Domestic use of military forces is not an uncommon thing around the world.

[Igel]

64. I do.

King George billeting troops among American civilians in peace time.

Or Stalin using his troops to confiscate food from peasants in the Don Basin.

If you want to get picky, the KGB (NKVD, ChK, whatever) was strictly speaking in the same branch as the military. The GULags were run by them. The militsia (the police--"police" was a bourgeois term) would arrest you; the NKVD would accuse you; and then you'd be sent off to quasi-military internment camps. Once you were released, you were in internal exile. If you left your area, it would be the police who would find you and turning you over to the NKVD.

Sounds like a lot of different forces. In fact, it's rather like having the Marines arrest you and send you to the Navy for trial and then going to the Army for prison.

A lot of small countries don't distinguish between army and police, simply because it's expensive to train and arm both forces, so you merge them. Their army's pretty pointless anyway. In case of external attack, you recruit every armed, trained man--and that's going to mean "police" first and foremost.

A lot of totalitarian countries don't distinguish between army and police, simply because the police do the kinds of things the army does. Saddam had a huge army garrisoned all over the place. They did patrols. Officially wartime, there was no fighting and no enemy. It kept down populations and made it clear that if you're going to rebel it's going to be expensive--and you'd better start off big because if you start small you won't get big.

Same in Syria. Same in China. Tibet has no revolution, has no rebellion. Yet there are lots of soldiers stationed not close to the border who do patrols. To intimidate the population.

Rather for the same kind of reason that King George billeted troops among American civilians in peace time. A large standing army can prevent war--especially if the army is standing with their guns aimed on the populace.