Two days ago I took delivery of Magdul’s Dynamic Handgun and carbine DVD’s. I’ve watched the first two discs of each and I have to say being in the military and watching these DVD’s, I feel the Army has cheated me on some very essential and basic training in the interest of getting IET soldiers on the line. The brass need to get their heads out of their collective fourth point of contact and give us what we need to fight an effective war and more importantly watch the backs of my fellow soldiers and make sure we all go home.
I shouldn’t have to wait to “get on line” or spend my own money to learn these essentials. Is there any hope that the military can do this?
I’m willing to bet the training you receive now is better than what I got when I was in (96-03)
ETA:
You can never count on your employer to train you to the point you want to be at (hopefully the best). At some point you have to go outside your unit/service/agency and seek outside training in order to achieve the best results possible.
Along the same lines, you might want to seek out someone who has had that sort of training and asking for pointers or, better yet, get the training yourself and bring it back to your unit/service/agency. At the minimum, you gain a few buddies to keep those tactics fresh. And in the best circumstances, what you share with them might save their lives.
Agreed wholeheartedly. Being an early 80’s era 11B, I felt the same way after my first carbine course, pre-Magpul DVDs. I continue to feel that way, with every subsequent Pistol, or carbine course. The Big Army will do what’s most expedient, period. The list of failures from uniforms to weapon systems are long and distinguished.
Maybe we as Vets and Patriotic Citizens, and Magpul, should just start buying these DVDs, and mailing them to units down range. That would have a more immediate impact than current training and resources could ever provide.
The main reason the Army as a hole doesn’t get the proper weapons training is very simple…time, money, and resources.
Time: how can we expect our Soldiers to be proficient with their primary weapon system if they are constantly being put on Taskings that are ‘more important’ than scheduled training.
Money: Ammunition is expensive. We are constantly having to beg, barrow, and steal to get the ammo for the training we are trying to accomplish now. We have a difficult enough time having enough rounds to even do a standard qualification range (and this is not because of crappy shooters that waste ammo). With 2 ‘Wars’ going on, there are Soldiers that need that ammo overseas.
Resources: There is limited range space and time available to train. Also, again ranges are run by civilians and their time is also money.
I think it would be great if every Soldier received quality weapons training in AIT. But the truth is there is a level of maturity required for this high speed training that just has not been developed in a Soldier until they have been in their active unit for a certain amount of time. And even then, some people just never reach that level of maturity.
So did it never occur to you to seek additional training at your own expense from other sources? If you think your training is inadequate, and there’s the possibility of needing to actually fight, then I’d find that to be quite motivating to seek alternative resources.
It just seems to me that some many military guys I meet WON’T train on their dime (I try to get them to go and hand them pamphlets). There are a few who will and I sometimes see them in classes.
Now that I’ve seen the training that is offered, when I get back stateside I will be taking part in these classes.
The extent of my “training” is sitting in the dugout, prone and shooting at 300m targets. I’ve never done reflexive fire, never done any kind of drills.
yep… if you get with a higher speed infantry unit, you might get some actual tactics training, but for the most part, tactics are left to the soldier, who may or may not get pointers from fellow squad members. and IET training is a joke… prone supported and prone un-supported- period. shoot while standing?? WTF are you talking about? and dont even ask about shooting while moving… if you have live rounds in your weapon, you sure as shit better not be “moving” anywhere.
More live fire training would be nice in the military but one has to remember that being a rifleman is more than just pulling a trigger.
Many of the weapon manipulation skills can be practiced dry, not as much fun but it’s better than nothing. Our machine gunners and mortarmen were always practicing gun drills during down time. They were pretty damn good at getting the guns up, when they got ammo they were so good at the gun drills they had more time to shoot. I would practice rifle manipulations and magazine changes during down time. I got pretty good at reloading and presenting my weapon from different positions. I also practiced manipulating my weapon with my weak side so that when I did get live ammunition I could shoot off hand more naturally. A lot of riflemen would lounge around and screw off because they felt if they weren’t putting lead down range they weren’t “really” training. You would see these guys fumbling with mag pouches, reloads, clearing drills what have you when we did do live fire. These are the things they could have been working on before they started shooting and had they worked on them they could have learned more and had more fun shooting. If I only got 10, 20 or 30 rounds to run a range with I would space them out in different magazines so I got to run reloads, a lot of guys would cram it all in one magazine because they didn’t want to bother reloading.
I guess what I’m trying to say is get good with what you got. Don’t diss your training, try to take everything from it you can. If you think it sucks and go into it with a “this is shit” attitude you won’t learn what there is to learn. Many of the shooting classes are geared towards civilian shooters and a civilian does not need to know how to read a map, call for fire, set a defensive position, work a radio, clear an LZ, write an operations order, link up with another unit, etc. Stay motivated, take shooting classes when you can but don’t neglect the other aspects of your job. Take what you can from your training now, both good and bad, and learn from it and what you learn you can pass on to others.
Every golf course on all military bases should be turned into shooting ranges (KD, steel, movers, pop-ups, shoot houses, FX/FOF sim houses, etc…) with 24 hr/7 day access for any service member to practice on…
And random golfers of the ranks of O-6 and E-8 and above would be publicly executed, weekly.
Seriously. The problem isn’t the lack of training; the problem is the arrogance and complete bullshit that especially combat arms soldiers live, eat and breathe that somehow convinces them they know anything of value about shooting or about their weapons systems.
I was one. It is, frankly, just easier to keep soldiers ignorant about their own limitations than it is to train them.
LE has that in common with the military in that unless you are SWAT, SRT, ERT, BORTAC, etc. you won’t get much more than square range training either.
Being in the USMCR, I didn’t know what was going in the Corps as a whole, especially on the active side, but I personally experienced a change from loop slings, “approved” shooting position qualifications to receiving MOUT training, EMP (enhanced marksmanship program) where you shoot and move, look and ID “threats” and then turn and shoot, them telling us to square up to the target to maximize armor usage versus pre-determined positions, and hearing about a new qual where a Marine was allowed to lay, sit, kneel, and stand in a fashion that bests enables the individual to put rounds on target while activated.
Surprising, since you don’t have to be a 25 yr active Marine to know that any change in the USMC(R) is extremely difficult. :eek:
I believe that every commercial carbine course I’ve ever been in had at least one military guy, former or active, who was shocked at what they didn’t know before the class and exclaimed “THIS is what the Army/Navy/Air Force/Marines should have been teaching us!” sometime during TD2 or so.
I hear a lot of people say “well why don’t you seek out your own training?”, but by all accounts that sounds to be a pretty tough prospect for military folks. You may or may not be deployed, you may or may not be able to get the time off, finances are probably pretty tough (tougher if you have a family), and most importantly you probably don’t know what you don’t know. And, for that 20 year old corporal or specialist, it can be a tough pill to swallow after you’ve been pretty well indoctrinated into “if you need to know it, we’ll tell it to you. if you need to have it, we’ll issue it to you.”
Cops face similar issues but to a lesser extent. There’s usually less institutional dogma to overcome but the social dogma can be pretty extreme. Most cops I know that seek outside training get at least teased about it at work by the donut-eaters if they don’t wind up with career problems from further up the food chain. They do, however, have the advantage of typically being older, in most cases better paid, and have more free time.
Interesting side bar, I have applied all of the above to non-shooting and non-mil/LE training in my job. I asked for training and equipment to do my job better and was denied, and I’m seeking it out for myself. This is not a life or death situation, but you can bet your ass that if my company didn’t get me safety training and/or issue me a hardhat or a fall protection harness I’d be out getting my own training and buying my own equipment.
Right. Remember that when the Military comes up with a training program, it has to be to the lowest level.
Just like their manuals and such (8th grade reading level).
It is normal to see SEAL’s, SF, Force Recon in Civy classes. Why? Because they are trying to get as much info and training as possible.
What is somewhat funny is that some here believe that being in the Military means you get BETTER weapons training than a a Civy can get. To quote on of them; “All you have ever dones is gone to civy shooting schools.”
Correct and because of it, I have been trained by the BEST on how to use and fight with a firearm. At the end of the day, he who puts the bullet in the other guy FIRST wins.
