I think you've hit on something there: Incentives. What are the incentives for the PD in an armed situation? To stay alive, yes, of course. But are there other

I think you've hit on something there: Incentives. What are the incentives for the PD in an armed situation? To stay alive, yes, of course. But are there other incentives? The guns blazing approach indicates there are other incentives. If they wanted to 'just' stay alive, they'd put a lot of distance between themselves and the suspect, get a lot of back-up, etc. But there is another possible incentive too: glory/honor. For many male-centric groups, dis/honor is a VERY powerful incentive. Taking down the 'bad-guy' and earning honor/glory through that act can be quite motivating. But can you replace that incentive with another one that is less 'thrill seeking'? How about 'hazard pay', payed by the number of hours that an officer is in a life-threatening situation, escalating with the time spent on scene? Like, you corner a suspect, but the longer the standoff lasts, the more pay the officer gets, and the more officers there are on the scene, the more the pay increases? That'll incentivize the officers to wait things out, get back-up, give time for media to get on site, and probably decrease fatalities. Or, you know, less guns on the streets too.