Occupy Forcing Militarized PDs to Show Their Colors

Today, The Daily offered this pic in still another story on the militarizing of local police forces. If  we’ve seen a legion of similar photos (pardon the pun), what makes these Washington SWAT guys that much scarier is not the hardware but the outfits and the color scheme. Specifically, the duds are not domestic blue or black, like most of the robo-cops we’ve been seeing for months brandishing batons at, and kettling Occupy campers and protesters. But what we have here instead is the Pentagon-inspired green-and-olive color scheme accessorized with helmets remembered, in living color, from old LIFE photos from Vietnam. I should emphasize, the trend isn’t exactly new, as you can tell from places like Atlanta or Fairfax County — or, maybe, you’re town. Still though, colors being as much tactical as anything else, it’s the design combined with all the deployment and use of the teams, hardware and gear — that makes America suddenly feel like Fallujah.

More militarism at The Bag.

(photo: Stephen Brashear/Getty caption: Armored vehicles, like this one being ridden by SWAT team members in Lakewood, Wash., are made available to police departments by a Department of Defense program)