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Articles on Militarization of police

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Sending in the feds to quell unrest often increases conflict on the ground, as it did this summer in Portland, Ore. Nathan Howard/Getty Images

Federal agents sent to Kenosha, but history shows militarized policing in cities can escalate violence and trigger conflict

Kenosha is the latest US city to see federal agents patrolling its protests. History suggests that supplanting the local police with a militarized national force rarely works out well.
Mexican soldiers killed up to 300 student protesters and arrested 1,000 more on Oct. 3, 1968, in an event that’s come to be known as the Tlatelolco massacre. AP Photo

Massacres, disappearances and 1968: Mexicans remember the victims of a ‘perfect dictatorship’

Fifty years ago, soldiers gunned down hundreds of student protesters in a Mexico City plaza. It was neither the first nor the last time Mexico’s army would be deployed against its own citizens.
Victims of violence by U.N. peacekeepers in Haiti say that the agency has neither investigated nor offered recompense for deaths and injuries that occurred during anti-gang raids. Daniel Aguilar/Reuters

Sent to Haiti to keep the peace, departing UN troops leave a damaged nation in their wake

On the eve of its departure from Haiti after a 13-year stabilization effort, the UN faces accusations that its troops used excessive force to fight gangs, killing innocent bystanders.
A bit of crowd control – nothing heavy-handed. EPA/Michael Reynolds

What led to the Baltimore riots?

Better handling of peaceful protests at the death of Freddie Gray might have prevented the riots.
Citizens and police officers. Nick Allen

Democratic policing: what it says about America today

The use of lethal force by police officers in Ferguson and Staten Island has raised many concerns about the dynamic between police and citizens and underlined the fact that all time favorite fictional…
Police in Ferguson, Missouri, far beyond your friendly neighborhood patrolmen. Larry W Smith/EPA

Police militarization is a legacy of cold war paranoia

In August 2014, the police who faced protesters in Ferguson, Missouri looked more like soldiers than officers of the peace. Citizens squared off with a camouflage-clad police force armed with tear gas…

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