It's not much, but it's a start:

READING, England -- During his training to become a British police officer, Ben Johnson recalled, an instructor told him and other recruits, "If you ever see somebody carrying a gun, turn and run away as quickly as possible."

"It was a bizarre situation," said Johnson, 34, a former police officer in Garland, Tex., and U.S. Army soldier who moved here with his British wife three years ago and became this country's first non-British police officer. He said running from trouble was exactly the opposite of what he learned as an American cop.

Now Johnson is publicly challenging one of the great traditions of law enforcement in Britain, what he calls the "old-fashioned idea of the unarmed bobby on the beat." He has written to his chief asking for permission to carry a gun, arguing that Britain is no longer safe for unarmed and under-trained police officers. He says he will resign if the chief refuses.

Johnson's case has caused a media furor here, partly because an American -- a Texan no less -- is claiming he feels less safe as a police officer in Britain than he did on the beat in the United States, which is routinely portrayed here as a gun-drunk Wild West.

...

Britain has some of the world's toughest gun-control laws, and violent crime, while increasing, is still far less common than in the United States. There were 184 murders last year in London, a city of more than 7 million people, compared with 572 in New York City, which has 8 million people.

...

"The U.K. is changing rapidly, and the police have been slow to adapt," said Johnson, 6-foot-4 and razor thin, cradling his infant daughter in his lap in the dining room of his neat row house. "We should value the lives of police officers enough to properly equip them and train them to do the job -- even if that means getting rid of some old-fashioned notions."

He said he had 36 weeks of academy training and supervised field work to become a police officer in Texas. But at Thames Valley he said he received less than half that, and most of the instruction involved how to fill out paperwork.

Johnson said British officers are instructed to retreat if they see a gun and call for backup from armed officers, but that can give suspects time to escape.

I love how they compare the entire U.K. London, with tough gun control laws, to NYC also with tough gun control laws.  Why not compare it to the states of Washington and Idaho combined?  Those states are almost friendly to gun owners and the right to self defense.  They have about the same population and a good mix of urban and rural areas.  Why?  Because it's the Washington Post and they have an agenda.  Here is a comparison they could have done:

Washington and Idaho Population according to the 2000 census: 5894143 + 1293953 => 7188096
Washington and Idaho murders and non-negligent manslaughter (FBI Year 2000 UCR): 196 + 16 => 212.

So, even with the "gun-drunk" Wild West states of Washington and Idaho the number of murders is comparable.  Could it be that something other than rate of gun ownership is the dominate factor?  Any sane person would conclude that, but the anti-gun bigots aren't sane.  That there is even a debate about keeping policemen disarmed in the U.K. is further proof of that nationwide case of Hoplophobia.  Fortunately there is help--if they would just take advantage of it.

Update: My mistake.  The Washington post comparison was London to NYC, not the entire UK to NYC.  I'll update with city to city murder rates when I have more time.