To be fair, even in a lot of relatively calm countries, you see armed troops all over the place on a day to day basis (in the major cities and transportation hubs). I'm not saying what is going on in Boston is normal, as they are actively looking for someone so it's a bit different, being admist an actual manhunt. But in my journeys across Europe, it was common place to see military personnel hold FAMAS/M16s/M4s/AKs patrolling around train stations, busy public parks, down populated streets, etc. Many of those countries, like France, Italy, Czech Republic, etc, have experienced acts of terrorism and violence of this nature in the past, and that's just a thing they do now.

I was in Europe in 2006, France at the time, during the "liquid bomb scare" thing in London, right when it broke, and we saw security at the train stations all across the continent skyrocket. Troops in groups of 3-5 patrolling, all armed, but also, all mostly smiley and friendly and fairly unintimidating. But being an American, I had never seen anything like this. I've seen cops in riot gear and swat teams quelling riots and protests, but never troops on the street armed just walking around on a normal day when nothing was happening. It was kind of odd to me, but not really all that bad. There were military on the streets before that as well, but in much small numbers. Think like pairs of young military people with assault rifles posted in a couple different areas of a train station, or highly populated area, or roaming the main roads of the area. On trains going into the Czech Republic from Germany the Czech police (or border patrol or whatever) had AKs swung over their shoulders as they checked passports on the train. This was all before the terrorist scare in London with the liquid bomb plot, after that we just saw an increase in the numbers.

Don't get me wrong, I would prefer we don't ever have a police state and have heavily armed police/troops everywhere all the time. But I guess those travels I've had in the past kind of made me realize that's how many countries do security already, and it's pretty common to see those kinds of sites on the streets in many European countries. It didn't really effect me, but it didn't really make me feel safe either. Made me wonder, "Why the hell are there people with assault rifles everywhere? What do they know that I don't?"

Russia, as another example, has had numerous attacks by Chechnyans and other former Soviet block countries. They are used to it, but they are also prepared for it and have a much strong para-military presence on their streets, at train stations, and at airports and malls. I don't think it's the life they chose, but it's just a situation they have to take into account now. Due to our foreign policy here in the US, we're also now joining that club of the hated. No, it's not because of our freedoms, it's because we're invading countries, and have bases there, we drop bombs from drones on them. We're friends with some Arab countries, and go to war with others. We pick and choose our battles over there, and not always for the most noble reasons. 9/11 hijackers were all Saudi Arabian, so we invade Iraq and Afghanistan and perform drone attacks in Pakistan... decisions like that don't win us any friends in the region. Just like invading Afghanistan and all the caucuses and eastern blocks hasn't really reflected well on Russia's currenty security.

Our foriegn policy, unfortunately, is getting us into a situation like many of these other older and more established countries like the others I've mentioned. We can only expect more attacks like this in the future, and sadly, as a result, I think we'll start seeing a more similar security presence like other nations as well.

Please excuse the thinking out loud, which seemed to have turned into a bit of a ramble. :)