AHC & WI: British Police usually carry firearms?

In Ireland the Garda are routinely unarmed and that was a decision taken in 1922 that the police would not be armed even though the largest and smallest of its three predecessor forces the Royal Irish Constabulary and the Irish Republican Police had always been armed. The third constituent force the Dublin Metropolitan Police were not routinely armed but did have an armed section G Division who were the political anti Fenian unit.

I think a lot of NZ's colonial constabulary were armed too, especially on the Goldfields. Not sure when that changes or why.
 
You would have had the SAS on Scene and murdering them right back inside of 30 minutes. And then the Special forces unleashed in the Northern Ireland province the next day.
Unlikely to be SAS - there are probably a handful of them in London at any one time, the regiment is simply too small to have that many men available in London on standby. However, that isn't required either - you've got a battalion of Guards permanently based at Wellington Barracks, and the HCMR at Knightsbridge barracks. The rest of the Household Cavalry (complete with light armoured vehicles) is at Windsor and probably could make it within an hour, along with another battalion of Guards, and I think there are more at Woolwich.

Realistically, soldiers are far more suitable than police for dealing with a Bombay-style attack, and the British have always been more relaxed than the US about using soldiers in support of the civil power where necessary. It would take something on the scale of Northern Ireland for it to be routine, but in an emergency they would be used and worry about the legalities later. Anything smaller would be left to the police however.
 
Unlikely to be SAS - there are probably a handful of them in London at any one time, the regiment is simply too small to have that many men available in London on standby. However, that isn't required either - you've got a battalion of Guards permanently based at Wellington Barracks, and the HCMR at Knightsbridge barracks. The rest of the Household Cavalry (complete with light armoured vehicles) is at Windsor and probably could make it within an hour, along with another battalion of Guards, and I think there are more at Woolwich.

Realistically, soldiers are far more suitable than police for dealing with a Bombay-style attack, and the British have always been more relaxed than the US about using soldiers in support of the civil power where necessary. It would take something on the scale of Northern Ireland for it to be routine, but in an emergency they would be used and worry about the legalities later. Anything smaller would be left to the police however.

Not many places you cannot get to by helicopter in an hour in the UK (UKs not that big after all) - Troops could be rapidly moved to the capital once people have pulled their fingers out and got the ball moving.

Since the Early 70s the SAS has maintained an 'Immediate Action' unit which IIRC was based in Aldershot just South West of London and ready to move at very short notice.

The rest of the Regt not deployed was then based at Hereford - about 100 miles to the west of London.

Of course from the 90s the Mets own firearm equipped officers would probably be first on scene (I think its 8 mins max response time anywhere in London) and have a pretty high standard of training (a fair % of them would be ex servicemen) - but the Immediate action team would not be far behind them in terms of response time.
 

It's

Banned
There was and still is a large majority both in the police forces and British populalion that is resistant to the arming of the police forces.

A large majority of very senior police officers are anti-arming police, because the majority of the political establishment who appoint them are. Most bobbies, and perhaps most of the general public, think British police should be armed, like police forces in pretty much every other nation (apart from New Zealand, middle earth etc).
 
A large majority of very senior police officers are anti-arming police, because the majority of the political establishment who appoint them are. Most bobbies, and perhaps most of the general public, think British police should be armed, like police forces in pretty much every other nation (apart from New Zealand, middle earth etc).

Source? Figures? Ta.
 

Pangur

Donor
There was a reason for this. The Guards are non political and disinterested in taking sides in anything other than law and order issues by design. During the civil war both sides left them alone and the Garda did not pick a side or take much action to enforce itself on the armed combatants with even its special armed wing disbanding as soon as practical.

Of course there was at least one incident when an unarmed Guard calmly arrested two armed men who submitted without a fight. There is a certain power to dignity and lawfulness in the face of great danger.

As for the UK well for that you need a different political environment. The Government over centuries gradually disarmed the populace not in the desired social groups who it often sponsored to form part of various milita and yeomannery units who spent much of their time putting down civil unrest.

The Police in Britain were deeply unpopular and unwanted for a long time and the government already had a monopoly on weapons and violence by the time they came about so turning them into a heavily armed force just wasn't necessary.

To add to this, when you translate the name of the Garda into English you get guardian of the peace. - Object is too keep the peace. Early on for them when Garda's where murdered by Republicans the locals gave them up. The fact that they were unarmed was a huge factor in that.

For the UK, its very hard to see how its society could change so much that people would be comfy with the Police being armed and I would go further, there is a nice (and I mean that) quirk to their society that events that might push others to arm the police would just not work - same in Ireland BTW
 
A large majority of very senior police officers are anti-arming police, because the majority of the political establishment who appoint them are. Most bobbies, and perhaps most of the general public, think British police should be armed, like police forces in pretty much every other nation (apart from New Zealand, middle earth etc).

Arming police comes up regularly in NZ, as several key people in the police association and elsewhere keep bringing it up. They can never easily argue the case as the statistics bely their principal argument of police safety.
 
A large majority of very senior police officers are anti-arming police, because the majority of the political establishment who appoint them are. Most bobbies, and perhaps most of the general public, think British police should be armed, like police forces in pretty much every other nation (apart from New Zealand, middle earth etc).

I would say the vast majority of UK people are against arming the general police with the firearms, they have armed response back up, trained to do the job. Police by consent has been the British way for a long time.
Even during the Troubles armed police in the mainland were not the usual.
The culture is too ingrained IMHO
 
A large majority of very senior police officers are anti-arming police, because the majority of the political establishment who appoint them are. Most bobbies, and perhaps most of the general public, think British police should be armed, like police forces in pretty much every other nation (apart from New Zealand, middle earth etc).

Well fly's in the face of everything I have ever read, heard and being English living in England, ever seen.

I think the current 'armed response' team approach fits in with the current British Society and is a happy medium.
 
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