I am not happy about it, but yes, I have faced fire, and I have fired back. Expert? No, experienced? Yes, Trained? Yes, a regular shooter? yes. Am I a gung-ho run into certain death John Wayne type? No. I picked up lots of bodies of the idiots who wasted their lives thinking they were bullet proof. I was taught to think, analyze situations, look for weaknesses, act with intent, and expect the unexpected, and it save my life, and cost others theirs.
What I do know, is that you were not there, neither was I, as more information comes out, we will have a clearer picture of what happened.
1. The operative word there is close quarters, he was never in a close quarters environment. School rooms are huge, you have not visited one lately, evidently.
2.You cannot enter an area, let alone a room when you don’t know where the shooter is, in this case he went to 3 different floors, and even went back to previous rooms on each floor, so your example in not relevant to this case as we currently understand it.
3. Evidently you don’t care for policemen. Those I know and have known are wonderful, selfless people.
Like I said, thank you for your service.
The problem I have is that when they are the only people available to take on an armed killer and young people's lives are being lost while they wait and they don't act, they are derelict in their duties at best.
They are the ones that are paid to train with firearms, they are the ones with authority under law, and they are the ones who should be on the point of contact when killing begins - even if they know they be killed in the process.
Police doctrine was moved away from courageous defense of the public to waiting the threat out and cleaning up the mess afterward.
I can pretty well guarantee that I have seen more good men killed while fighting for our country and I was shot dragging a wounded Marine to safety through heavy fire. Were our lives worth less? If we were willing to suffer and maybe die for our citizens and our country - for a lot less pay - why have the police less responsibility and risk than we had?
The videos at Columbine made me sick: all those police standing around doing nothing while the murders were underway and scared kids hiding throughout the building. Should have fired every single one of them.
I am a lot older now but like you, I practice combat shooting a lot. If our school needs someone like me to stop a killer I will not hesitate.