Historically, this changed across the country because of one incident — the north Hollywood shootout in 1997
Officer friendlies who responded to the bank robbery were woefully under geared to handle the robbers. They had their service revolvers. (Revolvers) and no vests. The bank robbers had AR15s and vests.
That one incident panicked police departments across the country.
Now, what we know now of false flags, it was probably a FF clown setup situation to excuse and cause militarization of police. Has all the hallmarks- young males with issues, far too well equipped to face sourced the paramilitary gear on their own.
With digging such past events too.