[devs1010]

I think this may have to do with cultural and geographic distances. U.S. cities, for the most part, may not be as easy to do something like kettling in as most are less dense than U.K. cities and may simply have more open space to cover to effectively "kettle" people and contain them to one area. Also, although the police are clearly acting as if they are militants at war, they still don't want the non-protesting population to feel as if they are under martial law so sectioning off a large part of a city with police in riot gear and chasing protestors around to where everyone sees this going on would probably hurt their cause more than help it.

[radicalbyte]

You shouldn't discount 25 years of experience trying to control football (soccer) hooligans in the UK has given the police a lot of experienced bodies and equipment (i.e. horses) to help implement such tactics.

Plus, in the UK the cops aren't generally armed with anything more than a club. So they have to use their heads a bit more.

This is what happens when UK cops get guns http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Jean_Charles_de_Meneze...

[bdunbar]

Plus, in the UK the cops aren't generally armed with anything more than a club. So they have to use their heads a bit more.

I attended riot-control training in the Marines: from the way things look on teevee the cops are doing pretty much what we trained to do.

Guns are out[1]. Clubs, chemical agents, are in. Using your head is the order of the day.

Because it only takes one guy not using his head, throwing a CS grenade into the crowd, upwind from your lines, to ruin your whole day.

[1] Let me (slightly) expand on the guns thing and Marines. We _had_ rifles in the Marines, but doctrine and training had us running around without ammunition, or with ammunition kept in pouches, and only allowed to be used with permission of a commissioned officer.

[devs1010]

Yea, its two different situations completely, U.S. police often look like military combatants by the gear they wear and often seem to view themselves as urban military units. While this is horrible and an obvious sign of our country going down the shitter, it does make them have to be more conscious of how they use force because it looks so bad to the general public to see images of cops in riot gear who are armed to the teeth chasing around protestors.

[nerfhammer]

Riot police look pretty scary everywhere

https://www.google.com/search?q=arizona+police&tbm=isch

and generally only armed with batons outside of low-human rights countries due to the obvious danger of losing control of weapons amidst violent crowds.

[devs1010]

I wasn't talking just about riot situations, U.S. police look sort of like this (especially where I am in Arizona) all the time, except without the masks.

[SageRaven]

Is this now state-wide or still only within the "Constitution-Free Zone" within 200 miles of Mexico's border?

I was in Nogales looking for property in winter of '04, and I noted how many of the law enforcement were all dolled up in their military-like gear. This was before the checkpoints, so I never got too close. Still... if I wasn't white and driving a giant, made-in-America pickup truck, I certainly would not have felt too welcome in the area.

[devs1010]

I'm in Phoenix.. IMO this state is insane, the government here really does deserve the scorn they get from the rest of the U.S., I am already planning my move out, I moved here a year and a half ago as it has a low cost of living, warm climate, etc and thought I would give it a shot but there is something very dark going on here with the government.