We Are the Enemy: Is This the Lesson of Ferguson?

Guest Post by John W. Whitehead

If you dress police officers up as soldiers and you put them in military vehicles and you give them military weapons, they adopt a warrior mentality. We fight wars against enemies, and the enemies are the people who live in our cities—particularly in communities of color.—Thomas Nolan, criminology professor and former police officer

Should police officer Darren Wilson be held accountable for the shooting death of unarmed citizen Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, on August 9, 2014?

That the police officer was white and his victim black should make no difference. In a perfect world, it would not matter. In an imperfect world such as ours, however, racism is an effective propaganda tool used by the government and the media to distract us from the real issues.

As a result, the national dialogue about the dangers of militarized, weaponized police officers being trained to act like soldiers on the battlefield, shooting first and asking questions later, has shifted into a largely unspoken debate over race wars, class perceptions and longstanding, deep-seated notions of who deserves our unquestioning loyalty and who does not.

Putting aside our prejudices, however, let’s not overlook the importance of Ferguson and this grand jury verdict. Tasked with determining whether Wilson should stand trial for Brown’s shooting, the grand jury ruled that the police officer will not face charges for the fatal shooting.

However, the greater question—whether anything will really change to rein in militarized police, police shootings, lack of accountability and oversight, and a military industrial complex with a vested interest in turning America into a war zone—remains unanswered.

Ferguson matters because it provides us with a foretaste of what is to come. It is the shot across the bow, so to speak, a warning that this is how we will all be treated if we do not tread cautiously in challenging the police state, and it won’t matter whether we’re black or white, rich or poor, Republican or Democrat. In the eyes of the corporate state, we are all the enemy.

This is the lesson of Ferguson.

Remember that in the wake of the shooting, Ferguson police officers clad in body armor, their faces covered with masks, equipped with assault rifles and snipers and riding armored vehicles, showed up in force to deal with protesters. Describing that show of force by police in Ferguson, Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, stated, “This was a military force, and they were facing down an enemy.”

Yes, we are the enemy. As I point out in my book A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, since those first towers fell on 9/11, the American people have been treated like enemy combatants, to be spied on, tracked, scanned, frisked, searched, subjected to all manner of intrusions, intimidated, invaded, raided, manhandled, censored, silenced, shot at, locked up, and denied due process.

There was a moment of hope after Ferguson that perhaps things might change. Perhaps the balance would be restored between the citizenry and their supposed guardians, the police. Perhaps our elected officials would take our side for a change and oppose the militarization of the police. Perhaps warfare would take a backseat to more pressing national concerns.

That hope was short-lived.

It wasn’t long before the media moved on to other, more titillating stories. The disappearance of a University of Virginia college student and the search for her alleged abductor, the weeks-long man-hunt for an accused cop killer, the Republican electoral upset, a Rolling Stone expose on gang rapes at fraternity parties, Obama’s immigration amnesty plan, and the rape charges against Bill Cosby are just a few of the stories that have dominated the news cycle since the Ferguson standoff between police and protesters.

It wasn’t long before the American public, easily acclimated to news of government wrongdoing (case in point: the national yawn over the NSA’s ongoing domestic surveillance), ceased to be shocked, outraged or alarmed by reports of police shootings. In fact, the issue was nowhere to be found in this year’s run-up to Election Day, which was largely devoid of any pressing matters of national concern.

And with nary a hiccup, the police state marched steadily forth. In fact, aided and abetted by the citizenry’s short attention span, its easily distracted nature, and its desensitization to anything that occupies the news cycle for too long, it has been business as usual in terms of police shootings, the amassing of military weapons, and the government’s sanctioning of police misconduct. Most recently, Ohio police shot and killed a 12-year-old boy who was seen waving a toy gun at a playground.

Rubbing salt in our wounds, in the wake of Ferguson, police agencies not only continued to ramp up their military arsenals but have used them whenever possible. In fact, in anticipation of the grand jury’s ruling, St. Louis police actually purchased more equipment for its officers, including “civil disobedience equipment.”

Just a few weeks after the Ferguson showdown, law enforcement agencies took part in an $11 million manhunt in Pennsylvania for alleged cop killer Eric Frein. Without batting an eye, the news media switched from outraged “shock” over the military arsenal employed by police in Ferguson to respectful “awe” of the 48-day operation that cost taxpayers $1.4 million per week in order to carry out a round-the-clock dragnet search of an area with a 5-mile-radius.

The Frein operation brought together 1,000 officers from local, state and federal law enforcement, as well as SWAT teams and cutting edge military equipment (high-powered rifles, body armor, infrared sensors, armored trucks, helicopters and unmanned, silent surveillance blimps)—some of the very same weapons and tactics employed in Ferguson and, a year earlier, in Boston in the wake of the marathon bombing.

The manhunt was a well-timed, perfectly choreographed exercise in why Americans should welcome the police state: for our safety, of course, and to save the lives of police officers.

Opposed to any attempt to demilitarize America’s police forces, the Dept. of Homeland Security has been chanting this safety mantra in testimony before Congress: Remember 9/11. Remember Boston. Remember how unsafe the world was before police were equipped with automatic weapons, heavily armored trucks, night-vision goggles, and aircraft donated by the DHS.

Contrary to DHS rhetoric, however, militarized police—twitchy over perceived dangers, hyped up on their authority, and protected by their agencies, the legislatures and the courts—have actually made communities less safe at a time when violent crime is at an all-time low and lumberjacks, fishermen, airline pilots, roofers, construction workers, trash collectors, electricians and truck drivers all have a higher risk of on-the-job fatalities than police officers.

Moreover, as Senator Tom Coburn points out, the militarization of America’s police forces has actually “created some problems that wouldn’t have been there otherwise.” Among those problems: a rise in the use of SWAT team raids for routine law enforcement activities (averaging 80,000 a year), a rise in the use and abuse of asset forfeiture laws by police agencies, a profit-driven incentive to criminalize lawful activities and treat Americans as suspects, and a transformation of the nation’s citizenry into suspects.

Ferguson provided us with an opportunity to engage in a much-needed national dialogue over how police are trained, what authority they are given, what weaponry they are provided, and how they treat those whom they are entrusted with protecting.

Caught up in our personal politics, prejudices and class warfare, we have failed to answer that call. In so doing, we have played right into the hands of all those corporations who profit from turning America into a battlefield by selling the government mine-resistant vehicles, assault rifles, grenade launchers, and drones.

As long as we remain steeped in ignorance, there will be no reform.

As long as we remain divided by our irrational fear of each other, there will be no overhaul in the nation’s law enforcement system or institution of an oversight process whereby communities can ensure that local police departments are acting in accordance with their wishes and values.

And as long as we remain distracted by misguided loyalties to military operatives who are paid to play the part of the government’s henchmen, there will be no saving us when the events of Ferguson unfold in our own backyards.

When all is said and done, it doesn’t matter whose “side” you’re on as far as what transpired in Ferguson, whether you believe that Michael Brown was a victim or that Darren Wilson was justified in shooting first and asking questions later.

What matters is that we not allow politics and deep-rooted prejudices of any sort to divert our efforts to restore some level of safety, sanity and constitutional balance to the role that police officers play in our communities. If we fail to do so, we will have done a disservice to ourselves and every man, woman and child in this country who have become casualties of the American police state.

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Mark
Mark

No not the lesson.

The issue is race and ethnicity. What Martin Armstrong wrote is very true. The Government can prosecute you for a ham sandwich and make it difficult to prosecute one of their own through the Grand Jury system.

The problem with a jury system in this case is race. No witness wants himself made a snitch. In this case the people paradoxically are more dangerous then the Government.

Race and ethnicity is the problem. There is no system that can handle it.

Anonymous
Anonymous

Nice article.

But it’s written from the standpoint of someone who thinks ‘the system’ can be ‘saved’ or ‘reformed’….

It can’t.

Cops are, no matter what your opinion of them is, Enforcers for the political elite. That they might be ‘good guys’ at heart and are duped into believing they actually are not Enforcer Goons with all their hearts does not change that they are Enforcer Goons… that they sincerely deny it and believe otherwise only makes them clueless Enforcer Goons…

They’ve been given all sorts of new, lethal toys. Lethality equals power, especially when used under Color of Law. Anyone who has been given real power – the power of life and death and is shielded by his employers (the State) by the Law – is loathe to give it up. Now that they have this new power, the only way for them to give it up is to take it from them…

The Experiment is over… the only thing you can do now is pick a side, get you and your team as ready as possible in the little time we have left…

Dutchman
Dutchman

Much needed dialog my ass. Ferguson is all about the “Welfare Rights”.

I can’t make this shit up: “The National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) was an American activist organization that fought to put more people on welfare, especially women and children. The organization had four goals: adequate income, dignity, justice, and democratic participation”

Yeah, we’re supposed to pay them to shit out more of the likes of Michael Brown.

I don’t know what percentage of Blacks – 25% ?? Just want to live off the rest of us and run around being the violent savages they are. It’s way too big of a percentage. They don’t have shit, cause they don’t give a shit, so they don’t care if they burn shit down, cause they will get more free shit, stolen from your and mine paycheck.

As far as the militarized police. Yes they are a menance to everyone. But look at it, the police are an extension of the government: they need to get involved in everything, no matter how trivial the violation, and our government has added thousands of laws to aid the polize in becoming enforcers.

As far as Michael Brown. A two bit nigger. Stole some cigs – big deal. However the cop ‘needed’ to confront this major crime (maybe instead of waiting for backup) he chased Brown down the street. It would have been much safer for Wilson to stay in his cruiser and wait for backup – that came 90 seconds later.

Billy
Billy

By the way, that Anon at 1:43 was me…..

My bad…

Hope
Hope

Yes, a heavily militarized police is a huge problem for me.

However, I wonder if the presence of such is a RESPONSE to the increasingly lawless/violent behavior of certain parts of our population, ie the black inner cities, illegal alien gang bangers, violent drug cartels, etc?

What would we do if the police just one day say, fuck it, we’re outta here? Mogadishu, that’s what.

Know-it-all
Know-it-all

Hmmm, a lesson to be learned from Ferguson?

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Mike Moskos

Just a cursory watch of the teevee news here in South Florida shows some cities seem to account for the bulk of the “officer involved” murders/beatings, etc. Solution: don’t live in those cities. Give your tax dollars only to those who treat you well. One look at the differences in uniforms & cop cars between cities will show you which city councils want to project force.

The most aggressive police force here is Miami Gardens–the city bordering the stadium where the Miami Dolphins play–and all the elected officials there are of African descent. Those cops are in all black uniforms, lots of equipment dangling from the shirts, big engine black Dodges with heavily tinted windows. They don’t get out of car without a gun and nightstick on the holster. The weight of all that equipment makes ’em walk funny. True gangstas. Out to subdue the population and presumably fund the department with civil forfeiture.

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