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THE JOUST

 

Actual Engagement Training (AET), what has more recently come to be known as Force on Force (FoF) training, has existed since man began using implements as fighting tools.  With each generation of weapons development facsimiles have been developed to allow Practitioners to engage in man on man training.  When my sons were Cadets at the Virginia Military Institute I gave each of them a replica of a Roman Short Sword as recognition of their development as warrior scholars.  I also gave them replicas of the wooden training sword that the Romans used for man on man training.  This form of training concept had been around a long time.

 

Man on man training with firearms has a long history.  There were training weapons for dueling pistols from early on in that form of fighting.

 

Today there are various manner of platforms for training man on man with firearms.  Certainly the development of the most recent generation of AirSoft systems is most useful in this form of training.

 

Man on man training has three variants.  First is to serve as a transition from live fire drill inculcation on inanimate targets to human targets.  The second is to provide the Practitioner an opportunity to use interactive interpretation in scenarios as a medium to practice decision making in a critical event.  The third is to learn anxiety management.

 

 

DRILL INCULCATION

 

Training for the practical use of a firearm involves the layering and dovetailing of skill sets into a drill that is believed to be useful in an actual critical encounter.  The target systems are, for the most part, stationary and inanimate.  At some point, there is a need to expose the Practitioner to an encounter with a human target.  The introduction of this dynamic can degrade the Practitioner’s ability to call-up the drill that is deemed appropriate to deal with the problem presented.  In particular, agencies may have, due to their specific mission, designated protocols they want their agents to follow in critical events.  Tightly scripted scenarios can be devised to allow the trainee to practice to the level of default to a specific drill in the face of a dynamic human interaction.  The function of this form of man on man training is to establish that default, particularly in a protocol driven mission statement.

 

 

INTERACTIVE INTERPRETATION

 

Drill inculcation man on man training has some use outside of the agency related mission statement environment.  Short and tightly scripted scenarios can be useful for training Practitioners who do not operate in an agency mission statement imperative.  Critical incidents do occur as they chose and where they choose.  They have a life of their own. 

 

Evolving critical incidents must be interpreted as they flow.  Practitioners must learn to spot the flow of such incidents and how to manipulate them.  To learn this skill man on man scenarios are used to allow the Practitioner to “communicate” with the role players in a way that confirms intent and may cause restraining judgments.

 

The function of this form of man on man training is to prepare the Practitioner to think and operate in real-time during a critical incident.  

 

From a training evolution stand point, drill inculcation exposure typically comes at the end of the training regimen.  Interactive interpretation is best inserted early in the training experience.  With early exposure the Practitioner has a sense of the purpose for the drills he will experience in his live fire training.

 

 

ANXIETY MANAGEMENT

 

Critical incidents are naturally anxiety creating events.  They should be, they can make you dead.  Among the functions of man on man training is to inoculate the Practitioner to the effects of anxiety and to teach management skills for dealing with this phenomena so that performance in such events can be enhanced.

 

Still, there is a lot of mythology associated with handgun encounters.  Master Trainer Tom Givens provides a sense of this mythology in his comment that “When people are shot with a handgun they do not disappear in a shower of sparks and a puff of smoke”.  Most people who are shot with handguns survive the occurrence.  Pension records from the American Civil War, or the War of Northern Aggression if you prefer, show that about 25% of the pensioners reported wounds above the shoulder.  People survive being shot.

 

Interactive interpretation scenarios can help the Practitioner to learn anxiety management.  There are, in addition, some simple drills that can help to remove the scary mask for the critical incident hobgoblin. 

 

VCA must get within critical distance to mount a successful attack.  Few VCA have good shooting skills.  Many have experience shooting at people and getting shot at.  This experience teaches them they must get almost within touching distance of the quarry in order to mount a successful attack.  Practitioners know that sudden, abrupt and explosive movement as a handgun muzzle is brought to bear is very useful in avoiding being shot.  It is instructive for the Practitioner to experience how useful and how important sudden, abrupt and explosive is.

 

ATSA Village Judges witness scores of shooting encounters during their duties.  They are always within in feet of the shooting, yet it is a very unusual event for one of them to be shot.  They are very adept at interpreting the flow of the encounter.  They are also very adept at cataloging the movement of multiple muzzles as weapons are brought to play.  They keep the muzzles off themselves.  A very handy skill.

 

 

THE JOUST

 

A drill the ATSA Study Group has used over the years to inoculate anxiety in a critical incident and to reinforce the importance of sudden abrupt and explosive movement is the Joust.

 

Because this is a man on man drill, a secured environment is used.  No implement of any kind that can be used as a weapon is allowed in to the secured environment.  Each person who enters is physically searched each and every time they enter.  A monitor is placed at the door to secured environment to prevent anyone who has not been searched from entering.

 

Gas powered AirSoft repeating handguns are used for the drill.

 

Two parallel charge lanes, two feet wide each are laid out.  They are each 30’ long.  The two parallel charge lanes are 3’ apart, measured on the inside lines.

 

Two Practitioners face each other from opposite ends of their respective charge lane.  A coin is tossed to determine which Practitioner will initiate the action.  The winner of the toss initiates the action by firing a shot at the opposing practitioner.

 

At the initiation shot the two Practitioners sprint towards each other, each engaging the other with fire as he is able, until the opposite end of his respective charge lane is reached.  At mid-point on the charge lanes the Practitioners are muzzle to muzzle.  Each Practitioner must maintain a full sprint upon initiation.

 

With Practitioners whose shooting experience is far above that of VCA we see the following:

 

·         An average of 20 to 30 shots are fired in each run.

·         The number of hits per run, if any, are in the low single digits.

·         As long as a Practitioner maintains a sprint he is very rarely hit.

·         Virtually all hits that occur are on the periphery of the extremities.

·         Practitioners who slow from a sprint for any reason are shot a lot and regularly CoM.

·         Practitioners who are fired on in the initiating shot and who are slow to react receive CoM hits.  This aimed shot and a failure to move instantly and explosively results in the highest number of CoM hits.

·         Assuming the Practitioner maintains a sprint, those hits that do occur, not surprisingly; occur at muzzle to muzzle range.  Even so, the hits are most commonly on the periphery of the extremities.

·         Practitioners who reacted to incoming fire by rolling their shoulders toward the center of the body and dropping their head reduced their speed and were struck by a lot of shots.

 

There is nothing in this exercise that suggests it approximates a practical event. 

 

What the exercise can contribute to the Practitioner is that even under conditions where the ranges are short, even very short, explosive movement can reduce your chances of being hit and if you are hit it is likely to be peripheral.

 

Practitioners learn that even with aimed shots, they can “know” when the shot is going to break and move off the line of force.

 

They also learn that timid reaction in the face of gunfire is not helpful.

 

Most importantly, Practitioners can practice anxiety management.