Kristian Williams - Our Enemies in Blue - Police and Power in America

Troops on riot duty should keep in mind the fact that they are called uponto put down disorder, absolutely and promptly, with as little fo rce as possible,but it should be remembered, also, that in the majority of cases theway to accomplish these ends is to use at once every particle of forcenecessary to stop all disorder.41The new theorists sought a doctrine by which force would be prescribed inproportion to the difficulty of dispersing the crowd. They thus advocated usingtactics suited to the particular situation.In terms of tactics, giving priority to prevention demanded what later militarythinkers would call doctrines of "sequence of force" or "flexible response."Simply put, the idea was to adapt levels of forces [sic] to levels of perceivedmenace, escalating to fire-power only as a last resort .. .. All of the writers of1918-1920 endorsed the initial use of verbal warnings, bayonets, rifle butts, orhoses, as alternatives to firepower.42..,....o..'"I:)o-....n(Do..,'"I:)o- ....n(D..,o·...[I)'VBy 1940, the Show of Force doctrine had been reinserted as the first step of thisprogression.43In this way, the doctrine of Maximum Force was transfonned into that ofEscalated Force, which remained the standard approach to crowd control untilthe 1970s.As its name indicates, the escalated force style of protest policing wascharacterized by the use of force as a standard way of dealing with demonstrations.Police confronted demonstrators with a dramatic show of forceand followed with a progressively escalated use of force if demonstratorsfailed to abide by police instructions to limit or stop their activities.44Fig. D. Escalated Forceo7. FfRF.ARISo6. LESS·LuIIAL "fl'NlTlO"o5. B."\TO.'\S4. ARRESTS""u""o""