Few topics regarding law enforcement elicit more of an emotional response - both within and outside of the ranks - than the so-called militarization of civilian law enforcement. This specter is usually raised after a high-profile event in which police employ equipment and tactics that appear military-like. Waco and the Elian Gonzalez incident are two showcase events that acted as lightning rods for this emotion. This discussion is often confused because the distinction between means and ends is lost.

To mean anything scary, militarization would have to mean the adoption by civilian law enforcement of military goals and rules of engagement. Yet the goals and rules of engagement of these two organizations are very different indeed. Military goals are centered around the capture or destruction of assets, and any level of force may be used to accomplish these goals. Law enforcement goals center around the capture of criminal suspects in order to bring them to trial, and only reasonable force may be used, about which there are very strict rules. Military rules of engagement allow for the (accidental) killing of non-combatants, and have a restricted concept of "rights" for civilian populations. Law enforcement rules of engagement are strictly constrained by the constitutional rights of everyone involved - including the perpetrator, and they place paramount importance on saving lives - again, including the perpetrator's.

However, there is nothing wrong with civilian law enforcement sharing tactics and equipment with the military. Tools are just tools. It's the ends to which these tools are employed and the bounds that are put on their use that differentiate the military's use of equipment and tactics from civilian law enforcement's. The means may be the same, but the ends differ.

If civilian law enforcement were truly being militarized, then police officers would be adopting military goals and rules of engagement; they would be allowed to imprison citizens without cause, and to kill them without being threatened, to take but two examples. That is not happening. (While some might point to Ruby Ridge - another lightning rod for emotion - as a counter-example, I'd point out that was a single incident, and that there are many points of view about what happened there.)