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I realise we Brits have the greatest special forces troops on the planet (SBS, SAS, Mountain + Arctic Warfare Marines and Pathfinder Paras) but why did the French use mere Police to hit the supermarket? It looked farcical?

" realise we Brits have the greatest special forces troops on the planet (SBS, SAS, Mountain + Arctic Warfare Marines and Pathfinder Paras)"

I am not sure what you base this on or indeed whether it is true.

" but why did the French use mere Police to hit the supermarket? It looked farcical?"

Obviously they are not the ordinary police you might see on the streets of Paris generally. I suspect they would be specially trained, anti-terrorist police. It depends on how France organises its police/anti-terror structure.

By any measure the lifting of the siege in the supermarket was a huge success. Rightly or wrongly I read that the four people who died in the supermarket were killed when the gunman initially went into the shop with gun blazing. If true, that means that they managed to save the lives of 15 hostages and kill the gunman without loss of life. A great success by anybody's criteria.

They looked very professional to me.

In what way did it look "farcical"? Seems like a job well done to me. Hostage freed unharmed in the printing works and both perps dispatched off to Paradise. And as David says, it appears that the 4 people killed at the supermarket were killed at the start at the siege.

And as for us having the "best" special forces, well the Israelis claim that theirs are the best, the Yanks say that theirs are and so on. Much of it is subjective.

I thought they did a good job. I'll piss on their graves.

Porn Baron wrote:

> I thought they did a good job. I'll piss on their graves.
>
That's ever so slightly confusing...

I thought the french did a good job. I'd like to piss on the terrorists graves.

Arginald Valleywater wrote:

> I realise we Brits have the greatest special forces troops on
> the planet (SBS, SAS, Mountain + Arctic Warfare Marines and
> Pathfinder Paras) but why did the French use mere Police to hit
> the supermarket? It looked farcical?


Far from looking farcical, they (the French security services) did a good job. As for saying "mere police" shows you have absolutely no knowledge of how the French security forces work... so maybe you shouldn't comment at all.

Just a very brief overview; in France there is the Police Nationale and the Gendarmerie Nationale. The Police is a wholly civilian force. It's main duties are similar to the roles of the normal police forces in the UK. Within the Police Nationale there are specialised units, the best known of which is the CRS (Compagnies Republicaines de Securite) who are charged with riot control/public order etc.

The Gendarmerie Nationale is military. It's main duties are the overall security of the nation and it's leaders (while "policemen" may stand outside certain buildings, including embassies, there will also be Gendarmes). They have specialist units (such as the GIGN or the Groupe d'Intervention de la Gendarmerie Nationale), who train along similar lines to the armed forces' other special forces units.

Until 1996, every young man in France did military service, so every member of the POLICE NATIONALE would have undergone weapons training, square bashing etc before joining, even though it's a "civilian" force. Pre 1996, only non-commissioned officers or higher ranks with at least 5 years military service would have been taken on in the Gendarmerie.

Where visitors to France may get confused about the various roles, is that the Police Nationale tend to police large towns and cities, along with major motorways, whilst out in the countryside, small towns and villages , B roads etc tend to be policed by the Gendarmerie.

The PN tend to dress is dark blue uniforms and will have a large red or red and white badge on the shoulder saying POLICE or POLICE CRS. Normal Gendarmes are in a brownish khaki uniform, while GIGN and similar special units are dressed in black. Those are the "farcical" ones who ended the sieges.