I’m pretty sure thats what I said.
I copied and pasted what you said. Let me do it again :
“So you’ve got an extremely stretched resource having to deal with serious riot conditions”
The police were not “extremely stretched”. Far from it, they had over 4,500 officers in case they were needed, but the march and the rally passed without incidents – and was stewarded by the TUC. So 4,500 officers to deal with, according to the police, 500 misbehaving protesters. I can’t see where you get the “extremely stretched resource” from.
At the time they occurred the Police don’t have instant knowledge of scale, scope or outcome, or for that matter who is involved.
I have already shown you the link which proves that the occupation of Trafalgar Square for example (which was were most of the trouble occurred) was pre-planned and was up on the Black Bloc website days before the event. I’ll do again for you :
http://www.resist.org.uk/uk/anti-cuts/march-for-the-alternative/
The police were fully aware what to expect and where it expect it. They didn’t need to have “instant knowledge”.
I’ll stick to my ordinal claim that you are clueless about the events on Saturday. Although I’m sure you’ll come back and repeat the same ill-informed comments.
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Using the army in support of the civil power was very common in the 70’s and 80’s including sending the SAS in to prison riots.
Certainly in the 70s and 80s the British army was one of the experienced in the world, if not the most experienced, in dealing with civil unrest, as a result of their deployment in Northern Ireland where they dealt with everything including policing demonstrations and marches.