VA-ALERT: VCDL Update 5/5/15

[OakRidgeStars]

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Not yet a VCDL member? Join VCDL at: http://www.vcdl.org/join
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VCDL's meeting schedule: http://www.vcdl.org/meetings
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Abbreviations used in VA-ALERT: http://www.vcdl.org/help/abbr.html
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1. VCDL picnic at Foster Falls State Park on May 18th
2. Panel discussion in Stafford on June 3, “Know your Virginia gun rights”
3. Bedford Regional Water Authority has illegal “no weapons” sign
4. The difference between terror attacks in Paris, France and Garland, Texas? GUNS
5. Anti-gun Tobi Keith’s Bar and Grill closes in Woodbridge
6. Lion & Bull in Haymarket bans guns
7. Federal court ’s “touchy, feely” ruling on military look-alike rifles ignores Constitution
8. The sound of the government retreating (from some gun confiscations)
9. Did I do that? Top negligent discharge videos
10. Do you know what 'dry firing' is and why you should do it? [VIDEO]
11. Guns for women on campus make sense
12. [TX] Campus carry could hurt cancer research
13. Top U.S. Army Marksman explains why gun nuts shoot better
14. The American 'gun culture' that saved Europe
15. Getting a gun legally in Europe may be hard...
16. Myths of European gun laws


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1. VCDL picnic at Foster Falls State Park on May 16th
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VCDL will hold its SW Virginia semi-annual family picnic on Saturday, May 16! This time at FOSTER FALLS STATE PARK.

HOURS: 11 AM to 4 PM, **rain or shine**

ALL VCDL members, families and any guests are invited! This will be a really fun day for the whole family, regardless of where you live in Virginia!

Come join us at the beautiful Foster Falls "River Shelter" on the banks of the New River for lots of fellowship & food.

VCDL will furnish charcoal-grilled burgers and hot dogs with all the fixin's, picnic salads and sides. This NOT a pot-luck event, but feel free to bring your favorite side dish to share if you would like to.

There will be door-prize drawings, and a celebratory cake. Several speakers are scheduled, including Philip Van Cleave, who will highlight the 2015 legislative session and veto-override session.

To insure that we have enough food and drinks for everyone, PLEASE RSVP TO al@vcdl.org and indicate how many adults and children who will be attending, and you will SAVE $4.00! RSVP and VCDL will reimburse your $4.00 parking fee!

Carry is legal in state parks.

DETAILED DIRECTIONS TO FOSTER FALLS STATE PARK:

From I-77, take Exit 24, go east on Rt 69 (Lead Mine Rd), turn LEFT on Rt 52 (Fort Chiswell Rd, Northbound), about 1.5 miles, Turn RIGHT on RT 608 (Foster Falls Road--EASTBOUND); and follow the signs about 1.3 miles to Orphanage Road and the park entrance (about 100 yards)

For a detailed map see:

http://www.mapquest.com/?q=116+Orphanag ... 24360-3067

or

http://tinyurl.com/pn74rf9

More details at:

http://www.dcr.virginia.gov/state-parks ... c_shelters


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2. Panel discussion in Stafford on June 3, “Know your Virginia gun rights”
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There will be a panel discussion titled, “Know your Virginia Gun Rights” from 6-8 pm on Wednesday, June 3rd at:

England Run Library, Stafford County
806 Lyons Blvd,
Fredericksburg, VA 22406

Speakers are:

Philip Van Cleave - Virginia Citizens Defense League
Ed Levine - Virginia Open Carry
Frank Martello - Retired Stafford County Deputy, Virginia Firearms Instructor
Jason M. Pelt - Stafford Criminal Defense Counselor

The event is open to the public.


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3. Bedford Regional Water Authority has illegal “no weapons” sign
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We are communicating with the Bedford Regional Water Authority over an illegal “No Weapons” sign on their door. It took a strongly-worded email to get their attention, but I got an email response today saying they are looking at their options and will be getting back to me.

As long as those options include removing that sign and eliminating the offending policy, we’ll be fine.

I’ll advise as we move forward on this issue.


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4. The difference between terror attacks in Paris, France and Garland, Texas? GUNS
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Guns: The Difference Between Garland And Paris
by AWR Hawkins3 May 2015790


When armed terrorists attacked Charlie Hebdo headquarters over Muhammad cartoons on January 7, unarmed police officers were forced to flee for their lives. When armed men attacked people gathered in Garland, Texas, on May 3 over Prophet Muhammad cartoons, armed police cut them down — and the Daily Mail reported that the body of one was left lying the street while police searched for explosives.

The difference between Garland and Paris can be summed up in one word: guns.

On January 7, CBS News relayed reports from Britain’s Telegraph newspaper that the first two officers to arrive “were apparently unarmed” and “fled after seeing gunmen armed with automatic weapons and possibly a grenade launcher.” The UK’s Independent reported that “three policemen arrived on bikes but had to leave because [the attackers] were armed.”

BBC reported the Paris gunmen killed 12 in their attack on Charlie Hebdo headquarters; that number includes 8 Charlie Hebdo “eight journalists, two police officers, a caretaker and a visitor.”

Moreover, the terrorists were able to continue their attack at different points in and around the city for the next 48 hours.

On January 19, Breitbart News reported that French police were demanding more guns as well as guns that were more powerful. The Charlie Hebdo attack was very lopsided — in favor of the terrorists — because of policing and arms policies, and had revealed a very important point: Gun control was not working.

Fast forward to Garland, Texas on Sunday, where approximately 75 attendees gathered in the Curtis Culwell Center to attend a contest for the best cartoon of Muhammad. The contest was sponsored by New York-based American Freedom Defense Initiative.

Just before the contest ended, two armed men allegedly drove up near the Culwell Center and shot and wounded a security guard before both were killed by heavily-armed Garland PD.

According to a City of Garland May 3 press release:

As today’s Muhammad Art Exhibit event at the Curtis Culwell Center was coming to an end, two males drove up to the front of the building in a car. Both males were armed and began shooting at a Garland ISD security officer. The GISD security officer’s injuries are not life-threatening. Garland Police officers engaged the gunmen, who were both shot and killed.

There was no prolonged, two-day pursuit of attackers, nor were there unarmed police officers dodging bullets on their bicycles. But there were plenty of guns in the hands of good guys who were keeping watch over the cartoon contest and who were charged with stopping any bad guys with guns who might show up.


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5. Anti-gun Tobi Keith’s Bar and Grill closes in Woodbridge
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Telling gun owners they weren’t welcome with their “no guns” sign probably didn’t help the bottom line.

http://www.insidenova.com/headlines/tob ... 2c6f7.html

or

http://tinyurl.com/pg6t4p5


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6. Lion & Bull in Haymarket bans guns
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The Lion & Bull restaurant in Haymarket is posted with a “No Weapons” sign. They have been added to VCDL’s High-Risk Business list for disarming the law-abiding but not the criminals. They might want to read item #5, above.

The Lion & Bull Restaurant and Grill is located in the Dominion Valley shopping center off of Route 15 in Haymarket, VA.

5351 Merchants View Square
Haymarket, VA 20169
Phone: (703)754-1166


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7. Federal court ’s “touchy, feely” ruling on military look-alike rifles ignores Constitution
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The two anti-gun judges wrote this little gem: "If a ban on semi-automatic guns and large-capacity magazines reduces the perceived risk from a mass shooting, and makes the public feel safer as a result, that’s a substantial benefit.”

What a crock of, well, you know. Laws should be based on rock-solid logic and reason, not nebulous feelings. And “feeling safe” and “being safe” are NOT the same thing.

The dissenting judge had it right and makes me want to cheer: "To be sure, assault rifles and large capacity magazines are dangerous, but their ability to project large amounts of force accurately is exactly why they are an attractive means of self-defense. While most persons do not require extraordinary means to defend their homes, the fact remains that some do. Ultimately, it is up to the lawful gun owner and not the government to decide these matters.”

http://www.guns.com/2015/04/28/federal- ... d-reasons/

or

http://tinyurl.com/plyc568


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8. The sound of the government retreating (from some gun confiscations)
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This case highlights the government simply taking valuable property (guns) from an individual without due process. If a gun owner finds himself prohibited from owning firearms, what’s wrong with letting him either sell those previously legally-owned guns or give them to family or friends? Why should the government be allowed to just snap them up and destroy them?

EM Dave Hicks emailed me this:

From washingtonpost.com: http://tinyurl.com/leyloy4
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volo ... etreating/


The sound of the government retreating
By David Post
February 25, 2015

I went to yesterday’s oral argument at the Supreme Court in the case of Henderson v. US, a case I blogged about earlier. The issue in the case is whether the prohibition on a convicted felon’s “possession” of firearms extends to a prohibition on a transfer of those firearms to a third party at the direction, and for the benefit, of the felon. [The amicus brief I submitted on behalf of the Institute for Justice, supporting Henderson’s argument that the statute should not be read to prohibit such transfers, is here].

Richard Re over on SCOTUSBlog has an excellent account of the day’s argument:

When the government has a dog of a case, someone has to draw the short straw and argue it. InHenderson v. United States, Assistant to the Solicitor General Ann O’Connell drew that straw. It seems clear that the Court will side with petitioner Tony Henderson – a felon seeking the right to sell or otherwise dispose of firearms that he owns but can no longer legally possess. In offering concession after concession and various fallback options, the government offered a case study in controlled implosions.

That sums it up pretty nicely. As I noted before, the government, in its brief on the merits, had more-or-less surrendered on the central legal issue in the case, abandoning the 11th Circuit’s holding that no such transfers are ever permitted, as a matter of law, because allowing the transfer would constitute an exercise by the felon of “dominion and control” over the firearms and would therefore amount to an exercise of “constructive possession” over them. [Second-best line of the day from the Court: Justice Breyer, who said: “I mean, to me, when somebody uses the word “constructive X,” that just means it’s not X and and it’s a way of pretending that it’s X when it isn’t.” ]

The government’s attorney – Ass’t SG Ann O’Connell – tried to make lemonade out of this lemon, with little success. The government’s position was: the statute does indeed prohibit convicted felons from exercising “constructive possession” over any firearms he/she may own, but not all transfers are thereby prohibited; transfers to a federally-licensed firearms dealer, for sale on the open market (with proceeds going to the felon-owner), are OK, because that wouldn’t involve the exercise of “dominion and control” over the property. As a number of the Justices pointed out, O’Connell was never able to establish why (a) a request to “please transfer my firearms to Mr. Jones, who has offered to pay me $1000 for them” involves the felon’s “constructive possession”, but (b) a request to “please ask licensed dealer X to sell my firearms” does not; or why (a) a request to “please transfer my firearms to my brother Jimmy” constitutes constructive possession, but not if Jimmy ends up buying the guns from the licensed dealer.

It was all a bit of a muddle and a mess – though the outcome seems pretty certain (and correct): the Court will surely reverse the 11th Circuit and hold that transfers at the direction of the convicted felon do not constitute “possession” within the meaning of the statute (and the Court may well, following Justice Breyer, abandoning the whole “constructive possession” nonsense entirely). Could well be unanimous.

And in case you’re wondering what was the best line at oral argument, that honor goes (as it so often does) to Justice Scalia. At the tail end of the hour, when Daniel Ortiz, Henderson’s lawyer – who did, incidentally, a terrific job — was using his rebuttal time, Justice Scalia referred him back to the beginning of his argument, when he had said that a particular detail of Henderson’s argument appeared in five different places in the record. He had been interrupted, first time around, before he could get through all of the five, and Scalia asked him to do so, “just in case I’m unfortunate enough to be assigned this opinion.” Maybe you had to be there, but it was pretty darn funny – we’ll see if Chief Justice Roberts picks up the theme as does indeed assign it to him . . .


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9. Did I do that? Top negligent discharge videos
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True gun safety (not the baloney from “gun safety experts" who are nothing more than gun controllers in sheep’s clothing) is important to all gun owners. Here is a series of videos to remind all of us to ALWAYS follow the basic gun-safety rules.

Member Walter Jackson emailed me this:

From controversialtimes.com: https://tinyurl.com/ng9hzel
http://controversialtimes.com/issues/co ... ge-videos/


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10. Do you know what 'dry firing' is and why you should do it? [VIDEO]
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From theblaze.com: http://tinyurl.com/m8l6ljl
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/02 ... -doing-it/


Shooters: Do You Know What ‘Dry Firing’ Is and Why You Should Be Doing It?
by Mike Opelka
February 18, 2015

Can you improve your shooting skills without spending a fortune on ammunition? According to sharpshooter Kirsten Joy Weiss, the answer is an enthusiastic “yes!”

Dry firing involves a shooter going through the entire process of shooting without actually having a live round in the chamber.

Of course, this eliminates the noise and recoil: “All you hear is the click of the trigger as you take the shot,” she says.

During training sessions, Weiss suggests dry firing three rounds for every live round you fire. She’s also quick to point out the economic benefit of dry firing, “As we all know, ammunition is one biggest expenses of shooting, and it adds up.”

What are you looking for when you dry fire your weapon? Weiss talks about three simple actions she focuses on in order to perfect the technique of pressing the trigger without moving your “sight picture.”

-Smooth trigger press
-Steadiness — shooting without moving your “sight picture”
-Follow through — the act of staying on your gun after your shot is released

One very important point shared by Weiss, dry firing should only be done on weapons made for center-fire ammunition. Using a rifle or handgun meant for rim fire ammunition could damage the gun’s firing pin.


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11. Guns for women on campus make sense
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EM Dave Hicks emailed me this:


From cnn.com: http://tinyurl.com/qd3z7b8
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/02/23/opini ... index.html


Guns for women on campus make sense
By S.E. Cupp, Host
February 23, 2015

(CNN)As the nation contemplates better ways to prevent sexual assault on college campuses, legislators and college administrators alike have recently offered some mind-bogglingly dumb ideas.

One of them is California's new requirement that students at state schools sign consent contracts before (and during!) sexual intercourse to avoid any confusion -- as if most rapes are the result of mere miscommunications.

Others insist that holding fast to the time-honored but totally ineffective tradition of adjudicating sexual assaults within the university instead of in courts of law (as if they are student council issues instead of crimes) is the best way to protect the colleges, er, the rape victims.

While there are certainly problems on campus that need addressing, binge drinking among them, the obvious solution to make an unsafe environment safer is to give students a fighting chance to fend off attackers. That means allowing them to be armed.

It might not surprise you to learn that guns are banned on most college campuses; most are so-called "gun free zones" (that somehow criminals with guns manage to penetrate).

But many colleges, including my alma mater, Cornell University, also ban knives, stun guns and pepper spray, leaving young women (and increasingly young men) with only their hands to defend themselves in the case of an attack.

Students -- even those who are licensed gun owners -- are systematically disarmed at the college gates and told to rely on campus security guards, who rarely stumble upon a rape in progress, and call boxes to protect themselves against sexual assaults. And when they are attacked, despite these supposedly good security systems, they are told to rely on college administrators and a jury of their peers to mete out justice. How is this responsible?

With lawmakers in 10 states now contemplating campus carry laws that would finally treat college students like free citizens instead of wards of the state, the usual anti-gun voices are coming out to dismiss this fairly straightforward idea as sheer insanity.

But isn't this about women's rights?

As a woman and a gun owner, I've never understood why there wasn't more overlap between the gun rights groups and feminists. On abortion, the feminists are clear: No man is going to tell a woman what to do with her body, or even that of her unborn child. "No uterus? No opinion," as the saying goes.

But when it comes to rape (on college campuses or anywhere else for that matter) feminists are perfectly comfortable allowing men -- in particular Democrats in Washington -- to tell them how they can and cannot defend themselves.

Where, for example, was the outcry from the National Organization for Women when Vice President Joe Biden told women that they "don't need 30 rounds to protect" themselves, nor do they need a semi-automatic rifle, which he said would be "harder to aim" and "harder to use." Instead, he suggested firing a shotgun into the dead of night, which is illegal in most places.

Where were the feminists when Colorado Democratic State Rep. Joe Salazar said women can't be trusted with a gun because "you just don't know who you're going to be shooting at" and "you don't know if you feel like you're gonna be raped." Instead, he insisted, women should just trust the system. "It's why we have call boxes, it's why we have safe zones, it's why we have whistles," he said.

So why, then, do women still get raped?

Likewise, I listened carefully but heard no outrage from women's rights groups over the University of Colorado's tips for female students to avoid being attacked. Some bordered on the absurd, like "vomiting or urinating may convince the attacker to leave you alone." Others were downright offensive, like "passive resistance may be your best defense."

So, rather than allow a woman to actually defend herself, the University of Colorado believes a woman can urinate her way out of a rape or she might just have to sit there and take it.

When will this madness end? And when will feminists demand that women on college campuses be allowed to protect and defend themselves against sexual assault?

We've tried things your way for a long time, colleges. And disarming students and pretending there's no problem hasn't worked. Isn't it time to bring common sense back to campus?


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12. [TX] Campus carry could hurt cancer research
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Antis are entertaining. I had my share of laughs as I worked through the tortured attempt, below, to make a connection between campus carry and cancer research.

Member Walter Jackson emailed me this:


From breitbart.com: http://tinyurl.com/mzl8jn7
http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2015/02/ ... -research/


HOUSTON CHRONICLE: CAMPUS CARRY COULD HURT CANCER RESEARCH
by AWR Hawkins
February 22, 2015

On February 21 the Houston Chronicle claimed the passage of Campus Carry in Texas could hurt education at colleges and universities and quoted M.D. Anderson’s Julie Penne saying it could hurt “cancer research” as well.

According to the Chronicle, legalizing the carry of handguns on campus “could cost tens of millions of dollars” and that money “could be…siphoned away from education and research programs at Texas universities.”

Using data from the Texas higher education systems, the Chronicle claims that many of the costs would be in increasing university police departments in response to law-abiding citizens carrying guns for self-defense. More “gun safes and lockers” would also have to be installed on campuses and “‘de-escalation’ and ‘judgment’ training for staff and on-campus security” would come at a high cost as well.

State senator Rodney Ellis (D-Houston) said: “We should be arming our children with a 21st century education, not arming them with handguns. As the cost of higher education continues to grow, it doesn’t make sense to push more unfunded mandates onto the backs of students and their families.”

Julie Penne, M.D. Anderson’s associate director for external communications, said “costs would be covered out of proceeds from patient revenue, which would normally go toward cancer research, education, and prevention efforts.”

State senator Brian Birdwell (R-Granbury) rejected these arguments, saying:

It is patently absurd to suggest that additional security resources would be needed to accommodate faculty, staff or student [concealed handgun license] holders on Texas campuses. CHL-holders are statistically the most law-abiding citizens in our state, and I think it bordering on offensive to suggest that they will conduct themselves any less thoughtfully or lawfully the moment they set foot inside a university building.


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13. Top U.S. Army Marksman explains why gun nuts shoot better
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The antis are running for the Pepto Bismol about this time.

EM Greg Trojan emailed me this:


From medium.com: http://tinyurl.com/nbdz7ug
https://medium.com/war-is-boring/top-ar ... 9f8dfd917f


Top U.S. Army Marksman Explains Why Gun Nuts Shoot Better

Master Sgt. Scott Satterlee says the military could learn a lot from civilians
by Kevin Knodell
February 22, 2015

Master Sgt. Scott Satterlee is really good at shooting things. He’s a member of the U.S. Army’s elite 1st Special Forces Group based at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state. He’s also a nationally ranked competitive precision rifle shooter—and one of the military’s best marksmen.

You wouldn’t guess any of this if you met him. Satterlee is soft-spoken and humble—to the point of almost being self-deprecating. Though confident in his abilities, he doesn’t brag.

Recent hit films such as Zero Dark Thirty, Lone Survivor and American Sniper have put America’s special operations community in the spotlight like never before. It’s an odd turn of events for a community often called “the silent professionals.”

Satterlee says he ordinarily wouldn’t talk to a reporter. But another soldier encouraged him to share his story.

Satterlee says he has learned a lot about firearms in the world of competitive shooting. It’s influenced how he shoots—and why he came to recognize flaws in how the military prepares soldiers for war.

He’s the operations sergeant at JBLM’s Special Forces Advanced Urban Combat Course. After years of combat deployments around the world, training soldiers and shooting at civilian weapon ranges around the United States, he thinks it’s time we radically revamp the way we think about firearms training.

He says new approaches could save a lot of lives—soldiers and civilians alike.

Shooting things for a living

Satterlee grew up in the Pacific Northwest. He became familiar with firearms at an early age, and was an avid hunter. In those days, shooting was purely recreational, and he channeled most of his competitive drive into sports and athletics.

He joined the Army out of high school, and has been a member of elite fighting units during most of his career. His first assignment was the 2nd Ranger Battalion at what was then Fort Lewis.

While there, he befriended Lance Dement, a competitive shooter from Texas who later joined the U.S. shooting team at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. The two regularly spent time at civilian shooting ranges.

Then Satterlee joined the 1st Special Forces Group. While many units focus on making soldiers proficient in whatever weapons they’re assigned, Satterlee’s team pushed expertise for all the weapons in the operators’ arsenal. The range became a central part of life.

He spent several years stationed in Okinawa. There, his training emphasized counter-terrorism and direct action—fast, violent, surgical raiding operations. He practiced under some of the military’s most experienced special operations warriors—including legendary Delta Force operator Kyle Lamb.

“They had a huge impact on my style of shooting,” Satterlee says.

Several tours in Iraq, Afghanistan and The Philippines put his skills to the test. He and his fellow operators launched raids, hunted terrorists and passed on their skills to local, allied troops.

These were often sensitive operations. The kind officials vaguely credited to “members of coalition forces” during press conferences.

Then Satterlee took on a wildly different assignment. He became an enlisted adviser to an ROTC program at a university on the East Coast—training college kids to be officers. It was very different from the special operations world.

For one, the ROTC’s training standards and leadership philosophies were far more conventional and rigid. But one of the biggest changes for Satterlee was that they didn’t have a shooting range. Access to—and training with—firearms was extremely limited.

He missed it immediately. To make up for the lost training, Saterlee began seeking out civilian shooting groups during his free time.

Whole new world

In short order, Satterlee became involved in the world of competitive shooting. Luckily, he found a large network of gun enthusiasts along the East Coast.

Many of the civilian hobbyists were much better shots than he expected. In fact, they were more than good—some of them gave the special ops warrior a run for his money.

It was a humbling experience—and an awakening for Satterlee.

He explains that competitive shooting used to be modeled around military and law enforcement practices. But over time, philosophies—and methods—evolved. Competitive shooters began introducing new variables.

These variables include different targets. The shooter would have to determine which ones constitute threats, and which ones do not. There’s shooting on the move, while trying to hit a target that’s also moving. All done under time constraints and considerable pressure.

“There’s no other sport or training that focuses on the draw, reloading, target acquisition, instantly being able to place accurate fire on a target while moving—and all this is done faster than any other sport with live ammunition,” former U.S. Practical Shooting Association president Mike Voight said in an interview with American Handgunner.

The Army’s marksmanship training hasn’t changed very much, while the wars we send soldiers to fight have.

“It can’t be ignored anymore,” he says. “At some point, we need to decide how good we want to be.”

He takes aim at many old school “secrets” to shooting that he believes derive from flawed reasoning. In particular, he lambasts the commonly repeated advice that shooters should “squeeze” the trigger in such a way that they feel surprised when the weapon goes off.

“I consider that a negligent discharge,” Satterlee says. He’s firm that surprise is never something a soldier should feel while handling a firearm.

“You should know when you’re going to shoot something,” he declares.

He said another faulty notion is the idea that the shooter should keep their focus on their weapon’s sight as they aim. “That’s good for bullseyes or a stationary target,” he says.

But in combat zones, things rarely stay in place. People constantly move—and if you focus on your optics, you can lose your target. Being aware of your surroundings is critical.

“You have to constantly assess the threat,” he explains.

Train how you fight

Satterlee explained that a lot of marksmanship training is still centered around “peer-to-peer” fighting scenarios—battles against other uniformed enemies with well-defined battle lines.

But contemporary battlefields bear little resemblance to that conventional paradigm. American troops aren’t fighting Panzers anymore.

Today, soldiers often find themselves in much more ambiguous settings—dominated by militias, guerrillas and spies. A civilian might approach to give soldiers critical information about the enemy … or blow them up in a suicide attack.

Satterlee said that practical exercises should force shooters to make quick assessments and act decisively. He said he often wonders how many soldiers might be alive today had they not hesitated to ask for permission to act when they saw a threat.

“On the flip side,” he adds. “How many [civilians] down range might be alive that didn’t need to die?”

He said those questions are the biggest takeaways from his time deployed in the Middle East and Southeast Asia.

On the battlefield, soldiers have to make decisions quickly. But acting fast can’t mean acting in a rushed or sloppy way. You need to be very deliberate. Handling a weapon is a huge responsibility—as is taking a life.

Satterlee says that for a soldier’s sanity, he or she needs to know they’re doing the right thing when they take their shot. They need to feel confident that they can determine if the car approaching them is packed with explosives, or just a dad rushing to get home to his family.

He says they need to train in an environment that simulates the uncertainty of a modern war zone, without its lethality. They need training that allows them to fail safely, and to reflect and learn from mistakes.

He’s taken his lessons from the world of competitive shooting and brought them to how he trains soldiers at JBLM. He’s a seasoned special operations veteran with years of experience—and one of the top shooters in the nation—so his commanders give him exceptional leeway to experiment in his training.

As a member of 1st Group, he’s in an environment that welcomes innovation and creative problem solving. His commanders trust his judgment. It’s an elite unit—everyone who comes through his doors for the urban combat course is handpicked.

He asserts that soldiers—especially new recruits—need to learn about the complexities of modern conflict much earlier. He says they need to learn how to assess threats and to know the consequences of both indecision and rashness.

He admits that it’s significantly harder to give large, conventional units that sort of training, compared to smaller and adaptable elite units. However, he proposes that the Army can impart these lessons with audiovisual aids and gaming-style training.

But the challenge of introducing new training techniques and philosophies isn’t just logistical—it’s cultural.

Change hurts

By their very nature, military organizations are highly regimented and steeped in tradition. But Satterlee says that when certain rules and traditions become outdated, these institutions can be painfully resistant to change.

“Standard operating procedure becomes dogma,” he observes.

He said there’s a tendency toward overly-linear thinking that prevents leaders from adapting to new challenges. Senior leaders often reject new ideas out of hand, because it’s not how they learned.

But failures in Iraq and Afghanistan have severely bruised many of those egos. As a result, military leaders today are far more vocal about reform, and some are surprisingly candid about what hasn’t worked. Perhaps more than ever, many commanders are willing to entertain new ideas.

That includes Lt. Gen. Stephen Lanza, U.S. Army I Corps commander and JBLM’s most senior officer. Lanza has said the Army needs to explore new approaches in how the leadership should tackle wartime contingencies and instability—and to avoid the mistakes of the past.

“We must adapt faster than that instability,” the general recently told an audience of cadets and civilians at University of Washington in Seattle.

That’s easier said than done. Even when the military is ready for change, that doesn’t necessarily mean the larger defense establishment is.

But at 1st Group, Satterlee says their philosophy on change is simple. “If it doesn’t work, we fix it.”


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14. The American 'gun culture' that saved Europe
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America’s “gun culture” is one of the things that makes this country great.

Member Walter Jackson emailed me this:


From gopusa.com: http://tinyurl.com/q28s5vz
http://www.gopusa.com/commentary/2015/0 ... ed-europe/


The American 'gun culture' that saved Europe
By Miguel A. Faria Jr., M.D.
February 24, 2015

An interesting conversation with a European neurosurgical colleague, who decries the "gun culture" of America, took place that may be of interest to readers of GOPUSA. The dialogue began with a difference of opinion on an unrelated topic, but in the course of that exchange, I happened to innocently use a figure of speech that offended the other party, and the conversation below ensued.

What I wrote was: "Although only three paragraphs long, Dr. Z's letter is a loaded gun of criticism with serious implications that require considerable historic and philosophic discussion and cannot possibly be answered fully in a few paragraphs.

Dr Z: "Dr Faria's comment tries to rewrite my letter but does not succeed. Certainly, my letter was no “loaded gun” — it caused none of the physical injuries, death and human misery inflicted by the 'loaded gun' culture that some choose to celebrate."

And with that retort, one may say, therein lies the rub. It happens that I had written a two-part comprehensive editorial entitled, "America, Guns, and Freedom," which had upset not only Dr. Z but also his mentor Dr. H at a prestigious institution in Europe. Both of them deplore America's "gun culture." A long correspondence had ensued on that occasion with Dr. H, who seemed to blame America for most of the evils in the world. Thinking he was naïve, I gently tried to dissuade him from such an erroneous opinion.

On this occasion I also responded to Dr. Z cordially that he obviously referred to my two-part editorial, "America, Guns and Freedom," when he made the remark, as they had been published in the medical journal in question. I reminded him that totalitarianism was not just a mere curiosity of the past, but history that should serve as lessons for avoiding erroneous repetition in the future. It was a "gun culture" of free citizens that preserved freedom in the 20th century — and hopefully will do so in the 21st!(1,2)

It was the American "gun culture" that liberated Western Europeans from the Nazis during World War II and subsequently also protected all of free Europe from the Red Army and the rolling Soviet tanks during the cold war. Moreover, witnessing the renewed roaring of the Russian Bear in the Caucasus and the Ukraine, I reminded him the Europeans may require further protection from the U.S. "gun culture" in the near future!

I went on explaining that it had been because of the protection afforded by the American "gun culture" that Europeans, including our cousins in Great Britain, were able to create and sustain in peace the social and economic "safety nets" of which they are so proud.

I was not putting down our Europeans friends and Europe to offend them. I stated Europe was worth defending as it was the birthplace of Western civilization and consequently the midwife of American culture! His derogatory statement, though, required a response.

Then I brought up a little history. Dr. Z, who practices neurosurgery in the British National Health Service but is not a native Briton, I admitted, may also not have been aware that the celebrated British Home Guard (1940-1944) was short of guns during World War II because of England's gun control policies. The Home Guard required guns urgently for the defense of the homeland as the Germans prepared for the invasion of Britain after their victory at Dunkirk. In near panic, some Home Guard units were even issued home made Croft's pikes (after Lord Croft, the Under-Secretary of State for War), which Prime Minister Winston Churchill had to promote as "effective and silent" weapons to fight the invading Nazis!

But in another hour of need, the "gun culture" of America came to the rescue. Private American citizens and the much hated National Rifle Association (NRA) collected and shipped large numbers of privately donated guns for use by the Home Guard.(3,4)

Winston Churchill stated eloquently in his book, Their Finest Hour: "When the ships from America approached our shores with their priceless arms, special trains were waiting in all ports to receive their cargoes. The Home Guard in every county, in every village, sat up through the night to receive them.... By the end of July we were an armed nation...."(4)

Most of the guns were never returned. They were melted down after the war when Britain resumed her gun control and social programs — sheltered by the Pax Americana as did the rest of Europe.(1,2)

Dr. Z, apparently not a bit annoyed by the embarrassing historical facts, then concluded: "I will not engage you further on “gun culture” or geopolitics save to say that — thankfully — many would disagree with your views on both matters." To which I responded that my historical details were referenced, verifiable facts, and that of course any geopolitical discussion would result in disagreements.(5) At the the height of the cold war, for example, there were many Europeans (and some Americans, no doubt) chanting "Better Red than Dead," preferring communist slavery to freedom. I'm thankful that those so chanting did not prevail, instead those of us in the "gun culture" with the contrary opinion won in the cold war. And that ended the discussion at least on the topic of American "gun culture." I'll let you know if there is more, so stay tuned.


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15. Getting a gun legally in Europe may be hard
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Member Mark Shinn emailed me this:

Shocking! The Washington Post publishes the truth. Does the black market exist? Yes! Can bad people acquire weapons? Yes!


From washingtonpost.com: http://tinyurl.com/np996th
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/eur ... story.html


Getting a gun legally in Europe may be hard, but terrorists have little trouble

The same open-border policies that allow people and goods to flow freely across Europe also make it extremely difficult to crack down on illegal weapons. (Oliver Bunic/Bloomberg)
By Griff Witte and Karla Adam
February 19, 2015

COPENHAGEN — Europe, a continent long known for the rarity of gun violence, is confronting twin challenges that give the issue sudden urgency: a growing population of radicalized young men determined to strike targets close to home, and a black market awash in high-powered weapons.

The problem has been rendered vividly in recent weeks by a pair of deadly assaults that each paralyzed a European capital. In Paris and Copenhagen, the attacks were carried out by former small-time criminals turned violent extremists who obtained military-grade illicit weapons with apparent ease.

In contrast with the free-firing United States, Europe is generally seen as a haven from serious gun violence. Here in Denmark, handguns and semiautomatic rifles are all but banned. Hunting rifles are legally available only to those with squeaky-clean backgrounds who have passed a rigorous exam covering everything from gun safety to the mating habits of Denmark’s wildlife.

“There’s a book about 1,000 pages thick,” said Tonni Rigby, one of only two licensed firearms dealers in Copenhagen. “You have to know all of it.”

But if you want an illicit assault rifle, such as the one used by a 22-year-old to rake a Copenhagen cafe with 28 bullets on Saturday, all it takes are a few connections and some cash.

“It’s very easy to get such a weapon,” said Hans Jorgen Bonnichsen, a former operations director for the Danish security service PET. “It’s not only a problem for Denmark. It’s a problem for all of Europe.”

European leaders have made tighter controls on weapons trafficking a priority in recent weeks, following the killing of 17 people in Paris by three attackers. The shootings in Copenhagen this past weekend, which left two people dead, raised the ominous prospect of copycat attacks across Europe.

But officials acknowledge there is no clear solution. The same open-border policies that allow people and goods to flow freely across the continent also make it extremely difficult to crack down on illegal weapons — a fact that arms dealers have been all too eager to exploit.

“You can find Kalashnikovs for sale near the train station in Brussels,” acknowledged a Brussels-based European Union official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record. “They’re available even to very average criminals.”

In the case of the Paris attackers, they were able to obtain an entire arsenal: AK-47 assault rifles, pistols, a Skorpion submachine gun and even a rocket-propelled-grenade launcher. All of it was purchased in Brussels for about $5,000, according to Belgian media reports.

The availability of such weapons in the heart of Western Europe isn’t new. The flood of high-powered weaponry began with the dissolution of the Soviet Union and continued through the 1990s as war raged across the Balkans. Many of the weapons from those periods are still circulating. They have lately been supplemented by an influx from the turmoil in North Africa, with weapons smuggled on ships across the Mediterranean.

The guns have been used primarily by criminal gangs that turn them on one another during periodic turf wars.

But beginning with attacks in the French city of Toulouse in 2012 that left seven people dead, guns have also become the weapon of choice for Islamist terrorists in Europe.

That’s a shift from the last decade, when bombs were used in mass-casualty attacks on transit systems in London and Madrid.

The new tactics may reflect the lone-wolf nature of the recent assailants, who seem to have operated with relative autonomy and not as part of centrally directed terrorist plots.

Analysts say explosives can be easier to detect than guns and are harder to transport and assemble. Guns also require less expertise, allowing even petty gangsters such as Omar Abdel Hamid el-Hussein, the assailant in Copenhagen, to carry out deadly strikes.

The use of guns has enabled terrorists to pick their victims more precisely. In Paris and Copenhagen, the targets were the same: cartoonists, police officers and Jews.

Guns have also been the weapon of choice in other recent lone-wolf attacks carried out in Ottawa and Sydney, suggesting the problem is hardly limited to Europe.

But it is a particularly challenging issue for Europe because of the continent’s open borders. With 28 countries in the European Union, each with its own rules and regulations, controlling the flow of weapons has been nearly impossible.

“A firearm that is illegal in one country may be legal in another,” said Raffaello Pantucci, director of international security studies at the London-based Royal United Services Institute. “You have continuous land all the way through to Russia and into the Balkans, which of course until a few decades ago was a war zone.”

Even assessing the scale of the problem has proven too difficult for Europe. A comprehensive European Commission study released last year cited an estimate of 67?million illicit firearms across the continent. But it also noted that the total was probably overstated and concluded that “no accurate quantification of the problem is feasible.”

U.S. law enforcement has long maintained an extensive database of lost and stolen weapons. But Europe has only recently begun to do so, working in concert with Interpol. So far, the database is believed to contain only a small fraction of the total.

One country that has largely succeeded in keeping illicit firearms out is the United Kingdom. Because Britain does not participate in the continent’s open-borders program — and because it is an island with strictly enforced weapons laws — guns are rare. Out of desperation, criminals and would-be terrorists in Britain have occasionally turned to antique weaponry — flintlock pistols and Wild West-style revolvers — as the most deadly options available.

Hussein, who first attacked a cafe and then struck at a synagogue, had a much wider selection to choose from. His primary weapon — an M95 assault rifle that can fire up to 900 rounds a minute — was stolen from the home of a member of the Danish Home Guard in 2013, police say. Hussein probably purchased it illegally, along with two semiautomatic handguns.

Analysts say the M95, which was used by the Danish army from 1995 until 2010, is more uncommon on the black market than other weapons. Kalashnikovs are “fairly easy to get ahold of. It’s the heavier-caliber, larger machine guns that are more difficult,” said Philip Boyce, a firearms expert with Forensic Equity.

But thefts can bring them into circulation. In 2009, more than 200 weapons — including grenade launchers and machine guns — were plundered from a Danish military barracks in what prosecutors later said was an inside job.

Even with the high-profile gun attacks of recent weeks, there’s been no major push in Denmark or elsewhere in Europe to loosen the gun laws. While American firearms advocates preach the necessity of self-defense, the argument holds little sway on a continent where citizens have seldom had to worry about gun violence — and hope the recent killings prove an aberration.

“As I see it,” said Rigby, the Copenhagen gun dealer, “more guns on the streets only means more trouble.”


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16. Myths of European gun laws
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From calgunlaws.com: https://tinyurl.com/kcyl2f7
http://www.calgunlaws.com/myths-of-european-gun-laws/


Myths of European Gun Laws
by Darrin Weiner
March 18, 2013

Several years ago Canadian criminologist Gary Mauser and I published what is apparently the only extensive study of violent crime and gun laws internationally. Our study debunked two widespread myths: First, that European gun laws are much more restrictive than American; and second, that Europe has less violence than America. [“Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide: A Review of International Evidence,” Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, vol 30 (2007)].

EUROPEAN GUN LAWS

Now it is true that European gun laws are often different from ours. This is largely because they aim to stem political violence, not apolitical gun crime. But they are not generally more restrictive. Only sheer ignorance of Europe explains anti-gun claims that European gun laws are much more restrictive than ours and that those laws cause Europe to have much less violent crime.

The falsity of such claims appears in the record of the Supreme Court case that struck down Washington D.C.’s ban on handguns or and on keeping any gun loaded for self defense (Heller). An amicus brief filed there by dozens of European professors said their various lands’ laws were far less restrictive of gun ownership than D.C. [Brief of Amicus Curiae International Scholars in Support of the Respondent; District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) (No. 07-290), 2008 WL 466090].

Moreover European gun laws generally allow far more extensive gun use against crime than American law does. Let me begin with two examples of that point.

SHOOTING THIEVES

A Columbia Law School professor uses a German case to illustrate how European law greatly differs from American. In the 1920s a German farmer was tried for shooing starving children who were stealing from his orchard. Now under our law, which is based on what is deemed reasonable, the farmer was clearly guilty. But he was exonerated by the German court because European law follows the thought of Immanuel Kant: There is the Right and there is the Wrong – and never need the Right yield to the Wrong! The farmer is in the Right and the starving children are in the Wrong. So if the only way to stop their thefts is to shoot them, then shoot them he may.

A later German statute overturned this – but in a way that reinforces it. The statute only overrules the case if children are shot. But the farmer may shoot if an adult steals his fruit.

SHOOTING A RETREATING RAPIST

The following is not an actual case but a hypothetical I constructed to illustrate the difference of Anglo-American law from more gun-friendly European law. HYPOTHETICAL: A rapist attacks a woman but retreats when she draws a gun from her purse. The woman, frightened and outraged, shoots him anyway. Under our law this is called “imperfect self-defense.” It is manslaughter (not murder) if the rapist dies; assault with a deadly weapon if he does not.

But under Austrian, Dutch, French, German and Italian law the result is entirely different. If she shot him from “outrage” (i.e., vigilantism) at his attack the court can just acquit her.

BUYING/OWNING GUNS – LAW JUST AS PERMISSIVE AS OURS

As to buying and owning guns, European laws are generally as permissive as American. It is true that you need a special permit to buy a 9 mm. handgun in many European nations. What ignorant American gun prohibitionists don’t understand is that this is a special control on “military-caliber weapons.” Similar controls ban military caliber rifles without special permission. But there is no restriction on other rifles or on handguns in, for instance, .380, .38 Super, 9mm Ultra and many more powerful handguns e.g., any of the magnums or .40 S&W, .45 auto, .45 Long Colt, .454 Casull, .460 S&W Magnum, 475 Linebaugh, .480, .500 and other powerful handguns.

ITALY – GUN LAWS

Unlike residents of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts or California, law abiding responsible Italians can buy any revolver or semi-auto they want. No permit is required nor is there any waiting period. Though the handgun must be registered, buying it involves less fuss and red tape than Americans face even in Texas.

AUSTRIA – GUN LAWS

Austrians require permits for semi-automatic pistols but not to buy a revolver. Moreover law abiding responsible adults have a specific legal right to a permit for a semi-automatic pistol for home defense.

AUSTRIAN CARRY PERMITS

Permits to carry are much more available to law abiding Austrians than to Americans in New York, Massachusetts or California. For a population of over 37 million, California has about 40,000 carry permits. For its population of around seven million, Austria has over 200,000 carry permits.

FRANCE, GERMANY – GUN LAWS

In France and Germany permits (easily available to responsible adult householders) are required to possess a handgun of modern design. But if you are satisfied with a cowboy-style gun, France requires no permit at all to buy a newly manufactured revolver of pre-1895 design.

Consistent with its focus on political crime, European law precludes stockpiling guns. You might be able to own multiple guns in different calibers, but not 10 or 20 in the same caliber.

There are no magazine size restrictions on semi-autos.

CRIME RATES

Nine European nations have fewer than 5,000 guns per 100,000 population. Seven have more than three times as many guns per 100,000 population. The nine nations’ violent crime situation is disappointing, even shockingly contrary to the myth that restricting guns diminishes murder. Their murder rates are three times higher than those of the seven high gun ownership nations!

We collected many examples: Norway has far and away Western Europe’s highest household gun ownership (32% of households), but also its lowest murder rate. Holland has the lowest gun ownership in Western Europe (1.9%), and Sweden lies midway between (15.1). Yet the Dutch murder rate is half again higher than the Norwegian, and the Swedish rate is even higher yet, though only slightly. Greece has over twice the per capita gun ownership of the Czech Republic, yet gun murder is much lower in Greece and the Greek murder rate with all weapons is also lower. Though Spain has over 12 times more gun ownership than Poland, the latter has almost a third more gun murder, and its overall murder rate is almost
twice Spain’s. Poor Finland: it has 14 times more of these evil guns than its neighbor Estonia. Yet Estonia’s gun murder and overall murder rates are about seven times higher than Finland’s.

The nations of Western Europe and Scandinavia – whose gun laws are often less restrictive than American — have very low murder rates. But not the nations that ban guns. For instance:

RUSSIA

Russia banned handguns in 1929 and also strictly controls long guns. Its murder rates and those of gun banning former Soviet possessions and satellites in Europe are much higher than American. (U.S. – fewer than 5 murders per 100,000 population; Russia – more than 20 murders per 100,000 population.)

But yes, if your only concern is eliminating GUN murder, Russia has virtually done that – despite having an overall murder rate far exceeding the U.S. and most of the rest of Europe. So what the Russian experience proves is that outlawing handguns does nothing to prevent murder.

Russia’s handgun ban succeeded largely because Russians are too poor to afford them. But Russia also has a unique policy. It chose for military and police guns and ammunition that is unique, so even if a Russian soldier smuggled a foreign gun home he could not find ammo there.

ENGLAND

What about ultra-restrictive England where all legally owner handguns were confiscated in 1997? Its murder rate is the highest in Western Europe and English violent crime overall is much higher than in the U.S. England annually has over 45,000 violent crimes per 100,000 population while the US has 33,600. For robberies the English rate is 2000 per 100,000 population compared to 600 for the US. The English rate for rape is 6100 per 100,000 people — nearly three times higher than the US rate.

In the late 1990s hundreds of thousands of English handguns and many long guns were confiscated from owners law abiding enough to turn them in. Yet today English news media headline violent crime in the kind of doleful, melodramatic reports that for so long characterized American news reporting. The 2002 report of England’s National Crime Intelligence Service lamented, that though “Britain has some of the strictest gun laws in the world t appears that anyone who wishes to obtain a firearm [illegally] will have little difficulty in doing so.”

Also in 2002 Harvard University Press published Professor Joyce Lee Malcolm’s GUNS AND VIOLENCE: THE ENGLISH EXPERIENCE which summarizes the failure of English gun banning. In 1900 England had no gun control and a violence rate among the lowest in the world. After a century of ever more gun restriction “areas in England, America and Switzerland with the highest rates of gun ownership were in fact those with the lowest rates of violence.”

Concomitant is a federally sponsored study of all available information on gun controls was published. Though its authors were originally anti-gun, in researching the matter they found: “There is no evidence anywhere to show that reducing the availability of firearms in general likewise reduces their availability to persons with criminal intent or that persons with criminal intent would not be able to arm themselves under any set of general restrictions on firearms.” [James. D. Wright, Peter Rossi & Kathleen Daly, UNDER THE GUN: WEAPONS, CRIME AND VIOLENCE IN THE UNITED STATES 138].




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VA-ALERT is a project of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, Inc.
(VCDL). VCDL is an all-volunteer, non-partisan grassroots organization
dedicated to defending the human rights of all Virginians. The Right to
Keep and Bear Arms is a fundamental human right.

VCDL web page: http://www.vcdl.org [http://www.vcdl.org/]