After the above incident I continued zeroing. Just as I was finishing up and getting ready to move to the handgun range, a local agency SWAT contingent showed up and started to set up their tactical rifles. I know that they were SWAT because they had multicam tabs on their multicam BDUs that said “SWAT”.
I showed the one guy my broken case… he immediately summoned one of his buddies who must have been the AR expert. He asked me if my chamber was real dirty and I told him that I didn’t think it was too dirty. He looked again and told me it was definitely a dirty chamber and that I need to clean my chamber. He told me that with ARs, if you don’t scrub the chamber with solvent and a brush every 200 rounds then you will get torn cases and broken extractors.
“No kidding? Thanks man!” I exclaimed and moved to the pistol range. I honestly never knew that ARs had to have their chambers scrubbed every 200 rounds. Learn something new every day.
Later on, the SWAT guy that told me the above and one of his buddies made his way over to the pistol range. I decided I needed to run one last drill then vacate to let them do their thing. They walked out onto the range without calling for a cease fire or anything. They set up targets and the AR expert pulls out a - wait for it - AK pistol and proceeds to blast about 10 rounds all over a silhouette making a large pattern. Without eyepro, of course.
Then he puts the AK pistol away and him and his buddy pull out their Glock service pistols and begin to pop at targets. Without eyepro, of course.
:rolleyes:
p.s. To all the SWAT guys and LEOs out there - I am not picking on you guys, seriously! This is just one of those amusing anecdotes that I got to experience first-hand. Some of the best performing and most knowledgeable shooters that I’ve ever met were LEOs. Just goes to show that there are guys like this everywhere… SWAT, .mil, gun store, etc…
Not all SWAT guys are gun nuts. A lot of the guys on our local team are very proficient with their service weapons but really don’t give two shits about guns in general. Except the snipers, they are all gun crazy.
I’m on 2 teams, one a smaller agency team that mostly does warrants and the like, then a multi-jurisdictional full-on SWAT unit. On the smaller one we don’t have as much money or time. There is one bloke that doesn’t like to use his sights. (Although, somehow he seems to usually shoot pretty well. When he uses them). We occasionally train with the MP5 so one day we are simulating room entries. He goes in with the MP5 stock collapsed, held a waist height and does a Schwarzenneger rock-and-roll 15 round burst on a target. He didn’t think it was funny as he originally did when we started doing pushups.
Some of the SWAT cops I work with are very motivated, physically fit and proficient with their firearms. I know of a few that are too fat to pass the PT test, another that doesnt know how to field strip his M4.
Those in the latter category usually guard the truck when there is a call out.
I’ve seen a lot of this kind of stuff too, Katar. Where I live, most are smaller departments and teams. I think this leads to a higer precentage questionable talent. Along the same lines, my knephew is a 19 y.o. marine preparing to ship to Afgan next month. He is a good kid and has learned a lot, but I will have to say, IMO, he doesn’t know as much as he thinks he does. I’ve suprised him a number of times with different recommendations for different issues. I tried to presuade him to read some tips and articles from people like LAV and Pat Rogers but he seemed unintrested, as if he already knows everything he needs to know, so I dropped it. I just hope he knows enough. And for the record, I am certainly no expert, at anything.
This. could be said about almost every team that I’m acquainted with.
A lot of teams, mine included, have people that hold one, two, or all three of the following philosophies:
I busted my ass to get on the team, so now I can slack off,
Training days are little more than 2 days a month away from my primary assignment, and/or
Training, gear, and weapons technology hasn’t changed since when I got on the team.
This type of thinking is epidemic among SWAT Teams, especially part time teams. This is because full time teams usually have a call volume, training schedule, or related duties that weed out the less motivated, or those that won’t keep on top of their game, training or equipment-wise. THIS ISN’T TO SAY THAT PART TIME TEAMS ARE BAD; I’m on one, but the majority of teams in the US are part time, because their jurisdictions don’t have the op-tempo, budget, or staffing to make them full time or semi-full time. The members also have other duties to which they’re attached for the vast majority of their time, and these assignments all vie for time and attention. But the community still needs a tactical response unit, and it’s no excuse for shitty shooting, especially on an apparently public range, where citizens can see their tax dollars being spent.
(I think there was a thread on this a long time ago, specifically about why LEOs aren’t as gun savvy as they used to be, or sometimes should be.)
The absolute hard-headedest people I have ever met when it comes to guns and training are the 18-25 Soldier/Marine. They have had it drummed into their head that they are the baddest motherfuckers on the planet, that if they need to know it the Army/Marines would have taught it to them, if they needed to have it the Army/Marines would have issued it to them, and if you didn’t serve or aren’t actively serving you couldn’t possibly know shit from brown bread.
But they kind of have to. They need that confidence.
Might give him a copy of SWAT from a couple of months ago with Paul G’s story in it about being shot, and how the Marine Corp didn’t give him the training that might have prevented him from getting shot, and that he didn’t get that kind of training until after he was out and it was too late.
I agree, and I do the same. I’ve always been his gun guru and he calls me from Mojave Viper about once a week to tell me what they have been into. He has shown me their TTPs on several issues and I’ll suggest a few techniques he may want to try. For example, he was complaining a few months ago that a few guys were faster reloading their M16s than he was. After seeing how he was performing his reloads I suggested another technique. When he returned home 2-3 months later he advised me he was using the technique I suggested and was very pleased with it’s performance. He is sort of a monkey see, monkey do kind of guy. If you show him something is better he is attentive, if you describe something without a demostration he shows no intrest. Overall I think he is performing very well, it just worries me (he is family after all) that he often thinks he knows all he needs to and shows no interest in learning more. I think he will be OK, we are praying for him.
I had my AK pistol out at the range this past Sunday. The guy next to me commented on it to his daughter, so I felt compelled to go tell him I was just function-testing it to make sure it was worth the $350 it’d cost to SBR it. Honestly, I was kind of embarrassed to be in public with it, but hey, I gotta make sure it runs before I sink a tax stamp and the cost of a triangle sidefolder into it.
rob_s
The absolute hard-headedest people I have ever met when it comes to guns and training are the 18-25 Soldier/Marine. They have had it drummed into their head that they are the baddest motherfuckers on the planet, that if they need to know it the Army/Marines would have taught it to them, if they needed to have it the Army/Marines would have issued it to them, and if you didn’t serve or aren’t actively serving you couldn’t possibly know shit from brown bread.
But they kind of have to. They need that confidence.
Might give him a copy of SWAT from a couple of months ago with Paul G’s story in it about being shot, and how the Marine Corp didn’t give him the training that might have prevented him from getting shot, and that he didn’t get that kind of training until after he was out and it was too late.
He doesn’t like to read very much, although I have gotten him to read a couple of articles before. He is mostly into reading gun reviews in the gun rags. I told him of Paul G’s story, he didn’t seem interested enough to take it and read it but he did listen as I described his experiences instead.
Rob, I agree with you to a “T”. And also feel they need the confidence as well. I can tell he has progressed quite a bit. I only wish he were eager to learn more, especially from those that have seen the “white elephant”. Although he does look up to the vets within his battalion. He scored expert on the M16 and gave me the credit, which I don’t deserve. I only introduced him to shooting and have shown him some basics. His mom, my sister, is convinced he is not coming home, but I disagree. I think he will be OK. I can only say that, at my age, if I were going into a combat AO I would seek all knowledge I could pack into my thick skull.
Nah, no need to denigrate them. They were SWAT and they were out there training to do their job. Props to them, I have nothing but respect. That doesn’t mean we can’t poke fun at stupid stuff when we hear/see it, though.
