Opinion piece from Blake here at K-VAR

[k-var Corp 61]

To all of you who spend thousands of dollars on gear/optics/guns, and precious training time engaging targets miles away- maybe consider the following statistics and use your training time and dollars for more relevant situations; And remember, these stats are from war- not civilian gunfights.

 

According to the U.S. Army Laboratory Command, 98% of all targets across all terrain are engaged at less than 600 meters, 90% less than 400 meters, and in urban terrain, 90% less than 50 meters. With this in mind, we need the ability to be able to reach targets beyond the 15-25 yard lines, but it is unlikely we will ever shoot beyond 600 meters in a defensive or even hunting situation.

 

As a legally armed civilian? I’d estimate the odds of me being in fight with anything other than my carry pistol at less than 5%. I’m not advocating only spending 5% of your training time with the rifle because if we do deploy it, things have gone REALLY wrong and we need to be REALLY skilled in its use- let’s just be realistic about the ranges we train with it. I’d be real interested to hear about how you deal with problem 2 (legal and civil liability) when you dump a Tango at 1200 yds. with your “precision” rifle. What specific scenario are you training for? I can’t tell you how many “precision riflemen” I see who simply flail around with a pistol because they’ve never been trained and/or never practice- too busy worrying about ballistic coefficients, sectional density, and when they go subsonic.

 

Advice? Spend about 75% of your training resources (time and money) with your daily carry pistol, and the remaining 25% with your AR/AK working from 0-300 yards- in buildings, around cars, under cars, barricades, moving, etc. When you reach a generally accepted level of Expert or Master with these platforms and just have to get out your ghillie suit and Kestrel, have fun! Until then, work on perfecting the skills with the weapons that could actually save your life in a REAL WORLD encounter.

 

[forsaken352 235]

There seems to be a lot of truth to this. Thanks for sharing, Blake.

[patriot 7,197]

3-gun competition would help anyone increase their proficiency at these ranges.

CAS/SASS as well....

 

Another good training tool is those polymer "ground pounder" targets Cabela's sells. They bounce around every time they're hit.

 

[gunfun 3,931]

I've thought about this for the same reason most of us have. It's interesting and fun. Trying to be realistic about it tends to sound arrogant, so I'll mix risk calculation theory with Adam West.

 

Using the Learned Hand formulation to evaluatate when a safeguard is reasonable vs excessively burdensome:

A safeguard is reasonable if: B<P*L. If B>P*L, the safeguard is excessive, but may be affected by additional factors. Fun could be seen as a real mitigation to . Changing public perception can also alter [P] either positively or negatively.

 

1) The Probability(P) of needing to use any firearm defensively is very low. The Burden ( B ) of carrying a pistol is medium-low. The burden of high proficiency is kinda high in terms of cost and time. The severity of the potential Loss (L) is very high, whether from an individual assailant, or an organized force.

 

2) Probably the most relevant training with any of your firearms is not hurting yourself or others. I do think a single careless friend (or self) with a firearm is more of a likely threat to your safety than any intentional harm in the USA. --Thank God. IMO guns are a worthwhile risk, but I've been recklessly swept by friends with loaded guns far more times than I've been threatened with violence. The Burden  ( B ) of training yourself and asserting range discipline on your friends is very low, and averts a comparatively high probability risk. Beyond a certain point, you get rapidly diminishing returns on safety stuff. Either you know and practice it, or you don't. So I think this is the most important training, but not the most time/resource intensive.

 

Blake's ratio implies that Probability ought to = time investment, but to me this suggests otherwise. I think most people can achieve basic competence to operate a rifle within 100 yards far more quickly than can be done with pistols at moderate range. Also I think pistol skills are more perishable. This reinforces his ratio pistol to rifle , but for a different reason than he gave.

 

3) I agree with the general proportion suggested by Blake, with the exception of in-home stuff. Shotguns /long arms are still better there. I'm thinking less of the night burglar, and more of your daughter or wife or whatever having an ex boyfriend show up drunk late at night, and keeping him at bay till the cops get there. Although I have worked on more cases/inmates from home invasions than people would think likely back when I was at prosecutor's and jail. Also have a friend who had strangers threateningly force their way into their home. My one encounter like that, a pistol on my person in the home would have helped, but my longarm even a few feet away was functionally irrelevant.

 

The one that swings it for me>

4) I think given that this is low probability, but high importance during the rare times it comes up: There isn't one right answer about the amount of time & resources that should be spent. It's the B>PL situation. Just about any training is higher burden than the probability warrants, and the likelihood of training in the particular format that fits that improbable situation of severe potential harm is comparable to Batman happening to have "Bat shark repellent" in his belt.

 

So basically, anyone doing anything to train is going above and beyond. If your 'above and beyond' looks different from mine, that's just fine. I'm pretty happy to have more of the civilian populace at least kind-a capable of handling: invasion, unrest, or US govt oppression. The more the better, and the more varied the better. It makes that Yamamoto "rifle behind every blade of grass" thing  apply to our own govt, to potential muggers, to your sketchy meth head cousin... More risk for bad behavior is better, and I don't care what kind of risk you choose to present. Go ahead and pack your belt with 75% Bat bear repellent, and 25% bat shark repellent. Have fun pondering whether you need to grease your legs to keep the rabid weasels from being able to climb up your pants. Dream up zombie scenarios. It's all good. It all helps raise the risk threshold evil has to over come.

 

If we are really honest, most of us aren't spending the time training, because we estimate the Probablity of Loss to be high, but rather, because the Burden of practicing is fun and therefore not treated like a Burden. I vote for people training in any way that is fun for them. That will almost certainly also increase the likelihood that they will enjoy and actually take the time to train in the other ways too, and be far more trained than is really necessary from a utilitarian perspective.

Edited August 12, 2016 by GunFun