is the actual deed committed.
Proponents of capital punishment in the States like to say we've never killed someone who wasn't guilty (though a report last week calls that into official doubt, as opposed to my, mere, moral certainty of it being false). This, on the other hand is a summary execution. What happened in the London Tube is what (in the most favorable light) happpened when the convoy on the way to Baghdad International Airport was shot up. The justification for the liberal ROE there is they troops never know who might be planning to do them harm, so they need to be allowed to kill people who make them nervous.
Britain has said it feels this to be counterproductive, in Iraq, and points to the better relations its troops have in Basra, where they have a much more limited right to shoot people.
But at home they've decided cops on the street are to be allowed to, "Shoot to kill to protect." No trial, no arrest, no chance at appeal. If one of these officers decides you are a threat, he has the absolute right, even duty, to shoot you in the head.
I can't say as this makes me feel any safer.
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no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:19 pm (UTC)The problem was thieves suddenly had a much harder time getting into a car.
Solution, what until the car is opened, even running, and take it then.
Prior to the widespread use of car alarms, there weren't anywhere near the number of such thefts.
Home invasion robberies seem to follow the same pattern.
TK
no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:29 pm (UTC)You might want to re-read it, now that I've edited.
TK
no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 02:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 03:48 pm (UTC)I believe they already do, at least in these parts (although the only confirmation I was able to find after a quick google was less than complete: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_man%27s_switch
no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 04:03 pm (UTC)Everybody's talking about this as if they knew that uniformed officers were following this guy for blocks, through the bus, etc., but the police have been intentionally using descriptions of the event that make it appear that their search was specific rather than widespread, all while being very vague about how they were surveiling him.
Truth is, London is possibly the most advanced city in the world for police video surveilance. You have to wonder whether it was just wishful thinking on the part of some guy staring at a videoscreen, vectoring people in on the target.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 06:15 pm (UTC)*nod* The first time I ever went to England, and to London especially, I was pretty creeped out by the cameras on every corner.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 02:13 pm (UTC)In part because he came from a block of flats (which was plain in the BBC and Ukrainian reports) and it seems most logical, from my perspective, that such a place, being surveilled for such a thing, ought to have live agents working the site.
But that's just my semi-professional opinion.
TK
no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 05:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 02:11 pm (UTC)TK
no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 03:31 pm (UTC)Is it okay for me to link to your analysis?
no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 04:32 pm (UTC)I never mind being linked to.
TK
no subject
Date: 2005-07-25 06:17 pm (UTC)Another thing that really wigs me out about this whole thing is that they waited until the guy was in a place where he could do maximum damage if he'd actually had the bomb they claim to have believed he was wearing. WTF?
no subject
Date: 2005-07-26 07:51 am (UTC)Ok, he got on a bus first- I don't think this team was a crack unit, but a bunch of guys who were pushed into a stuation that rapidly got out of control.
We need to review operational procedures, training, everything to make sure it does not happen next time.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-26 07:45 am (UTC)This is ' jumping the gun' ( no pun intended).
There is an inquiry sitting as i write, it began yesterday. I would not be surprised if it concludes that the cops tailing him were not really prepared for any contingencies and had to respond to situations they did not envisage.
It certainly looks to me like they could hve had a detonation on the bus, or at the station had the suspect really been a bomber.
The Israelis have yet to come across a 'dead mans switch', so maybe we won't either. extremists have been quoted on TV as aying they want to take over the UK inthe name of Islam, however. that is scarey and we must support the police in thier efforts to prevent this. Shooting Brazilians ( and anyone else) who gets in the wrong place at the wrong time will not help, though.
no subject
Date: 2006-03-20 02:39 am (UTC)you would be surprised at how many here have a similar view, and will tell the white folks as such, "Watch out when we take over" is something i have heard said on a number of occasions, and, well i'm not all that far from where the riots were a few years back.
Terry Terry Terry...
Date: 2005-07-27 02:28 am (UTC)By the way, the LAPD (and 99.9 percent of the LE community) have the same rule. Hey, so do we. Shoot to kill to protect life and property. I guess by placing 4 shots at a guy who ran away from armed guys (specially in a country were guns are outlawed, meaning either they are cops or you are screwed) the LE agents might prevent him (the suspected terrorist) from activating/detonating a device. Shoot, if you hit the blasting cap, you screwed up, but it is a better screw up that allowing a suspected running bomb to detonate at will.
Can you imagine the brit cops? They follow a guy from a block that has been under surveillance. I am imagining that this particular block was full of middle eastern looking persons. Then, you see a brown skinned young man (fits the profile). You follow, he goes in the train station.... you challenge him.... he bolts.... You kill him.
If you are a bomber and you get challenged, you will probably run near a group of people so that your bomb has a larger effect. I can see the cops... thinking that he is running towards a group of people. Uhm... what would you do? I would have emptied a clip just to insure he did not press any buttons.
I guess I am just happy I am not brazilian, and living in London, in a neighborhood full of suspected terrorist. Anyway... my 0.25 cents.
Re: Terry Terry Terry...
Date: 2005-07-27 01:27 pm (UTC)I don't know what the reportage was here, all I saw was the Ukranian news, and the BBC, all I was able to read was the Financial Times.
He walked to the bus, left the bus, got on the Tube. If they were doing active surveillance (which is how this is reported as starting) they either lost eyes on (poor tradecraft) at the bus, or they followed him.
Profiling, per se, isn't bad, but it needs humans (a computerized system doesn't work) and it needs humans who have experience (like the customs guy who asked me if I chew my vodka. He wanted to see how nervous I was in reposnse to a follow up on food in my baggage).
De Mendes (I hope I have the name aright) didn't match the profile of the previous bombers, all of whom (even the one's who were killed in the blasts) were carrying the bombs, not wearing them.
Look at it from his perspective: A group of six, to twenty guys starts yelling at him, at least some are brandishing pistols. Recent events have made you nervous because lots of people are talking of wiping out people who look like you. You can't see any cops (because these guys are all plainclothes.
The tube, and people, and apparent safety are just a few meters away.
Given the usual skill of cops with guns (the case in Compton where two cops emptied three clips of 9mm at a kid, from twenty feet and hit him four times, comes to mind) it is slightly better that they pinned him, but if they had him pinned, there shouldn't have been any need to shoot him.
In the same way I am willing to accept the crimes which occur because we are permitted to keep guns, I am willing to risk someone detonating a bomb, rather than give the cops (even a special unit, like the one the LAPD used to have [so we are told, which is to say we have been told the unit is disbanded], a guns free, shoot if you get nervous, policy.
TK
no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 06:16 pm (UTC)About the bus. I saw a surveillance photo in which all bombers in the original incident were seen together a the train station. So if you stop the bus, you do not get to see the meet and/or other possible targets. You see? They are not looking for suspected terrorists at this point. They are looking for moving targets (I guess, in their minds). So they are operating at a different threat level, hence, the shooting.
I guess the profiling was done by humans, because they were casing the block and started following the electrician.
Just because he did not wear the bomb does not mean anything Terry, and you know it from personal experience. MOs change accordingly.
From his perspective? LOL. If I see 20 guys with guns yelling at me (and I can probably look at them and see crew cuts and donut bellies) I will prone my ass down. Maybe I have an unfair advantage, knowing that it is a lost fight (I am not Jason Bourne) and that if I run, I am getting shot. Now if he was a middle eastern person, then he knows he is done for, so he runs. Perfectly doing what all target seekers are looking for, a reason to shoot.
The people and the tube (and apparent safety) are just meters away (thinks De Mendes), and so do the cops. He runs to 4th base, and the cops have to nail him (your out) before he gets to the tube and the innocent bystanders.
I am very glad that these British officers only fired four rounds. Can you imagine if this was the LA Sheriffs? My god, they would have fired at least 300 rounds into that poor chap, and of course, everybody else but that is a different matter. And if he can detonate something while he is alive (even while apprehended) then there is plenty of reason to shoot to kill.
Cops already have the shoot if you get nervous policy Terry, don't forget it.
It is very easy to be an armchair analyst. But everybody seems to foget that the person who second guesses, ends up dead. I can certainly say that I was very lucky, and I did not have to discharge a single round while in the sandbox. With that said, I cannot comment on the instincts and/or mindset included while you decide to kill somebody in order to defend yourself and your buddies. Given that, and the ROEs, I would have probably shot a lot of people if I felt threatened physically. I guess the british police felt threatened enough to have to kill this guy.
And talking about tradecraft. I have no idea who these british officers are. I can probably guess they were not MI5 or MI6 (or whatever other intel units they have). I seriously doubt that regular cops know anything about tailing, triggers, surveillance and countersurveillance. But when you are a city in trouble, you do what you can with what you have (shoot, that sounded like Rumsfeld... sorry). LOL.
Anyway, if you have time, read the following article:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-guard27jul27,0,291062,print.story?coll=la-home-headlines
It has nothing to do with London, but it will make you mad (given our joint membership in that green club of ours). See you very soon.
Jerry
no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 07:10 pm (UTC)That's the part which bothers me most.
TK
Update
Date: 2005-07-28 05:48 pm (UTC)One thing that did strike me as unusual an completely insane (and will probably negate some of the aspects posted before by me) was that De menezez was allowed to get in a bus.
I understand that one of the terrorists detonated or attempted to detonate a device inside a bus.
Given that (and the profiling methods) if they allowed him (De menezez as a suspected bomber) into a bus, then they broke protocol, endangered passengers and acted completely unprofessionally.
Now, I am confused...
Anyway, see you Monday. Bring coffee or tea. I'll bring the stove.
Jerry
P.S.: By the way, I saw a photo of the victim. He could be my cousin for christ's sake.
Re: Update
Date: 2005-07-29 12:01 am (UTC)If you want to come up early, we have space.
I'll have coffee, both to drink, and to brew.
TK
no subject
Date: 2005-08-04 04:43 pm (UTC)I just hope the Independent Police Complaints Commission gets to the bottom of what went wrong and who screwed up, and there's neither a whitewash nor an attempt to protect more senior police by putting all the blame on the cops at the scene. My guess is, from what both you and The Economist have said, is that whoever was orchestrating this operation massively screwed up--though of course, the possibility of such screw-ups calls into question the entire 'shoot to kill' policy.
According to secret documents obtained by....
Date: 2005-08-17 04:51 pm (UTC)http://www.itv.com/news/index_1677571.html