Campus Police Outfitted with Heavy Weaponry by Pentagon
What are they gearing up for? Is there an underground college terrorist network that I don’t know about? Because the campus protesters at my school seem pretty tame.
Christopher White at The College Fix reports:
Pentagon Doles Out Assault Rifles, Armored Vehicles To College Cops
Are campus police departments preparing for war?
The Ferguson Police Department’s heavy-handed response to protests and riots in Missouri in the wake of the Michael Brown shooting – complete with black helmets and assault rifles – has left many fearing that the small-town constabularies of the past are giving way to militarized RoboCops of the future.
That concern is also playing out at universities across the nation, as more and more campus police forces receive weapons and vehicles from the Pentagon designed to withstand rocket-propelled grenade attacks and impacts from improvised explosive devices, not fisticuffs in the campus quad.
Yet the list of campus police forces armed with such weaponry grows.
Ohio State University last year received a Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected (MRAP) vehicle, commonly referred to as an urban assault vehicle. It includes a turret, gun ports and a battering ram for those hard-to-get-into dorm rooms. Florida State University also has a ginormous and intimidating Army Humvee.
The University of Maryland garnered a $65,000 armored truck, 16 “riot type” 12-gauge shotguns, 49 M16 rifles, and a handful of other items, according to Pentagon data reported on by The Baltimore Sun. What’s more, Coppin State University received five 12-gauge shotguns and 29 40-caliber Glock pistols, and Morgan State University got six 12-gauge shotguns and 13 M16 or M14 rifles, The Sun reports.
Pentagon Doles Out Assault Rifles, Armored Vehicles To College Cops (The College Fix)
Comments
Declaring war on campus? Begging for another Kent State?
Maybe for the *next* school shooting? Remember, those MRAPs aren’t for attacking, but mostly for defense. Originally they were created because our troops were victims of IEDs in the streets of Iraq and Afghanistan, so soldiers were welding metal plates in the sides and floorboards of Humvees to protect them from dismemberment or death.
Imagine for a second, the first responders at Sandy Hook having MRAPs available, both to get rescuers closer to the source but also to rescue students more safely than having them have to march across open swaths of campus.