Viability of Pieing

[HCM]

I'm still not sure what a singleton movement is, and I'm at least a semi-edjumakated hillbilly.

This thread confuses me. There seems to be an intermixing of team clearing of unknown structures with presumably hostile actors and clearing one's own home solo. I'm still not real clear on what the question is.

Phil Singleton moving by himself ?

[Coyotesfan97]

I was in my Department’s Tactical Unit for 25 years. I was on SWAT for 15 years and K9 for 16. There was an overlap of 6 years where I was in both. I couldn’t tell you how many thousands of structures I’ve helped clear. I know we took rounds through a wall with no injuries at least twice. It’s definitely a risk but not one that stopped us from clearing rooms. Frankly I was always more worried about someone hiding and playing angles more than taking rounds through a wall.

The most dangerous part of the job is clearing someone else’s house. We did a lot of things to force people out before clearing it. Try to clear it with a robot before anyone goes in. SWAT and K9 are pretty integrated. Usually a dog clears ahead of the team. That takes away a lot of the risk but dogs aren’t perfect. SWAT still expects to find someone the dog might have missed.

The scenario where you can see a foot and the suspect won’t surrender. We’d probably pull back a little bit and figure out what we wanted to do. Some options are Rake and break a window and put eyes on him allowing the use of less lethal on him. Gas the room thoroughly, deploy a diversionary device , and send the dog. (my favorite option lol) Shooting his foot is an option if it’s a deadly force encounter.

I’m sure the tactics we used would be familiar to any of the posters on this thread who have worked in a team environment. Our SWAT guys teach their slow and deliberate tactics to the recruits in the academy during building search training. That includes cutting the pie when you can and limited and push entries. The recruits are taught tactics SWAT uses all the time.

Clearing a house or a business by yourself is a world of suck. It can be done but it’s not going to be a best option and I don’t see a lot of scenarios where I’d do it. Just look at Glover’s video and count the number secondary threats like open doorways he has to deal with.

I reread this thread a couple times because I wasn’t sure what you’re looking for. At this point I’m still not clear. Clearing structures is dangerous work. You can use tactics to mitigate the risk but it’s always there.

[Coyotesfan97]

Phil Singleton moving by himself ?

Phil Singleton the Brit right? LOL he’s Welch. I was fortunate to attend one of his MP5 schools early in my career. We frequently jokingly called him British and he’d fire right back about taking the piss out of the Limey.

[HCM]

Phil Singleton the Brit right? LOL he’s Welch. I was fortunate to attend one of his MP5 schools early in my career. We frequently jokingly called him British and he’d fire right back about taking the piss out of the Limey.

Yup. If you were a child of the 80s you can't get more "tactical" than Phil Singleton with a Balaclava and an MP5...

[Lost River]

I'm still not sure what a singleton movement is, and I'm at least a semi-edjumakated hillbilly.

This thread confuses me. There seems to be an intermixing of team clearing of unknown structures with presumably hostile actors and clearing one's own home solo. I'm still not real clear on what the question is.

One thing I have noted (and I actually have a bachelor's degree in training and development) is that when people use "High Falutin" words to impress, especially as instructors, usually it is because they are trying to baffle people with their bullshit, and their resume is not exactly stellar.

The very best instructors/teachers, no matter the subject, and no matter their personal education level, use language that every person can clearly understand. They convey their message in a manner that a person with a PHD or a GED both will understand equally. By the same token, if the subject is clearing a room, and the audience is a mixture of neophytes and SOCOM Vets, the presenter uses plain language that everyone understands.

Speaking of "Slicing the Pie"; Real world example. In an event 10 year ago this year, I was doing it, going after a bad guy. A younger officer who was a "Hard Charger" and to be frank had his Competence and Confidence scale unbalanced went charging around some corners a little hard and ate a bullet for his actions. I was not surprised to see him getting carried out of the building. I went after the shooter, as he had already killed someone else. He was waiting to ambush me. Fortunately, I was methodical and carefully worked the corners. The bullets went past my head instead of into them.

Eventually the situation got settled. But it was a good lesson. Work those corners very carefully.

[DDTSGM]

To me, pieing, clearing from the threshold etc, largely sets up a shooter for a gunfight through a wall. With a majority of internal walls being concealment the advantage lies with the bad guy. As an example moving up to a breach/threshold, there are only so many places you can be positioned. If that breach/threshold is going into a corner or center fed room, there is substantially more real-estate on the opposing side for a guy to work you from. So the bad guy has a somewhat specific area he can focus his fire on (if it turns into a gun fight through a wall) vice the good guy who has a huge frontage.

I'm not sure what you are trying to learn/accomplish. In terms or police work, virtually every call you make has some potential for danger. There are good solid BASIC tactics which officers can use to somewhat mitigate danger in those circumstances, but they don't eliminate danger.

The interior walls of most structures, when you get right down to it, offer concealment rather than cover. As I mentioned before, there are tactics which can be used to mitigate risk, but not eliminate it.

Searching for armed persons, whether you be a homeowner, a soldier, or a police officer, is a risky business, if you can't accept such risks, then don't do those things, or take those jobs. That is not to say that officers, soldiers, etc., should be cavalier about taking risks, rather that they should be aware of the risks, and decide if the risks are worth assuming before acting.

You've mentioned threshold evaluation several times. I was involved in this kind of stuff for over thirty years. As far as I know, the term threshold evaluation came into vogue when a group out of a university in Texas got a contract to begin teaching active shooter response. They were big about threshold evaluations and many of the guys I attended with didn't agree with the way they were doing them. Not going to discuss on open forum, suffice to say I don't believe you should set yourself up to fight from a doorway. I felt that one thing they had going for them was that if the doorway didn't have glass on either side, as some schools have, generally a school's interior walls are pretty robust, so you might get away with crowding the door.

I don't think you are going to find a perfect technique. I think a good idea is to absorb all you can, think of the in's and out's of each tactic and put them into the toolbox, maybe to be used at some point.

It's just A way, not THE way is a good mindset to have.

[jnc36rcpd]

Threshold clearance was taught when I was assigned to the county police academy several years ago. While it has greater applicability if you're clearing a house or compound in Iraq or Afghanistan where walls are considerably thicker, I see its relevance in the U.S. or similar environments. Dan Lehr's concerns about the technique are valid. We taught to do threshold clearance pretty quickly. You certainly don't want to get bogged down at a doorway whether you're a member of a team, a patrol shift, or a family.

While I haven't had the opportunity to attend a Centrifuge Training class, I will steal this concept from them. I'd rather have anything in front of me than nothing. People, good and bad, tend to shoot at what they can see. If a bad guy in a room can't see my entire body, he is likely to shoot at what he can see which reduces the chance of him hitting me. I'd rather present a partial B-27 to the bad guy than a full one because, aiming at a partial B-27, he may throw rounds into the white part of the target rather than my scoring rings. While many rounds will punch through drywall and other common building materials, some won't. Others may deflect or break up reducing the possibility of injury. Door frames are more solid than doors or walls so a round hitting a door frame is less likely to be effective.

Add to this, if I threshold clear a room, I don't have to immediately orient myself to a new environment. If I enter the room, I have to look around to see, and possibly shoot, what I can see, If I threshold clear and/or pie the room, I'm not taking in as much as quickly. I'm probably the better marksman than the bad guy. I'm more likely to hit from him a few feet away than he is me.



You cannot eliminate risk in clearing structures and certainly not open areas. Everything comes with trade-offs, but in the words of tactics instructor and role model Sonny Crockett, "I knew the job was dangerous when I took it."

[HCM]

As noted whoever sees their opponent first has a real advantage.

Some research along those lines regarding the link between seeing and making quicker hits: https://www.forcescience.org/2009/10...nfight-part-1/

In general, people like to shoot at what they can see. shooting through cover / concealment is generally a trained behavior.

I recall an experiment where pairs of untrained people were put in protective gear, one was given a Simunition pistol and told to shoot the other person on the signal.. The other person was given a full sheet sized piece of newspaper and told to open it up and block the other person from shooting them on the signal.

Those with the SIM pistol attempted to shoot the other person by going under, over and around the newspaper but none of the shot through them newspaper.

[HCM]

I'm not sure what you are trying to learn/accomplish. In terms or police work, virtually every call you make has some potential for danger. There are good solid BASIC tactics which officers can use to somewhat mitigate danger in those circumstances, but they don't eliminate danger.

The interior walls of most structures, when you get right down to it, offer concealment rather than cover. As I mentioned before, there are tactics which can be used to mitigate risk, but not eliminate it.

Searching for armed persons, whether you be a homeowner, a soldier, or a police officer, is a risky business, if you can't accept such risks, then don't do those things, or take those jobs. That is not to say that officers, soldiers, etc., should be cavalier about taking risks, rather that they should be aware of the risks, and decide if the risks are worth assuming before acting.

You've mentioned threshold evaluation several times. I was involved in this kind of stuff for over thirty years. As far as I know, the term threshold evaluation came into vogue when a group out of a university in Texas got a contract to begin teaching active shooter response. They were big about threshold evaluations and many of the guys I attended with didn't agree with the way they were doing them. Not going to discuss on open forum, suffice to say I don't believe you should set yourself up to fight from a doorway. I felt that one thing they had going for them was that if the doorway didn't have glass on either side, as some schools have, generally a school's interior walls are pretty robust, so you might get away with crowding the door.

I don't think you are going to find a perfect technique. I think a good idea is to absorb all you can, think of the in's and out's of each tactic and put them into the toolbox, maybe to be used at some point.

It's just A way, not THE way is a good mindset to have.

I agree. Tactics are context dependent and there is no one way to do things - more like Good/Better/Best. Context includes the idea that what is best for a team that regularly trains together may or may not be best for an individua (s))l who (if they are lucky) get 8 hours of tactics training every year or two.

The university you referenced was Texas State University's ALERRT program.

Their argument is based less on the validity of door frames as cover and more on human factors like most people's tendency to shoot at what they can see and easing the cognitive load of responding officers. They studies conducted included over 3,000 SIMS room entries using both threshold evaluation and dynamic tactics which were video recorded.

Their video (open source) has a pretty good summary:



ALERRT is what it is. It's not DARC, but well suited to it's target audience.

[KEW8338]

"Security issues aside, tactics are better demonstrated than discussed. The semantics arguments alone make it a pointless exercise."<<<HCM earlier in this thread.

I now realize why he posted this.

If you're going to "stick to your guns" even though you admit to having had ZERO training in this area, there is not much point in continuing this. I have tried and I have failed to explain some of this stuff to you (not blaming you here. I failed.). Cherry picking different comments instead of trying to suck in the whole is an issue here (why would you think that when targeting a foot that we're just shooting randos here? Do you not think that Craig would have set up a scenario where doing something like that would be appropriate? Come on!).

I dont think I said zero training. If this becomes a merit badge list of trainers, in order to validate an individuals opinion vice the merits of the opinion stated....well....

Again this is the tactics forum. A place to discuss tactics.

You said shooting a guy in an extremity. If you are shooting a limb. Chances are you cant see center mass. Making PID potentially difficult. I understand the effectiveness of shooting what you got.

I never said bad guys don't shoot through walls. I can think of a few instances in PD shootings (besides Waco) where bad guys targeted cops through walls. But it is rare. AND, the strongest part of the wall is right around the door, so there is a modicum of protection there (just like how Will Petty teaches stacking roof pillars for temporary "cover", but I suppose you never took VCQB either, right?).

2x4 and drywall, to me does not constitute any real degree of protection. Maybe against 22LR.

I would love to discuss VCQB but with the amount hate mail generated over this....Im not sure the tactics forum could take it.

Edit to add: I'm not sure I'd use the word "compromised" to talk about one-handed shooting. Are all those 50 yard one-handed bullseye shooters really shooting from a compromised position? It may not be ideal, but I think "compromised" is too strong a word. If we're grappling and I shoot you from #2, am I shooting you from a compromised position? See? We're back at what HCM said upthread. We need to have common vocab to even discuss this stuff.

#2 is absolutely a compromised position. It is not as good as having 2 hands on the gun. Does it serve a niche purpose? Yes. Plenty of things that serve a niche purpose are compromised from the original form factor. I apologize my words are strong.....

A lot of guys who served in Iraq in the 2000s shifted to the idea of pieing and threshold evaluation when they started running into hardened rooms and getting chewed up. Evaluating or splitting the doorway before committing to the room is still in practice with NSW and MARSOC. Variations of that are nothing new. What speed one does that is driven by the particular problem.

And quite frankly one may not even be going into a room. A surreptitious clear, by a homeowner of a doorway in an attempt to maybe bypass a particular problem area, in an effort to get out of the structure and call LE to come handle the problem is a far different mission than SWAT/warfighters assaulting a room. That's just particular one example.

Walls in most other areas of the world are comprised of 3-12" of rock/mud/concrete. Those are effective at actually reducing the effects of incoming fire. Additionally that decision is part of a tactical thought process which blends into actual TTPs and escalation of force.

One of the determining factors to me, is if I have to go into that room or not.

Threshold clearance was taught when I was assigned to the county police academy several years ago. While it has greater applicability if you're clearing a house or compound in Iraq or Afghanistan where walls are considerably thicker, I see its relevance in the U.S. or similar environments. Dan Lehr's concerns about the technique are valid. We taught to do threshold clearance pretty quickly. You certainly don't want to get bogged down at a doorway whether you're a member of a team, a patrol shift, or a family.

In previous linked videos, would you say any participants got bogged down in doorways?

While I haven't had the opportunity to attend a Centrifuge Training class, I will steal this concept from them. I'd rather have anything in front of me than nothing. People, good and bad, tend to shoot at what they can see. If a bad guy in a room can't see my entire body, he is likely to shoot at what he can see which reduces the chance of him hitting me. I'd rather present a partial B-27 to the bad guy than a full one because, aiming at a partial B-27, he may throw rounds into the white part of the target rather than my scoring rings. While many rounds will punch through drywall and other common building materials, some won't. Others may deflect or break up reducing the possibility of injury. Door frames are more solid than doors or walls so a round hitting a door frame is less likely to be effective.

People also tend to shoot at where you WERE, and if you are moving, not where you ARE.

To me, I default to maneuver. I can stack odds in that, people have a tendency to shoot where you were, coupled with people suck at shooting moving targets. These are the small details, to me, you should be trying to steal advantages from.

I agree. Tactics are context dependent and there is no one way to do things - more like Good/Better/Best. Context includes the idea that what is best for a team that regularly trains together may or may not be best for an individua (s))l who (if they are lucky) get 8 hours of tactics training every year or two.

The university you referenced was Texas State University's ALERRT program.

Their argument is based less on the validity of door frames as cover and more on human factors like most people's tendency to shoot at what they can see and easing the cognitive load of responding officers. They studies conducted included over 3,000 SIMS room entries using both threshold evaluation and dynamic tactics which were video recorded.

Their video (open source) has a pretty good summary:



ALERRT is what it is. It's not DARC, but well suited to it's target audience.

Sim Based science always weirds me out. That always turns into some super gramaton cleric shit

To me, as it stands my decision making process for how I tackle a breach/threshold/aperture/portal is based off

1)Do I have to go into that room?
2)Do the walls offer me ballistic protection ?

If I have to go into the room, I will not pie it. I will enter dynamically. Essentially running rabbit. (risk mitigation done through surprise and speed)

If I dont have to go into the room, and the walls offer ballistic protection, I will pie/pin/bypass. If engaged, I will engage from the threshold using available cover (risk mitigation done through speed and violence of action)

If I dont have to go into the room, and the walls offer no ballistic protection, I will pie/pin/bypass. If engaged, I will engage while making entry (risk mitigation done through speed and violence of action)

Speaking of "Slicing the Pie"; Real world example. In an event 10 year ago this year, I was doing it, going after a bad guy. A younger officer who was a "Hard Charger" and to be frank had his Competence and Confidence scale unbalanced went charging around some corners a little hard and ate a bullet for his actions. I was not surprised to see him getting carried out of the building. I went after the shooter, as he had already killed someone else. He was waiting to ambush me. Fortunately, I was methodical and carefully worked the corners. The bullets went past my head instead of into them.

Eventually the situation got settled. But it was a good lesson. Work those corners very carefully.

I am glad that worked out in your favor. Any other details you would like to share?