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Article: 11-2005
Tactical Response
High Risk
Civilian Contractor Course
Part 1 of 2
By: Andy Fitzgerald
A
friend and I attended Tactical Response’s (www.tacticalresponse.com) High Risk
Civilian Contractor’s course the week of 5-10 September 2005 in Camden,
Tennessee. The goal of the course was
to prepare individuals for Executive Protection in Iraq. Mr. James Yeager was the course instructor. Mr. Yeager spent a year in Iraq protecting
Iraqi public figures and was involved in an insurgent attack which claimed the
lives of three of his co-workers.
This
five-day, $1,000 course, was attended by eight men, four of whom were activity
pursuing work in Iraq; the remaining four, including me, were there for the
training and experience.
This
course is not for the untrained gunman.
We all pushed our training to the limit and did drills some may
characterize as unsafe or extreme such as the extensive car exit drills, the
shooting through windshield while sitting in the front seat and the sweeping of
body parts while in the car. The rate
of rifle fire was very high (full automatic fire was used at times by those of
so equipped) and weapons got excessively hot to the point we did have a round
cook-off. Safe gun handling was
critical. For the most part, individual
safety was very good.
Mr.
Yeager vetted the students to ensure all were professional gunmen and I’m glad
he did so. An untrained or inexperience
gunman would have caused serious problems in some of the drills.
Over
the five days, we each fired over 2,300 rounds of rifle ammo and 150 rounds of
pistol ammo.
I
took extensive notes on each day’s activities in order to compile this
report. I can highly recommend the use
of ‘Rite-in-the-Rain’ note pads and pens.
Although we were fortunate that it did not rain, we all sweated
profusely and any normal paper products carried in my back pocket would have
deteriorated after the first day. My
Rite-in-the-Rain notebook is still going strong.
Rifles:
All
used the AR or M16/M4 weapons systems in 5.56mm. The use of a .30 caliber system, although fully applicable, would
have left the operator with one sore shoulder as the rate of fire at most times
was very high and sustained. Break down
of models included:
All
functioned very well. My M4 went down
due to an ammunition malfunction. I was
using surplus Lake City 5.56 purchased from the Ammoman.com. The powder in the round failed to ignite and
left a bullet just in the rifling. I
believe this ammunition has been re-imported after being rejected for use by
the foreign government as numerous rounds felt to be under powered. Another student, using the same ammunition,
experienced the same problems.
Other
problems included a bent bolt hold-open catch which was easily replaced
(nothing like gunsmithing in the motel room).
Handguns:
A
standard mix of handguns was used:
All
worked well, except for a Kimber 1911 which went down for unknown reasons and a
Glock which broke an internal component.
I recommend not bringing any ‘nice’ weapons as they will get beaten up
in the many drills. Also, Mr. Yeager,
in his style, has a habit of throwing any sidearms lost during the drills. We considered it a ‘teaching moment’.
Optics:
We
had the usual mix of optics:
No
issues or problems arose with any of the optics.
Personal
Tactical Wear:
We
all wore tactical vests with either leg-drop holsters or used vests with
built-in holsters. All seemed to work
well. I did have problems with my leg
holster, a no-name purchased at a gun show.
It doesn’t pay to use cheap gear, regardless of its function.
Lights:
All
used Surefire lights; most had rifle mounts for the lights. I did not have a rifle mount for my 6P
Surefire (just ran out of money and something had to give), but I used MIL-SPEC
100mph tape to tape my light to my M4 for the night shoot. This worked very well and I can recommend it
in pinch.
A 6P
and the other weapon mounted lights were able to illuminate the targets in
complete darkness out to 50 yards; in low light, the 6P was good out to 100
yards.
Slings:
All
used single-point slings. I used a
Giles Single Point using the GG & G attachment point which replaces the
standard retaining plate between the receiver and the butt stock. This system worked well except in the car
drills. I did not employ the sling for
in-the-car drills and when I reached for the rifle, I got a handful of sling
with the pistol grip. This slowed me
down as I had to take time to re-grip.
Hydration:
The
temperature during the week averaged well into the 80’s and low 90’s and we all
sweated like dogs. Mr. Yeager insisted
on us all being properly hydrated and I drank several gallons a day. Even so, there was one student who did get
heat sickness and had to bow out for a spell.
Several wore Camelbacks.
Physical
Condition:
One
overlooked aspect of nearly all civilian weapons courses is the student’s
physical condition. In general, we forget
that physical conditioning should be part of any gunman’s regular
training. In this course, most of the
students’ physical condition, although not overweight, was mediocre. I highly recommend a regular, strenuous
cardiovascular and weight training program for those who want to get the most
out of this course or who plan to work as civilian contractors.
Mr.
Yeager was the chief instructor. He’s a
colorful guy who pushed the class. He’s
not one for those who cannot take direct, pointed criticism (including having a
weapon tossed about). Not all will be
able to warm to his style, but I like his methods and would not hesitate to
take another of his courses. Mr. Yeager
has been a local law enforcement officer.
Mr.
Yeager was assisted by several competent instructors, including Mr. Tracy
Hightower, who worked with us the last day and Mr. Shawn Hughes, an explosive
consultant, who handled the IED portion of the course.
Day
#1:
Day
#1 got off to a quick start on the short 25 yard range after a brief safety
briefing. We immediately started
shooting the six DEA dots and practicing the handgun/rifle transition drill
known as the ‘Mississippi Meltdown’.
You just can’t practice this drill enough. All drills commenced with the command ‘Fight!’
The
next drill was two-man drills with one student walking to and backing away from
the 25 yard targets while firing with the second student hanging on to the
first’s tactical vest. If the weapon
went down, the students reversed roles and continued the drill. Stepping up when a weapon went down or a
team member was ‘injured’ was a constant theme throughout the course. My team began to use ‘Red’ and ‘Green’ to
communicate our status – ‘Red’ being, ‘I’m down, step in’ and ‘Green’ ‘I’m
ready to get back in if needed’. I
quickly learned the 20-round magazines were insufficient and switched to
30-round magazines.
The
two-man drills then became four-man drills, again walk to and from the target
while firing. Not easy. With the four-man drills, targets were
placed both front and right/left and were engaged as the team traversed the
course. Mr. Yeager insisted on good
hits at a high rate of fire regardless of the shooting conditions.
The
last drill before lunch was the classic ‘Rolling Thunder’. Rolling Thunder starts with the students
lined up on the firing line. The first
students on the left starts by firing one round followed by all firing one
round going left to right. The sequence
starts over with the first student firing two rounds and the line following. If the student to your left fails to fire,
you must immediately step in and fire.
The sequence continues until the round count reaches 10. This drill trains you to be aware of your
teammate’s condition and ammo management.
After
lunch, we resumed the two-man drills, this time moving from left to right along
the firing line, bounding to/from four cover positions. We learned to communicate with our partner,
indicating when to move. We were
instructed not to crowd cover and allow at least two rounds to be fired before
instructing our partner to move to a new position. We had to watch our magazine changes and use the ‘’Red’ and
‘Green’ commands. Only one team member
would be firing at a time and the non-firing teammate would be watching our ‘6’. It was very difficult to communicate with
the noise and hearing protection. This
is drill we could have practiced all day and still not be proficient. Mr. Yeager was constantly riding us on
accuracy and rate of fire.
After
about four iterations of this drill, we moved to the rifle range.
At
the rifle range, we continued the two-man drill, only this time instead of left
to right bounding, we bounded forward and backwards 100 yards, jumping from
cover position to cover position located at 50, 75 and 100 yards with a 18” x
24”steel plate target at approximately 150 yards. There were two identical lanes of fire separated by 25
yards. One team member would bound
forward on one lane and once in position and firing would signal to our partner
to move forward on his lane of fire. Only one team member would be firing at a
time. Again, communication was very
important and it was even more difficult due to the increase range. It was very important for the non-firing
teammate to be watching the ‘6’. The
drill became interesting on the backward bound as one team member would be
firing from behind you, separated by only 25 yards. Mr. Yeager insisted on a rate of fire of 3 rounds per
second. He wants to overwhelm the enemy
with suppressive fire (or at least scare the pants of them!).
The
two-man drills quickly morphed into four-man drills. Two team members were on each firing lane. One team would bound forward and once in
position, would signal for the second to move forward. This drill did not stop until all had
bounded down range and back. It was a
hot day and we were all soaked with sweat by the third repetition. One student did go down with heat stress. At this point, we broke for dinner and
prepared for the night shoot.
The
night shoot involved the same two and four man drills, this time in complete
darkness. If communicating in the
daylight was difficult, it’s 10 times harder in darkness. We all managed fairly good hits on the steel
plate in complete darkness. One
interesting phenomenon was experienced on this calm night: The smoke from the weapon reflected the
light back into our eyes and it got so bad I was unable to acquire the target
through my Aimpoint. One solution is to
frequently move behind cover to a ‘smoke-free’ area. Another is to add a suppressor to the weapon.
Comments
on Day #1:
1)
These were advanced drills for
the first day.
2)
We each averaged about 800
rounds of rifle and 150 rounds of pistol.
3)
It was very physical. We each drank about two gallons of fluids.
4)
I and others were burned in several
places by hot empties going down our vests – ouch!
Day
#2:
Day
#2 started in the class room with basic Battlefield Medicine. Mr. Yeager instructed us in the use of the
‘Cinchtight’ compressive Battlefield dressing.
The Cinchtight is the US Army equivalent of the famous Israeli
Battlefield Dressing. The major
difference is the Cinchtight uses Velcro instead of the Israeli plastic
hook. We also discussed the use of Quickcot
and tourniquets to stop bleeding and water jell for burns. Mr. Yeager supplied us with two Cinchtights
– one for training and one for emergency use.
We
then returned to the rifle range for more team drills. This time, in four man teams, we divided
into roles: one shooter, one watcher, one first-aider and one injured. The team had to engage the steel plate while
dragging the injured member to cover and applying the Cinchtight. Dragging a 200# teammate 15 yards and
applying the Cinchtight proved to be physical challenging. The drills continued until we had partaken
of each role. Communication again
proved to be challenging. One gun did
go down during this drill and the team mate correctly employed the injured
man’s weapon instead of wasting time working on his own. A very good lesson.
We
then receive a briefing on the use and application of smoke grenades. Mr. Yeager issued each team one grenade for
use during the next drill.
The
next drill was the same, but this time with three team members engaging the
target before two members broke away for assist the injured student. Mr. Yeager wanted us to focus on and
neutralize the threat before treating the injured. I employed the smoke grenade during this drill. I, unfortunately, failed to inform my team
that I was using smoke; a small error, but it re-enforced the need to communicate.
The
third drill of the morning was to engage the steel target with four, 30 round
magazines at a high rate of fire. Mr.
Yeager wanted us to practice accuracy and speed (3 rounds per second) as he was
unhappy with our marksmanship. Rifle
really got hot! Glad I had Colt’s
double heat shield!
The
last drill before lunch was to engage a steel target at 300 yards (actually 289
yards as measured with a laser range finder).
Everyone did fairly well. It was
after this drill I discover that the screws on my ARMS mount holding the rings
were loose. This was easily corrected
with Loctite (the instructions with the ARMS mount clearly state NOT to use
Loctite. Clearly this is not correct.)
After
lunch we returned to the classroom to discuss planning site security.
Site
Security:
Mr.
Yeager spent an hour reviewing how to plan site security and assigned each of
two, four man teams a job of planning the escort of the Tennessee Governor to
locations within Camden, Tennessee.
This drill took the rest of the day to physically research the route and
areas and prepare a team briefing. A
long list of items such as coordination with local law enforcement, site
description, exit routes, choke points, reaction plan, press handling, stash
car, hospital location, etc. were all researched and briefed to the team. I used one of the computers in the class
room to collect all the information in a Power Point briefing and this worked
well.
Comments
on Day #2:
1)
We fired only about 250 rifle
rounds the second day; no pistol rounds
2)
Continued to experience
problems with team communications. We
all need to practice this.
3)
Need to standardize on our
communication words – need to use action-type words – and to use clock
references (6, 9, 12, etc.).
4)
The site security was a little
dry, but necessary for the course.
END OF PART ONE