It is a scene designed to terrorise criminals: more than 150 police officers lining the city centre of Glasgow operating under a code name taken straight from the pages of a hard-boiled crime thriller and on the hunt for anyone out to cause trouble.

But whether it was the Christmas cheer or a sign that one of Europe’s toughest cities is getting safer, Friday night’s “Ring of Steel” lockdown by Strathclyde Police turned out to be more Hamish Macbeth than Judge Dredd, with just a handful of low-level offenders brought to book.

The plan was simple: stop crime in the city centre, especially the violence associated with Glasgow at night.

Officers were dispatched across the city centre; checkpoints were set up at every route into town; metal detectors scanned for knives; and Automatic Number Plate Recognition units checked vehicles for criminal connections. Plainclothes detectives roamed the city’s streets intent on sweeping up the kind of criminal that turns Glasgow into a place of forboding for some on weekend nights.

According to police chiefs, Operation Rose proved such a hit with the public that it could be repeated across Scotland.

Officers were briefed at 6pm and there was an atmosphere of tense anticipation at the force’s Pitt Street headquarters, but the twin goals of engagement and reassurance were emphasised, while officers were advised to stay cheery and chatty.

This weekend and next are among the busiest nights of the year for office parties, and police were expecting a flood of visitors unused to Glasgow nightlife.

Willie Caie of Glasgow Community and Safety Service said his team – which doubled from six to 12 for the night – routinely expected around 50,000 people in town on a Friday night. During the December rush, however, that figure is reckoned to jump to “anything between 70,000 and 100,000”.

The operation was apparently a great success, as all visitors to Glasgow who spoke to the Sunday Herald – with one exception – saying they were pleased by the police presence, and several even repeated the words of the force mantra, “reassurance and engagement”.

Many looked surprised by the presence of the groundbreaking Ferroguard pole metal detectors that were rolled out across the city’s bus and train stations, but initial unease gave way to curiosity once the devices’ purpose had been explained. With an active range of 3m, the Ferroguard allows officers to screen crowds of people for weapons without the bottleneck effect that airport-style arch detectors entail. Anyone setting the sensor off is then open to a full search. The intention is to halt the movement of weapons through Glasgow’s main bus and train stations.

Most travellers treated the detectors as a bit of a game, with groups of young men even egging one another on to approach it. The drunken 20-something who emptied his pockets but couldn’t understand why he was setting it off with his umbrella was a YouTube hit waiting to happen.

Sixteen-year-old John Opfer, a Glasgow resident whose white cider was confiscated by officers at Central Station, grudgingly said he did sometimes feel “a bit wary” in town at the weekend. Asked how he felt about the police taking his alcohol, he admitted he was “raging”, but added: “I can understand their point. It probably will make the city safer, but it’ll also be a pain for people who aren’t doing anything.”

Much was made by online commentators about the decision to publicise Operation Rose in advance through the pages of The Herald and Evening Times, with some people complaining that it gave criminals advance warning.

Sergeant Kevin McMullen of the British Transport Police, however, said quite the opposite was true. Speaking at Queen Street Station around 10pm, he said his organisation had yet to seize any illegal weapons. “Through the advertising, newspaper coverage and posters, I think people have just adhered to the message regarding knife crime,” he said.

In fact, throughout the entire operation – lasting from 6am until club closing time, around 3am – there was not a single arrest for possession of an offensive weapon.

From a total of 1016 stop-and-search actions, there were just 16 arrests and two dozen or so other disposals. Seven people were picked up for alleged breach of the peace, one with the additional charge of resisting arrest; three for alleged vehicle theft; two with drugs offences; one for an alleged assault; one drunk and incapable; one for an alleged housebreaking and one for driving while disqualified. There were seven fixed penalty notices for drinking or urinating on the streets; and more than 20 other minor or traffic offences.

But while some would look on the low arrest rate as failure – a similar operation in Liverpool last year netted £80,000-worth of drugs and 36 vehicles – most people on the streets on Friday backed the verdict of Strathclyde Police: crime had been halted through increased police presence and forewarning.

Speaking yesterday afternoon after the operation had finished Chief Superintendent Bernard Higgins, Divisional Commander for Glasgow City Centre and West Divisions, declared it a success. “The aim was public reassurance – making sure that people felt safe to enjoy themselves, and absolute assurance to those individuals intent on carrying knives that we will use every tactic and resource at our disposal to identify and arrest them. I believe we have achieved that,” he said.