Oakland police have their hands full. In addition to a shootout on the freeway and a police-involved shooting at a BART station, officers are now on the hunt for an apparent sniper trying to take out officers.

"They hear gunshots and can feel the bullets pass by them," police spokesman Officer Jeff Thomason said. "They can hear them whizzing by."

The latest incident happened Sunday at about 11:30 p.m. Patrol officers were on a traffic stop near 8th and Adeline Streets in West Oakland when they heard shots. They were detaining people in a car on suspicion of drug-related offenses.

The officers had to get out of the line of fire and get the detainees out of the line of fire. They called for back up.

The officers took cover, and no one was hit by the gunfire. Thomason said four officers were there at the time.

Police searched the high-rise apartment building from where they believe the shots were fired but they did not find the gun or the shooter.

To make matters worse, police checked the building's security room where cameras might be -- and the room had been vandalized.

Police say its unclear whether that was done in advance by the shooter or if it was a coincidence but they were not able to get any surveillance tape right away which might help in the investigation.

The officers and detainees were not hit.

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A lot of people, including me, have been bitching about the restrictive Rules of Engagement governing the use of force by our troops in Afghanistan. If you want to see restrictive rules of engagement, read between the lines in the above article.

I don't see any mention of the police firing a single shot. There is no mention of an air strike or artillery barrage called in on the building that was the source of the highly accurate sniper fire they were receiving.

The closest I ever came to a situation like this was 40 years ago in Lai Khe, Vietnam, when I was visiting with a USAF FAC outfit that was supporting the US Army 1st ID. One night some dark shadows crawled under the grey darkness of the perimeter wire near the USAF sector.

For the next few hours, I joined several hundred GIs in the primary mission of the U.S. military: the overwhelming application of deadly force. We were assisted by a few U.S. Army Cobra helicopter gunships which orbited over our heads and made runs on the wire with rockets, machine guns and grenade launchers.

The next morning, a detail was sent to clean the remains out of the wire, I don't recall ever hearing an exact casualty count, or whether they were even able to count how many bodies there had been.

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Police officers can't do that shit. They have to read the alleged suspects their rights in their native language (if they're literate) and be sure that no one speaks harshly to them, grips them too tightly or violates their personal space while taking them to meet their lawyer, who will have them back on the streets before the policeman gets off his shift.

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One last thought - I am sure there are some good people somewhere in Oakland. Have the local authorities given any thought to evacuating these people? Then there will be no need to endanger the lives of the policemen on patrols. The police can just maintain a perimeter around Oakland to prevent anyone from escaping.

Also, the Oakland Police might check with the California Highway Patrol to see if CHP has any "special resources" available for stopping highway speeders. If they're anything like the Texas Department of Public Safety, they really, really get embarrassed when a speeder outruns them.