Hello, hello, hello! (courtesy standard.co.uk)

“On Wednesday, 4 September at approximately 1800hrs two uniformed officers approached a man in the gardens of Buckingham Palace to verify his identity,” the [London] Metropolitan Police statement conceded. “The man was satisfactorily identified.” At gunpoint. And the winner was . . . Prince Andrew! According to express.co.uk, the Royal’s extremely happy he didn’t emerge from the early evening encounter with an extra hole or two. In him, I mean.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

40 COMMENTS

  1. Pfah. Those Limey poofters can’t even maintain their weapons properly. There’s rust inside the muzzle of the one pointing at the camera.

    It sometimes is ironic to think that the Brits used to possess some of the very finest gunmakers on the planet, and today their pudgy cops can’t even figure out how to properly lube a weapon to prevent rust. No nation has fallen as far, as fast, without being invaded by a foreign army, as the UK has.

    • That’s the first thing I noticed too… I thought… is that RUST??? Ahh… maybe it’s just severe copper fouling… nah… that’s RUST!

    • It was a very foggy morning and the sun had only just come out. It happens all the time to the ARs that wait for their owners while they take a shower.
      Home bathroom carry, hoo ah

      • Well, the Brit Royals do serve in their military and take their chances. Andrew was in the Falklands, but didn’t fight in Desert Storm 1. A bit of a controversy in the press as he was appointed to HMS CAMBELTOWN which didn’t go to the gulf. Luck of the draw in terms of his assignment being determined well before Desert Storm. Press raised heck claiming that Andrew was being shown favoritism by not being made to go, while in the ranks of other Navy Lynx pilots, folks were afraid he would be swapped for public affairs reasons – thereby taking a career enhancing slot from somebody else. Operational experience plays well in British performance evaluations and career progression.

    • Hardly fallen far – please support your assertion. Pudgy cops, where in the photo was that. I don’t believe donut (or if you rather doughnuts!) runs are synonymous with UK police but with US police!
      Even if it is rust, the gun would still work. Not that it really needs to since the police don`t need to shot many people in the UK.

    • @ Dyseptic:

      “No nation has fallen as far, as fast, without being invaded by a foreign army, as the UK has.”

      The current administration and all its minions at both the national and local level are working very hard to make up ground in this area.

    • Goes to show they have no respect for firearms,but of course their firearms are issued daily could be that it is someone else’s fault.Right!Be prepared and ready.Keep your powder dry.

    • It probably hasn’t been fired or maintained in years. Just checked out of the armory and checked back in, repeatedly.

  3. Brilliant career move by Officers Krupke and Fife. But I have a sneaking suspicion that Prince Andrew wasn’t quaking in his boots. Not if he takes after his ol’ lady.

    She once woke up to find a slightly drunk and depressed (but nonviolent) stranger at the foot of her bed. They spent an hour talking about world affairs, cricket and Ozzie Osborne who knows what until somebody on Her Majesty’s crack security team caught wise.

  4. I noticed the rust inside the barrel first thing. I just shook my head. They must have gotten their police training in NYC

  5. Well, I don’t know whether Andrew tore into the police, he was a pretty down to earth guy, but I can almost guarantee that the security detail that travels with him have had words with the cops.

    They’re mostly ex-SAS and take protecting him very seriously. I can’t imagine they’re very impressed with him getting braced this way during one of the few times they’re not around.

    • The Met have released a statement that identifies the source of the illegal guns in Tottenham, Haringey and Brixton as “Syria. Or perhaps Virginia.”

    • “The decision follows a 17 per cent rise in gun crime in the capital over the past six months, fuelled by a Turkish gang war in north London and a rise in teenage gang shootings south of the river.”

      Any comment on that, Piers? Didn’t think so.

      If Britain was as safe as he makes it out to be, the Police wouldn’t be wearing body armor and carrying submachine guns. When you go from cops carrying nightsticks to cops carrying SMGs, you probably didn’t think things through when you started making changes to the law.

  9. That’s the beauty of corrosive ammo. We comblock enthusiasts are insanely assiduous about cleaning and maintenance…

  10. The British; beset upon by war from Germany, twice in one century, and what
    nearly iced a royal, in Buckingham Palace no less? German made HK MP5’s.
    Nicht ironisch, wahr? (Ironic, isn’t it?)

  11. How much you wanna bet those weapons are checked out of an armory at the start of a shift and returned at the end? The officer probably never draws the same weapon twice and he has no idea whether the one he has drawn for that shift will even fire as he’s never practiced with it. Rust in the muzzle is just the tip of the iceberg and England is following the path of the Titannic.

    • I’d bet anything you’re right about that jwm. There’s NO WAY those cops get to take their weapons home, so it’s either a locker at the station or an armory, and the second seems way more likely to me.

      Just wait until American cops have to do the same thing. It’s coming, if we can’t succeed in stopping the advance of gun kontrol. You’d think the cops would want to help us, but they’ll never believe it until they get the memo that they can’t take their weapons home anymore.

  12. The Brits do love their H&K’s. Well they have to show some gun some love as their bullpup Enfields were POS. One of my fondest memories of a trip to Blighty is seeing 2 HEAVILY ARMED and ARMORED military types, carrying H&K MP5’s at the entrance to the Aer Lingus gates at Heathrow. Yes nothing says “Gud Aye” like the bbl of an MP5.

    • H&K was British-owned from 1999 to 2003, which accounts for part of the enthusiasm for MP5s in some quarters: you could have “SAS-style special forces kit” and still be buying British to get your fix of allyness. Given the low levels of use, they last a long time.

      Conveniently, it meant H&K could work over the L85 and L86 for us, which had the unintended effect of costing them business: in the 2003 make-or-break infantry rifle trials, the L85A2 trounced the G36 (and all three other contenders) on accuracy and only the AK beat it on reliability.

  13. I find it ironic, and yet not surprising this happened, and to a Royal nonetheless. Seeing that, the Brits have a long history of giving up there rights to be ruled boy the elite class. First the Monarchy, but for the last 113 years the Oligarchy – via Parliament and the Prime Minister.

    So not a whole lot of sympathy for this guy, seeing that you get out of your government what you put into it.

Comments are closed.