Rioters fire shotguns at French police. French police … do nothing.

Be sure to see the text I’ve bolded in the below excerpt from today’s New York Times:

[W]hile the scale of the unrest of the past few days does not yet compare with the three-week convulsion in hundreds of suburbs and towns in 2005, a chilling new factor makes it, in some sense, more menacing. The onetime rock throwers and car burners have taken up hunting shotguns and turned them on the police.

More than 100 officers have been wounded, several of them seriously, according to the police. Thirty were hit with buckshot and pellets from shotguns, and one of the wounded was hit with a type of bullet used to kill large game, Patrice Ribeiro, a police spokesman, said in a telephone interview. One of the officers lost an eye; another’s shoulder was shattered by gunfire.

It is legal to own a shotgun in France—as long as the owner has a license—and police circles were swirling with rumors that the bands of youths were procuring more weapons.

“This is a real guerrilla war,” Mr. Ribeiro told RTL radio, warning that the police, who have struggled to avoid excessive force, will not be fired upon indefinitely without responding.

The police have made more than 30 arrests but have been restrained in controlling the violence, using tear gas to disperse the bands of young people and firing paint balls to identify people for possible arrests later. [Elaine Sciolino, “In French Suburbs, Same Rage, but New Tactics,” New York Time, 11/28/07.]

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Karen writes from England:

Poor French Police! Losing an eye and having a shattered shoulder are terrible injuries. Shooting the Police is war is it not? So why not send in the Army and have this situation immediately controlled? Sarkozy is a feeble leader. What sort of leader describes such acts of violence as merely “unacceptable”? This description makes it sound as though the rioters have been doing something like throwing bubble gum.

Paul K. writes:

I too was struck by that remarkable statement of resolve: “the police … would not be fired upon indefinitely without responding.” I imagine it being sputtered by Inspector Clousseau.

I would hope that Americans are grateful that we have a Second Amendment in this country. We are seeing that in times of civil disorder a government may choose to placate the criminals rather than protect law-abiding citizens. We saw it in the Rodney King riots in LA, when police did nothing during the first night of rioting, forcing citizens to organize for their own protection. We saw it in the Crown Heights riots in New York, when Mayor Dinkins would not order the police to protect Jews from rioting blacks. And we saw it in New Orleans.

It appears that in a situation such as the French are experiencing, the only real hope would be for the law-abiding citizens to organize an active defense against the rioting element, in large enough numbers to force the government’s hand. As long as the majority remains passive, the government will continue its policy of appeasement.

Daniel P. writes:

A few days before the start of the riots LeMonde had an article on the “hunting rifles” French “youths” are importing from the Balkans.

Chris C. writes:

Martin van Creveld writes in The Changing Face of War (2006) at p. 235:

The most important insight of all, though, did not come at Camberly [site of Army Staff College, UK] but over dinner in Geneva in 1995. My partner on that occasion was a British colonel, regiment of paratroopers, who had done several tours of duty in Northern Ireland. What he said can be summed up as follows. Look at almost any one of the hundred or so major counterinsurgency campaigns that took place since 1945. To be sure, the differences among them are very great. Still, they have one thing in common: In every known instance, the “forces of order” killed far more people than they lost. Quite often they did so by an order of magnitude, as was the case in Vietnam where the Americans, engaging in what they called “body count,” always emphasized how many more alleged Vietcong than marines or army soldiers died. Often they did so in such an indiscriminate manner (in counterinsurgency, whenever heavy weapons are used, the results are bound to be indiscriminate) as to make the result approximate genocide.

By contrast, he continued, the struggle in Northern Ireland had cost the United Kingdom three thousad casualties in dead alone. Of the three thousand, about seventeen hundred were civilians, either such as had been deliberately killed for supporting one faction or another or innocent bystanders who had been blown apart as bombs exploded at the time and place they happened to be. Of the remaining a thousand were British soldiers. No more than three hundred were terrorists, a ratio of three to one. Speaking very softly, he said: And that is why we are still there.

Meanwhile, I understand that after the Newark riots of ‘67, commission reports discovered that there was a huge ratio, ranging between 100 : 1 and 1,000 : 1, between confirmed police gunshots to possible civilian gunshots. I heard that on a PBS type (Frontline?) show.

I doubt the Police are doing nothing. Arrests are something; which I understand are taking place, and gathering evidence, including witness and video, with an eye towards further arrests and prosecutions in the future. There’s also the professional and disciplined patrolling of the streets. Indeed, CNN International reports right now that the French police “flooded” the Metro to insure order.

One of the reasons police forces cannot just crack heads a la days gone by, is video. No doubt the police will use video to prosecute.

Of course, I must agree with an anticipated criticism: not bloody likely they’ll deport any of the rioters.

Bottom line analysis: the French police are not doing nothing; we probably want them to be restrained; but, no, they shouldn’t get used to this rioting, and yes, there should be some deporting going on but, again, no, not likely that last.

LA replies:

Chris’s analysis seems contradictory. On on hand, through his analogy to counterinsurgency warfare, he seems to be saying that only massive use of deadly violence can work to suppress rioters who are using guns against police; on the other hand, he seems to be justifying the French police’s current weak response.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at November 28, 2007 11:29 AM | Send