So far this week in London police have seized eight firearms, including two handguns and three sawn-off shotguns, four knives, two swords, 11 kilos of cocaine, three kilos of cannabis, one kilo of MDMA, four kilos of crack cocaine and heroin with a street value of £250,000.
Scotland Yard say Operation Kestrel is an extension of an earlier initiative launched against knife crime in June which resulted in 6,000 arrests and led to 1,000 knives being seized.
The Met is responding to a spike in stabbings and firearms offences with joint operations involving hundreds of specialist officers, including firearms teams.
As from the beginning of the year 15 teenagers have been stabbed to death in London.
There have also been more than 350 firearms-related incidents in the capital so far this year, up 15% on the 2014 figure.
The crackdown follows a guns amnesty two weeks after the Paris terror attacks, which resulted in the recovery of dozens of guns, including an AK47 assault rifle, the same kind of weapon used in the attack on the French capital.
The Metropolitan police operation - codenamed Kestrel - is being run by the Trident and Area Crime Command.
Trident Interceptor officers Chris Dartnell and Graham Barthel used an unmarked police car to follow and stop a number of vehicles linked to gang crime.
Although the teams involved in the Bethnal Green crackdown managed to detain a number of known gang members, Scotland Yard said the aim of the operation was as much about disrupting gang activity as it was about making arrests.
The arrests and seizures have been as a result of weapon sweeps, intelligence-led operations, search warrants and directed patrols by Armed Response Vehicles and Trident officers using ANPR technology.
Detective Chief Superintendent Kevin Southworth, in charge of the Trident and Area Crime Command, said officers targeting firearms were using similar tactics to those employed during June's anti-knife operation.
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