21 June 02

Here is a summary of the team drill performed by a friend and me at the NTI. This is always the last NTI drill. It is conducted with Simmunitions, and not all participated. He makes excellent points:

"Early Saturday morning, John Farnam and I arrived at the West Shore Sportsman Club to participate in the two-man, team tactics drill. This is a real-time test of thinking and fighting skills.

The L-Shaped house:

The scenario begins with John sitting in the front room and I around the corner in the middle bedroom. We were not in visual contact. All at once, there was a loud commotion followed by frantic shouts from John, then gunfire! As I leaped to the doorway, I saw one suspect enter the shower area adjacent to my position, while another was running towards John with a gun drawn. Fearing for John's safety, I fired twice at the moving target, hitting her both times. She went down. John simultaneously shot and killed another bludgeon-wielding thug.

I called out to John to let him know that I was all right, and told him that there was one more intruder hiding in the shower area. I commanded the suspect to come out. There was no response. Here, the communication between John and I became confused. John asked if I was lying down, and I misunderstood the question, and said ‘Yes'. Unfortunately for John, what John saw was the third intruder who was lying down, and John mistook him for me. The suspect shot John in the lower leg as John tried to move forward make contact. Obviously, this misinformation was corrected the moment that John got shot. John ducked back behind cover, and we both then commanded the intruder to come out.

At this time, I heard noise and ran to the window in the bedroom, just in time to see another intruder, armed with a gun in his hand, come rushing the window, I stepped back away from the window and fired twice, hitting him both times, terminating the exercise. Unfortunately, in the exchange he also hit me in the non-dominant wrist. Painful, but I was alive.

Lessons:

This scenario was intended to simulate an aggressive home invasion. We were not familiar with the house. Both John and I should have toured the home together beforehand, so that we would have known where each other was.

We both spoke to each other, but there was still a communication breakdown, which resulted in John getting shot. Clear communication is extremely important.

Immediate and violent reaction against an aggressive and violent, criminal assault saved our lives. Indecisive dithering would not have helped.

Ranges were close, and we were both able to hit moving targets. Practice with rotating, steel targets turned out to be very helpful.

ATSA Village

John and I were then sent to an indoor shopping mall. Upon entering, mall security stopped us and said that this was a ‘gun-free' area, and that we had to check our guns, then step through a metal detector to assure compliance.

Our mission was to retrieve John's dry cleaning. While at the dry cleaners, John got a message from the dry cleaner that there was an emergency at home, and that he was to call home immediately. The pay phone was around the corner next to a parked car.

John had me hold the dry cleaning, so that he could call his wife. I examined the area and shined my flashlight into the parked car, noticing an individual sitting in there in the dark. The man then stepped out from behind the car and asked for change. I told him that I had none, and alerted John.

As we were attempting to break contact, he drew a gun and demanded money. I shouted to John, ‘He's got a gun!' Unarmed, both John and I immediately moved laterally in opposite directions. This sudden and decisive movement confused the suspect. He waived his gun back and forth between John and me, not knowing what to do. I announced that I was calling the police and grabbed for the phone. He turned towards me, but John distracted him again, and I successfully dialed 911.

The suspect continued to swing his gun back and forth. Then he decided to come for me. As he ran around the corner toward the phone booth, I took off for the exit, meeting (and passing) John. The suspect then broke it off and ran away.

Lessons:

Always have a gun.

Immediate action saved the day. John and my immediate stepping off the line of fire confused the attacker and allowed us to seek cover. Separated as we were, he could not decide whom to go after.

You need your hands to fight. Jettison nonessential items when a fight appears imminent."

/John

21 June 02

On current shooting fads, from an LEO trainer in the Midwest:

"It amazes me the number of guys who unhesitatingly leap onto every bandwagon that comes along, not because it's superior, but because they so desperately want to be relevant.

Two years ago, a group of our guys became all fired up with the ‘Israeli shooting technique.' This is the one where your first move is to draw and then chamber a round, because your pistol is carried unloaded. I don't know about you, but I customarily carry my pistol loaded, so I was never able to see the point. However, if you put ‘Israeli' or ‘Tactical' in the title, kiddies will predictably flock to your door.

Last year I went to a regional seminar. One-handed, unaimed shooting was all the rage then. This shooting technique rears its ugly head every few years, until its most ardent promoters demonstrate authoritatively that even they can't hit anything.

This year, several of our guys went to a seminar on the ‘Central Axis Relock' pistol technique. It is basically a Weaver, contorted and turned sideways. In addition to being strained, one actually blocks his vision to one side, because his arm gets in the way. It is just another dreary reinvention of the wheel. However, these guys were ALL fired up. Mostly I think, because it is their chance to be trendy, ‘cutting edge,' and all that. When they get old (like us), they will, like us, have lived long enough to have seen this twaddle periodically recycled, under a new and trendy term, every few years.

I had to ask them, ‘Does any of this stuff work significantly better than what we do now?'"

/John