6 thoughts on “The Yellow Vests”

  2. Either the intelligentsia will be forced to properly acknowledge the existence of these people, or they will have to opt for a kind of soft totalitarianism.

    Narrator: They wanted totalitarianism all along.

    French riot police are now using semi-automatic weapons with live ammunition against Yellow Vest protestors as Macron’s law and order crisis spirals

    This is sensational. Carrying weapons isn’t the same as using them. Our cops have guns and yet don’t mow down protesters. We need more information about what is going on rather than radio silence but we need good information, not sensationalism.

    1. If the mainstream media weren’t on the side of the governments and would accurately report on the protests, there’d be far less chance of people believing sensationalist reporting.

      By imposing a news blackout, governments and their cronies are making things worse. As they usually do.

  3. It may seem a bit freaky to normative Americans to see all those European riot cops armed like SEALs but this is actually par for the course Over There and has been for decades.

    I worked in Western Europe for a couple years in the late 70’s with the largest part of that time spent in Milan. I was there through three Popes, four governments (plus or minus – it’s a little hard to keep track sometimes) and the kidnapping and murder of former Italian head of state Aldo Moro by the Red Brigades who were at their high water mark of activity at the time.

    In addition to the Carabinieri, there were a lot of formations of very tough-looking spec ops troops in light teal battledress and dark teal berets armed with assault rifles all over the streets, especially when the Italian lefties were out in force demonstrating – which was often.

    I was also in the Netherlands around the time of the train hijackings there by South Moluccan terrorists. Amsterdam, though, was the one place I went in Europe that didn’t look like a bivouac area a lot of the time. Dutch spec ops troops just showed up at the actual sites of train hijackings, killed the hijackers and faded back into the ether.

    European cops, including the Carabinieri in Italy, are typically much more heavily armed than their U.S. counterparts including SWAT units. The standard sidearm is typically an autoloader handgun with a selectable 3-round burst fire mode in addition to the standard squeeze one, get one mode. In Italy, these were a version of the Beretta 92. The cops in Brussels carried FN 9mm mini-SMGs with big mags. The visible guards at the Belgian royal palace were scarily competent-looking spec ops troopies in red berets with FN assault rifles and grenade launchers. The ones inside, out of sight, were probably far more formidably armed.

    So assault-rifle-toting cops – or even soldiers – are de rigeur on the streets in most of Europe whenever there are mobs roaming those same streets.

    Ring us up again if they actually start shooting. Just being there is no biggie by European standards.

    1. How do you burst-fire a handgun without the shots landing in Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg, respectively?

    2. Such an exaggeration. It is a common sight in Paris sure. You see military troops on patrol with assault rifles in major transport nodes and large squares. I have even seen them in other places like Strasbourg. But in most of their other cities it is rare to see any troops with assault rifles. You don’t see them in the medium sized French cities at all.

      I have been to other places in Europe. In most cases I do not see the military or any armed forces with assault rifles. Just pistols at best. Heck in the Czech Republic you would be hard pressed to find a policeman in sight and it is pretty safe. Even boring actually.

      France is more of an exception, Paris in particular, than anything else. Yes there are counter-terrorism units in most countries but those only show up to deal with actual terrorist attacks. We have had those units in Europe since the Munich massacre.

      When I went to New Orleans I also saw incredible amounts of police compared to what I am used to.

Comments are closed.