STOP! Or I'll yell STOP again. What good is a cop without a gun. Here we call them meter maids.

yes
and there are areas in France where the police and fire are not allowed.........because of the muslims

I heard it is an individual officer's choice to carry a gun. To be an officer and not carry a weapon is unbelievably courageous or stupid depending on how it is looked at.

I wonder if they will change their stance on this matter in light of the events of the past few days?

How many heard the story that Jimmy Carter took all ammo (not the guns, themselves) from the Marine embassy guards, in Iran, prior to the hostage crisis in the 70's?

We all saw how that story ended.

In addition, most of the London police do not carry fire arms. Maybe it is a good idea keep away from countries like that.

I visited Paris for the first time this spring. Its a beautiful city and I shutter to think of what can happen to people that don't admit that there is evil in the world that needs to be confronted. Use your pen for sure but back it up with semi-automatic when the need arises

Monsieur, mes mains sont en place! Se il vous plait ne tirez pas!
According to Google Translate, this is a Parisian gendarme saying, "Mister, my hands are up! Please don't shoot!"
My dino imagination conjured up a vision while I was writing the above.
Imagine French cops on strike marching through a Muslim neighborhood chanting, "Hands up! Don't shoot!"

Every time I have been to France, the police carried side arms. I have never seen an unarmed cop in France.

yes, they rode their bicycles up to the scene and
surrendered. -- j

A cop without a gun? A wasp without a sting, a pianist without fingers, an accountant without an adding machine, a butcher without a knife, a politician without a mouth, (hmm, maybe that last one's not a bad idea.). Perhaps the only good thing that may come of the French massacres is to make it compulsory for police to carry guns.

I do not think that this is entirely accurate. The national police apparently are armed; the municipal police are under the control of the mayor of the town they are in and the mayor is responsible for whether or not they are typically armed.

I cannot find anything about whether the assigned police guards at Charlie Hebdo were armed but the first police to arrive on bicycles apparently were not.

So it looks like whether or not an individual officer is armed depends on who they are working for - one bets that more of them are armed today than there were last week.

Jan

Odd, I carry at least one gun everywhere I go. In addition I carry two extra magazines on my belt, just in case. So 17+1, 17 and 17. A decent amount of stopping power.I'm not even a cop.

That's right. The only ones you can count on having guns, are the Gendarmes. They, by definition, are armed. ("Gentlemen at Arms.")