zlacker

    On a more conspiratorial note, this seems like a good
    counter strategy for the people who ostensibly would
    rather the masses focus on property damage than laws,
    statutes and police training.

Yes. This is an age-old and (unfortunately) extremely effective technique. "Agent provocateur" is the term here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_provocateur

There's a lot of direct and circumstantial evidence pointing toward exactly that sort of thing happening during this current time of unrest.

There are plenty of incidents during the current protests that, and I'm going phrase this very mildly for HN's sake, certainly invite... uh... speculation as far as whether or not there are agents provocateur at play.

Moving away from speculation and into the realm of hard facts, this sort of escalation is an explicitly stated goal of some movements. Example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boogaloo_movement