Outpost of paradise choose Glocks to rearm its police force
The small and often overlooked U.S. territory of American Samoa is undertaking an effort to arm their police force for the first time in decades. To protect and maintain the peace of this quiet Pacific paradise, the Department of Public Safety has chosen Glock, and is looking for help from their Hawaiian neighbors to the north.
American Samoa, part of the U.S. since 1899, in general has had a pretty peaceful history since the end of World War Two. During the war, the Marine Corps organized every military aged male into a reserve battalion to withstand an expected Japanese invasion. While an errant Japanese submarine did surface and fire a few shells from her deck guns into the island on one occasion, the invasion never came.
This led to the local battalion being disbanded and even the territorial police hanging up their guns. In fact, by the 1980s, the territorial police, the Department of Public Safety, was unarmed.
But that has now changed.
Read more in my column at Glock Forum