Experiences in Tactical Operations

Not to say aimed sight is never warranted in SD situations but I get the hint that you're insinuating a hero mentality in something like a school shooting or terrorist attack. GOB, I am not one to insinuate things. I say what I mean. Two years ago I had training to respond to an active shooter at schools. We were taught to move in for immediate contact against the shooter. I've also been on a tactical team as well. I've worked all sorts of different tactical operations elements for police and military groups because of the work I've done. With the immediate response to a school shooting scenario, the idea is based on the fact that as soon as the shooter is confronted by law enforcement officers they generally suicide themselves rather than be taken alive. While the idea of quickly confronting the active shooter is to save lives I don't like the danger a lone officer is placed in by rushing in alone like the modern training urges. I understand it and it does make sense but the danger is immense in so many ways. The key thing is that it might save more lives and the sacrifice of one lone officer could be worth it. So it's something to consider, not that I favor it a lot. I'm still mulling it over and trying to think of ways to offset the danger in some fashion. The best idea I have is all police be required to ride in 2 man cars on a 24/7 basis. That way no officer is ever alone.

That's the problem that a lot of departments have: not enough manpower. That means that some rural agencies only have 2 officers to cover an area the size of like Rhode Island in states in the middle of the U.S. That's also why one officer will be responding to an active shooter alone which again brings up the danger issue. Keep in mind that Columbine involved 2 active shooters at one time...

For those of us who have been involved in tactical situations, do you have the phone number of an attorney on speed dial? I do. I may never need it but it's good to think ahead of possible trouble and that's the key thing that I next want to get you thinking about. It's always the little things that keep us alive and well. Forethought is your friend as is situational awareness. Good experiences lead people to develop situational awareness. Situational awareness leads an experienced person to plan ahead or develop forethought.

If a guy has been in enough gunfights, he anticipates being in the next gunfight and plans ahead for it. It's like the homeowner who has his house broken into and looted. The first time he'll get an alarm. The second time he gets a handgun. The third time, if he hasn't moved after the second time, he'll get a shotgun and use the handgun to back-up the shotgun. So you can see a progression of planning based off of what a person experiences in life. Same thing for those of us who have been through the fires of tactical situations over and over and over. It's sort of like driving in some states, some of us learn early on to carry a first aid kit in our own personal vehicles to use if we get hurt in a wreck or, if needed, when we come across other people hurt in wrecks. Same learning just a different learning curve area.

One of the main things I learned in Viet Nam was to layer my defenses. My main defense item was a sniper rifle. If you got closer, I would use my pistol, a 1911, that I wore on my hip in a holster. If we got to dancing and made personal contact, I would use my sheath knife for those real intimate moments. So I had it in my mind that there were 3 distances of defense I needed to control in Viet Nam: long range with the rifle, fairly close range with the pistol and very close range with my sheath knife. Later on, when I got back home, I still maintained that mindset in my personal life.

We all learn different ways to do things. I know a woman who sleeps with a sword near her bed. If you break into her home while she's there, she will first confront you with her sword from ambush and then take on any other bad guys with her single action pistol. She's a short stout woman who some have nicknamed, "The Angry Gnome" in good nature. One man swears that he once saw her in a fight with a guy. During the fight he said that her head spun around and around while she yelled, "This fight's not over until I say it is." That was while she was on top of a guy's chest punching him out. She knows that she can match most guys in a fist fight but, because she thinks ahead of trouble, she also layers her defenses in her home in her own way. That's why she prefers a sword first.

Jeff Cooper used to have his idea of a color code for use when it came to situational awareness. White was when you were pretty much asleep or not aware at all. Yellow meant you were kind of alert because of something not being quite right. Red meant that you felt something was wrong because of things that you had picked up on around you. Black meant that you were confronting danger right now! The thing about being in the black zone was that (A.) you had stumbled into something that maybe you should have avoided or (B.) you walked into an ambush of some kind. Either way you find yourself in a fight or flight position. If possible, moving out of danger, without fighting, can be a good thing. Take as many innocent people with you if you do plan to move away from trouble. If you are forced to do so, take the fight to the bad guy, but do it with surprise as an ally. Catch the bad guy(s) off guard and strike hard and with precision/accuracy. Don't half step.

So, what do some of you have for forethought ideas?