Laconic and soft-spoken—right until he isn’t. [HSLD = High-Speed, Low-Drag. A term referring to “operators”: firearms experts with military and/or security training.]

 

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27 COMMENTS

  1. So. I keep shooting til the threat ends. Saved myself a weekend of expensive training by watching that video.

  2. I have to confess that the looking-both-ways affectation looks silly to me too, like others have mentioned. It’s like a ritual, instead of bowing you do look-both-ways.

    • He’s establishing a habit to check for other threats. It’s also done to force yourself out of tunnelvision and open up your situational awareness after a traumatic situation, like a gunfight. It’s becoming standard practice now. My organization has been doing it for the better part of 5 years and just today I qual’d and did it without thinking or being told to. It took that long to teach an old dog the new trick.

      • I think its a hold-over from what they taught us in basic – since you a did so much range training with other guys on the firing line with you. Military habits perpetuated by military people, and so on until nobody knows why, you just do it. And then all the myths about why begin to manifest.

      • It’s good to look around, to maintain situation awareness, and to avoid tunnel vision.

        The potential problem with training until you do it without thinking, is that you’re going through the motions and not thinking about what you’re looking at.

      • My 2 cents: if you are really high speed, low drag, you will train yourself to unass the AO immediately. Screw that standing still and doing the perfunctory look-over-the-shoulder gayness. In a gunfight, anything stationary is a target. Unless you are already under the best cover, you should be moving and ducking and zig-zagging your happy to-be-alive-ass to the best cover. And in a DGU situation, you need to get to somewhere where you can call 911 (it helps your legal case to be the first call). Think about it for a second: everybody who shoots trains to hit a stationary target. How many people actually train to hit a running target? Hardly anybody.

        • Think about it for a second: everybody who shoots trains to hit a stationary target. How many people actually train to hit a running target? Hardly anybody.

          Seriously useful wisdom right there.

      • “It’s becoming standard practice now.”

        And?

        Everything new is a fad and everything that used to be new is apparently crap. It’s a constant cycle. Weaver was the bomb for a long time but now isosceles is the only way to go. Buy into the newest fad if you want but Cooper and Chapman nailed the basics a very long time ago. The core basics have always been and will always be the same. Tack on all the tassels and feather boas you want, it all boils down to the basics.

  3. Out of respect to those of us that don’t connect telephone calls for a living (unfortunatly I do) can we please follow Mission First Tactical’s lead and describe the HSLD folks as “Assaulter-Operators”. It makes us sound more inclusive and welcomeing.
    (sarcastic referance to their new banner ad, hit refresh a couple times, you’ll see it.)

  6. What’s with his head bob, is he supposedly dodging bullets, how does one actually scan when the head is in such rapid motion and how does one perform that ritual while moving backwards, away from the herd of approching Zombies?
    Yes it was a ritual

    • Yeah, and if there is a deadly threat approaching from his front why does he take a full second to look behind himself before popping the drug crazed perp and then look behind himself again in that wierd fashion when he could just turn his body (and run)?
      I’m sure this routine works like a charm in Afsandalot but it’s ahead of it’s time in CONUS

  8. How, exactly, does screaming unintelligibly at the “approaching threat” assist in one’s “neutralization” of same?

    • I had to watch it 5 times to figure out what he’s saying- I think it’s “Divert, divert, divert.”

      I would think that saying something more along the lines of, “Stop moving or I’ll shoot” would be better. Preferably in as calm and clear a voice as possible. At the very least, it might convince any witnesses that you weren’t provoking the attacker by shouting at him.

  9. Let’s see:

    1. A home-made you-tube instructional video.
    2. An “instructor” who doesn’t really identify himself other than to say “Charlie here”.
    3. An instructor dressed in a dew rag and a KC Chiefs jacket.

    I mean, hell, what could possibly be wrong with the latest guy who thinks he knows fecal matter from shinola offering his inept advice about self-defense shooting techniques.

    Oh yeah. And if you stick around after discerning that this guy is a nobody pretending to be an authority, and surmising this guy probably is inept at best and a wannabe idiot at worst, you’re THEN rewarded with a piss-poor MZB — after screaming some ‘gunfight’ bullshit three times like he’s casting a spell of doom (on himself) and not moving off the X.

    Hell, I’ve got housewives who’ve never shot before who could deliver a better execution of that drill on the second day of training.

    And then he goes to a mangled, wannabe interpretation of position SUL.

    And then he takes an equally sweet-ass time assessing for threats.

    And this guy holds himself out to be an expert?

    Oh Crikey.

    Thanks for the laughs, Charlie.

    The dangerous part is people without a modicum of common sense or training are going to watch this video and learn goofy technique that may well get them hurt – at their own hand while training. Hope Charlie’s got an Israeli Battle Dressing and knows how to use it.

    • From his YouTube channel bio:

      “Charlie is a former US Army Ranger and Special Deputy US Marshal. He has provided executive protection for dignitaries in nearly 90 countries, including Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Mexico. He is a graduate of the Army’s Ranger School, SERE Level C course, Jungle Warfare Course, Airborne school and numerous firearms and evasive driving instructor courses.”

      If we believe him, he’s apparently an actual “operator.” Of course, anyone can say they’re anything on the interwebs.

    • Ok, Santa. Instead of a stocking on the mantle I’m leaving a pair of panty hose. Fill em up with the appropriate model, preferably blond and you’ll get a great big thank you from me on the 26th.

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