Thoughts on Training, from an Old Hand

This is an email I received a few days ago from one of my contacts with a long career in LE. All incredibly valid points. Get training, because its gonna get real. -NCS

Been reading your articles on the AK. As a result, I got a PSA AK pistol…. great gun! Good advice! Perfect car/truck gun.

Re: drills, and skills.

All the skill and drill implementation begins, in all articles, at some location designated for joining the battle. Then there is a gap, followed by neighborhood or HOA protection plans (XXXXX’s stuff). But.
Side track- LE has always falsely taught their folks that they are large, and in charge. That they are the highest trained (10 minutes per year- trigger time), baddest dudes on the block. But 99.997% have never read, or analyzed Beslan.

Back on track-

Good guys don’t start gunfights, except in the military. So all good guy training should start with the good guys sitting at the dinner table, when they get attacked. Or in front of the tv. Or for real excitement- on the can! Fight your way to a secure perimeter. Call your neighbors to do the same. As their secure perimeters develop, and overlap, the blm/antifa pogues will be forced out. Hopefully.

Conflict-

Traditionally, it was fine to set up your house security so that bad guys would look at it, and pick an easier target, go someplace else. But in the coming fracas, if they go someplace else tonight, they will just be back another night. So that pulls in the old bear trap, hammer, and anvil. We will not “want them” to go away. We need to “make them” go away. So they can’t run away to terrorize another night.

Side track-

At any warrant execution location, except XXXX Police Department where they shoot all the good guys, then go home…. the first thing LE does is yell code 4, shed the armor, drop their guard, and order pizza. Tacticality gets severely compartmentalized, but in the wrong way, only on/off. I am old enough to remember the 60’s/70’s. LE management then, as now, refused to train their folks. The force continuum remained the size of a silverware drawer.

Side note- in Afg, I was trying to add articulation of threat recognition, force continuum training to the combat hunter program. Marines from below the Mason Dixon said- damn skippy! But the Command staff, who were mostly carpet baggers, would not allow it.

Back on track-

In the developing fracas, tacticality starts on approach to your front door, from the inside. Probably where the reference to LE not being able to hit the broad side of a barn, from the inside… came from.
So the compartmentalization should be. Your home, and your individual security perimeters (yard, street, neighborhood), as well as leaving your home to go to your car, entering your bullet magnet and leaving your home, moving from your home to the nearest main street, onward. Since we are glued to our cars; If we have to go anywhere to join the fight/pull duty, we will need transportation. For a definable, walking distance, home AO, your perimeter should include a gas station, grocery store, medical facility. In Houston, for some unexplainable reason, all minority, crime ridden apartment complexes are located within a block of a grocery store, gas station, bank, or welfare check cashing center. So someone thought out the S4 stealable, gimme free stuff perimeters, long before the good guys. That perimeter modification, to exclude/prevent the close in bad guys from controlling necessary critical support, will have to occur early, and definitively!

If you go somewhere, to join the fight/pull duty, either you need a secure location to park your car, or you need a transportation service that doesn’t leave vehicles parked in/near the danger zone. Granted- I’m talking about a sub-urban areas, and not an urban ville.

Every time I read some of your stuff, it gets the old brain housing group going. Makes me get a second cup of coffee. Makes me wish I careered as an elementary school teacher!

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About the Author: NC Scout

NC Scout is the nom de guerre of a former Infantry Scout and Sergeant in one of the Army’s best Reconnaissance Units. He has combat tours in both Iraq and Afghanistan. He teaches a series of courses focusing on small unit skills rarely if ever taught anywhere else in the prepping and survival field, including his RTO Course which focuses on small unit communications. In his free time he is an avid hunter, bushcrafter, writer, long range shooter, prepper, amateur radio operator and Libertarian activist. He can be contacted at [email protected] or via his blog at brushbeater.wordpress.com .

35 Comments

  1. Brad December 16, 2020 at 18:59

    “LE has always falsely taught their folks that they are large, and in charge. That they are the highest trained (10 minutes per year- trigger time), baddest dudes on the block.”

    LOL. One of my best friends is LE, a POST Certified trainer, and an all around gun nut. Retired now. But before he retired he was constantly complaining about how the majority of LE hate training with a gun. Free ammo, free range time. Sign me up. He also use to say you can tell what kind of LE your dealing with by looking down at their Glock to see if they still had the plastic ball in basket stock sites.

    • David December 16, 2020 at 19:52

      Your friend is so right on! I am a retired LEO. Was a state certified firearms instructor, trained recruits and experienced officers in a fairly large (1000 plus commissioned officers) PD. Our PD provided free ammo, flexible range hours and expert instruction (when requested) to all officers. Virtually NO ONE, except a few field officers and SWAT guys took advantage of this. We had re-quals twice a year and it was like pulling teeth to get everyone through. Most officers barely qualify on the State Course (it’s unbelievably easy!)and year after year the same officers failed to qualify on their initial try and had to get remedial training in order to pass. I was appalled at all this when I first became a F/A Instructor, but the older instructors said this is the norm around the country. I confirmed this myself by attending training on my own dime outside my PD and spoke to other F/A instructors. Officers, in general, HATE any training or instruction in which they have to perform to a “passing grade”. It’s a matter of ego and believing their own BS about how badass they are.

      • MN Steel December 16, 2020 at 22:27

        Have a buddy up here that was recruited to be a US Marshal from the prison he worked at for under a year. At FLETC in Gerorgia he was pretty much assistant instructor for the firearms training for the class after the first day.

        There are some that are “gun nuts” in that racket, and some that are good guys and can be trusted, but I think the overlap is smaller than most think.

    • wwes December 17, 2020 at 09:00

      I have never been in the military or law enforcement, but I have spent a good deal of time shooting with LEO’s and also with friends and family who are vets, and I will say that I can outshoot most of them any day of the week. I’ve even outshot several of them with their own department issue guns. I would rate myself as a mediocre shooter, but I do practice, and most of them don’t.

    • Ryan Johnsonsniffen December 29, 2020 at 12:58

      Or ask them at what range are glock plastic sights optimized for? (5 yards), or the front blade width (.140), Then look at the dimension of front sight blades optimized for 25 yards (.125). Front sight blades are designed to equate to preferred hit zone dimensions at a specific range. Pick a spot on the tgt, and shoot the spot vs shoot the tgt! Then ask if they use the sight outline (equal light, left and right, equal height), or do they use the cup and ball. The cup and ball are not there to use in the sighting process. They are there to allow you to see, and align the 4 corners of the sights faster),

  2. Anonymous December 16, 2020 at 19:27

    5

  3. StormN December 16, 2020 at 20:24

    I can’t speak from combat experience. A comment regarding Force Continuum and the Marine Combat Hunter Program. Although I’ve heard of Force Continuum before I have to admit I just did a search on it. I have read ‘Left of Bang’ (Marine Combat Hunter Program). This book has found its way into the Marine commandant’s reading list. It mentions in passing, threat management by soldiers in combat (SHTF) vs. law enforcement/policing. My understanding is that threat management in combat is the opposite from law enforcement. Thus the force continuum does not apply to soldiers in combat (or SHTF, IMO) and therefore Command staff would therefore say no.

    As I understand it, a soldier in combat when he approaches a suspected enemy he must be absolutely ready to kill that person at that moment. He de-escalates it from there: to just observing, to capturing, etc., to releasing( no danger). Law enforcement or any policing, is, of course, the reverse.

    Therefore it’s unrealistic to expect our soldiers to double as police and flip from one mode of escalation to the opposite on a dime. When combat soldiers come home I think that’s part of their debriefing process, or should be – which is not at all easy like flipping a switch. I think if returning combat soldiers are consciously, clearly aware of this need to reverse it would be a great help to them in adjusting back to civilian life.

    • NC Scout December 16, 2020 at 22:13

      I was an instructor for that course when it came over to the Army. You are correct.

    • Chuck Zimmerman December 29, 2020 at 12:04

      The first half of force continuum is threat recognition. A guy with a rifle at 10ft is also a threat at 400 yards. So expand your threat recognition envelope to the limit of your field of view. The force continuum is not a sequential list where you start at line 1, and go to line 30, in order. It is a horizontal, lateral option display. You use what best addresses the threat at hand. The current military teaching is no longer to locate, close with, destroy. It is now, locate, identify how much force the bad guys have at hand, and use just enough more force to beat the threat. Back in the day, we were taught to use what ever was necessary to shut the bad guys down, fast, hard, and permanent, so we could go home safe at night. Today, you also have to take into consideration, technology. You know bad guys are around with guns, but you don’t see them. (Shark theory), but you see mini mopes on the corners with radios, or cell phones. You can no longer ignore the mini mopes, but must use them as pointer/indicators that sharks are near by. Look at current blmantifa com plans, and command staff movement operations. Look at the round count/hit rates of units. Situational/tactical awareness/efficient use of the force continuum, means fewer rounds expended for successful threat elimination. If it’s done right, you won’t see things like “420 25mm warning rounds fired”. An alert, prepared, gunfighter, is much more likely to go home safe at night, and bring his guys with him.

  4. Knowbuddy Yuno December 16, 2020 at 21:53

    Any thoughts on how to sniff out the readiness level of one’s local/county/state LE agencies? What info, if any, should one request by FOIA? What social engineering or schmoozing strategies might yield worthwhile intel?

    I’m wondering about OSINT/RUMINT on:

    • official frequency of firearms quals
    • actual frequency of firearms quals
    • content of quals / performance standards
    • qual failure rates
    • ammo consumption
    • weapon/ammo purchases

    • NC Scout December 16, 2020 at 22:12

      Watch them when they exit their vehicles, especially the young ones.

      • Vishay December 17, 2020 at 02:25

        What things do you specifically look for?

        • NC Scout December 17, 2020 at 05:24

          See if they size up their environment before exiting. It’s a basic situational awareness skill that many (and many people for that matter) don’t have.

      • Juan valdez December 29, 2020 at 12:46

        Youngsters will be the first ones out of the cars, usually with a radio or something in their gun hand. Experienced ones will get out, gun hand always empty, and ready. Youngsters will visually lock on the subject at hand. Experienced will get out a 360 view, twice, while retaining focus on potential threats. LE are traditionally taught to fight their way in. They are NEVER taught to fight their way out, or prepare for an ambush. Look at police presence at blmantifa riots. How many cops are behind the line, looking left/right/up/to the rear? The 360 degree fight rules apply on the ground, as well as in the air.

        • NC Scout December 29, 2020 at 13:46

          Yup.

    • mike December 17, 2020 at 10:14

      OSINT can tell you a lot. Rural AO often has whole TOE on the website with names and pictures and job history/education bios. Research from that point might be able to ferret out the political views of key personnel. Bios are gold. They might tell you if the subject is a hiker/camper/hunter or if they are really just a managerial class bureaucrat. Radio ref has all the pertinent info on their comms. Listening to their routine traffic over the air can tell you a lot. If they think tactically and co-ordinate a mobile search to try and intercept a simple hit and run motorist, then they probably take their job seriously. Local media may have archives about incident response as well. Do they call for the state police Tactical team over a punk barricaded in his house? How long does it take for that tac team to assemble and arrive in your zip code? What kind of effort are they prepared to make to apprehend someone who has fled into the woods or hills? Do they run undercover operations against the local drug infrastructure? Is it successful? when and if it is, it always makes the regional paper.

    • Lou Davies December 29, 2020 at 12:36

      Several ways. Find their range, and go watch/listen. If they use a dedicated range with moving, rotating, swinging, plate racks, pepper poppers, running man, remote controlled, with a 200 yard rifle deck, they may be serious about training. If they share a 10 lane, 15 yard, stationary target area at a commercial range- not so much. Then go to area idpa/uspsa matches. See how many, and from what departments are there. Watch for LE using the idpa/uspsa as training, and not gaming. If you find LE at the events, they will invariably be leaders in their units. There are two kinds of leaders. Those that command respect, and those that demand respect. The demanders are usually in mgmt.

  5. Brad December 16, 2020 at 22:59

    ” I got a PSA AK pistol…. great gun! Good advice! Perfect car/truck gun.”

    My humble opinion is AR and AK pistols are really bad ass for clearing structures, but once things stretch out a bit you’re at a big disadvantage against something with a stock on it. Even if said pistol has a brace on it. I supplied our local Sheriffs department with a couple AR pistols a couple years ago and watched their tests with their SWAT team. I wouldn’t own one. Except the wife like shooting them. LOL.

    • NC Scout December 16, 2020 at 23:47

      Ever took one out past square range distance?

      • Brad December 17, 2020 at 00:01

        Spray and pray.

        • NC Scout December 17, 2020 at 05:22

          Try to get some distance with it. You just might be surprised.

        • Mike Leatherneck December 17, 2020 at 08:06

          Nah man, even a 10″ barrel can hit a human silhouette reliably at 400-500 yards. You might not be scoring headshots every time, but you don’t need to.

        • wwes December 17, 2020 at 08:53

          They are definitely capable of much more than spray and pray. They might give up a little in some areas to a full blown rifle, but they can be very effective at distance. Hell, I attended NC Scout’s course this past weekend and I had the privilege of seeing some awesome young people ringing steel at 300m with AR pistols, and that was on targets smaller than a human torso. They definitely weren’t spraying anything, and I damn sure wouldn’t want to be in their sights, pistol or not.

    • Brad December 17, 2020 at 12:43

      Well, here’s the criteria the Sheriffs department I was working with used. I won’t bother with the shoot house. The pistols had no braces on them, just the padded tube. LE requested red dots, back then we used Black Spider Optics, Co witnessed. Range was 50 and 100 yards. 8 shooters, including myself. Shot timer, standing, from the low ready. And we compared the pistols, 7 inch barrel, to a 14.5 barreled carbine. There’s was no comparison in time and hits. Would a 10 inch barrel with a pistol brace do a better job? No question. Will it be faster then the carbine? I don’t think so. I’ll take the carbine.

      • wwes December 17, 2020 at 13:04

        Given a choice I would probably pick up a carbine instead of a pistol in most cases, but it really depends on what you’re doing. At 100 yards you’re really giving up virtually nothing with the pistol though. The bare buffer tube definitely doesn’t help anything, especially if you’re talking speed shooting.

      • Mike Leatherneck December 17, 2020 at 14:00

        Those observed results are from standing, so human error is a much greater factor than it could be and not a great measure of accuracy difference. I also don’t see how you came to the conclusion that a “carbine” with a stock would be faster than a pistol with a brace, unless you’re talking about follow-on shots while standing. In that case yes I’ll grant that the greater weight of the weapon would reduce your muzzle rise slightly.

    • Alvin Clark December 29, 2020 at 12:24

      Car/truck gun. That is not to imply leave your car and go on extensive offensive operations. The longest defensive shot in the Miami incident was 52 yards from Platt to the off side front fender of the agents car across the street. So at 52 yards, what can you shoot better/faster at 52 yards? A pistol, or a pistol with a brace and 10″ barrel? In urban/suburban areas, a one block gun.

  6. Anonymous December 17, 2020 at 06:31

    3.5

  7. Cliff December 17, 2020 at 06:35

    I have a son in LE and it would be really bad for anyone to get in front of his weapon (At any distance or weapons platform). Scored perfect 300 at range in Academy and won top gun. What many fail to understand is the importance of firearms training (instilling the right principles) while they are young. He has had a gun in his hand since he was old enough to hold one. Fathers need to teach their children and train with them.

    • NC Scout December 17, 2020 at 08:01

      Yup!

    • Tom Chamavich December 29, 2020 at 13:04

      It’s not the threat in front of his gun that you have to worry about. That’s his peak performance training envelope. Zero to 25 yards +_, 20″ wide, 30″ tall. Approximating a humanoid. It’s the other 358 degrees around, and 180 degrees over and behind, that you have to worry about. Does he train to shoot at the b in beep, or the gu in gun? Or does he shoot at the p in beep, or the n in gun?

  8. James December 17, 2020 at 20:01

    Just going most part going to comment on authors post,i.e. “Makes me wish I careered as an elementary school teacher!”

    Me grandfather was a 20 year military guy who worked his way thru college during the depression of the 30’s and fought WW2/Korea(that was mostly a back post/WW2 a combat in your face post) who then went on to become,….well,a teacher in the early 60’s,he joked which was worse mind wise!

    He was a great guy who saw his son(me uncle) sent to Vietnam(cobra pilot).

    I will say though me dad divorced his daughter they still got along and me dad sent me out on paid tickets to west coast(Pacific Grove,me grandfather bought a home there after stationing at Ft. Ord., many times as he thought(was right) I would learn a lot from him.

    My grandfather told me true stories about the “Depression”not taught in school/told me while earned the G.I.Bill passed as too many vets coming home with lockers full of guns who were not willing to live thru more “Depression” and on me last visit he went off on Vietnam and how he was angry that his son and others were sent there.

    The author of this article in ways reminds me of me grandfather in that many had a opportunity to make them selves better and passed.

    Thanks dad,R.I.P., for when I was not having a lot of cash sending me out there to see grandfather,especially the last visit right before he died.

    • wwes December 18, 2020 at 09:04

      I was fortunate to spend a lot of time growing up with my granddaddy too, he was a little young for WWII, but he served during the Korean war, and then ended up being a chemistry teacher for many years. Shooting and fishing were pretty much his two favorite activities. I learned a lot from him. And chemistry is a fun and useful subject! My great granddaddy was a machinist on an LST in the south pacific in WWII, and I got to spend a lot of time with him as well. It was a great thing to be raised in a family with a lot of male role models who were into shooting, chemistry, and machining lol.

  9. Sanders December 18, 2020 at 09:09

    I’ve had a couple cops get pissed off and pack up their stuff and leave after shooting next to me at an indoor range. I usually shoot at the full 25 yards, and they shoot at 7 and are all over the target. When I pull the target up and the bullseye is shot out of it, is usually when they get pissed off. Once, I was shooting my Ruger 22/45 with a bull barrel and red dot, my old Bullseye set up, and just for fun, made a smiley face on my target. Cop next to me was all over his target. I wasn’t watching what he was doing, but I guess he was watching me.

    I could hear him slamming his stuff down and throwing it into his range bag. I mean, I’m shooting a dedicated target pistol in .22LR and he was shooting a 9mm service pistol. You can’t compare those fairly. But his ego would not allow him to talk to me, or I would have explained it. His ego could not allow him to ask someone for some shooting tips to create a group – forget about tightening a group, since he didn’t even have one to begin with. His target told me he was shooting with his eyes closed, or with one hell of a flinch.

    Another time, I was in there shooting my carry 1911A1, then decided to warm up the old Ballester-Molina. I loaded up 8 mags and ran the target to the 10 yard line and proceeded to mag dump every shot into the bullseye. When I was done, there was a softball-sized hole in my target. Now, I was pretty proud of that and leaned around the barrier and said, “Not too bad for a 75 year old pistol!” It was that moment I saw the cop had a brand new Kimber Raptor and a target that looked like it had been shot by a blind man. Again, instead of asking for some instruction or tips, he packed his stuff up and left.

    And I’m not even a good shot, compared to my friends.

  10. Anonymous December 18, 2020 at 09:15

    4.5

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