Competition vs Combat vs Self-Defense: Conclusion

 First, to clarify, I have said for years that the definition of Self-Defense is "a legal determination made after the fact by a criminal justice authority" (Tim Larkin, When Violence is the Answer).  I absolutely still believe that; what I am referring to in these last few columns is the distance at which self-defense shootings occur.  If a situation is determined to be self-defense after the fact by a criminal justice authority, it is typically going to happen within a certain distance, because there has to be some element of imminent danger to be determined as Self-Defense.  Sorry if that confused anybody.

So, having said that, allow me to go back to confusing people by misusing my own terms again.  What makes good self-defense shooting?  In the past few weeks, I have written about how the fundamentals of marksmanship either apply or don't to self-defense shootings in close proximity.  Breath control is useless.  Slow and steady trigger squeezes are unimportant if you have a proper tight grip on the gun.  Aiming is not optional outside of gun-grappling range because of the risk to bystanders,  Stances are irrelevant because in a six-foot fight, your stance will never be what you practice.  That covers four of the NRA's five shooting fundamentals.

The one I didn't cover is Follow-Through, because it confuses the more important aspect of successful defensive pistol shooting: speed!  The purpose of engaging with a handgun when your life is threatened is to "stop the threat."  What does that actually look like?  Well, what I teach students is that the goal is to put the enemy into shock, INSTANTLY!  That is the critical aspect of winning a self-defense encounter of any type; cause Damage to the attacker as fast as you can.  Now, if you shoot somebody in the chest with one 9mm bullet, he will eventually go into shock, he may even die.  What most people don't understand is that "eventually" means he is still functionally able to hurt you before he goes into shock.  That is why it is so critical to shoot fast into the ribcage and put him into shock, instantly.  That means putting two to five shots into his ribcage in under two seconds.  Which can only be achieved if you GRIP the gun correctly and pull the trigger as fast as possible without moving the point of bullet impact outside of the attacker's ribcage ("accurate enough" shooting). Second point, the precision of the shooting in a ribcage with a handgun is not nearly as important as the volume in achieving the objective of putting the enemy into shock, instantly.  Hitting somebody three times in the lungs or liver or spleen in one second will actually have greater medical effect on the enemy than hitting him once in the heart in that same one second.  Both of these scenarios are survivable, despite what Hollywood says, but the three less-accurate shots in one second will cause greater shock and systemic shutdown, ending the fight more quickly.  That's the main objective in self-defense shootings: end it QUICKLY.

And that is the fundamental difference between combat distances and self-defense distances in shooting.  In combat, you shoot to wound, despite what hostage rescuers preach, because the laws of land warfare are very specific about this point.  The reason soldiers can't modify ammunition to make it more lethal is because the Geneva and Hague Conventions legally make warfare about putting the enemy out of the fight with a single shot wound.  At self-defense distances, I have to shoot until the attacker is incapable of harming me.  Now, whether he lives or dies is up to doctors, our goal is to end the engagement as fast as we can, and the best way to do that is to put him into shock instantly, which requires multiple shots delivered as fast as possible into the ribcage.  Which is why I argue that pistol fighting is a lot more like fist or knife fighting than rifle combat.  It is much more grisly and violent, and the outcomes are usually more gruesome, because the closer you get to an enemy trying to kill you, the fewer options you have.  You have to end such fights as quickly as possible, to minimize your exposure to getting hurt instead.  In a tank battle, miles apart, things can happen more slowly than in a knife fight in a phone booth.  The closer you are, the faster things need to happen to minimize risk.  That is why Follow Through is not worth talking about for Self-Defense distances, because while it might technically happen, it will happen in a fraction of a second between shots if you correctly manage the recoil of the handgun with your grip, trigger pull and aiming.  Proper recoil management is proper Follow-Through, it's just allowing you to shoot much more quickly than traditional understandings of Follow-Through as preached by bullseye shooting at paper ranges.

Be the Gunslinger!

In conclusion: the goal is to end a self-defense encounter as quickly as possible without risk to yourself.  How do you do that?  By incapacitating the enemy as quickly as possible, which medically means I want to put him into shock, INSTANTLY!  What's the best way to do that with a handgun?  Putting two to five rounds into his ribcage in under two seconds.  The faster you can put him into shock, the less risk you are exposing yourself to in a self-defense situation.  Speed is the most important aspect of self-defense shooting and it is achieved by proper grip, trigger pull and combat accurate aiming (ribcage).  Precision is for competition or hostage rescues (combat).  Calmness is for snipers, not self-defenders.  Slow and deliberate decision making is for generals, not gunslingers.  Be the gunslinger. 

Hope you liked these tips on effectively defending yourself with a handgun at close range.  If so, please share this blog with other people you may know who want to learn.  If you totally disagree and think I'm an idiot, please also share and comment.  If you want to learn how to do it for real, give me a call.

Thanks,

Soule

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Competition vs Combat vs Self-Defense: Breathing

Prologue: The premise of this series of columns is that there is a significant difference not just between Competition shooting and Combat, but also a significant difference between both of them and Self-Defense shooting.  Like most instructors, I define Self-Defense as happening within seven yards.  Combat typically happens at ranges greater than that, obviously there are times when combat happens closer than that, but then it more resembles "hand-to-hand combat"/"close-quarters combat"/"extreme close range combat," or whatever the cool-guy acronym of the year is.  All of these buzzwords are talking about the same thing: fighting in close proximity.  The military and SWAT teams make a distinction between close-range combat and long-range combat for a reason, because they ARE different.  I call them "Self-Defense" distances and "Combat" distances as a way of distinguishing the two, but whatever the title, there are differences in how shooting is done in each.  The differences are the premise of this series, resulting in a conclusion that much of what the armed public trains on with firearms is training for Combat or Competition, rather than Self-Defense, which I believe is a mistake.

For Example: "Breath Control," the firearms industry's fancy way of saying breathing, is the next shooting fundamental I want to compare between Competition, Combat and Self-Defense.  But not really, because it's bogus.  Very simply, at long distances or extremely precise shooting (like hostage rescue), breath control is important.  Neither of these should be done with a handgun.  I will grant that on occasion "operators" have rescued hostages with handguns instead of rifles, but that is a much higher level of training than most armed citizens possess.  Also, those are Combat situations, not Self-Defense.  Things like school shootings, or a church shootings, or other types of "Defense of Others Shootings," are clearly NOT the same things as Self-Defense, and are in fact types of Combat operations undertaken by trained military and SWAT personnel.  Back to the point: in Combat at longer ranges, or in precision shooting Competitions, Breath Control is important.  In Self-Defense shooting, it is neither important, nor really very possible.

It is possible to control your breathing while being shot at from fifty yards or greater.  I have done it.  It is impossible, in my opinion, for the vast majority of people to control their breathing in a gunfight at five feet.  Adrenaline floods your system, you are instantly in a fight-or-flight situation, with a heartrate at or above two-hundred beats per minute, and you are gasping for air.  I have done that also, and still managed to shoot a handgun "accurately enough" into a human torso, to survive.  You know what I wasn't doing?  Controlling my breathing!  I do believe there are probably some very elite special operations personnel who could control their breathing in a six-foot gunfight.  I am not one of those guys.  Nor is anybody reading this column.  But it doesn't actually matter, because at Self-Defense distances (from zero to seven yards), no amount of breathing problems will cause you to miss a human ribcage with a modern handgun: the ribcage should be the preferred target for Self-Defense Shooting (see the last column).  In reality, it's not Breath Control that is causing people to miss at these ranges, it is flinching, or "Anticipating the Shot."  It's often blamed on breathing because the bullet impact is above or below the intended point of aim, and in rifle shooting, that usually indicates poor Breath Control.  But with a pistol at seven yards or less, it simply isn't true.  People flinch the barrel up or down, because of anticipating the bang, not because they're breathing "incorrectly."

More importantly, it's a stupid thing to train for Self-Defense shooting.  Now, it is a fundamental of marksmanship that should be taught to new shooters, and if you're going to go to a range and shoot bullseye targets, good Breath Control will make you more accurate.  But when somebody is trying to kill, maim or rape you from six inches to six feet away, you will not be calmly exhaling and slowly squeezing a trigger when the sights are perfectly aligned.  That's myth, it's absurd, and frankly it's dangerous, because it's teaching people unrealistic things.  In rifle shooting, Breath Control is way more important.  In precision shooting, whether in Combat or Competition, Breath Control is important.  Even in long-range pistol shooting, it is important.  But those aren't Self-Defense Shooting situations.  That leads to the next column, which is about what is actually important in a Self-Defense Shooting situation: how FAST you can stop an attacker with "accurate enough" fire.  That is entirely based on Grip, Self-Defense ("accurate enough") Aiming and Trigger Pull and has nothing to do with Breathing or Stance or Precision.

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Soule

Easy 6 Training

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Competition vs Combat vs Self-Defense: Aiming

Sights: Not just there to tacticool-rack on your belt or boot.

 So far, I've talked about the differences in Steady Position (stance and grip) and Trigger Pull in competition shooting vs combat vs self-defense shooting.  Now, I'm going to cover a much more complicated fundamental of shooting: Aiming.  It's very complicated because there are not just three versions of aiming based on the three different situations.  Sometimes in competition, very precise shooting is necessary and thus meticulous aiming is necessary, and sometimes speed is more important than accuracy, and at short ranges "accurate enough" does not require using the sights at all.  In combat, it's slightly less complex, you always aim.  Again, the premise of these blogs is that combat is different from self-defense and both are different from competition, though competition can help shooting in the other two.  That being said, in combat you always use your sights, unless you are in extreme close quarters ("gun grappling" range), which much more closely resembles hand-to-hand combat (i.e. the typical self-defense shooting range of less than two meters) rather than rifle combat of several hundred yards.  A significant difference between combat and self-defense, however, is that "collateral damage" is acceptable in combat.  Which means, even though you are using your sights, the enemy WILL BE moving to avoid bullets, as a result, often in combat, we miss.  Sometimes those misses cause collateral damage.  That is perfectly legal and accepted in war zones.  It is NEVER acceptable in a self-defense shooting situation, which means you have to be absolutely precise in self-defense shooting.  How precise is that?  Good question.  The answer doesn't change in self-defense shooting; it will change in defense of others type shootings like a school or church shooter or a hostage situation.  Again to reiterate, I consider those type of scenarios combat not self-defense.  But in self-defense shooting, the answer to the precision question never changes: the ribcage.  That's how precise you have to be.  From a thousand yards, that's very precise shooting with a sniper rifle.  From a hundred yards with a pistol, that is very precise shooting also.  From a wrestling match in an alley with a mugger or a rapist, that is not very precise shooting at all.  So, the target doesn't change, the difficulty of hitting it changes with distance (and thus the necessary precision of aim required to hit the ribcage).  That being the case, there are three levels of self-defense shooting in my opinion:

1) Within 1 meter (arm's length): Shooting should be done from the hip into the torso of the opponent without any attempt to utilize sights at all.  At this distance, it is difficult to miss.  Shooting From Retention drills.

2) Greater than arm's length, but less than 2 arms' lengths (approx 6 feet).  Shooting should be done from the Compressed Ready Position (meaning gun is in a 2-hand grip, in front of the torso, but arms are retracted not extended) to prevent gun-grappling (opponent grabs your gun because he's within your and his arms length).  Shooting from Compressed Ready, sights are not used, rather the orientation of the body towards the opponent (the Natural Point of Aim) determines the orientation of the barrel.  With the barrel parallel to the ground, oriented at the torso of the opponent, shots will hit somewhere in the ribcage from 1-2 meters out.

3) Greater than 2 arms' lengths.  Use the sights!  Collateral damage CANNOT be accepted in self-defense shooting situations, unlike in a combat zone, which means you are accountable for every round that comes out of the barrel of that gun.  Some people can Point Shoot (not use the sights) beyond two yards, but from a self-defense perspective, there is no reason to, in my opinion.  If you are outside the range at which he can grab your gun, then there's no reason to shoot from the Compressed Ready or Retention (the hip), and the risk to hitting innocent bystanders increases with every inch farther away from the opponent your muzzle gets, which will end it being a self-defense situation to where you can be charged with a crime.

Most competition shooters look at that very differently.  Their perspective is about speed, if they can shoot from the hip and hit the target at longer ranges, that can shave time off of their scores, adding to their points.  That is absolutely the opposite way a self-defender should look at using sights and aiming.  Just as in combat situations, the default should always be to use the sights.  The only time we don't use the sights is when there is a real risk of the gun being batted to the side or taken away from us, in which case shooting from the Compressed Ready or Shooting From Retention are Techniques (remember, difference between Tactics, Techniques and Procedures from my last blog) to overcome the situation that prevents using the sights, but every modern firearm is designed WITH SIGHTS for a reason.  They should always be used unless it's impossible.  Competition shooters do not risk collateral damage and they don't have to be as precise sometimes.

In conclusion, when should you use your sights?  Always, unless there is a defensive reason not to (gun grappling), in which case you use the next best options based on distance.  Just because you can point shoot and hit a steel plate at three meters doesn't mean anything in a real self-defense engagement.  As a final caveat, I will simply say that self-defense situations are dynamic.  A fight that might start a seven meters can very quickly change to one meter or less, so all of these distances I'm referring to are AT THE TIME OF THE TRIGGER PULL.  That means the gun will be moving between these various levels of extension at different times in a gunfight, and that's a good thing.  If a guy is charging you with a knife and you have to collapse your shooting position back to the Compressed Ready when he breaks that two meter line, so that you can KEEP FIRING, then do it.  There's not static cardboard targets, which is why you should always use your sights UNLESS YOU CAN'T.

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Soule

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Competitive Shooting is not Combat; Combat is not Self-Defense Shooting

Practical Self-Defense??  Really??

Prologue: As I was writing this, I kept using certain terms that I feel I need to define up front.  In the military we use the acronym TTP, that stands for Tactics, Techniques and Procedures.  We use the acronym and all three of those concepts blend together, even though they are separate and distinct:

Techniques: Individual skills that are the building block of the other two.  For example in pistol shooting, how to draw the handgun from the holster.  It's the same way every time, and practicing it builds reliable muscle-memory.

Tactics: Unit maneuvers with many factors including force structure, terrain and weather, enemy capabilities, et cetera...requires creativity and judgment. For example, entering and clearing a building; every building is slightly different with rooms and walls, so you must make quick tactical decisions.

Procedures: Hard written rules for accomplishing specific types of objectives, not subject to creativity and judgment. Firearms safety rules: always keep  the muzzle pointed in a safe direction, for example.

Having established that, let us begin:

The shooting industry has started to recognize a distinction between shooting sports and combat in the last few years.  "Practical" shooting sports are, like all athletic pursuits, driven by outstanding performers.  The best competition shooters in the world, however, do things to make them faster that are not tactically sound in combat situations.  The best of them will admit that; guys like Rob Leatham and Taran Butler acknowledge that to be the best in their sport, they have to focus on the skills that allow them to shoot fast and accurately enough to get points.  This means standing tall, head up, bringing the gun up to eye level, lightened triggers, lightened guns, et cetera...  Many of these things are not tactically sound.  Some are partially sound, depending on the equipment somebody is carrying in combat.  For instance, using the isosceles shooting stance is a classic argument among athletes putting holes in cardboard targets that do not shoot back.  Without a doubt, it is faster to shoot multiple target scenarios from the isosceles stance; and if you are wearing body armor with chest plates, it is also the tactically smart thing to do.  But, if you are not wearing body armor, "blading" your body away from full presentation of your vital organs to an enemy shooter is the more tactically sound method; this is why it was taught to soldiers and cops from World War Two through Vietnam and into the 1980s.  It's better to get shot in the shoulder than in the center of the chest.  So, that's one example of many shooting techniques that may or may not be a good tactic depending on the setting and the equipment.  

For SWAT cops, wearing plate carriers and Kevlar helmets, that technique would also be a good tactic, but for plain-clothed detectives wearing suits and ties, with no body armor, it would not be as tactically sound.

I say all of that by way of introduction, because the shooting "world," the industry and enthusiasts/athletes, mostly accept the logic that there is a difference between competitive shooting and actual combat.  In the same way, self-defense shooting is different from either of them also.  Combat is all about advantages.  Finding the higher ground, the more defensible position, the best tactics for the size of the unit, the right mixture of forces including tanks and infantry and artillery and battleships...  Furthermore, smart combat is about Initiative, setting the time and place of battle.  A self-defense shooting engagement is none of those things.  By the nature of violent crime, self-defenders are always at an "Initiative Deficit," meaning they are ambushed.  Fighting out of that ambush is where many of the techniques of competitive shooters can be useful: fast draw, shooting from compromised positions, et cetera.  Self-defense pistol shooting, by contrast, is more akin to hand-to-hand combat then full-scale combat.  Just like in hand-to-hand combat, it is the techniques that are important, as any tactical considerations are moot, because really the best tactic for self-defense considerations is to avoid the situation entirely, or escape a violent encounter before it starts.  Those are good self-defense tactics, though not techniques.

This is why I talk about the martial art of shooting, because self-defense pistol engagements are much more like a fist fight than a tactical military defense.  Most happen within six feet, many happen much closer than that, within arms length.  Which means that many of the aspects of training that go into competitive shooting are unimportant in a self-defense engagement.  Within arms length, there is no reason to aim a handgun.  In grappling range (a martial arts idea), it's very dangerous to use sights as the gun can be taken away, it will be deflected from the natural point of aim that competition shooting emphasizes, or the fundamentals of marksmanship that combat training emphasizes.  In the Army, soldiers qualify shooting at man-shaped and sized targets out to three-hundred meters in basic training.  Even military pistol ranges are shooting out to 35 meters.  No self-defense shooting situation happens at those ranges.  Active shooter situations are not the same as self-defense shootings; those are acts of terrorism, which is a type of combat scenario, and the lone pistol-armed defender against an active shooter has a very low-probability of success, which is why I don't teach Active Shooter Response.  That is a tactical scenario, which requires either more people (security teams) or more equipment (rifles) than an armed citizen with a concealed-carry 9mm handgun can reliably provide.  Not saying it's impossible, but the odds are strongly in favor of the active shooter, especially if armed with a rifle.  

But I digress, the point I'm making is that self-defense shooting is much more akin to fist fighting than combat scenarios, and while some techniques from the competition world can be useful, some are not at all useful.  Another picture worth a thousand words:

Now this is a more accurate vision of a self-defense shooting situation.  It's very chaotic, not based on good fundamentals of marksmanship as taught for combat, nor speed-accuracy balance as preached in competition.  The self-defender is falling down--knocked down by the skateboard--draws the gun, shoots the man on the left who had tried to stab him, all in about two seconds, while grappling and in a fist fight.  That's self-defense shooting.  It's not tactically elegant.  Nor is it sexy like watching a world-champion competition shooter blaze through a course of fire.  It is really the martial art of shooting, just like stick fighting or knife fighting or fighting with a katana, a pistol is just a different tool that (slightly) extends your body, but you're still in a hand-to-hand combat distance and range most of the time.

Therefore, what should you be practicing?  Is competition shooting making you better at self-defense?  Probably it is, if you are focused on the consistency of some techniques and the speed with which you can put accurate strings of fire into aggressors, but understand a lot of what makes competitors great is not very smart when people are shooting back at you.  I wrote a column recently about the "tactical lean" and why it's not very good for sport shooting, but if you look at this picture again, he got knocked down because he was not in a good fighting stance.  A good fighting stance is good irrespective of the tool you are using to fight the engagement.  Now, that makes me a slower shooter, but it means when somebody swings a skateboard at me, I have things I can do to that person with or without a handgun.  In my principles of self-defense, I preach that I am the Weapon, and the gun is just a tool, just like a knife or an automobile can be tools of self-defense.  That's why my technique for shooting is a fighting stance, leaning forward on the balls of my feet, aggressive, on balance, and able to move my feet for targeting instead of just my arms.  I would lose in shooting competitions using this method, however, in a handgun fight, most competitive shooters would lose to my techniques.

There are many of these differences between combat, competition and self-defense shooting.  In this column, I focused on stance, one of the shooting fundamentals taught in all three disciplines, but with different motives for emphasizing different techniques.  In my classes, I try to bring up these distinctions and always come back to the idea that self-defense with a pistol is exactly the same as self-defense with your bare hands or a knife, the only difference is the targeting.  So as you go about practicing and training to defend yourself with a handgun, take from the competition side and the combat (tactical) side, but always think about whether their techniques make sense in a sub-six-foot encounter against a guy with a knife or a skateboard.  Some of them will, some of them won't, but view them all through the lens of a fist fight and you will be preparing yourself better for actually employing a handgun in a self-defense shooting.

Please like and share with other shooters and self-defenders.  I'm always open to feedback, especially if you totally disagree with me.  I don't take it too seriously, it's just shooting people!

Thanks,

Soule

Easy 6

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