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Swedish PM Does Not Rule Out Use of Army to End Gang Violence

posted by janrinok on Monday February 26 2018, @07:34PM   
from the big-guns dept.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Sweden will do whatever it takes, including sending in the army, to end a wave of violence that has seen a string of deadly shootings, Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said in Wednesday.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sweden-violence/swedish-pm-does-not-rule-out-use-of-army-to-end-gang-violence-idUSKBN1F629L

Sweden's murder rate is relatively low in international terms, but gang violence has surged in recent years and Swedes are worried that the police are unable to cope.

In 2016, the latest year for which official statistics are available, 106 people were murdered in Sweden, a country of 10 million.

But Swedish TV reported there were over 300 shootings, mostly in turf battles between gangs over drugs, protection rackets and prostitution.

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Original Submission

• Re:MACP is pretty much outlawed in the U.S. Re:MACP is pretty much outlawed in the U.S. (Score: 2) by Thexalon on Monday February 26 2018, @10:58PM (1 child)

  by Thexalon (636) on Monday February 26 2018, @10:58PM (#644285)

  Which of course in no way applies here, because Sweden isn't the USA.

  That said, I'm not convinced the US response to bad guys with military firepower has been much better. If your problem is "criminal gang with enough weaponry to outgun your police forces", which seems like the least-bad choice:
  A. Use your military when necessary to fight these gangs?
  B. Turn your cops into military-like units (SWAT, the cops with tanks and APCs, etc)?
  C. Allow gangs with sufficient firepower to function basically unmolested by the authorities?

  I'm pretty sure option C isn't what anybody wants. Option A, while bad, at least offers the possibility that the army will come in, do a specific job, and head back to base, and the bureaucratic negotiating involved each time they do that means they won't be called in unless they really are needed. Option B, by contrast, means those souped-up cops are there to stay, and if they don't have anything to do they'll find something to do.

  --
  The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.

  Parent

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• Re:MACP is pretty much outlawed in the U.S. (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 27 2018, @01:01AM

  by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 27 2018, @01:01AM (#644349)

  Gordon Lightfoot's "Black Day in July", about the Detroit riots and imposition of martial law:

  And then the tanks go rolling in,
  To patch things up as best they can.

  Parent