Unlike 99.55 percent of the American population, I’ve been in combat, and I’ve been in a direct armed struggle with experienced combatants at ranges from around 15 to 800 meters. Still, I’m no expert on tactics. I’d say I’m a journeyman soul snatcher at best. But it doesn’t take tactical Tactical Jesus (a.k.a., SGM Kyle Lamb) to come away with some simple tactical lessons from the attack in Dallas.
Movement is life, and aggression wins
One man was able to make multiple experienced law enforcement officers on the scene think that were under a coordinated assault by a fire team. They were not used to the simple, engrained tactic of firing from a position, then changing positions. And that goes both ways.
If you are a member of a team attempting to stop an attacker(s), keep at the forefront of your mind that where the shots came from is in the past. Those rounds are gone now, and there’s nothing to say that your opponent isn’t gone as well, and is maneuvering to attack you from somewhere else.
Teamwork is key
We saw lots of videos from Dallas. I noted something that was extremely rare for the military. Single officers, running in different directions, alone. I see cops working alone all the time, and I hate it. Even for highway patrol, I’d prefer they were always in pairs. Part of that is safety and accountability, but it’s also a mindset, and one that I’d like to see engrained further.
Communicate, reload and fire from cover
Notice I didn’t say cover is where you hide or wait. While you’re doing those things, your opponent is maneuvering, firing and killing you. In short, never be married to your cover. Consider it more like dating during spring break. Get what you need, and get moving.
Back off the cover
The army trained me to stay a good three meters away from the side of structure, and to push as far back as I could from cover and still be covered by it. The reasons are many.
We had to be concerned with RPG’s hitting the cover, but spall or ricochets from rounds striking the cover will absolutely destroy your hands, weapon or face, depending on how far you are pushed forward.
Pressing against cover makes you far less mobile. As we saw in Dallas, doing so greatly reduces your field of view. If the officer that was shot behind the pillar had been pushed back from that pillar, he very likely would have seen the attacker closing in on him and had a chance to maneuver and fire.
This is a training mistake I see very often, and one I often find myself getting into after I’ve watched other people do it in a class or competition. If that happens to you, if you find yourself pressing up against the barricade, drill yourself out of it. It’s a training mistake that will get you killed.
Standard police tactics have limited effectiveness
That’s certainly true against an aggressor who does not intend to escape or live, and whose goal is only to inflict the maximum amount of damage possible
When I went into the army in 2001, we were still being taught how to clear a room based on SWAT tactics. By the time I left the army in 2010, those tactics had transformed.
When I started, we stacked up on the door, or created one, and all flooded in like sand. When I got out, we opened the door with explosives, often the Mk19, used the minimum number of people necessary inside the structure, and were far, far more destructive during entry and clearing.
We denied our opponents the time to plan, dig in or get reinforcements. We also denied them what they really wanted: more targets.
The result from the change in those tactics was that house-borne IED’s went from common to rare, and the number of civilian non-combatants caught in the cross fire actually went down.
I don’t know if those tactics would ever be tolerated inside the United States. Considering that some media is decrying the use of explosives against a single attacker in an enclosed space, the concept of clearing the entire garage floor with coordinated fire from M2s is probably a bridge too far.
Great article. One more thing. Don’t bring a handgun to a rifle fight.
When the man with a 45. meets the man with a Winchester, the man with a pistol is a dead man.
Aim for the heart, Ramon
It’s a good thing for the Man with No Name that Ramon never heard of the Mozambique drill.
How about this:
When the trained man with a 45. meets the untrained man with a Winchester, the man without training is a dead man.
Only at contact distances.
Or perhaps more tactfully, bring what you are best able to a gun fight. A .22lr pocket Derringer is still better than no gun at all.
In 1994, a USAF Security Police officer at Fairchild AFB in Spokane, Washington traded shots with a nut job who had just murdered five people and wounded twenty seven others at the base hospital. The nut job was armed with an AK-47 clone and the cop with a Beretta M9 handgun. The nut job missed. The cop connected with two of his four shots, hitting the nut job first in the shoulder and then between the eyes. The distance between them was seventy yards.
My gun club often has side shoots following the main match. For the most recent one, the target was a pig silhouette at about the same distance as in the Fairchild incident. The winner of the shoot, with three hits out of five shots, used a compact pistol. Some of the losers had full size pistols with five inch barrels and one had a six inch revolver.
I was stationed at Fairchild AFB when this incident occurred. The SF police officer had to do his duty with what he had (he was on bike patrol and only had an M9). It was a great fight stopping shot(s) he took to end the ordeal but if he had his choice I am sure he would have preferred his M16 A2. In this Dallas incident the officer did hit the suspect in the chest with one or two shots but apparently the perp was wearing body armor.
I said from the beginning of all this ( kill cop ) rhetoric from ‘ Black Lives Matter ‘ and ‘ Nation of Islam ‘ and all the other hate cop groups that have been spouting out hate and threats from every orifice , this day ( Dallas attack ) was coming . I also told people for years that some Islamic radicals would attack NYC after the first WTC bombing occurred . I don’t understand why we continually shove our American heads up our bottoms and pretend these things are not going to happen , that somehow our enemies will just decide they’re wrong and go away , that nut jobs will disappear and not copy any mass shooters ‘ gun free zone ‘ mass ammo dumps , that some radical group won’t get their hands on a dirty bomb and play with it in some heavily populated US city , that some rouge nation or terrorist group won’t detonate an EMP or rudimentary nuclear bomb somewhere in America .
Why did 12 police offices have to be gunned down before the police departments started actively watching their backs in these situations ?
I am prepared to respond if and when someone starts to dump a few magazines in my local mall and I am prepared to survive without electricity , without a working grid and if and when hoards of desperate un-prepared folks try to stake claim to what is not theirs .
The lack of coordination on the part of the cops was rather disturbing. Quite frankly, that simple fact alone was far more responsible for the outcome than any skill or determination on the part of the attacker.
Oh, and now I officially hate VTAC barricades even more. That shit brings in training scars like nobody’s business.
Street cops aren’t set up for a coordinated response against terrorist attacks. Nor should they be. Check out the lines of cops at these SJW protests. They are sitting ducks. That is the nature of their job. They aren’t military. Nor should they be. Should they all be sitting inside MRAPs? No. They are street cops. They know this when they get up in the morning and voluntarily come to work. I also thank the gentleman LEO who attempted to end the terror shit show with only his sidearm. That’s what a street cop is supposed to do.
Pwrserge, are saying that the cops need to be better trained in “military style” tactics? Now, I’m all for the “militarization” of our police, but, I never thought I’d see the day where YOU would advocate for such things.
From his comment, I didn’t get that he was advocating militarization of the police. He was just noting a glaring lack of coordination and teamwork. Training police to work in two-man teams and not gluing themselves to cover, wouldn’t be militarizing them. But something like providing them with 249s and frags, would be.
Patrolmen aren’t trained to fight riflemen. They’re trained for close quarters incidents with handguns against opponents with short range weaponry. Police training and tactical training have come lightyears since the days of teaching 50 yard one handed Camp Perry style bullseye shooting with a revolver and calling that good enough. The switch from revolvers to pistols was a step in the right direction, as was the switch from M1911’s to plastic fantastics, and the addition of a shotgun to the squad car was a step forward, but it has been the proliferation of the patrol rifle to the common officer which has seen a revolution in tactics and capability. The number of incidents where officers have been unable to respond due to shortcomings in training and tactics is too high in a world where armor and carbines should let even one officer handle almost anything short of utter bedlam.
Outstanding advice. Move, reload, engage the enemy and USE your cover; don’t hide behind it. Be aggressive if at all possible and continue to move. In short, get off the X. Vid is hard to watch but instructive none the less.
I may be wrong, but I believe that officer killed in this video was the last one. I think the others were shot from the parking deck across the street in the initial volley. Looks like from other videos as well as this one. that the police had eyes on him once he was in front of Centro College building. I imagine radio chatter was insane but more communication was needed at this point before a lone officer moves in with a handgun. Even if you can’t broadcast your position and that of the shooter, Take two shots from cover and retreat as you draw fire and let the cavalry come in as they eventually did, however too late for this cop and that gave the killer a back exit.
Great observations and advice.
One can fault his tactics but certainly can’t question his courage.
Uh – yea I would definitely think so.
A small block of c4 in a parking garage isn’t going to get loose and bounce around a residential neighborhood two blocks over like the big 50 is liable to.
I support cops but I’ve yet to be convinced they need or should be issued full auto weapons.
Two blocks? Try twenty-two blocks away.;-)
The IDF has frangible .50 cal ammo, great transfer of energy, minimal ricochet or over penetration.
That’s what I was thinking of. Still, an M2 would be too much.
But I wonder if there are any PD’s that have an M82 or M99 in their arms room.
I’m waiting on the court case to come forward that says Johnson’s civil right to due process was violated with the police used a robot and C4 to take him out.
Were I the government, I would make the argument that as an illegal combatant, the terrorist in questions didn’t HAVE civil rights.
You’re not going to see that case.
You have rights to protect you from the excesses of government. If they bombed an innocent citizen you would have a point. When you corner a shooter, do not comply to disarm after hours of negotiations, then your a combatant. Using a robot to deliver a bomb is brilliant, no different than throwing a grenade
Sad is the next shooter will be ready and destroy the robot.
Im no expert, but my guess is those things are HARD to disable.
If they’re not now, they will be soon. I mean who doesn’t want to justify an expense report for an ARMORED COMBAT ROBOT?!?
Gee the po-leece got in a gunfight with the pos-and negotiated at length. How is this materially different than flash banging? And good luck getting anyone to champion any suit…
As frivolous as it would be, don’t be totally shocked if you see a lawsuit. Remember the 1997 north Hollywood shootout. One of those jackasses’ family sued LAPD. The family eventually dismissed the case, but not after a judge let it go all the way to a jury trial (hung jury).
They didn’t use a robot. They used a telepresence device. A human officer ended the life of another human in the course of his duties. It meets the generic definition of “good shoot” so why is this even a talking point?
The [lack of] tactics aren’t a surprise. The officers detailed to the march probably came from different precincts, squads and even departments. Some may never have met before. They certainly haven’t trained or worked together recently. There’s no reason to think that they would be able to work as coordinated squads or fire teams – and that’s what makes an army effective. You can be a totally badass Rambo, but that still won’t cause you to grow eyes in the back of your head. For that you need buddies, buddies with whom you’ve trained so that you know what they’ll do next and vice versa. SWAT teams have (or should have) that – regular patrol officers don’t.
Complex tactics require coordinated training together, simple tactics do not. All they require is a common training background, and a shift in mind-set. I, for one, never deployed with the unit I trained with. I was always pulled in as an augementee or a replacement. But “React to Contact” was the same in every unit in that theater. And the concept that if there were other soldiers around me before, and there are not now, I am wrong, was ingrained from Basic.
Common tactics and a team based mindset are absolutely possible within a single police force.
Training budgets? A soldier graduates from boot and he spends a large part of his time still in training. If he’s not deployed for real he’s training for the next time.
Agencies would have to budget time and money for cops to recieve this level of training. Unless Dallas type attacks happen with regularity I don’t see bean counters allowing the expense.
The tactics I listed would likely require no more training dollars. Doubling up officers certainly would hit the budget though.
A military theater is a much simpler and more predictable environment than that faced by a bunch of street cops. I’m not even sure what standardized “react to contact” script could be taught to urban police.
Not at all saying police, especially if this kind of attack on them becomes more common, shouldn’t avail themselves of learnings from the military, but their mission, and the environment they operate in 99.99% of the time; is very, very different. Simply determining that you are now in a 0.01% situation, will require more time and reflection than when you are in an enemy infested war zone.
The basic “survival under attack” skills you outlined should always be taught, though. Heck, it should be taught in high school, with a passing grade required to obtain voting privileges…..
I’m sure it’s for budgetary reasons, but it seems like more often than not, police work alone and they are used to it.
It’s easy to armchair quarterback the aftermath. As someone who lives in the Metroplex, I can tell you that nobody I know in law enforcement is thinking about lessons learned right now. Too many of their colleagues were hurt or killed. On Sunday, I watched a police officer who was on duty at the hospital the dead and wounded were taken to break down in tears even though no one he knew personally was assaulted.
I’m sure there will be some lessons learned eventually, but some of the issues noted in this article are due to fighting “yesterday’s war”. Ambushes on police officers used to be the domain of movies. You don’t attack an entire police force, no one has done that since, I can’t even recall when. The Roaring 20’s?
However, the criticism of officer vulnerability of working alone has been noted just as long as it has been a common practice. Hopefully some more thought and analysis will be done around this. It was disgusting to see how effectively the shooter was able to ambush lone officers. Had they been paired up from the start, they may not have happened.
“I can tell you that nobody I know in law enforcement is thinking about lessons learned right now. ”
If that is the case, it is a serious and devastating error. I know it is painful. Really, I know. I’ve done after action reports even before I was able to clean my teammate’s blood off my hands. But right then, right after it happened, is the first time you need to review and question your actions. You just have to make sure that this isn’t the last time they are reviewed, and that you allow as many points of view as possible.
I’m sure the questions will start being asked this week, though concrete policy decisions and effective tactics won’t be overnight.
One does not simply bounce back from an attack of this magnitude. I’m fine with giving them some time to grieve. The officer in question is not someone I’ve known to be very emotive, seeing him moved to tears despite having a front-row seat as they wheeled in the officers at the hospital was almost unexpected. There are some deep scars still trying to close in the Dallas law enforcement community, and it goes beyond DPD.
Surely this officer knew the odds were high that this guy was wearing armor. Once the guy fell he should’ve shot for the head. Not faulting him, hindsight is easy.
When did he fall? The cop scored zero hits.
Mr. Taylor is correct on all count. The key point is mindset. Yes your a police officer until your not. The moment multiple rounds from an elevated position are inbound your a warrior. The mindset of fixing the objective in a position ie. home or store, negotiate, then storm goes south when a determine cop hunter is loose. Simple fire team tactics could have made the difference. Add this to annual training and police response will be more effective.
Great article and well stated.
What we had in Dallas was a trained soldier doing what he was trained to do, and whose goal was to kill as many people as possible before he got wacked himself.
The police did what they’re trained for, which is to shoot back at untrained urban thugs who normally shoot at cops only in a fruitless and unplanned attempt to evade capture.
Incidents like this are so rare that for LE to train for such a situation would be counterproductive, I believe. It would make more sense to give LE more training in the tactics required to protect themselves from the gang banger who just acquired his Glock 40 yesterday and has no clue how to use it effectively.
Wrong Curtis. Simple fire team training (fire and maneuver) is a skill set that can be mastered in a day. Unfortunately more events like this will happen.
Recall the bank shooting in LA, shortly afterwards police departments understood the need for long guns. After Dallas fire and maneuver will seep into training.
Curtis, I don’t think the tactics I raised in the original article would take much training time, but the point you raise is a really important one.
Even when it was obvious, even when the police knew and communicated that this was not the ordinary scenario you described, they reacted to the threat as if it was.
I trust Taylor’s assessment of the degree of effort such training would require. That aside, though, maybe we won’t need to up arm and train every last officer in these tactics. Maybe we could develop particular police units and provide them with special weapons and tactics? Maybe give them a cool acronym to go by?
Such a unit could be deployed in advance of these major protests/rallies and already be on scene. With the resources if the DFW area, they could have such a unit on standby perpetually.
I’m just concerned someone could learn these military tactics on youtube and then apply them at, say, a Trump campaign event. If a major party candidate today went down like RFK, I don’t see how anything resembling gun rights in this country could continue.
The shooter took a defensive move and shoot class a year or so before, and was seen doing “military type exercises” in his backyard (could have been PT in his camo and boots, or simply dry fire and roll and move or who knows….
Aren’t we all supposed to do dry fire drawing and presenting hundreds of times a week to make fast smooth?)
Here’s a thought. If that had been a crowd of CCL holders marching in the streets, perhaps they could have joined the DPD in shooting back…
Think UT Tower sniper incident…
As much as I advocate concealed carry, I don’t think it would have helped in this incident. The shooter was using ambush tactics, there was chaos on the streets. No one knew what to look for and CCL holders never make up a majority of a crowd. If a CCL holder had done any good they would have been extremely lucky, right place at the right time. Even then, with the police expecting multiple shooters at first, a CCL holder is likely to just get shot.
This is one time, an exception not the rule, where a good guy with a gun did NOT stop the bad guy with a gun. We don’t live in a world of absolutes. It doesn’t invalidate going armed or 2nd Amendment rights, but it is worthwhile to recognize that in this incident the People of the Gun were probably not going to be of much use.
When Ferguson deployed tactical units ahead of protests they were criticized for it.
There is no winning here.
That officer shot in the video was AT LEAST one bill overweight, too. He had no business going in alone for close quarters combat with a fleet footed, 25 year old military vet with tactical training.
Could he have known all that ahead of time? No, not for certain, but it should’ve been assumed. After all, the first thought should’ve been ISIS terrorist, who often have travelled to the M.E. and could pick up tactical training. They were already under the assumption this was a coordinated sniper attack, so they should’ve moved past the thought of a typical maniacal, unsophisticated spree shooter.
The officer should have fired from cover to pin the shooter down or force him off his plan, and radioed in his position for backup. Charging forth alone, untrained, unfit, and underequipped amounted to too many mistakes to survive.
There’s probably a lot of things officers could have done differently. But in case of the officer behind the pillar, the question we, and certainly other officers, should be raising is, did he react in accordance to his training? If so, these were not performance mistakes, but mistakes in how he was trained.
Police training is minimal, especially post-academy. I know agencies around here, including campus P.D. forces, who struggle to scrape together funds for range time just to maintain officer certification.
The issue here wasn’t that he was beholden to outdated or inadequate training. It’s that he had no training on urban combat, was instantly in way over his head, and failed to realize it. Knowing the limits and applicability of your training, is part of your training.
If anything, his actual training would have saved him. Pre-Columbine, the era in which he would’ve likely gone through the academy, SOP was to establish a perimeter and call SWAT. Had he done that here, he’d probably be alive.
“Knowing the limits and applicability of your training, is part of your training. ”
So true. And so damn hard to learn.
Everybody thinks police training after the academy is full of what they see in the movies. Daily shooting, lots of ho-rah happy tactical stuff. The truth is so different.
Shooting? The truth is that most cops are only given a box of 50 to 100 rounds to train and qualify with per year. Per year. Think about that. Most civilians who actually shoot sporadically are better at shooting than dedicated cops. Think about that. It is the reason why civilians do a better job at plugging bad guys than cops.
Classroom time is mostly relegated to meeting the new standards and reading out of the next revised manual. Or is spent on community policing seminars or classes dealing with appeasing the community. Classes on survival, stress management, even health (like classes on losing weight) take a far back seat to more PC oriented classroom fair.
Most street cops aren’t taught tactics ouside the academy. Tactics are what the SWAT teams are for. Unfortunately, just like we have discovered about calling 911 (when seconds count the police are 10 minutes away) the police are now discovering about SWAT (when SWAT is needed now, it takes 2 hours to activate (kid you not. 2 hours for activation is about norm)).
The police are well trained and well equipped to handle standard policing situations. And they (for the most, like 99.9% of the time) do a good to excellent job at handling standard policing situations. But things that are out of the norm, like hostage situations, active bank robberies or, shall we say it, active shooter situations during a low intensity riot (like the BLM march) exceed the training and equipment of the police. The fact that they were able to fight him into a fixed position, and trap him there, during Ragnarok, speaks well of their ability to overcome their training.
Bet he got annual diversity training. Really helpful, no doubt.
Unfortunately, the policeman wasn’t doing normal police precedure in this situation- Hang back and wait for SWAT. While SWAT is overused these days, this is exactly the situation where they would be most effective. Ballistic shields, long rifles and massed tactics could have easily overwhelmed a lone gunman. The fact that the gunman was using basic military tactics made it more difficult, since all of the movements and flanking he utilized are taught in basic (I still remember them, ten years later.) Sadly, this is all armchair quarterbacking. Situations like this ARE very rare, and the officer taken down in the video was doing what he could with what he had. Though I also agree- Budgetary concerns be damned, let’s have officers move in pairs in the future!
What’s the deal with fat cops, anyway? I know there are generally physical fitness testing and requirements to get hired. I would think annual testing would be required, just like annual marksmanship certification.
I remember taking a tour of the local Police station as a youth. They have a whole room full of exercise equipment and we were told they’re encouraged to work out on their own time. There were a couple cops there lifting weights.
Seems to me a fat cop is about as useful as a fat soldier.
To play the devil’s advocate – apply that advice to yourself. We all must do this.
-How in shape are you, right now?
-Could you sprint a mile through gridlocked traffic to retrieve your child from a school that’s being assaulted, and still be combat effective when you get there?
-Can you carry an incapacitated adult at speed for a half mile or more, while still remaining capable of engaging threats with at least suppressing fire?
-Can you apply a tourniquet while still remaining aware of your surroundings?
-Can you enter and exit your vehicle under fire at speed?
-Have you adjusted your lifestyle to carry enough firepower where you would even have a chance in a fight like this one?
-Can you effectively engage threats in the street from your vehicle without crashing?
These are all skills most of us would consider “over-the-top”. But there are 5 dead cops (RIP) who probably thought training to urban guerrillas was “over-the-top”.
Mr. Advocate –
The taxpayers don’t pay me to do any of those things.
Incidentally, I am on the payroll of a local government. And I have a sufficient level of physical fitness to do my job.
“Seems to me a fat cop is about as useful as a fat soldier.”
Or a keyboard commando
Glad I’m not the only one to notice the rotund physiques of a large % of Dallas’ finest. Like a donut shop convention.Yeah it’s hard to be “tactical” when you’re our of breath…
I believe Mr. Taylor to be correct. In my day fire teams, cover fire and fire and movement were page one squad training. Of course, it is Monday.
Great stuff, it makes me question what we do in IDPA regarding cover, but:
He may have been overweight and under trained, but he was “moving to towards the sound of the guns”. Alone.
The next group teamed up.
“it makes me question what we do in IDPA regarding cover”
For most of us, we do it wrong. But that’s our fault. There are not rules that say you have to hug the cover, and I’ve never been at a course that didn’t allow me to back off a bit. Of course, that adds distance, and you have to accept that your score is going to go down. Accept it.
Don’t quote me, I’m not exactly a regular, but where we play I think the muzzle has to be beyond the cover.
ew
Alone and under gunned. Ever so often you here that snarky “cowardly cops” remark in our threads. Bullshit.
Some cops are cowardly. Not this guy. This guy moved to contact. No doubt his heart was in the right place.
I’m glad you commented on this. That video was very hard to watch.
Very well written and accurate points.
Great observations. Been in firefights in what now seems a lifetime ago, and as I watched both the private and tv footage, thought to myself that these poor souls have not been trained for a situation like this, and all is not going to end well. Combat engagement is very different from normal police tactics.
Any combat is very different than any normal anything else.
Would have been nice for the person doing the videotaping had used a rifle instead of a camera. Several cops may still be alive.
I was thinking that. It is likely a condo they are filming from.
Um, no. Are you insane? Downtown Dallas at night with chaos and gunfire is not a video game.
So you’re saying if the guy with the camera had the firearm, scope and training to take out the shooter before he executed the cop, he shouldn’t have?
Cause “not a video game”?
“This is a training mistake I see very often, and one I often find myself getting into after I’ve watched other people do it in a class or competition. If that happens to you, if you find yourself pressing up against the barricade, drill yourself out of it. It’s a training mistake that will get you killed.”
Don’t tell the tactical timmys at IDPA that. They will say you are just gaming.
I can’t disagree with anything written by JWT, but let’s slow down for a second. Police are trained for police work, not military work. Police are not an occupying army, and that’s the way we like it and the way it should be.
The Dallas incident was a black swan event. If officers are trained like soldiers, they will treat every incident like Dallas and turn it into a military engagement. They will fight the way they are trained. And when that happens, Dallas and other American cities will be no better than Fallujah.
We cannot complain about the militarization of the police and then argue in favor of the militarization of the police. That would be schizophrenic.
This^
I have similar uneasiness with the robo-bomb.
In this exact instance I have no problem with the robo bomb. But if robo bombs are suddenly seen as the answer to all barricaded suspect issues, yes, I have a problem.
Full auto weapons do not belong in police armories and c4 should be used only as a last resort. I think the Dallas incident should be a template for explosives use. If your situation doesn’t meet Dallas specs, no boom.
My last point about standard police tactics not working here is the only point relevant to the militarization of police. And recognizing that the event isnt normal, and common police tactics won’t work is what, during those rare events, police have to realize.
The other points don’t increase the militarization of our police at all, and only improve officer safety.
But your comment is a good one. This isn’t the event that most cops need to spend their time preparing for. That said, the proper use of cover, teamwork, and the recognition of those black swan events goes well beyond the event itself.
Yet the other side will fret about us all turning into Rambo’s and crow when we do the smart thing and Run. Schizophrenia is rampant.
I said this yesterday right here in TTAG. The officer in the pillar incident was overwhelmed by aggression he didn’t know how to deal with. His only option was to aggressively counter-attack with the tool(s) at his disposal.
It doesn’t guarantee he doesn’t end up dead, as I pointed out, sometimes you can do everything right and still lose. However, his only option to come out alive was one he didn’t use and probably never even thought of.
Some food for thought in light of this incident:
-How in shape are you, right now?
-Could you sprint a mile through gridlocked traffic to retrieve your child from a school that’s being assaulted, and still be combat effective when you get there?
-Can you carry an incapacitated adult at speed for a half mile or more, while still remaining capable of engaging threats with at least suppressing fire?
-Can you apply a tourniquet while still remaining aware of your surroundings?
-Can you enter and exit your vehicle under fire at speed?
-Have you adjusted your lifestyle to carry enough firepower where you would even have a chance in a fight like this one?
-Can you effectively engage threats in the street from your vehicle without crashing?
These are all skills most of us would consider “over-the-top”. But there are 5 dead cops (RIP) who probably thought training to fight against a guerrilla assault in an urban environment was “over-the-top”.
-How in shape are you, right now?
Very good.
-Could you sprint a mile through gridlocked traffic to retrieve your child from a school that’s being assaulted, and still be combat effective when you get there?
Yup.
-Can you carry an incapacitated adult at speed for a half mile or more, while still remaining capable of engaging threats with at least suppressing fire?
No one can and no one should. Put the incapacitated person down. Engage threats, pick up and move. Otherwise all you end up with is both of you dead. Tactics, I’m not an expert on. Tactical Combat Casualty Care, on that I am a certified expert.
-Can you apply a tourniquet while still remaining aware of your surroundings? Have, can.
-Can you enter and exit your vehicle under fire at speed? Have, can.
-Have you adjusted your lifestyle to carry enough firepower where you would even have a chance in a fight like this one? No adjustment necessary. I’ve always been this way.
-Can you effectively engage threats in the street from your vehicle without crashing? Have. Can.
Next Pres,
What the heck is the point of your questions?
Do I expect an active duty infantry unit to be in top shape? You bet. I also expect them to be 30 years younger than me.
As for our police, the standard can be lower than that, but there should still be standards for physical fitness.
As for the rest of us, I would be happy to simply see a reversal of the trend of ever-increasing obesity in the U.S. We’ve got 40-yr-olds riding motorized carts through Wal*Mart and using the drive-thru lane at McDonald’s because they’re too fat to walk. The costs of treating the plethora of health issues associated with obesity continue to rise, and frankly, I’m tired of paying for other people’s laziness and poor lifestyle choices with rising health insurance premiums.
I’m a distance runner, but I play soccer because the sprint work kicks my ass and it needs kicking at my age. I have a bailout bag with level 3 vest, aid bag and carbine in my vehicle. I exercise my 2nd amend rights always. I may not be as good at fire an maneuver as I was when I was a paid trigger puller, but I will do everything in my power to reduce the innocent body count.
No offense, but I’m going to quibble with you here about your first item. I know this might be overly technical, but I’ll point it out because it actually goes to the heart of your point.
No one on the planet can “sprint” a mile and still be combat effective because no one on the planet can “sprint” a mile. Sprinting is running at absolute maximum speed and world-class competitors start to run out of gas late in 400m (.248 miles) races. Simply put: No human being can truly sprint a mile. It’s simply not possible.
Can you run a mile quite rapidly and still be combat effective? Yes. Can you sprint that distance? No.
Fitness has nothing to do with this. The human metabolic processes simply can’t handle actually sprinting a mile.
The trick to this is to be fit enough that your running speed is fairly fast but still sustainable over the distance of one mile and therein lies the devil. Being able to run quite fast for one mile will usually take significant training specifically at running and you’re going to be pushing the limits of human metabolism to truly do it AFAP unless you’re high on meth or something, in which case you may well kill yourself.
You’re going to have to sacrifice some speed here in order to arrive ready to do anything or even arrive at all, so it’s all about pacing and that will depend greatly on what you’re carrying.
Thank God that mass shooters are nut jobs and not a trained infantryman. A simple plan could have tripled the body count and probably allowed the shooter to evade before the confusion had cleared. It is good that nuts lack experience and do not plan.
Very good analysis. His initial shots appeared to be from his left side from cover shooting right handed (strong side) – rather than shooting support side – so initially he was somewhat exposed (no bilateral drills for this guy) Not sure from the angle, but moving back to the other column would probably afforded him a strong side shot from cover and a small alley of exposure. He did move and shoot, very deliberate, used low ready, fired and maneuvered, used point shoot technique when closing distance, shot on the move to cover. I suppose we can’t expect law enforcement to take up a position, establish fire superiority and fire and maneuver through the ambush. I’m thankful this douche bag didn’t have help using elevated positions with sectors of fire, particularly if they used something heavier. I’m glad they turned him into little chunks with C4 – it was creative, didn’t put more LEO’s at risk, and his parents save some cash by burying the remaining scraps of his worthless carcass in a shoebox. Outstanding.
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