I think the US police system is a pretty strong counterargument against importing military customs and mores into police forces. Aside from a few rabid reactionaries, almost nobody likes the militaristic turn American cops have taken, where they now seem to learn more about "Killology" (an actual thing being taught to actual cops by former soldier and current psychopath Dave Grossman) and operating armored vehicles and assault rifles than de-escalating domestic conflicts, building relationships with informants, restraining people without recourse to blowing their brains out, and other core police skills. And it's made even worse than the fact that their military role models are less regular grunts than "operators" from our covert death squads.
Great article. Loved the graphics!The civilian police force was largely invented to enforce the law among people who expected it. The military was for forcing the will of one power on another. The more people in a society do not believe they are (or should be) expected to follow the law, the more the police will resemble the military. Or something else will happen.
"...the ‘Territorial Army’, which on occasion resembled a heavily armed drinking club..."
I shall remember that one, and no doubt quote it frequently.
This is the first time I have read your blog, and I found it educational, instructive, cultured, and witty. Quite a combination!
Thanks for the lesson, as the tennis player Matteo Berretini said to Roger Federer while congratulating him after a rather one-sided match. Actually, he said "How much do I owe you for the lesson?", but in view of my decrepit finances we don't know each other quite that well yet.
Very interesting article, I would posit though that whilst we may not need an officer class, we do need a re-injection of discipline. Standards are at an all time low across the board.
Maybe we could just get the air force to run Hendon again?
One point about the military way. Newly minted officers rely on and if they have any sense learn from their senior NCOs. There is a reason platoon Sgts are paid more than a 2Lt. On the Intelligence agencies side, in my experience if something goes wrong it’s not blame game time. They find out what went wrong and what needs to be done to stop it happening again. An approach I wish police would adopt
Yes, but the Service have the added bonus of a different (ahem) accountability framework. Every mistake made by police is in plain sight. There's aren't. And, if they ever are, they retain anonymity.
Excellent piece and what a diagram. My experience of this phenomenon is similar, although I think the NCA have a similar attitude to the military.
In the cops if your boss got into work and a big job had broken out, they would expect things to have happened, decisions made and actions carried out. In the Chaos Agency nothing happens until you are told to do it.
The police hierarchy would ask why you hadn’t got on and done stuff, the other crew would be horrified that you had made a decision. There is still a big Tarquin/Jemima contingent in the intelligence services too and I think class features far more in the civil service realm than the cops.
I have worked with the NCA and agree wholeheartedly. They are, at heart, civil servants with the timidity and arse-covering that comes with it. If the police have a 'golden hour', the NCA has a 'golden week'.
This is an interesting article. My 36-year career in the Royal Hong Kong Police and Hong Kong Police, which operates a direct-entry inspector scheme for inspectors, has given me a critical perspective on policing models. The Hong Kong scheme involved nine months of full-time training, including Cantonese for the expats, and a three-year probationary period before advancement to the full inspector rank. The Hong Kong policing model, derived from the old Irish Constabatory Colony model, is unique in its command and control structure and less autonomy for the individual constable. While the model has evolved over the decades, it retains these distinctive elements. The Hong Kong Police also retain a paramilitary role, undertaking many functions that the military would do in other jurisdictions. My experiences on overseas attachments in several police forces, including in the UK, have led me to believe that no model is perfect, as the clowns can still rise to senior ranks.
Policing is a trade, lots of theoretical knowledge but there’s only one way to learn to do and not everyone has the aptitude. The Sandhurst Fallacy is the same mindset that wanted to professionalise the police with degree programmes, it doesn’t fit.
Fundamentally the police need to get back to apprentice style of education and grow its constables and future leadership from that basis. The plug-in bolt-on solutions of an “officer class” “direct entry” senior managers and accelerated promotion programs were always shallow minded solutions from consultants and civil servants.
It seems to have been a mantra amongst the RW press that the armed services can sort anything out and the go to answer for any problem in the public sector is to bring in an ex-army officer. I don't for a moment doubt the competency of the lower ranks and the small unit leaders but lets face it, leadership and management at the strategic level in the armed forces seems to be less than optimal, look at the procurement crises and other problems that have beset the armed forces recently. The same press also do not grasp that the army and police fulfil quite different functions.
Still, since the press seem particularly unhinged at the moment expect more guff like direct entry to come out.
I must have missed the new, recent calls for an 'officer class' being needed for the police. It is a rather tired idea. My first memory is this was proposed in the early 1980s by the then Conservative government and was quickly rejected by persons unknown. Over the years there has been a dribble of ex-officers joining the police, a good number in my experience in a big city (not London) is that few progressed very far. As the UK military has shrunk now for two decades in the same city few joined who had military experience and I recall one NCO who did was a "damp squib". Now possibly ten years ago a retired senior Army officer joined HMIC for a short time.
I am aware that some who have written about policing, all too often from a London & MPS-centric viewpoint, think the operational independence of the police has reduced since the 1984-85 Miners Strike. Add in the reform of the PCC, the increasing role of the HMICFRS, alongside the College of Policing and above all a lack of resources - the mess the police are in can be blamed on just about everyone, except the public.
I worked with and for many ex-armed forces in the police, like curates eggs most of them. Same with those with no military experience. Good coppers come from a multitude of backgrounds, some develop, some don’t. Brown nosing by both streams went on and led to some rising to the top whilst others crashed and burned. Any pretensions to officer class would soon be stamped on, I’m just glad I retired before direct entry came in. Best to just leave the police to reflect the mix of society and hope the cream rises to the top, although too much of it seems to be souring recently with fuss about shagging, medals, neglected investigations, corruption etc revealing the stars are just as fallible as the rest of us were.
As ex army and middle ranking police officer I agree wholeheartedly! There were a few crossovers in the 20th Century but a lot less now….. One may be map reading so the 21st Century constables can see where his beat is? Maybe not…..
I loved your diagram, took me back to training and OHP’s… ?
I remember being posted to a surveillance unit in 2006, when newer officers were already addicted to satellite navigation systems. We confiscated them all and made them use map books!
I thought the Unherd article was interesting. It explains and contextualises the SLT and FLT ostrich like behaviour. I was a lot closer to the social care failings that fed that particular shit-tsunami.
And those failings are continuing today - look at the 14yr old stabbed to death on a school bus. Same underlying causes.
As for the ‘officer class’ of the police - bang on.
I think the US police system is a pretty strong counterargument against importing military customs and mores into police forces. Aside from a few rabid reactionaries, almost nobody likes the militaristic turn American cops have taken, where they now seem to learn more about "Killology" (an actual thing being taught to actual cops by former soldier and current psychopath Dave Grossman) and operating armored vehicles and assault rifles than de-escalating domestic conflicts, building relationships with informants, restraining people without recourse to blowing their brains out, and other core police skills. And it's made even worse than the fact that their military role models are less regular grunts than "operators" from our covert death squads.
Great article. Loved the graphics!The civilian police force was largely invented to enforce the law among people who expected it. The military was for forcing the will of one power on another. The more people in a society do not believe they are (or should be) expected to follow the law, the more the police will resemble the military. Or something else will happen.
"...the ‘Territorial Army’, which on occasion resembled a heavily armed drinking club..."
I shall remember that one, and no doubt quote it frequently.
This is the first time I have read your blog, and I found it educational, instructive, cultured, and witty. Quite a combination!
Thanks for the lesson, as the tennis player Matteo Berretini said to Roger Federer while congratulating him after a rather one-sided match. Actually, he said "How much do I owe you for the lesson?", but in view of my decrepit finances we don't know each other quite that well yet.
Very interesting article, I would posit though that whilst we may not need an officer class, we do need a re-injection of discipline. Standards are at an all time low across the board.
Maybe we could just get the air force to run Hendon again?
One point about the military way. Newly minted officers rely on and if they have any sense learn from their senior NCOs. There is a reason platoon Sgts are paid more than a 2Lt. On the Intelligence agencies side, in my experience if something goes wrong it’s not blame game time. They find out what went wrong and what needs to be done to stop it happening again. An approach I wish police would adopt
Yes, but the Service have the added bonus of a different (ahem) accountability framework. Every mistake made by police is in plain sight. There's aren't. And, if they ever are, they retain anonymity.
Excellent piece and what a diagram. My experience of this phenomenon is similar, although I think the NCA have a similar attitude to the military.
In the cops if your boss got into work and a big job had broken out, they would expect things to have happened, decisions made and actions carried out. In the Chaos Agency nothing happens until you are told to do it.
The police hierarchy would ask why you hadn’t got on and done stuff, the other crew would be horrified that you had made a decision. There is still a big Tarquin/Jemima contingent in the intelligence services too and I think class features far more in the civil service realm than the cops.
I have worked with the NCA and agree wholeheartedly. They are, at heart, civil servants with the timidity and arse-covering that comes with it. If the police have a 'golden hour', the NCA has a 'golden week'.
As for class, I wrote about it here... https://dominicadler.substack.com/p/plod
This is an interesting article. My 36-year career in the Royal Hong Kong Police and Hong Kong Police, which operates a direct-entry inspector scheme for inspectors, has given me a critical perspective on policing models. The Hong Kong scheme involved nine months of full-time training, including Cantonese for the expats, and a three-year probationary period before advancement to the full inspector rank. The Hong Kong policing model, derived from the old Irish Constabatory Colony model, is unique in its command and control structure and less autonomy for the individual constable. While the model has evolved over the decades, it retains these distinctive elements. The Hong Kong Police also retain a paramilitary role, undertaking many functions that the military would do in other jurisdictions. My experiences on overseas attachments in several police forces, including in the UK, have led me to believe that no model is perfect, as the clowns can still rise to senior ranks.
But we had Bramshill, Dom, turning out bright and formidable leaders of the future. Ah, yes, sorry, as you were…
I remember it being called 'Brands Hatch', because it was full of egomaniacs racing around in circles for no discernible reason.
Magnificent! In today's drab and stupid world, those little flashes of wit do me so much good. You fellows should be paid by the NHS.
Policing is a trade, lots of theoretical knowledge but there’s only one way to learn to do and not everyone has the aptitude. The Sandhurst Fallacy is the same mindset that wanted to professionalise the police with degree programmes, it doesn’t fit.
Fundamentally the police need to get back to apprentice style of education and grow its constables and future leadership from that basis. The plug-in bolt-on solutions of an “officer class” “direct entry” senior managers and accelerated promotion programs were always shallow minded solutions from consultants and civil servants.
It seems to have been a mantra amongst the RW press that the armed services can sort anything out and the go to answer for any problem in the public sector is to bring in an ex-army officer. I don't for a moment doubt the competency of the lower ranks and the small unit leaders but lets face it, leadership and management at the strategic level in the armed forces seems to be less than optimal, look at the procurement crises and other problems that have beset the armed forces recently. The same press also do not grasp that the army and police fulfil quite different functions.
Still, since the press seem particularly unhinged at the moment expect more guff like direct entry to come out.
I must have missed the new, recent calls for an 'officer class' being needed for the police. It is a rather tired idea. My first memory is this was proposed in the early 1980s by the then Conservative government and was quickly rejected by persons unknown. Over the years there has been a dribble of ex-officers joining the police, a good number in my experience in a big city (not London) is that few progressed very far. As the UK military has shrunk now for two decades in the same city few joined who had military experience and I recall one NCO who did was a "damp squib". Now possibly ten years ago a retired senior Army officer joined HMIC for a short time.
I am aware that some who have written about policing, all too often from a London & MPS-centric viewpoint, think the operational independence of the police has reduced since the 1984-85 Miners Strike. Add in the reform of the PCC, the increasing role of the HMICFRS, alongside the College of Policing and above all a lack of resources - the mess the police are in can be blamed on just about everyone, except the public.
I worked with and for many ex-armed forces in the police, like curates eggs most of them. Same with those with no military experience. Good coppers come from a multitude of backgrounds, some develop, some don’t. Brown nosing by both streams went on and led to some rising to the top whilst others crashed and burned. Any pretensions to officer class would soon be stamped on, I’m just glad I retired before direct entry came in. Best to just leave the police to reflect the mix of society and hope the cream rises to the top, although too much of it seems to be souring recently with fuss about shagging, medals, neglected investigations, corruption etc revealing the stars are just as fallible as the rest of us were.
As ex army and middle ranking police officer I agree wholeheartedly! There were a few crossovers in the 20th Century but a lot less now….. One may be map reading so the 21st Century constables can see where his beat is? Maybe not…..
I loved your diagram, took me back to training and OHP’s… ?
I remember being posted to a surveillance unit in 2006, when newer officers were already addicted to satellite navigation systems. We confiscated them all and made them use map books!
Witty, informed, eloquent. Bravo, and thank you.
Gosh, it seems I have become an echo! 8-)
Absolutely spot on the idea has been knocking about for ever. How well did the accelerated promotion scheme work ???? Not inthink
I thought the Unherd article was interesting. It explains and contextualises the SLT and FLT ostrich like behaviour. I was a lot closer to the social care failings that fed that particular shit-tsunami.
And those failings are continuing today - look at the 14yr old stabbed to death on a school bus. Same underlying causes.
As for the ‘officer class’ of the police - bang on.