During the 70's & 80's at the height of the IRA bombings, on several occassions Parliament discussed and debated whether to allow the police to go to a shoot to kill policy. On each occassion the debate resulted in Parliament voting not to allow a shoot to kill policy.
A decision that was ignored on a regular basis. Aside from such high profile cases as the Gibraltar murders, I know from talking to people who served in NI that "shoot to kill" was SOP pretty much whenever they thought they could get away with it. It's over 25 years since an infantry NCO gave me a chilling description of how plastic bullets were actually used. Let's just say it involved a shot to the head at close range.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2005-07-26 11:05 am (UTC)A decision that was ignored on a regular basis. Aside from such high profile cases as the Gibraltar murders, I know from talking to people who served in NI that "shoot to kill" was SOP pretty much whenever they thought they could get away with it. It's over 25 years since an infantry NCO gave me a chilling description of how plastic bullets were actually used. Let's just say it involved a shot to the head at close range.