The German Police do not mess around. When they tell you to stop, you stop. Any aggressive move whatsoever on the part of a potential perp is handled very severely.
I lived thee for two years in the 70's.
If this report is accurate, then the German Police did, off base, on their soveriegn soil, what they had to do to protect themselves and their citizens.
I's too bad one of our own behaved in this manner...but we have bad apples and he acted criminally and threatened life, and paid with his own.
While I was there, one guy took a tank off base and ended up running through a German town and crushing several cars. German citizens were killed. In that case MP's got on top of the tank and were able to get it opened and stop the guy. There was a big international flap over it because as you can imagine, the Germans wanted that guy. I can't remember whether afterwards they ever got him...but I know the Germans were extremely angy (and understandbly so) over it. The guy porobably got harsher treatment in Leavenworth or somewhere as he would have gotten in Germany...but I cannot blame them for wanting to try and punish him themsleves.
Exactly the way it ought to be!