The jackboot being the sharp as a bowling ball fellow it sounds like, DID see the orange tip of the air soft but he quickly decided....that the orange was a muzzle flash of a real handgun firing! And away we go, again.
There is absolutely no resemblance between a muzzle flash (even at night) and the orange ring around the muzzle of these toys. No one who has seen a muzzle flash would make such a statement, unless they were certain they could BS someone with it.