Geopolitics Magazine January - February 2015 ( 7th Edition ) | Page 68

Geopolitics & Daily News Magazine

Police Special Forces when
breaching and get inside the
building they are to neutralize all
people inside. Hostages and
attackers. Hostages are to be tied up
and left down. This is a point where
many people claim they suffered police
brutality. What they do not know is
that police officer at scene is not aware
if he/she is a threat or not and
certainly does not have the time at
that point to verify. So all people are
to be tied down first and when
operation ends they will be freed.

Charlie Hebdo Attack: French Special Forces Raid On Hostage Taker
In Vincenne Paris

Executing an operation is not an easy
task, even though members of such
forces have extensive fight and
weapons training in real field. They
might get injured which means that
force team will escalate (like in Paris
where terrorist shot against them and
tried to go through the glass door
where he got shot 40 times!!).

Special Police forces follow a basic ruleset on security.
First comes the safety of the team because if they get injured or end up dead then mission has
failed and they might get added to hostages.
Second is the safety of hostages. This means that they will try to bring hostages alive outside or in
worst case scenario lightly injured. This is a field decision which will be explained later, but it is not
something that won’t happen.
Third is the safety of the attackers. In contrary to what most people believe, neutralizing or taking
down a threat does not necessarily mean killing them. It could end up to an arrest of the attackers
depending of the possibility of success they might have on such an attempt.
Guidelines to hostages:
In many incidents as mentioned above, several hostages were killed by attackers or escalated their
wrath against them because they made mistakes when they were held captive. This is a brief list of
guidelines to follow when you find yourself in such a situation:
- Keep calm and do not attract attention with screams and nervous behavior.
- Do not talk unless they talk to you. Keep it brief and avoid looking them directly in eyes. Try to look
elsewhere. Direct eye contact always provokes.
- If you see that they have placed explosives somewhere and you are free to move, try to direct your
feet towards the point of the explosives while sitting or lying down. If they go off you might stand a
chance with a leg injury but not with a head one.

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