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Recherche Assistance Intervention Dissuasion (Research, Assistance, Intervention, Deterrence) — is a militarized SWAT team that uses special forces techniques. It is accused of triple tapping a mentally disturbed man who took school children hostage in 1993. RAID killed the man while he slept.

It is interesting to note how terrorism is conflated with bank robbery in the article. It’s part of a federal effort to characterize all crime — from marijuana possession to bank robbery — as terrorism.

“There will be the sound of gunfire and blasts — all part of Urban Shield, one of the biggest domestic terrorism drills in the country. The $1 million, two-day event begins Saturday and will test the training of 27 crack teams from throughout the state, elsewhere in the country and the world,” the Tribune article reports.

Urban Shield is funded by the Department of Homeland Security and at least one large corporation — BAE, a death merchant based in Britain. BAE stands accused of paying millions of dollars in bribes to secure contracts in Africa and Eastern Europe.

BAE’s “generous contributions” to Urban Shield will get the residents of Alameda County acclimated to the “sound of gunfire and blasts” and the presence of militarized cops “in full battle gear ” roaming the streets of the Bay Area this weekend.

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