Posted on 06/12/2013 12:29:46 PM PDT by LibWhacker
There is a false truth present in the “tactical” shooting community that has been around for decades. This lie goes back to the old mythology of “one-shot stops” and the mantra of “I’ll only carry a pistol if it starts with point-four.” That lie is the misguided faith in a two-shot default response to a bad guy problem that requires a ballistic solution. This used to be taught as the “double tap.” Based on conversations I’ve had with supposedly “trained” tactical shooters, including numerous “instructors,” the stupidity that is the double tap is still being promulgated.
To ensure a shared point of reference, a “double tap,” by definition, is simply two shots fired as quickly as possibly. It is simply “sight picture–shot-shot.” The greatest problem with the double tap is that you don’t know where the **** your second shot is going, since it wasn’t aimed. You must see your sights for every single shot. YOU MUST ACCOUNT FOR THE IMPACT OF EVERY SINGLE ROUND THAT EXITS YOUR WEAPON. It doesn’t matter if you’re a cop on the street, an armed citizen defending your life or home, a soldier in Afghanistan fighting a counterinsurgency, or an insurgent trying to kill members of a totalitarian regime’s security forces, while gaining and maintaining the support of the civilian populace. YOU MUST ACCOUNT FOR THE IMPACT OF EVERY SINGLE ROUND THAT EXITS YOUR WEAPON.
In two decades of running a gun professionally, I’ve yet to see ANYONE who could shoot double taps accurately, with any degree of consistency at all. Sure, at three meters, with a pistol, shooting a stationary IPSC silhouette, on a flat, level, square range, double taps seem to work, and pretty well at that. However, as soon as you begin adding no-shoots amongst the hostiles, in tight confines, or allow the hostiles to move, or add any other kind of stress to the equation, at realistic pistol and rifle engagement ranges (all of which you know…happens in real life and ****…), the double tap **** falls completely ******* to pieces…in a hurry.
Being fast is great, and it is inarguably important when you’re trying to kill the other guy before he kills you. Fast misses though, will get you (or more importantly, your buddies) killed just as quick and just as dead as slow misses. Hits on target are what ultimately count, and the only way to ensure hits on target, is to AIM YOUR ******* WEAPON, EVERY SINGLE TIME YOU SQUEEZE THE ********** TRIGGER!
Controlled Pairs are the answer….maybe…sometimes…
Controlled pairs, sometimes referred to as “hammers,” are the trained gunman’s response to the inherent inaccuracy of double taps. Controlled pairs require three distinct sight pictures to be executed properly: “sight picture-shot-sight picture-shot-sight picture.” Assuming you can actually shoot worth a ****, this means that, all other things being equal, all of your shots will be hits, because you aimed every one (obviously, that’s not going to work out in real life, because **** happens, Mr. Murphy gets to vote, and the bad guy may be moving, or the shot is just too difficult for you to make…As long as you can account for the shot though, you’ve got a chance of surviving the court of popular opinion when dealing with the local civilian populace after your errant round smokes some yahoo in the head that didn’t have enough ******* brains to exit stage right when the guns starting making noise).
Controlled pairs will be slower than double taps, at least initially, because you have to build the ability to aim/shoot/aim/shoot/aim as quickly as humanly possible. With good, effective training and subsequent practice though, it is more than possible to get two aimed rounds downrange at CQM ranges (call it out to 50 meters), in less than 1/2 second (at 100 meters, two shots to the “A-zone” or “sniper’s triangle,” in one second, is readily achievable).
The Rest of the Time and That *****, Little Miss Reality
The controlled pair is a useful tool in teaching fundamental combat marksmanship and weapons craft. In fact, I use it all the time in teaching. It’s an excellent tool for developing the mechanics of follow-through. The problem is that, far too often, in both training and execution, the controlled pair becomes a default response and a de facto double tap.
As soon as someone who’s trained exclusively in controlled pairs has to fire a third or fourth or fifth round in the same string, the miss the last shots, and **** just generally falls apart, because they’ve trained and conditioned themselves to blow the follow-through on the second shot. At best, they end up firing a string of controlled pairs, with a noticeable pause between, allowing the enemy time to adjust his position relative to their sight picture, slowing down the next controlled pair, or causing it to miss entirely.
Your shot string doesn’t end with the last shot. It ends after you’ve assessed the effects of your work. You’re done shooting when you’ve looked through your sights and seen that the threat no longer exists as a threat. The controlled pair becomes a default response and a de facto double tap, because shooters conditioned to controlled pairs invariably blow the follow through on the second shot, in their hurry to get to the next target.
The problem with default responses, whether they are controlled pairs, hammers, or double taps, is that they don’t take reality into account. You might have missed, regardless of how well you shoot IPSC silhouettes on the square range. Or, your hits may not have been as precise as you thought they were. Or, maybe the dude’s just not a *****, and it’s going to take more than two hits to the vitals to put him down (before any of you ********* start blathering ridiculously about how it only takes one hit from a real man’s gun, like a .308, you need to go read the autobiographies of both Colonel Charles Beckwith and General Boykin. Both men took hits from 12.7mm anti-aircraft guns, to the torso, and not only survived, but returned to duty and spent years more in the SOF world. Newsflash: 12.7mm is the old Warsaw Pact answer to .50BMG. It makes a much larger hole, and delivers a ******** more energy to the target than your pipsqueak 30-caliber does…). That’s where the currently fashionable-and correct-adage comes from, to “shoot him to the ground.”
“Yeah, but I’ll just pull a Mozambique Drill on his ***, and put the third one in his brain bucket!” Of course you will, because you are a rare, delicate, and special little flower, and gosh darn it, people like you!
Outside of the bad guy wearing rifle plate body armor (in which case, you ought to be shooting the ************ in the hips any way…), what if your two to the chest were misses? What if they turned out to be just peripheral hits? Now, out of the blue, after missing the largest ******* part of the dude, you’re going to magically pull precision accuracy out of your ***, and hit a smaller, more difficult target? Of course you are…Are you ******* high? Even if they’re wearing armor and you smoked him in the hips, what if you missed? What if you did hit him, but he hasn’t bled out enough yet?
What if the bad guy is not a ******* silhouette or photo-realistic target printed on a sheet of ******* paper? What is the bad guy is a real person and is smart enough to use cover? What if all you can see of him is his shoulder, or part of his leg?
The only sensible response, and the one that any thinking person with a modicum of common sense and realistic training or experience would provide is, to forget using a two-shot default response. In fact, forget a default response at all. We live in a world of shades of gray (maybe not fifty shades, but there’s lots of grays in the world….see what I did there? ****, I’m a funny ******!). ****, even black and white are shades of gray!
Shoot the ************ with a non-default response. Whether it’s one shot, or two, or three, or five, or ten…you need to be able to fire accurate, fast, repetitive shots, and assess the effects of your shots, through your sights, without slowing down.
Change it up from time to time in training. On one target, shoot three; on another shoot four. Then two, then one, then five; you get the idea. The key is not to go slow, nor to go fast. The key is to go as fast as you’re able, while still being accurate enough to get the job done. Shoot only as fast as you’re able…but be able to shoot as fast as you need to. Any hillbilly with a squirrel rifle can take his time and get accurate hits. You need to be able to shoot accurately, fast.
“But John! What if there are more than one bad guy? Do you shoot each guy once or twice, and then come back, or do you shoot the first one to the ground, and then move on?” It’s a question I get asked a lot, and it’s a valid one. The simple, and brutally honest answer is…it depends on the situation.
The practical answer, in my experience, is that there are a couple of factors to consider…
First of all, remember that we’re not talking exclusively, or even primarily, about a home or personal defense situation, where you’re the only good guy with a gun. If you’ve got to kill every bad guy, all by your lonesome, you seriously need to reconsider your personnel selection and your training programs for your group, because they are ****** UP!
Second, outside of CQM distances (and even within), your first or second or third shot might not kill the dude, or even hit him. It might, however, force him to duck deep enough behind cover that he’s no longer a threat to you, or you’re just no longer able to effectively engage him any more for the time being.
Third, common sense and tactical logic says that you should address the most dangerous lethal threat first, right? Then shoot him until he’s no longer a threat, or at least not the most lethal threat, and then move on. Whether it takes one round, or ten rounds, to either kill him, put him down hard enough to be out of the fight, or make him seek cover (i.e. “Make him more concerned with not getting shot than he is with shooting you”), shoot the ****** until he’s no longer a threat.
DOL,
John Mosby
SFOB-Rifleman’s Ridge
A simple question for a simple but fraught situation:
A woman who refuses to practice, but nonetheless has access to a weapon. Should she be told to just point in the general direction of the bad guy and empty the magazine?
(The background is relatively clear, so unintended casualties can be ignored for the purposes of response...)
I’m no expert, but I don’t think so. All she’s going to do is end up missing most of her shots. And then what? I think Mosby’s approach is the right one even for ladies who refuse to train... Get a sight picture, preferably center of mass, then fire. Repeat as often as necessary. But in a real fight, she’s not going to have the luxury of knowing there are no innocents in the background. So... keep pestering her to practice! Tell her that without practice, the chances of her killing someone she didn’t intend to kill go way up.
No. There are several better answers.
1. Teach her to use a two handed grip. I think Isoscoles is the easiest and fastest to learn, takes only a minute, and to bring the handgun up to eye level. This is a very fast version of unconscious aiming, as her eyes can see where she is pointing the gun, even if she does not formally use the sights.
2. Put a laser on the handgun so she can see where she is pointing it without the sights.
3. Instead of telling her to empty the magazine, tell her to keep shooting as long as there is a threat. In most real situations, people keep shooting until their gun runs out of ammo without being told to. Sometimes, especially when the threat is immediately down or out of sight, people do not empty their firearm, but it is very common for them to do so.
4. If she is willing to take the time to actually listen to the above, it may help her without spending hours at the range. If you can, teach her to dry fire (especially helpful with a laser). It can do wonders for accuracy without firing a shot.
1. I’ve shown her the grip. She won’t pick it up. But she would use it if her life depended on it, I think.
2. I have a light on the gun, so that bullets hit the middle of the light +/- 2 inches. I’ll investigate a laser.
3. Got it. That’s probably an improvement. She might save ammo for additional use if the bad guy just ducks.
4. Right-o. Some day, we’re going to get her 75 year old mother out shooting, and I think we’ll get her on a .22 LR handgun. I think she’ll probably start there. Maybe.
Thanks!
Innocents is good leverage.
But they’ll be 4 lath and plaster walls and 100 yards away.....
I hope the energy from a 9mm hollow point is dissipated by then, or it found a 2x4.
I REALLY like marktwains’ suggestion to get a laser. I’ve been thinking about doing that for some of my own guns. Check out some of the videos on YouTube. I mean, you can tell some of the shooters are not especially highly trained individuals, but they can shoot fast and fairly accurately just by keeping their eye on that little red dot.
Sounds like you are on the right track. When working with a new shooter(on handguns) I almost always use a .22. If gun mufflers (silencers,suppressors) well rationally available as they are in Europe, instead of insanely regulated, as they are in the United States.
People can get excellent utility from a handgun with just a couple of hours of instruction, if they are willing to learn.
If you can teach her mother to shoot, it might break down whatever barriers are preventing her from participating.
“Should she be told to just point in the general direction of the bad guy and empty the magazine?”
No. Try it sometime at a range. You won’t hit anything. She won’t either.
Have you considered suggesting she dry practice? Cheaper and you can develop your skill a LOT that way.
No, you are right, she won’t hit anything. Better advice might be for her to fire one shot in the general direction (to see if that will scare him off), then hold her fire until he gets close enough for her to have a good chance of hitting him.
>>A simple question for a simple but fraught situation:
A woman who refuses to practice, but nonetheless has access to a weapon. Should she be told to just point in the general direction of the bad guy and empty the magazine?<<
First, you need to verify that she is keeping her eyes open when she pulls the trigger.
Second, you need to determine exactly why she refuses to practice. Possibilities are the noise frightens her, the recoil hurts her hands, she is afraid that you or someone else will belittle her for poor performance, she doesn’t have the self confidence necessary to take a life. And a whole long list of other reasons.
Going back to First. If she refuses or is unable to keep her eyes open when she squeezes the trigger, explain to her what happens when a bullet passes through walls and windows. The possibility of wounding or killing the wrong person goes through he roof! I would recommend taking the gun away from her. Replace it with a Taser or some wasp spray or mace or some other deterrent, but don’t allow her to have a firearm.
See if she will practice with someone else without you in the immediate area. If she will, then something about your mannerisms is the problem. Ignore it. Don’t be offended. Ask the other person to teach her the basic rules of safe gun handling, verify she keeps her eyes open when squeezing the trigger. Then determine her effective shooting range with the weapon and explain the reasons why not to shoot beyond that distance.
Good luck
“The greatest problem with the double tap is that you don’t know where the **** your second shot is going, since it wasn’t aimed.”
Stopped reading. Author is an idiot.
Affirmative. When I was on the police department, our standard range course included double-tap to the chest, then one to the head. If the threat ended before we got to the head shot, we could presume he either wasn't wearing body armor, or it wasn't effective. If he was still standing after a double-tap to the chest, that head shot was automatically on the way thanks to muscle memory.
We all consistently placed both shots of the double-tap right at center mass, because we were trained to immediately regain sight picture after the very first shot. In practice, it seemed like I never lost sight picture at all, it was so ingrained by training.
Good advice.
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