Iām looking forward to reading what you have to say.
I agree with everything you said, Tony. Well said, too.
It all boils down to everybody teaching what they know. Or maybe better put, teaching what they've been taught. Maybe learning from multiple sources, multiple different sources, is the way to go for a more well rounded knowledge base. The problem is, sometimes we don't realize that what we are learning from an instructor might not be the most tactically sound subject matter. It certainly wasn't in my case. My, God, some of the stuff I was taught would have gotten people killed. Especially concerning firearms and edged weapons. And there I was, a young man, passing it on to others.
Serious stuff, this gun and knife thing. No clear "all in one" answers.
A dozen of my friends have been shot. Most of them are/were police officers, but not all. One was shot on two different occasions. One was shot seventeen times. Seventeen. One was shot point blank in the chest and one point blank in the head. They all survived, they are all doing just fine for the most part. the one shot point blank in the head moved at the last second, the round bouncing off his skull, he was out of the hospital in a couple days. All of them told me that getting shot doesn't really hurt as much as you would think. But healing from being shot hurts like hell. I hope and pray I never find that out first hand.
Other than Martial Arts and fitness, I have more training in handguns than with any other thing in my life. I had a permit to carry long before I became a cop. I was pretty well trained by an experienced friend. That very first time I shot was at his gun club. He had a duffel bag full of pistols, I shot a dozen different pistols that first day, wheel guns, revolvers, big guns, small guns, Saturday night specials, we were there for hours. I joined his gun club the next day and continued training with him and others. But we were just target shooting. Target shooting is just that, it's not combat shooting. But you have to start somewhere.
Several years later I became a police officer. We were Federal and had an indoor range right there in our building. We shot four days a week, sometimes five, several times a day. We were lucky to have an unlimited budget and never used reloads, only the best factory ammunition. But while we still shot targets, we were being trained in combat shooting, shoot/don't shoot training - a large white screen was on the range, with film projected on it. Various scenarios and ambushes were seen and you had to shoot the screen....or not. You had to determine background and make sure it was safe to engage the enemy. You were fooled a lot, purposely. It's how you learned.
We had a Hogan's Alley set up. Pop up targets, except some of them weren't targets, they were innocents, we shot targets that moved and came at you. We shot under normal conditions, we shot under smoke, with and without gas masks, we shot under strobe lights, incredibly loud noises that came out of nowhere. We shot right handed, left handed, two handed, shot with one hand secured behind your back or taped to your side like you were wounded. We learned to reload using your teeth to jack the slide on an automatic if an arm was injured and useless, we shot on the run, we shot on the crawl, we shot from barricades. We would do the same things at an outdoor ranged, sometimes in the summer, sometimes in the winter. Note - shooting in wet snow
really sucks.
Anyway, I did this for thirteen years, the four day a week shooting thing that is, other years I didn't shoot as much, maybe a few times a month....so I'll start with handguns. I really don't know a lot about handguns, other than how to use them. I wouldn't know how to fix one or alter one. I don't know a lot about the companies that make them, I can't identify one I've never used, I don't know their history. But I seriously HATE guns. Honest to God, I hate the f'n things. Because there are too many of them in our country and people are f'n crazy and killing people or shooting up crowds. That being said....
Before I started the training, we had a lot class time discussing law and the use of deadly force. When you teach anything about guns and knives, you need classes on the law and the use of deadly force as it pertains
to where you live. If you have to use a gun in defense of your life, you are in for another battle with the courts. That can be scary.
Nobody ever got shot with a blue, plastic training pistol.
When I first started teaching handgun retention and close quarter weapons disarms, I was teaching other cops. Guys and gals who had to learn to shoot in many of the same ways that I did. They carried a handgun every day. One of the first things you learn is "every place you go there will always be
at least one firearm. Always."
When it came time, some years later, to teach my advanced students handguns disarms.....I wasn't really sure how to do it. How could I teach these nice, young men and woman who trained their butts off day in and day out - how to disarm somebody if they've never held an actual gun? Or even been around one?
Fortunately, I had resources. I hired a friend, the hand gun trainer on Boston P.D, to come down the dojo for my advanced guys. He held a three day safety course. After the safety classes, off we went to an outdoor range, where they learned to target shoot. With a dozen different guns. Everybody wanted to use my wife's Uzi pistol, which was a wedding present from me.
And they all did. There were several days of range time, each one a little bit better than the last. They were learning how guns felt, how guns shot, how heavy or light they were, what kind of kick they had compared to another, how to break them down and clean them, how a safety on a gun worked, how different people held different guns. And all the while, safety, safety, safety. If you're ever around anyone who treats a firearm in a laissez faire manner....get the hell away from them. Immediately.
After their initial introductions to guns, then, and only then, did I teach disarms. We used the blue, plastic training guns. One with a trigger guard, one without. You have to start, IMO, with the one that has no trigger guard, for obvious safety reasons. But - in real life you can, and should, again IMO, rip a guys finger off if he's pulled a gun on you and
hasn't already shot you. I mean, fair is fair. F him and the horse he rode in on.
Eventually, we used actual firearms, ones they had shot, to teach disarms. And, remember, these were my advanced students, most had been training in the arts for many years. And one of the very first things they had been taught in those safety classes, was how to check a gun, how to pass a gun to another person so he/she can see if it's safe, and how to protect the safety of everyone around you. In my opinion, if you don't teach the law and the safe practice commandments of firearms.....you shouldn't be teaching anything to do with firearms. If you don't have that, go get it. Hire professionals to come to your dojo. They'll come if you pay them.
There is a difference in feel to a blue, plastic training gun and an actual handgun. And if the blue one is all you know....well, you should be all set if someone pulls a blue, plastic training gun on you.
I don't think Martial Arts instructors should teach handgun disarms. I don't think they should teach swimming either. Some of the things I've seen in dojos were frightening. Some of the things I was taught as a young black belt were horrible, or ridiculous, and dangerous. But the folks who were teaching me didn't know that. They were just passing on what they were taught. And we ate it up. It was just so cool. And there I was, a young black belt, eventually teaching the same nonsense to others.
So be careful out there. Try to get as much practical experience as you can from professionals who use guns. Guns are nasty, violent things.
Knives are a whole different thing. I'll bore you with what I know, which ain't much, later.
