Is "Run, Hide, Fight" The Right Model for Armed Defenders?
- Thread starter luzyfuerza
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mcb
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"A rose by another name would smell as sweet. "
bdickens
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Whole lotta perceverating and overthinking going on here....
Old Dog
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That's what we do here. We're really good at it.
Still, the question in the OP is worthy of consideration and discussion.
To play devil's advocate here, you may believe that you have a certain moral responsibility to act according to your conscience and within your abilities. Recent events have clearly demonstrated how terrorist groups such as Hamas purposely target children and women. Reports indicated armed citizens interceded in some situations, with the certain knowledge they were facing probable death, and prevented further loss of Israeli lives.
In a shopping mall, by yourself, during the last couple frantic days before Christmas, one known active shooter with an AK type rifle, taking out people sitting at tables in the food court, you were in line at Sbarro Pizza and see the shooter heading over to the child-care room (where you see at least 15 children playing nicely behind the glass windows) next to the Jamba smoothie place, you can see at least two or three children already down in pools of blood, he's steps away now, no sign of law enforcement on scene yet... the shooter hasn't seen you as there's a pillar between you... you do have a clear avenue of escape. What's your response?
What my response would be is not anything that I would advocate or encourage anyone on an internet forum to do. I know my capabilities and experience. I don't know anyone else's here so I am not going to advocate they do anything. I am just going to remind them that they have no obligation to do anything. It's also dangerous to encourage anyone to think that the fact they are carrying a firearm gives them some kind of duty to inject themselves into a situation. There is a lot more to being a peace officer than possessing a gun.
Old Dog
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I should have been more precise -- I was not asking what anyone's response as a peace officer would be, only as a private, lawfully carrying citizen. Joe Sixpack, out for a last-minute gift for the wife at Victoria's Secret, running away from the gunshots? No one will second guess him.
And no, I am not advocating that anyone inject themselves into a situation just because they are armed, simply trying to provoke consideration, because most people never have cause to think about what they would do in this type of situation. "It'll never happen to me" is the prevailing thought process among most Americans today. And that's why the "acceptance" piece is so difficult for most Americans -- 99% of us never see violence visited upon our families, ourselves or our own neighborhoods.
Taking a look at how the Israeli citizens, living under constant threats, prepare during the course of their daily lives, and respond during crises, may serve us well. We are not going to have a military response inside the U.S., and law enforcement response is rarely immediate, and thus far has been shown to prevent or mitigate deaths and injuries in only a small percentage of active shooter responses.
And no, I am not advocating that anyone inject themselves into a situation just because they are armed, simply trying to provoke consideration, because most people never have cause to think about what they would do in this type of situation. "It'll never happen to me" is the prevailing thought process among most Americans today. And that's why the "acceptance" piece is so difficult for most Americans -- 99% of us never see violence visited upon our families, ourselves or our own neighborhoods.
Indeed, and I'm pretty sure most here understand this. But again, Americans are long overdue for a major paradigm shift (you'd have thought this would've stuck after 9/11); terroristic acts will probably increase in scale and intensity within our shores over the next few years. "Mass shootings?" Until we address all the root causes and figure out why we keep growing these guys, we'll still be seeing them.
Taking a look at how the Israeli citizens, living under constant threats, prepare during the course of their daily lives, and respond during crises, may serve us well. We are not going to have a military response inside the U.S., and law enforcement response is rarely immediate, and thus far has been shown to prevent or mitigate deaths and injuries in only a small percentage of active shooter responses.
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luzyfuerza
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It is probably worth noting that many, if not most, of the Israelis at the concert venue on 10/7 initially "Ran". And the Hamas terrorists in that open setting gunned them down.
On the other hand, it appears that many of the kibuttzim did not run. Instead, they chose to hide out in their safe rooms and await rescue. Unfortunately, the safe rooms were designed to protect against Hamas' small rockets, not against an on-the-ground assault. Because the people were (and still are) largely disarmed, terrorists were able to breach these rooms and maim, rape, and murder pretty much without opposition.
I want to avoid those mistakes, if I can.
On the other hand, it appears that many of the kibuttzim did not run. Instead, they chose to hide out in their safe rooms and await rescue. Unfortunately, the safe rooms were designed to protect against Hamas' small rockets, not against an on-the-ground assault. Because the people were (and still are) largely disarmed, terrorists were able to breach these rooms and maim, rape, and murder pretty much without opposition.
I want to avoid those mistakes, if I can.
The "promised" terror campaign on US soil after 9-11 didn't happen. The few "terror attacks" that were "thwarted" were dupes that the feds trotted out when they needed some headlines. The couple terror attacks that happened were perpetrated by people the government was watching. We've greatly restricted personal freedom and changed our society for the worst since 9-11. That is the paradigm shift that happened. I don't see any terror attack changing society to something like they have in Israel. The politicians fight tooth and nail to keep our schools target rich environments. They work very hard to make sure people are defenseless at concerts, sporting events and other large venues. One can make a very good case that the paradigm has been shifting away from the armed citizen taking decisive action in the public arena since 9-11 at the very same time that we (society as a whole, not us on this forum) started accepting that citizens should be allowed to carry firearms for their own protection. In the space of 100 years we've went from the government handing out WWI surplus weapons to banks to arm their employees to deal with the bank robbery epidemic the wide adoption of the automobile started through the federal reserve to the government creating gun free zones everywhere and denying a purchase of M16s by Israel because they would be used to arm civilians.
An internet forum is not the proper venue to encourage people to jump into a situation they might not be qualified to handle. Anyone can read this forum. It's trolled by Google bot and these threads show up in Google search results. We don't know who is reading them. We don't know what their motivation is. We don't know their skill level or how emotionally mature they are. What action you or I might take under a given circumstance will probably not be the right action for the 18 year old in a constitutional carry state who just got his first handgun.
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luzyfuerza
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Another reason for doing "mental reps" of what could happen in the venues we frequent is that we learn what plans, skills, and tools we need to master in order to respond effectively.
Examples:
I have spent a lot more time shooting a handgun quickly at longer distances since Elisjsha Dicken put down the Greenwood Park murderer with eight hits out of ten shots in 15 seconds at something like 40 yards.
I have spent a lot more time shooting at the side of a moving target that is partially occluded by, say, a door jam. The kind of target that might present itself if a murderer were entering a room where I had taken cover.
I have spent a lot more time drawing from the seated position (e.g. from the drivers seat of a car) and engaging a target on my left side. The kind of target that might present itself if someone was attempting to carjack me.
If you haven't already mastered more advanced skills like these, first make sure that you've mastered the basics. Later, find competent training to teach these specific skills. And others that you've determined that you need. Then learn them with a dry gun or other tool. And only then practice them on a safe range with live ammo.
I encourage members to examine your venues, decide what your emergency responses should be, and then to learn, practice, and master the skills that you will need to have in order to respond effectively.
Examples:
I have spent a lot more time shooting a handgun quickly at longer distances since Elisjsha Dicken put down the Greenwood Park murderer with eight hits out of ten shots in 15 seconds at something like 40 yards.
I have spent a lot more time shooting at the side of a moving target that is partially occluded by, say, a door jam. The kind of target that might present itself if a murderer were entering a room where I had taken cover.
I have spent a lot more time drawing from the seated position (e.g. from the drivers seat of a car) and engaging a target on my left side. The kind of target that might present itself if someone was attempting to carjack me.
If you haven't already mastered more advanced skills like these, first make sure that you've mastered the basics. Later, find competent training to teach these specific skills. And others that you've determined that you need. Then learn them with a dry gun or other tool. And only then practice them on a safe range with live ammo.
I encourage members to examine your venues, decide what your emergency responses should be, and then to learn, practice, and master the skills that you will need to have in order to respond effectively.
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D.B. Cooper
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While all this is true, you just can't have a gun everywhere you go. You just can't. If you refuse to go unarmed, it's a very very small world in which you are welcome. Not much larger than your home and your yard. I've been working 50 plus years now. I've never worked anywhere in my life, at any pay rate, at any skill level, blue collar or professional, where firearms were allowed-not even in the Army. Sure, I could have carried in violation of company policy...and eventually gotten fired. Get fired from enough jobs for bringing a gun to work and you'll find it difficult to get hired.
The world is never going to welcome guns into every public space, and I think the Supreme Court is about to let a lot of people down on that note.
D.B. Cooper
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Totally. If you're on your own, in a movie theater or mall, then ALICE really isn't for that scenario anyway. It's more for education campuses and corporate settings.
Old Dog
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Jeff, not poking fun at your statement, but if any AI bots read many of the threads on THR, the conclusion will surely be that all humans should work remotely from home, order all their food from DoorDash or GrubHub, stream all their movies on Netflix or Amazon Prime, watch all their sports on cable or satellite television, listen to music only on Spotify or Pandora and only leave the safety of their hardened, fortified homes to go out in the back yard to potty Muffy and pick up her poop (of course, only with an overwatch in the upstairs bedroom). Seriously, between this thread and the "bad areas" thread, it's looking like fewer and fewer folks -- at least our membership -- actually get out in public anymore.
Will, I go to concerts and ball games. Saw .38 Special back in Oct. I live in a rural area with no close neighbors. I will confess that I don’t get out much in the immediate area but it’s because I don’t want to run into people I dealt with professionally. Before the pandemic when Walmart was open 24 hours if I had to have something in the middle of the night, I went.
Being alert and able to “read the room” are skills everyone should develop. Those skills will keep one out of trouble in most places.
You won’t find me going downtown to watch the BLM riot and the last time I was in downtown St Louis after midnight was the night the Cardinals won the 2011 World Series.
The closest I came to a riot in the current unpleasantness was a Billy Joel concert at Busch stadium when BLM was protesting the acquittal of a former St. Louis officer who was charged after a line of duty shooting. I’m sure that I’ll get flamed for going to the concert anyway but I wasn’t going to let BLM run my life. I knew St Louis Metro PD would be out in force so that an event like that wasn’t disrupted and they were.
I look at it like this, if your gut tells you not to go, don’t go. At 67 I’m well past the age where I go to bars or clubs. I follow the old adage of not doing stupid things with stupid people and not hanging out with those who do. I’m not going to stop doing the things I enjoy because of what might happen.
That works for me, everyone is free to do what they want. If you learn to be alert and read the room you can avoid most trouble.
It's pretty easy to live a full life and do things in Texas while being armed 100% of the time. There's a couple of events I skipped but not many. Restaurants, rodeos, markets, stores, outdoor events in general, my family is armed. We have fun and there's never been any trouble, hopefully there never will be. I did skip the F1 race in Austin but that saved me 3k and TV coverage is better than being there.
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jmorris
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I think all of those are tactics used by people that know what they are doing, just depends on all of the other variables as to what one that pick.
”Trojan horse”, is all we have to say about the effectiveness of hiding, even in an offensive application. Retreat, is a military tactic as well and if you can win with out employing them, too improve your chances, you just fight It out by throwing bodies at the problem.
Welcome to internet gun forums.
The Night Rider
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I saw them in the Houston Astrodome in 1984. I was not impressed. I like their music but they're not very good live.
No one was good live in a stadium in those days. Stadium concerts basically gave you the right to say you saw them live. Sound systems are magnitudes better today. Back on topic, would you even attend a concert these days or are those venues too dangerous?
The Night Rider
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IDK Rush was the headline act that day and they were unbelievable. Their sound was phenomenally clear. I had already quit drinking in 1984 so is Stone Cold Sober for that show.
The Night Rider
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Nevermind
JTHunter
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Jeff - the porosity of the southern border is allowing large numbers of people (mostly young males) from the Mideast and mainland China into the U.S. with little or no follow-up or monitoring. The fact that the U.S. was "lucky" to have avoided a second attack after 9/11 may just have been part of our enemy's "long game". With so many now in this country and the disruptions the "legal ones" are already creating, it isn't too far-fetched to calculate that the odds against a terror attack have shrunk considerably over the last 20 years.
People come here from dirt poor oppressive regimes and find unlimited women, booze, and luxuries beyond what they could have ever dreamed of back home. I'm not particularly concerned about them. They've had more than 20 years and haven't done a thing. I'm sure at some point someone will do something but I think anything large scale isn't very feasible.
Old Dog
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That's some hubris right there.
Taking Muslim jihadists for example, they're not motivated by unlimited women, booze or luxuries. And they'll take as long as they take... Need examples? How about the Boston Marathon bombers?
Anyway, it's not necessarily how long the illegal immigrants are in the country; they're playing the long game and will plan for years. Witness from the first bombing at the World Trade Center, 2/26/93, until the last attempt, 9/11/01.
Anything large scale not very feasible? That's been proven wrong. Given the resources of the state-sponsored (Iran, Syria, Yemen, Russia, North Korea, et al) terrorism, the next attacks may well be "large scale." At least we finally had an FBI Director admit the truth recently.
Jim Watson
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There have been innumerable intrigue and adventure novels featuring islamofacist intruders hiring coyote guides. One swarthy foreigner looking much like the next if he keeps his mouth shut. There must be some disincentive.
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