Better late than never.....I guess!?

[Roger Phillips]

Officer.com: 'The dozen critical elements of modern firearms training'
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12 Elements of Firearms Training
The dozen critical elements of modern firearms training

Posted: Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Updated: November 16th, 2009 09:14 AM EDT

BANK MILLER
Training Contributor

It can easily be argued that the job of a law enforcement firearms instructor is more difficult today than ever before. With everything now required from our already strained training resources, it has become increasingly difficult to even establish what the right questions are, let alone find the right answers. To help build a solid foundation and establish some basic criteria for what a law enforcement training program should include International Training, Inc. has adopted the 12 critical elements outlined below.

The information gathered for this analysis was obtained from several surveys conducted by the California Commission on Peace Officers Standards and Training (POST) and the FBI. The FBI has collected data on officers killed and assaulted since 1945, and California POST started collecting such data in 1980. The surveys cited in this study encompass those conducted by the FBI from 1995 through 2004. After summarizing these studies, the following guidelines were drawn for police firearms training.

FBI Analysis of Officers Feloniously Killed from 1995-200

545 total officers feloniously killed with firearms

Broken down into two category distances: under seven yards and over seven yards.

Under Seven Yards:

* 0-5 feet, 268 officers killed, 49% of total
* 6-10 feet, 107 officers killed, 20% of total
* 11-20 feet, 65 officers killed, 12% of total

Note that the percentage totals indicate that 440 officers killed (81%) with firearms in the time frame specified were killed at distances under seven yards.

Over Seven Yards:

* 21-50 feet, 47 officers killed, 8% of total
* over 50 feet, 41 officers killed, 7% of total
* distance not reported, 17 officers killed, 3% of total

Totals for officers killed at distances over seven yards (or not reported) was 105 officers or 19%

1. Prepare officers for immediate, spontaneous, lethal attacks

Why?
Based on the above statistics, one can see that close quarter tactics and techniques are a must for officer survival. Personal communication with unknown individuals is a big part of our officers' daily routine, and they have to be close enough to them to do it effectively. The difficulty arises when these unknown individuals turn out to be bad guys. When this happens, a mastery of drawing and firing from various close quarter positions, weapon retention, physical strikes, and other close-quarter combat skills are obviously critical.

How?
To satisfy the close distance issue, a basic cardboard target holder that is sturdy enough to withstand muzzle blast, palm strikes, and an occasional flying ticket book should serve you well. As far as sudden and spontaneous goes, a high-speed turning target system that suddenly presents a threat just when the officer glances away can add a tremendous amount of stress to the situation.

2. Prepare officers for assaults by multiple threats and uninvolved subjects

Why?
Statistics tell us there is about a 60% chance that an assault will involve more than one attacker. At the same time, we need to be aware of uninvolved, innocent bystanders as well. In many domestic abuse calls, the spouse or other family members can start out as uninvolved, but then join in against the officer if a conflict ensues. Learning to break the tunnel vision phenomenon and engage multiple threats with total awareness of uninvolved subjects justifies shoot / no-shoot training, increases survivability, and decreases liability issues.

How?
The most obvious approach here is lots of targets. Tall ones, short ones, some closer, some farther away, some clustered in a group, and some off by themselves. Another particularly effective technique also employs turning targets, but they have to be individually controlled. As your officer is engaging targets 1 and 2 as they edge and face right in front of him, try facing target 6 and see if he notices. Better yet, use a 180 degree turning target that can show you a bad guy or a good guy in the same place at any given time.

3. Integrate the sudden transition to firearms from arrest and control techniques, including searching and handcuffing

Why?
Many potentially lethal assaults occur as the officer is searching and/or attempting to handcuff the subject. This sudden shift to a deadly force situation can be exceptionally dangerous if the officer has not been conditioned with the proper response techniques. Glaring examples of insufficient training and conditioning would be the officer failing to create distance if the chance arises, or attempting to draw his firearm with his handcuffs still in his hand.

How?
The use of drag dummies, CPR dummies, and turning targets are all effective here. The dummies provide realism and a platform for practicing control techniques, while the turning targets provide the sudden visual indicator that the situation has escalated.

4. Base training on the fact that most officers are killed at short distances

Why?
The statistics presented earlier clearly establish where most officer fatalities occur. However, it is important to note that this element does not say Teach your officers how to shoot at close distances. It says to base your training on the fact that most fatalities occur up close. It's like the guy who tells his doctor that he broke his leg in 2 places and the doctor says So, don't go to those places! If most fatalities occur at close distances, we should all be aware of when it is appropriate to be farther away.

How?
In addition to the close-quarter combat techniques discussed in elements 1-3 above, a moving target that charges straight at the officer can be extremely effective at illustrating the importance of creating distance and demonstrating the best ways to move quickly and effectively in various situations.

5. Base training on the fact that officers will have limited fine and complex motor control

Why?
We should all be aware of the various physiological responses our bodies undergo during a combat situation. Manual dexterity is the one we are focusing on here. As blood flows away from our extremities and towards our core, we lose fine and complex motor control in our fingers and hands. Unfortunately, elements of good marksmanship like trigger control can be the first to go. Now before a panic ensues, we believe that teaching basic marksmanship skills (like proper trigger manipulation) is absolutely vital and should not be abandoned! However, make room in your training for the fact that fine and complex motor control will be decreased, and that the officer can still make good hits despite this.

How?
The best way to demonstrate the effects of stress to your officers is to immerse them in it. Make them run, get their heart pumping and their adrenaline flowing, then send them into an interactive scenario with dye marking rounds and role-players shooting back at them. The breakdowns in technique will be startling.

[Roger Phillips]

6. Integrate two-person contact and cover teams involved in realistic scenarios

Why?
Just because one of your officers knows how to safely and effectively engage multiple threats, reload efficiently, and move from one piece of cover to another doesn’t mean he knows how to do those things with 2 or 3 other officers running around him trying to do the same thing at the same time. Where is my muzzle? Where is my partner? Where is my partner's muzzle? Proper tactical communication is absolutely critical!

How?
Have 2 and 3 man teams go through tactical scenarios together. Use portable cardboard and steel targets in a variety of locations and configurations. Have the teams shoot side by side so their partner's brass is bouncing off the bill of their cap or down their shirt collar. Condition them to be profoundly muzzle conscious, and make them realize the importance of communication when it comes to moving, reloading, and staying in the fight.

7. Emphasize the survival mindset and the will to win in all skills training

Why?
Quite often, what you bring to the fight will dictate the outcome of the fight. Having a winning mindset and a positive attitude will enhance the officer's odds of survival. While our work is dangerous, we have a high risk of being a victim off the street rather than on the street, and at times the biggest threat we face is the one in the mirror. Particularly with younger officers, movies and television have shaped much of what they perceive as the realities of a gunfight. For example, the perp that flies back 15 feet and crashes into a pile of trash cans after being hit with a single handgun round. Clint Smith said if you get into a fist fight you might get punched, if you get in to a knife fight you might get cut, and if you get in to a gunfight you might get shot. It doesn't mean the fight is over, it just means you may have to finish the fight a little differently than you had originally planned.

How?
Knowing how to shoot, reload, and clear stoppages with only one hand (both left and right) is imperative. Our officers must be confident in their ability to win the fight even if they are injured, and they must be comfortable with these techniques in order to gain that confidence.

8. Integrate one-handed firing of a handgun. Include dominant and support hand, plus drawing, reloading, and stoppage clearing

Why?
Many law enforcement shootings occur with one hand, and using a single hand is often to your tactical benefit based on the situation. Even if you are not injured, a traditional 2-handed grip may be impractical or even dangerous if means giving up too much cover or concealment.

How?
Primarily for safety reasons, one-handed skills training is best executed in small groups. Because officers will be presenting and handling their weapons in untraditional and perhaps unfamiliar ways, muzzle awareness is critically important in these drills.

9. Integrate close-quarter structure searching and clearing plus indoor combat tactics

Why?
When a family comes home to find their back door kicked in, they call the police. Does the call go to the SWAT team? Of course not - it goes to the nearest officers on patrol. Either alone or with a partner, every single officer needs to know how to perform basic close-quarter techniques like tactical entry, hallway navigation, and room clearing. They need to know things like which way a door swings if you can see the hinges (towards you), and they need to know not to expose body parts around corners, don't rub you back along the wall as you move, and don't hang out in doorways.

How?
A live-fire ballistic shoot house is the ultimate training tool for these situations. It provides a structure for all the tactical movement and navigation training, plus it escalates the stress and realism of the training by incorporating threat engagement with actual duty weapons. It's one thing to fire a gun in a nice straight line out on the qualification range. It is another thing entirely when you are inside a building trying to be aware of 360 or 540 degree environment.

10. Emphasize dim or no light situations as much as daylight training

Why?
Because 70% or more of law enforcement shootings occur under reduced or diminishing light conditions, significant training with your duty illumination tools is a must. Target identification and threat recognition are critical parts of this training as well, and keep in mind that flashlights are needed in the day time just as much as in the night time because you never know where you may end up. The illumination tools you carry will have a significant impact on how you handle your weapon and ultimately on how you fight, so you must be extremely comfortable using them under a wide variety of tactical situations. Many departments have adopted the use of lasers, so your training must include the proper use of these tools as well.

How?
If you already have a shoot house that can be darkened, you have an ideal venue for all kinds of low-light training. An indoor range also serves this purpose well. If you don’t have access to either of these facilities, night time on your outdoor range should provide some pretty good darkness.

11. Integrate moving then shooting and moving while shooting techniques

Why?
If you maintain a picture-perfect stance during a gunfight, you are not doing it right. If you are not moving to create distance then you should be moving to cover. The ability to shoot effectively while incorporating lots of movement gives you a dramatic tactical advantage, increases your chances of survival, and decreases the chance of hitting something you didn't want to hit. Remember, when shooting while moving you should move no faster than you can hit, see, and in some cases, hear.

How?
Effective movement techniques can be taught with just about any target equipment you have available. Running man targets and automated turning targets can make the experience more realistic and intense by allowing the trainer to control the scenario and respond to the trainee's actions.

12. Integrate engagement techniques for moving targets, both laterally and charging

Why?
Training on moving targets has become mandatory for law enforcement agencies across the country, and rightfully so. When was the last time you were in a violent confrontation with someone who just stood still? Because running seems to be a part of most gunfights, the ability to fire safely and accurately at moving threats can be one of an officer's greatest assets. It is important to train for both lateral threat movement and charging movement because each requires a specific skill set and response from the trainee.

How?
Some portable moving target systems are very effective and flexible because they can be configured for both types of threat movement (lateral and charging). A heavier-duty track mounted system can be equipped with a steel target plate to enhance muscle memory through the immediate positive feedback of clanging steel

Again, being a law enforcement firearms trainer today is an extremely difficult job. You have to be part teacher, part motivator, part mechanical engineer, part lawyer, part drill sergeant, part counselor, part maintenance staff, part etc., etc. We pay tribute to you trainers who dedicate your efforts to developing the next generation of warriors, and we hope the information presented here serve to focus and clarify the process.

Source - http://www.officer.com/web/online/Operations-and-Tactics/12-Elements-of-Firearms-Training/3$49345

[Roger Phillips]

Hard to believe the inability to see "the nose on your face."

Still hardly any talk about FOF!

They are not just ten years behind.....they are falling further and further behind every day.

For my LEO buddies out there.....I'll teach you if they won't!

[Gabe Suarez]

There are none so blind as those who are not interested in seeing, think seeing is too expensive, don't want to hear about seeing unless the department pays for it. What is available to stock brokers and barbers is also available to cops....they have but to open their wallets and all the secrets of close range gunfighting will be theirs.

[JohnH11B]

Wait! You guys are wrong. Can you be so blind to see that what we really need are the Risk Management and Cultural Diversity classes

I will say that the Training Unit at agencies hold most of the blame. If they aren't going to learn it so they can teach it, how do they expect the officers to learn it. "Boy John, that's easy. Get the instructors to learn it". Hah. The main FA instructors where I work know I have trained with SI, they know what I learned, I showed them, and explained to them why. You would have thought I was asking them to work on the Hubble telescope. "Wait John, we didn't know about this stuff". Hah. I send them every WT newsletter I get, I posted the Waco classes, the Marc Denny seminar in Killeen, Sotis in Killeen and tell them about the Central Texas Combatives Group get togethers, like the one a week from today.

"We've never done it like that", "they miss the target when they move and shoot", "if we do FoF and someone gets hurt we could be sued", blah blah.



Sorry for the early morining rant. Guess I need another cup of coffee.

[Rick Klopp]

Wait! You guys are wrong. Can you be so blind to see that what we really need are the Risk Management and Cultural Diversity classes

I will say that the Training Unit at agencies hold most of the blame. If they aren't going to learn it so they can teach it, how do they expect the officers to learn it. "Boy John, that's easy. Get the instructors to learn it". Hah. The main FA instructors where I work know I have trained with SI, they know what I learned, I showed them, and explained to them why. You would have thought I was asking them to work on the Hubble telescope. "Wait John, we didn't know about this stuff". Hah. I send them every WT newsletter I get, I posted the Waco classes, the Marc Denny seminar in Killeen, Sotis in Killeen and tell them about the Central Texas Combatives Group get togethers, like the one a week from today.

"We've never done it like that", "they miss the target when they move and shoot", "if we do FoF and someone gets hurt we could be sued", blah blah.



Sorry for the early morining rant. Guess I need another cup of coffee.

I agree with you John. It seems that it always boils down to either liability, budget, or the "we've always done it this way" attitude. Matter of fact, when I help to qualify deputies, by state mandate, I'm only allowed to let them take one step before it's back to stand & deliver. I suppose that they think it is easier and less emotional to file the officier down paperwork than it is to look into better training methods.

It really is a sorry situation.

[Al Lipscomb]

Roger,

About 5 years ago I was in the process of training to become a volunteer LEO. At that time I started to understand that the training they were giving me was not all that it could be. That is when I started looking and found Gabe.

Since that time Gabe has continued to push the technology and bring new things to the table. Your part in that process cannot be understated. Your efforts to identify solid solutions and talent in teaching them have been a huge gain for the community.

In my "day job" I spend many hours every year of my own time keeping up with what I need to do my job. I add to that the time I need to maintain myself as a volunteer LEO.

I would encourage anyone who works as an LEO to consider the need and find the resources to get the training. Notice that I did not say "extra" training, but "needed" training. I have found myself in situations were what I learned from Suarez International was needed and nothing in my official training had covered it.

[MO XD]

Roger what I see as the important thing is that we now have a place and the someone's that are teaching these things and MORE. Learn from the past but look forward to the present and the future. Learn all you can today because tomorrow it will be from the past.

Glade to have found SI

[Roger Phillips]

I just do not get it.

If my job was one of teaching people how to stay alive (and it is), I would attempt to be the very best that I could be at it. We are talking about teaching issues of life or death....not just passing on knowledge and teaching how to prosper.

To me this makes a huge difference from a typical "instructor" responsibility.

When you combine this article with what recently came out of Force Science, it amazes me that these things are being presented as some new epiphany. It just comes down to common sense to me.

I knew from day one inside of my very first MT course (1999) that I would never fight within the methodology in which I was being trained. Luckily I met some guys that were thinking just like I did. My training partner (BH) and I point shot everything inside of three yards even though we did not know that we were technically "point shooting." We moved much faster than everyone else was and accepted seeing less, still knowing that we could make the hits. We questioned everything that we were taught for common sense. This seemed to be heresy, because we did not witness hardly any "questioning." We kept these discussions to ourselves for two years. We spent two hours at the end of every ten hours of training, doing nothing but analyzing, questioning, and seeking out common sense. We both understood the context and the reality of the fight and clearly saw that what we were being taught was not inline with reality and simply did not make sense.

This is the epiphany that everyone needs to personally experience. I had mine ten years ago while at the entry level of a subpar training methodology.

In 2001 I learned about "gun forums" and went searching for a better way. 99.9% of what I saw was the subpar status quo. I witnessed a bizarre phenomenon of dogma, guru worship, and competition focus where anyone with a desenting opinion was burned at the cyberstake. Filtering out the dogmatic BS was a chore in itself. When less than .1% of what is being said makes any sense, the search for "the truth" can be a very frustrating thing. I hung in there and eventually found guys like Gabe, Fred Darling, and a few others that were making sense. These guys were questioning the status quo, pointing out stupidity.

Over at the now defunked "Polite Society" Fred Darling was constantly pointing out the stupid things he was seeing inside of the MT courses. His opinions mirrored that of my training partner and mine. Here was a MT trainer publically stepping up to the plate and taking on the stupidity that I was seeing on a weekly basis. It became time for me to take my opinions out to the public. Fred and I got some very good things changed at one of the MT schools by airing out the dirty laundry publically. We were able to enact change in the way things were being programmed into the students. After action drills, always moving after shooting, close contact after shooting were being programmed in a manner that could cost somebody there life. Until someone stirred it up publically on the forums, it simply was not going to change.

So here I am today, publically questioning everything!;)

Question everything! No matter who says it!

I do not care if he is a guru, a Col. or if he is part of one of the elite LEO/military teams. I do not care if he is a world renown instructor or the lead trainer in your department. I do not care if it is Gabe or any of the outstanding SI instructors.

Question everything and everyone.....especially me!

Never take another mans word as the word of God!

It must past two tests!

(1) Common Sense that comes out of quality knowledge.

(2) Does it stand up to a living, thinking, and resisting adversary?

In 2002 I began training with Gabe. I took CRG, the original IGF (FOF/clearing/low light), CRG II (ECRG), and the IGF under the new format (FOF). (For those that love to claim to have made me who I am. Over 98% of this was done with point shooting without formal training in point shooting.)

This stuff made sense just like I knew it would from reading his posts on GT and PS. It also stood up to a living, thinking, and resisiting adversary.

Since then, I have continued with my search. Always looking to improve and to find a better way.

"Sometimes an instructor.....always a student......questioning everything!"

As an instructor that is teaching issues of life and death....it is your obligation.

[denko]

"I just do not get it."

It may have been Bruce Lee that said something like; to learn something new,you have to empty your cup. Many do not want to empty their cup,to do so would take them out of the comfort of what they think they know.