London: We Need to Celebrate Our Police Force!

Of all the numbers surrounding the London Bridge attacks – three attackers, seven dead victims, 48 wounded, eight police officers firing 50 bullets – the most striking statistic is eight minutes.A

That is how long it took police to find and kill the murderers, who had had the advantage of choosing the time and place of their rampage.

Police received the first distress call at 10.08pm saying that a van had struck pedestrians on London Bridge. That white Renault van had only entered the bridge 10 minutes earlier. By 10.16pm police had shot the three men, who had left the van and gone on a stabbing spree in Borough Market. While killing them ruled out any chance of interrogating them about their networks Home Secretary Amber Rudd pointed out on Sunday morning that the fast action saved lives, as it meant that 80 paramedics were quickly able to help the injured instead of being held back by a longer stand-off.

Fast response

The first officer to challenge the killers was a member of the British Transport Police, which has a strong presence in the area because London Bridge is a major transport hub. He was injured after taking on the knife-wielding men armed with just a baton. An off-duty Met policeman based in Southwark who is a keen rugby player also tackled one of the attackers before being stabbed and suffering critical injuries but armed officers were on the scene remarkably quickly. In all, four officers were injured, two seriously.

Police had the enormous task of first neutralising the danger and then trying to quickly establish just what had happened so they could launch the follow-up action that saw a dozen people arrested by lunchtime on Sunday.

Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley said he was “humbled by the bravery of officers who will rush towards a potential suicide bomber”.

“The situation these officers were confronted with was critical – a matter of life and death – three armed men, wearing what appeared to be suicide belts, had already attacked and killed members of the public and had to be stopped immediately.”

“Awestruck”

The public certainly appreciated that fantastic performance, with Hackney Police tweeting: “Awestruck at the amount of nods, thumbs up and thanks we are getting from you as we go about our everyday business. Thank you #London”

The amount of work the police are doing to keep our streets safe was evident before the attack. The fact that terrorists launching recent attacks in the UK have mainly had to resort to knives and vehicles highlights the fact that UK authorities have been remarkably effective at gun control, with tightly-controlled borders so far managing to prevent a Paris-style attack using multiple firearms and lots of ammunition.

Previous cases have seen retailers reporting large purchases of household chemicals, exposing bomb makers. It is that type of intelligence that results in police raids preventing plots from reaching their deadly conclusions, at times with just hours to spare. MI5 is monitoring 3000 suspected extremists, and officials say that 12 attacks were directly prevented in 2016 alone.

After the May 22 bombing of Manchester Arena the terror threat level was raised to “critical” for four days, allowing some army units to be put under police control to guard key sites. That released armed police for anti-terror work at a time when they knew it was unlikely that the bomber Salman Abedi had acted alone and they were desperate to round-up possible accomplices.

This time around Rudd has said the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre so far believes that there are no further members of this plot still at large, so the “severe” threat level does not need to be increased.

Evacuation

Videos and eyewitness accounts show that police quickly cordoned off the area and evacuated homes, bars and restaurants, at times forcing members of the public to get down on their knees for safety. Columns of people ran from the scene with police herding them out of danger while watching out for any hidden attackers in a carefully rehearsed operation.

Witness Steven Gibbs told the BBC about his experience after drinking at the historic St Christopher’s Inn on Borough High Street. “A black cab drove past and the driver shouted, ‘Terrorist attack, run! I stood up to take a look and then all of a sudden there were gunshots. Lots of people were screaming. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”  He hid in the basement before police evacuated the building. A video has also been widely circulated showing police enter a restaurant and order diners to “get down” as they secured the building.

At 1.30pm on Sunday the Police announced that 12 arrests had been made after raiding the flat of one of the attackers in Barking, where a controlled explosion was carried out.

The London Bridge attack may have chilled Londoners but it also left millions of them newly aware and grateful at how diligently the city’s police and paramedics are waiting to burst into action whenever terror hits the city.

 

by Stewart Vickers @VickHellfire

 

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