A TTAG reader writes:
I thought this news might interest you if you haven’t seen it. Right along with open carry starting seven hours from now, I got word that the Texas Adjutant General has released a policy change for all Texas Military Forces members. This includes the Army National Guard, Air National Guard, and State Guard along with all civilians. All personnel will now be allowed to carry personally owned firearms provided they have a CHL/LTC. In uniform, POFs must be concealed, however, out of uniform it looks like open carry is fair game. See the docs below . . .
Wow personal responsibility claus as well! Cannot carry a POF while carrying an issued weapon, wonder if carrying an issued weapon your also carrying issued ammo? This is a step in the right direction overall, now if only this gets to the Federal military and not just the State Guard…
I’m speechless.
Hopefully, ad required by the NDAA, the federal branches come up with their CCW policy just as soon.
Will the DOD really allow this?
State vs Federal, as long as the Guard isn’t receiving special training on a Federal base they should not be able to say different.
It looks to be only be applicable to Guard units, who fall under the State, unless federalized
for an emergency.
Active Duty personnel will be under federal auspices, so this won’t apply…
The Purpose section says ‘other military service component members.’ While this will only apply on Texas guard property, not other military installations, it seems to me that it would apply to active duty as well. Where do you see that active duty is left out?
The Texas Adjutant General has no authority over title 10 active duty troops.
I know a good bit about the TX state guard. It’s a volunteer organization…completely unpaid. They are not part of the department of defense.
It always resonated wrong with me that if a person volunteered his or her time to drill every month and possibly deploy to disaster scenes, they the right to concealed carry with a valid license was voided. This is a step in the right direction. Don’t make people sorry that they joined by refusing to acknowledge the unalienable right of self-defense.
The national guard is a different story. Who knows how they are going to juggle the different requirements pending the drill location, federal bases vs. Texas armories. At least they will issue soldiers weapons to carry. The State Guard hasn’t done that in decades.
I spent 19.5 years in the Guard and all of it was on federal property. This announcement would have done me no good, nor will it help my troops that are still there. Interestingly, the CO of Dyess AFB has allowed firearms to be brought onto his base although he has restricted the carrying of them They may be in the vehicle loaded. This is a result of the bill recently passed in Congress. This would have been a big help to me, because it would still allow me to be armed everywhere else besides the base. Before that, I couldn’t have taken the gun on the base at all.
Just an added thought about restricting carry. I was an airplane mechanic. Me and my guys were constantly wiggling in and out of tight spaces, hanging upside down or in some other weird position to fix or adjust things. I would not normally carry while doing that job. We have restrictions against having anything in our pockets in many cases yet the AG has said the supervisor can’t add restrictions on the carrying of firearms. There are work places where carry just isn’t appropriate.
> There are work places where carry just isn’t appropriate.
Exactly right. Other examples:
– Hand-to-hand/defensive tactics training, where you would normally empty your pockets of anything that might hurt you or others when you fall on it.
– Explosives handling when you get rid of any metal objects that might cause sparks.
– MRI machines in military medical facilities.
Unit COs have full responsibility for the safety and mission readiness of their units, and need to be able to issue orders to accomplish this, to include ordering their personnel to disarm when it’s appropriate.
Plus — and people on here are going to hate me for saying this — some members of the military are not mature enough yet to be armed. Like one of my Sailors who decided he needed to do a little unauthorized quick draw practice while standing post with his M-9. Under these rules, a the CO of a TXARNG member who does something stupid and dangerous with his POF wouldn’t be authorized to disarm him, even temporarily for extra military instruction?
All in all, I think it’s a move in the right direction, but it is overly restrictive of unit leadership.
some members of the military are not mature enough yet to be armed.
By extension, you don’t support “shall not be infringed” in the civilian world either. After all, immature people aren’t limited to the military. Your viewpoint sounds like just about every other useful idiot out there to me. But what do I know?
By the way, I support an immediate CO’s authority to temporarily disarm for good cause as long as the military service is voluntary. But that is the extent of it and it has nothing to do with immaturity. Then again, someone might come along and educate me; changing my opinion.
> I support an immediate CO’s authority to temporarily disarm for good cause
So you agree with me!
> By extension, you don’t support “shall not be infringed” in the civilian world either
Civilian life =/= military life. A military commander is ultimately responsible for everything that goes on in his command, and partly due to this, everyone in the military gives up a lot of their personal freedom when they join. If one of my Sailors is a threat to himself or others, due to criminal intent or immaturity, it’s my problem and I have to fix it. As a CO, I need the authority to determine who can and cannot be armed in order to accomplish this.
TMD is moving in the right direction; they’ve just over-corrected a bit and I’m sure they’ll fix it soon.
I only partially agree with you. You took my statement out of context. Your baseline reasoning for disarming someone is a problem, civilian or military. That reasoning is why the majority of the people I’ve spoken to in the civilian world (some have been veterans) who support gun control, including other gun owners, give for their support of unconstitutional government actions. The only time I support the immediate CO temporarily disarming someone under his or her command is under specific circumstances; essentially necessary for the task at hand. Immaturity and other reasons… Nope. I don’t agree at all.
Immaturity or whatnot should have nothing to do with it. It should be task specific and very temporary. If they’re too immature to exercise a basic natural right, then they’re too immature to serve at all.
( I learned firsthand years back to Never Again Volunteer Yourself. 😉 😀 Carry on.)
Oooh! What will they authorize next?
Non-white people in the front of the bus?
Votes for women?
Independent newspapers? *
Rejecting the papacy?
I can’t wait to see what other benefices will be bestowed upon us this new year!
* yeah, maybe this one has run its course
Gen. Nichols policy states in 4d.(1) ‘The handgun must remain on your person or properly secured.’ This suggest that there will be circumstances, situations, locations, etc where TMD members will find a need to remove their POF, say when working on or flying NG aircraft, physical training, worksites I can’t think of, etc … thus who will decide wherever or whenever the POF needs to be secured? I read the policy that it is the TMDs call of when to secure her POF, yet who will decide what constitutes ‘properly secured’? Will arms lockers be needed throughout the workplace? Well, it’ll all be worked out in good time, hopefully without incidents.
Interesting, I wonder what constitutes Texas Military Department facilities? Presumably Camp Mabry in Austin, but what about Fort Hood? I’ve ruined a planned trip to see an event at Fort Hood because I carried that day, and their regulations wouldn’t even allow me to secure it in my vehicle. Wife took the disappointment better than I expected, but I still felt bad about it.
Ft. Hood is a federal installation. This would not apply. A lot of guard activities take place on federal installations.
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