Shooting at Parliament

PiperCub

I agree with the last post to some extent.

I just can't believe that people come on here and represent views like choddo who say we should accept the risks of terrorists, making parallels to foreign policy decisions as to reason why we have it, and that his view is that unless all citizens stand up against past or future foreign policy decisions which can turn our own Islamist fanatic people against us, terrorism will continue. It's appalling. How can I, respecting the rule of law and democratic process for government to do what it thinks best (taking out whether I or others thinks these decisions are best), affect the views of terrorists people to try and kill me if they don't believe in the rule of law.

Frankly I think the problem of home grown terrorism comes from the often split loyalties of our Muslim citizens to the sympathies of similar religious people abroad, through the democratic foreign policy decisions of government, to the extent that it can plant the seed for someone then being radicalised or just building their views to commit terrorism. That's why anyone who states that our government should accept risks or seeks to normalise should firmly be put in their place.

Sonic67

The policeman who died was an ex-dropshort who then joined the police. I'm going to assume that when it comes to stagging on he knew everything there was to know.

PiperCub

Yes maybe but you could or should expect a weapon to be drawn against that person. Whether it's used is another matter.

Sonic67

You are critiscising a dead copper and ex-squaddie? How much guard duty have you done? It's mind numbing dull and your mind wanders. Even in a war you don't expect anything to actually happen to you, let alone stagging on on a gate.

PiperCub

No I'm not doing that at all! Not so many assumptions please.

I think questions will have to be asked as to how the guy got past the gate, why the police officer was not armed, whose decision is it for policeman around Westminster to not be armed, was this material to the incident or not, where was the colleague with the mp5 rifle, how should police officers be in proximity to other officers at external positions where the risk is higher, to stop lone wolves. These are the type of questions, in risk assessment (regulation 3 of the management of health and safety at work regulations 1999), that the police will have to look at.

Bl4ckGryph0n

Naturally you did

Security is like an onion. All layers are required to make up the whole. The only logical conclusion is that it worked, it worked very well.

Sadly a life was lost as part of that, and undoubtedly the data and analysis gathered will be fed into the ongoing and continual reviews. However there will also be a test of proportionality.

PiperCub

He was an unarmed officer. That is not his decision, but his superiors in organising the ministerial protection command for which he was involved.

Sonic67

It's not unusual. In fact it might have been his decision. I used to stag on at a barracks in Germany. There were two on the gate. One was to carry the weapon the other didn't. The guy without the weapon was the one checking IDs, looking through bags and dealing with the public. The other guy was his protection.

The unarmed guy was close to the public and didn't have a weapon that could be taken off him and used against anyone. The armed guy stood a few metres away as overwatch.

Other's were in the guardroom as a QRF.

I used to carry the weapon as I couldn't be bothered chatting to loads and loads of people, my mate didn't want to carry the weapon as he didn't like the weight etc and was more sociable. Between us it worked fine.

Note, the guys on the gate etc are bulletcatchers. They are there to protect others and if necessary with their lives. Sad for him, but the people that mattered were the MPs and PM and they were all fine. He did his job as the sacrificial lamb so they would be ok.

This seems to be typical. Incident happens, after the shock and everything else, then there's lots of armchair generals all throwing their bit in. The ambulances got there in six minutes. General Bloggs said they should have been there in five. Car mounts kerb, General Bloggs wants fences and bollards on every road going.

PiperCub

I agree with most of what you say but I'd have preferred to have a side arm at the very least and weapons can have protection devices to stop being used by others. Whether this could have made a difference we don't know, and you are right to say we shouldn't be armchair viewists but I do wonder how someone can come at someone with a knife and succeed.

RiceRocket

Think what was needed to make this a preventable situation was a sniper in guard towers (like the type seen in Prison Break) to have seen the rampaging vehicle earlier, but there probably would've been moans about landscape aesthetics.