I think it is a mixed bag concerning terrorists and CCW as some have pointed out.

I own several handguns and practice at the range. It is a hobby I enjoy and could be helpful in home and self-defense. I took the required NRA course and have the certificate to get a permit if I wanted one. I have not because where I work and live I dont feel the need to carry every day.

The NRA course was very good at teaching gun safety, laws, and basic operation of the weapon but I know it was nothing like the sort of tactical training one gets in the military or law enforcement. We did need to show basic proficiency at the range and discussed what we might do in hypothetical situations but that was it.

My instructor also told me that many people offer him money to just issue a certificate without spending an entire weekend in his class. He is one of the honest ones but he knows of other caught cheating.

Anyway I think these terrorists would not have chosen this sort of attack in an area like mine, with many citizen gun carriers as well as a much more aggressive police force than we saw in Mumbai.

Like a lot of us who know how to shoot with reasonable proficiency I near wept when I saw Sebastian D’Souza’s photo of the terrorist at the train station. Clear shot at close range.

Two hands…he cant see you yet…center sights on body mass…breath hold…1,2,3 shots… I feel a sense of survivor guilt when I see it. I tell myself that had I been there with my weapon even I could have taken him out. Maybe, or maybe that is my own psychological projection.

Then again, as has been pointed out, if I were in the crowd around the hotels I would only have been a danger to the professionals.

I think these sort of terrorists will not attempt this type of attack in the USA. They will choose another method and have. We are feared, for good reasons, as an armed populace with a very aggresive police and security apparatus.

None of this matters when we talk about bombs or more sophisticated operations such as cyber-attack on computer networks, or chem/bio/nuke attacks.

An armed population is a good thing IMO. Yet we must be aware that we are not dealing with idiots here. There are weapons and tactics easily available to render your trusty .45 useless.

Spindok

The legendary Swiss rifles, yep.

They werent used to keep out Nazis. They were used with great effectiveness to keep out Jewish and other refugees. Germany did not even begin to stamp Jewish passports with the notorious “J” until requested to do so by the Swiss so they could identify and turn away any Jews for fear they wouldnt leave.

The Nazis ran the trains to the concentration camps right through Zurich and could not have afforded to do that if the Swiss had not given them enormous loans. The Nazis used the gold obtained of the teeth of their victims or looted as collateral and the Swiss knew all about it.

Yeah, the brave and mighty Swiss and their rifles.

I guess your scenarios are constantly playing out in Israel, which is heavily targeted by terrorists and has an armed population?

I also wonder how many people in the Mumbai massacre were glad they didn’t have a gun when the terrorists were breaking down the doors to their hotel rooms?

>1. Such armed citizens would be acting as solo operators, outside any chain of command, out of >any communications or control of 1st responders.

As anyone that has spent any time at a gun range can tell you, most first responders are completely unprepared to defend citizens in this type of scenario. You can always spot the cops because they’re the ones doing their required yearly practice and aren’t nearly as comfortable with their guns as the hobbyists.

It is not the job of the police to protect the populace. It is the job of the police to track down the criminals and deter future crime by the threat of getting caught. Your concept of the police swooping in and taking out the terrorists isn’t very likely. 10 minute response times are considered reasonable. In NYC you get an automated attendant if you call 911 during a peak period. You won’t see SWAT deploy for a very long time. When seconds count, the cops will be there in half an hour.

>2. Imagine you are a cop and hear gunfire, see bodies stewn about – and the next thing you see >is a wild-eyed person running at you or at a cluster of civilians waving a pistol. Not knowing >he is a “heroic armed private citizen” – you drop him.

Anyone that has taken a CCW class knows that you don’t run at the nearest cop with your weapon drawn after an incident. You stop your attacker and move to a defensible position, with your gun in a non-threatening but easily accessible position. I wonder what kind of permit you actually have and if you’ve taken the training and know better?

Funny how people expect our soldiers in Iraq/Afghanistan to easily distinguish between civilians and terrorists and will put them on trial if they make a mistake, but are willing to give the police (who are supposedly trained for this) a pass and think the armed citizen would be in the wrong for defending themselves.

And frankly, I’d rather take my chances with friendly fire than accept the certainty of being lined up against a hotel room wall and shot.

>3. You think you are a hero and get your trusty AR-15 and drop a guy you see wearing a ski >mask and carrying a submachine gun – with a beautiful long-distance shot that you believe will >be discussed as a feat of penultimate skill for the next century. Then you see police >helicopter and sharpshooters converging on your position, because you just killed a cop >responding to the scene and didn’t know it because you lacked any comms or command & control >warning all others that 4 cops in ski masks were moving to reposition. You drop your gun, but >odds are that pissed off cops, taking no chances, wax your ass. And no one will really object.

In this case the armed citizen didn’t properly identify the target and shot at something that wasn’t a direct threat, so they were taking their chances. Anyone with CCW training knows you don’t do this. But SWAT teams routinely conduct no-knock raids and shoot grandmothers and that’s ok in your world view that only cops should be armed?

There’s a reason that SWAT teams wear shirts with “POLICE” in big, fluorescent letters on their front and back. So your scenario is even more unlikely.

Armed citizens are just as likely to flee a gunfight as anyone else. The reason for being armed is to deal with the situation where you don’t have the opportunity to get away. It’s the same reason you probably own a fire extinguisher. You’re not yearning for the day that your house catches on fire so that you can use it, are you?

>4. You do identify a good target, but in a situation where it is not self-defense, you fire 12 >pistol shots. One actually downs the “evildoer” but you were so focused on the terrorist that >you didn’t see the crowd behind him. 3 of your other shots hit civilians. One grazes the leg >of a man, but another shoots half the face off a young woman, and the last rips up the liver >and one lung of a 11-year old boy..he bleeds out before he gets to the hospital.
>The cops arrest you. You chuckle and repeat the gun-lovers favorite “Well, I’d rather be >judged by 12 than carried by 6″. A few days later, in jail, your lawyer says that 8 people >have seized your savings and home by court order lien, that as a lawyer he still gets paid…but >your kids in college are out of luck and your wife lost all her credit..and any purchases >until the lawsuits are resolved must go through a court officer paid 60 bucks an hour to see >what are “necessary expenses”. Your personal liability insurance doesn’t cover it. And you >also have the criminal charges for killing the kid and wounding two, one seriously..that may >be filed despite your protestations that it is all the “terrorist’s fault”.

This scenario is wrong on so many levels it’s hard to know where to start. A “good target” is by definition a self defense scenario. In most states that allow CCW, citizens are permitted to use deadly force to protect themselves and others from deadly threats. So shooting a terrorist in front of a group of people won’t get you in trouble. In Texas (and other free states) you wouldn’t be arrested, and the law suits would be quickly dismissed. Maybe things are different in the liberal utopia you live in.

I guess instead of the citizen hitting 3 others and killing 1 you’d rather the terrorist have time to kill the entire crowd, change magazines, and look for another crowd?

And since you’re close enough to take out a terrorist with your pistol, then yes it would be much better to fight in the courts rather than be killed out of hand by the terrorist.

I suppose you’d rather deal with a life of guilt over having run away while the terrorist killed hundreds and you could have done something?

>5. The “armed citizen” is fairly useless in most terorist attacks, which use bombs and >surprise.

Which is why the terorists use bombs and only use these commando raids in areas where they know the citizens are unarmed.

>It may be of marginal value if you are in a hotel or other place with lots of people and you >have no opportunity to retreat..

Ok, here’s a scenario: 2,000 people in a hotel. 5% of the population has a CCW (such as in AZ) and is carrying. That’s 100 armed citizens against the 3 Mumbai terrorists assigned to a hotel. The scenario would end very differently than it did, wouldn’t it?

>As for airlines and cruise ships, security experts have concluded that armed private citizens >out of the control of the captain & crew would be absolute disasters endangering others and >continue to strongly endorse banning autonomous gun-wielders who would react on their own, and >unpredictably, to a terrorist or hostage situation and could make a bad situation far, far >worse. No ship or airplane captain wants “the armed citizen” on board. Neither does the >public. As a holder of a permit, I agree. Bad idea.

I’m sure the people on United 93 were very glad none of them were armed when they were going through the galley looking for makeshift weapons.

But I agree to some extent, at least now an airplane is an environment where the government can make sure that no one is armed. Cruise ships are a bit different, because the terrorists can board them without going through security. I guess that’s why I don’t go on cruises — it’s just a huge, floating unarmed victim zone.

Do you really want to live in an unarmed victim zone all the time?

Can you say the word genocide? I thought you could.

Really?

I stayed at the Taj for almost 10 days in early October. While there were metal detectors and mandatory package checks at the lobby entrance (enhanced security measures were in effect), there were no armed guards or police on the hotel grounds or in the Gateway of India plaza directly across the street. No doubt such measures were considered to be bad for business.

In other words, there was absolutely nothing in place that would have deterred an armed assailant, to say nothing of an organized paramilitary assault.

How reckless and irresponsible of the Indian security officials and the ownership of the targeted hotels. The nearly 200 dead are as assuredly victims of Indian incompetence as they were killed by LET bullets and grenades.