Posted on 06/05/2006 6:39:00 PM PDT by Atlas Sneezed
MONTROSE, Colo. - Marcus Klintmalm's two victims lay sprawled on the ground, their weapons released by hands gone limp. Spent cartridge casings, his and theirs, were everywhere -- testimony to two gunfights.
The shooting had stopped. It was time to debrief.
''Where did you hit him?'' an instructor asked Klintmalm, referring to one of the assailants. The man was standing now, with a mark of orange wax from Klintmalm's ''bullet'' on his pants.
''In the hip,'' Klintmalm said.
If the fight had been real, that might not have been good enough, the instructor said. ''He may not be dead.''
Such are the hard-edged lessons taught here at Valhalla Training Center, where students learn the basics of urban shootouts in a mock downtown. Special Forces soldiers train here for combat in Iraq, but Klintmalm is not a soldier: He is a 23-year-old aspiring business-school student from Dallas, who gave his current occupation as ''ski bumming.''
Lightly regulated|
Valhalla is part of a lightly regulated industry thriving in a time of war overseas and terrorism fears at home. Around the country, at least 16 privately run schools teach civilian students skills usually associated with SWAT teams or military combat -- close-in gunfighting, assault-rifle tactics, sniper shooting.
The reasons for the schools' growth include the U.S. military's increasing openness to privately run training, a rise in public demand for personal-defense skills and a new marketing strategy from some schools, which now sell tactical shooting as weekend recreation. Along with this growth have come concerns, voiced by academic observers and even some in the business, about the leeway afforded these schools to choose who and what they teach.
''You're talking about an entirely new industry that has a patchwork-quilt quality.... Some parts are regulated, and some parts are entirely unregulated,'' said Peter Singer, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He said that such a system would be ''one thing if we're talking about clown schools,'' but ''it's different when we're talking about private military schools.''
The schools, however, say that they strive to screen out clients who might misuse their training.
''They don't show up for class and have a gun in their hand until they've had a criminal background check,'' said Timothy Beckman, director of the training arm of the High Desert Special Operations Center in Nevada. ''You don't get in the door if you don't have good paper.''
Advance combat skills|
A survey by The Washington Post of schools that advertise on the Internet and in gun magazines located 19 that offer advanced instruction in the skills of combat, with two more such centers planned in New Hampshire and Oklahoma. Of these, only three said that they limited the teaching of advanced skills to military and police clients.
One thing shared across the industry was a sense that -- these days more than ever -- people want what they are selling.
''Our business has increased since September 11, period. People realize since September 11 that they need to be more prepared,'' said Jane Anne Hulen, marketing director of Gunsite Academy, a school in the Arizona desert that is one of the industry's heavyweights. She said Gunsite's business, which now involves about 1,000 students per year, has at least doubled since the 2001 terrorist attacks.
One engine of the industry's rapid growth is the wartime U.S. military. Private weapons schools now teach thousands of Navy sailors to defend their ships from terrorist attacks, and they put Special Forces soldiers through simulated combat in Middle East villages.
But these days, the schools have an equally big business in teaching civilians. With customers looking for defensive skills or recreation, the industry buzzword is the same one that puts the T in ''SWAT.''
''This is not a shooting school. It's a school for tactics,'' meaning the total set of skills useful in actual gunfighting, said Rob Pincus, director of shooting operations at Valhalla.
Taught to avoid confrontation|
At many schools, the offerings include ''tactical'' approaches to personal defense, in which students learn to take on burglars and other assailants in ''shoothouses'' designed to mimic real life. At Valhalla, there is a fake house, convenience store and barroom where students encounter gun-clutching dummies or live instructors playing armed bad guys. The courses are often intended for people who have permits to carry concealed handguns.
Some gun instructors have questioned whether such classes make civilian students too aggressive with their guns in real life. But the schools say they train students to avoid confrontations if possible. They argue that a well-trained civilian should be less dangerous than an untrained one with the same gun.
''We're the solution. People have guns. They're always going to have guns,'' said Heidi Smith, an owner and instructor at Thunder Ranch in Lakeview, Ore.
But many schools also provide civilians with training that would seem to have few, if any, applications in everyday life.
Thunder Ranch, for instance, offers a class in which two-person teams learn to move and shoot in confined spaces and provide covering fire for each other.
At least seven of the 16 schools teach civilians the use of military-style assault weapons. Some schools say they teach only target shooting using these guns, but at Front Sight Firearms Training Institute outside Las Vegas, there are classes in both the M-16 rifle and the Uzi submachine gun that include tactical simulations and lessons in how to use the guns in ''full auto'' mode.
At least six of the schools teach civilians how to fire a rifle accurately over long distances. Some focus on hunting or target-shooting skills only.
But not all do: West Virginia's Storm Mountain Training Center offers a ''Sniper I'' course that, along with shooting, includes the construction of ''ghillie suits'' like those worn by military snipers to camouflage their positions. ''Sniper III'' includes training in ''sniper mission planning'' and the chance to fire live shots as part of simulated tactical missions, according to the school's Web site.
Storm Mountain accepts U.S. citizens who pass a criminal background check and a physical fitness test, Rod Ryan, the school's vice president of operations, said in an e-mail message. At Front Sight, students must pass a criminal background check, sign a ''Statement of No Criminal Record, Mental Illness, or Substance Abuse'' and provide a character witness who has known them for at least five years, said the school's founder and director, Ignatius Piazza.
Although some schools have even stricter standards, limiting their training to executive bodyguards or security contractors headed for Iraq or Afghanistan, the most common approach seems to be a combination of background checks and character witnesses.
One voice absent from the debate is the federal government's. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which licenses gun dealers, has no similar monitoring for weapons trainers. State-level oversight is also largely absent, school officials said.
The self-regulating system has broken down in the past. In 1993, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officer who offered weapons and survival training in rural Pennsylvania taught a group of men from New York how to fire assault rifles and stage mock assaults on a nearby power substation. The men were later found to have been affiliated with the terrorist group that bombed the World Trade Center that year.
Some anti-violence activists and even a few weapons-school officials say that somebody -- a government agency or an industry association -- ought to set out rules for acceptable training and students.
''I don't think this should be taught to just anybody off the street,'' said Richard Weaver of ArmorGroup International PLC, which has camps in Virginia and Texas.
But no such limitations seem to be on the horizon. Instead, many schools are seeking to expand their civilian clientele by fully embracing the idea of gunfighting as entertainment. The Valhalla Training Center, for instance, already shares space with the Valhalla Shooting Club, which allows clients to live out James Bond-style fantasies such as taking down assailants in an airplane cabin or shooting their way out of a crowded subway station.
Later this year, a gun trainer in Oklahoma plans to create an $11 million ''Tulsa Adventure Center'' that will combine a climbing wall and a scuba pool with an indoor shoothouse. Jack Randal, the man behind the center, said he thinks his industry is ripe for the kind of transition into big-box prominence that the fishing-tackle industry achieved a few years ago.
''We're taking the mom-and-pop bait shop,'' Randal said, ''and we're turning it into the Bass Pro Shop.''
The local media referred to one outdoor rifle range here as a potential "terrorist training facility". I'm surprised that wasn't worked in here.
Yep, I really do know the answer to that question. "Ignorance"!
WHEN are we going to start controlling this dangerous press??
ping
Because it makes the rats plans to confiscate guns that much more problematical.
i was bigtime into paintball the first six to eight years it was around and we did some work with the Sheriff's Department and Village PD... it was kinda fun and i hope everybody learned a thing or two out of it. that and i've taught quite a few Cornell kids how to shoot paint guns, and later, for the ones who wanted a little more, real guns too.
be polite, be have a plan to kill everyone you meet.
Too much training?
???
Yeah, I want paramedics with no training so they don't aggresively try to save my life using proven tactics.
Same thing with Cops, Firefighters and Life Guards.
Had I not had extended life saving training unrelated to my profession I would not have been able to save my son's life a few years ago.
My firearms training might do the same thing someday, but they are against that?
Go figure.............
I would bet that the author is a metrosexual sissy. Anyone who gets scared at the thought of people learning how to use guns better is a sissy.
Now they want to gripe cause they're getting the training?
I love it when libs destroy there own arguments.
Anyone in the NH, Northern Mass, southern Maine area are welcome to my club ( http://www.majorwaldron.com/ ) for "Tactical" training (you don't have to be a member for this). (Go to the site and click on the calendar - we hold this on the 1st Saturdays of each month).
Its not super duper stuff, a lot of fun and tought by our President who is a retired Marine Recon/Scout. Mainly long range shooting and such.
Please drop by if you can (cost is minimal) ... you'll have fun and get a lot of questions answered by our President on anything gun/sniper/target shooting related questions.
So...liberals think no one should have a firearm without the proper training.
They also think no one should have the proper training.
They are a confusing lot.
Oh, those horrid peasants and their evil guns! I think I'm going to faint! /sarcasm
Had 200 rounds of training today at Carter Country, you can never train too much.
Looks good!
My son saved my life due to his Red Cross Lifesaver swimming lessons at a boat docking incident. The dock broke loose and I went under in full winter gear, Bayliner bouncing against one side of me, dock against the other. He pulled me out of it.
I gotta agree with ya Eaker, training sucks... what a waste.
I thought they were for gun control. How can you control you gun unless you practice?
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