Small Unit Tactics for Patrol
principles /prĭn′sə-pəl/ noun A basic truth, law, or assumption. "the principles of democracy." A rule or standard, especially of good behavior. "a man of principle." tactics /tăk′tĭks/ noun The study of the most effective ways of securing objectives set by strategy, as in deploying and directing troops, ships, and aircraft against an enemy. Military actions or maneuvers used against an enemy. A procedure or set of maneuvers engaged in to achieve an end, an aim, [...]
Making Ready
There was an interesting confluence of events over the weekend. The first was the anniversary of Patrick Rogers' death. A good number of experienced private sector trainers were influenced by Rogers and likely connected to each other by him. The other was an email question early Sunday morning about the [...]
The Danger of Higher Ready Positions
There’s a balance to maintain between safety and acceptable risk We can agree that there's room for a variety of techniques in firearms training and law enforcement tactics. However, we must also honor fundamental principles. One of these is safety—an important consideration in all law enforcement operations we cannot ignore. [...]
Target Selection
What targets do you use for practice, qualification, and teaching classes? Does it matter? I believe so. Saying that it doesn’t discount a lot of research, experience, and anatomical factors in defensive shootings. These are a few of the studies I thought were particularly relevant, but there are dozens more [...]
Large Scale Event Prep For The Individual Officer
Most communities have hosted a festival, Fourth Of July weekend, a car show, or a marathon race - some multi-day event. Many bigger cities that have major league or college sports teams that have won a major championship have experienced a large-scale event at which its officers have needed to [...]
Code 3 vs. Pursuit Driving: Is There A Difference?
I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure most of us became cops so we could drive fast legally. Who can deny the attraction of having droves of people get out of your way while burying the gas pedal into the floor in conjunction with the bright lights a-flashin’ [...]
Competitive Shooting — Dangerous Diversion or Practical Pastime?
Nothing says training can’t be fun. Action-based competitive shooting is both derided as the province of silk pajama-wearing game players, and praised as the single most important exercise you can do to improve your shooting. They’re damned as a superb way to ingrain habits that will most surely get you [...]
REALITY CHECK | Step-Up
Training is a constant adaptation of using what resources you have to teach what you want your students to know or be capable of doing. The “doing” process in the field or in fighting needs to be rigidly flexible as fights are never the same from one day to the [...]
What’s Your Hurry?
Let me be the first to admit — I’m guilty. We’re all guilty of it. The “it” I’m referring to is stupid or perhaps more aptly, arrogant driving. This term covers a broad spectrum of misdeeds sometimes committed by the average cop. The kind of driving I’m talking about includes [...]
Shooting in Virtual Reality
Scenario-based training in my academy class involved role players – often more than one - and evaluators spread out across the grounds of the academy. In addition to those people were the scenario coordinators, a dispatcher or two, and additional support staff. All that starts to get intensive human resource-wise. [...]
Self-Defense
The term "self-defense" means different things to different people. To a police officer, self-defense differs significantly from defensive tactics or DT, as it is known in the law enforcement training community. From a civilian perspective, "self-defense" may be synonymous with martial arts. While others may believe self-defense means using a [...]