Shoot to disable instead of shoot to kill. Let's have an open talk about this.

[jklinders]

Probably been said already but anyway.

If a police officer is discharging their weapon it's gone pretty far from polite discourse to life or death. I doubt there are very many firearms instructors who even discuss the notion of shoot to disable. It's dangerous. You aim for center mass because that is the target you are least likely to miss and in turn maybe wound an innocent.

If you are pulling the trigger it needs to be with the sober understanding that you intend to destroy what's on the other end. That's the basic message. Shooting at limbs has the double effect of having a lower chance of scoring a hit on the intended target and a lower chance of stopping the target. If you miss then you may hurt someone else you didn't want to. Always a risk, but one you want to minimize, not increase.

This keeps coming up and so many people explain it better than me.

 

[cerebus23]

Well. Shooting to disable is very, very hard. Shooting someone in the legs to subdue them without killing them, for instance, is difficult, as several vital blood vessels run through your thighs. The only reasonably "safe" places to shoot, then, would be the hands, feet or bottom. All of which rather difficult to hit, not likely to disable the target enough, and can still lead to a fatal wound through rotten luck.

If someone won't reason with armed policemen aiming at them, it's unlikely they will be prepared to reason at all. In that situation, a centre mass shot is the safest thing to do, everything considered.

Disabling shots are just too much of an unsafe gamble, something you should avoid in a situation where policemen have to use their sidearms. The suspect might likely be killed reguardless, or a policeman might be killed because the gamble didn't work and only escalated the situation.

(Note: Not spoken as a policeman, doctor or any form of authority whatsoever. It's the musing of a Mr. John Citizen. So it might have to be taken with a grain of salt. If you are an authority on the matter, please let me know if I'm terribly wrong)

Center mass pull trigger, safe shot certain shot deadly shot, how everyone is taught to use a firearm.

Rest you covered fairly well why disable shots are more a hollywood thing where you graze a bullet past a hostages head with a handgun from 15 20 feet away, is a incredibly hard shot, nm trying to hit a kneecap or shoulder on someone that is moving presumably.

 

[Alarien]

snip

I wouldn't even try man. I am former military. I know how for every bad soldier, cop, etc. there are 10 good ones. I know that most of the bad comes from above. I just wish there was a way or encouragement within the context of our police forces, military, society in general to stand up to bad orders. In the Army we were told it was our duty to refuse unlawful orders. However, according to that same military, there is practically no such thing as an unlawful order until it's goes to a Courts Martial years later. By that time, all the people who might have said no have already been punished, discharged and/or ostracized.

I do stand by my comment though. I'm not trying to point my finger at individuals, but at the organizations involved and the mentality that they encourage.

 

[blackrave]

I'm pretty sure police officers are trained to hit wherever they are aiming- knee, chest, shoulder, palm, neck, head, whatever.
Good marksman will hit any spot they are aiming (kill or not to kill is their call depending on situation)
What we need to train them more is shooting from non-regular stances and using ricochets for they advantages

I'm personally for warning headshots- it is warning for others

At first, I thought this post was a joke, but follow up posts seem to imply that yes, you really were serious here. That's... somewhat alarming, and indicative of the complete ignorance much of the population is under when it comes to firearms and firearm safety.

What you describe is flat out impossible. There's simply no way to be anywhere near as precise as you point out here. On a completely stationary target 25' away, when completely calm and with unlimited time to line up their shots, the average trained marksman using a standard 9mm pistol can put shots in a 4-6" grouping (read: all impacts with the target are within a circle 4-6 inches in diameter).

Against a moving target, at greater distances, and/or when their body is pumped full of adrenaline and trying to do something, accuracy drops by orders of magnitude. You can expect the grouping to be anywhere from around one to several feet across depending on how many and to what extent any of those conditions are true.

Also, ricochets are completely unpredictable. You cannot use bullet ricochets meaningfully in combat. At best, you've only filled the air with supersonic shrapnel that's bouncing around. At worst, you've killed yourself or an innocent bystander. Don't ever try to bounce a bullet.

Actually ricochet and warning headshot wasn't meant seriously (sorry if it wasn't clear)
Everything else though...

I wasn't aware that police officers simply are taught to hit largest target possible (torso)
I knew that in most real life circumstances you're not shooting stationary target indors, that is why safest bet is aiming for the chest/back
But I thought that officers are at least being taught about other options (in theory and in shooting range)
Apparently not :/

As for irregular shooting positions and moving target training, I still am convinced that it isn't that bad idea.

 

[senordesol]

I'm pretty sure police officers are trained to hit wherever they are aiming- knee, chest, shoulder, palm, neck, head, whatever.
Good marksman will hit any spot they are aiming (kill or not to kill is their call depending on situation)
What we need to train them more is shooting from non-regular stances and using ricochets for they advantages

I'm personally for warning headshots- it is warning for others

At first, I thought this post was a joke, but follow up posts seem to imply that yes, you really were serious here. That's... somewhat alarming, and indicative of the complete ignorance much of the population is under when it comes to firearms and firearm safety.

What you describe is flat out impossible. There's simply no way to be anywhere near as precise as you point out here. On a completely stationary target 25' away, when completely calm and with unlimited time to line up their shots, the average trained marksman using a standard 9mm pistol can put shots in a 4-6" grouping (read: all impacts with the target are within a circle 4-6 inches in diameter).

Against a moving target, at greater distances, and/or when their body is pumped full of adrenaline and trying to do something, accuracy drops by orders of magnitude. You can expect the grouping to be anywhere from around one to several feet across depending on how many and to what extent any of those conditions are true.

Also, ricochets are completely unpredictable. You cannot use bullet ricochets meaningfully in combat. At best, you've only filled the air with supersonic shrapnel that's bouncing around. At worst, you've killed yourself or an innocent bystander. Don't ever try to bounce a bullet.

Actually ricochet and warning headshot wasn't meant seriously (sorry if it wasn't clear)
Everything else though...

I wasn't aware that police officers simply are taught to hit largest target possible (torso)
I knew that in most real life circumstances you're not shooting stationary target indors, that is why safest bet is aiming for the chest/back
But I thought that officers are at least being taught about other options (in theory and in shooting range)
Apparently not :/

As for irregular shooting positions and moving target training, I still am convinced that it isn't that bad idea.

Probably isn't a bad idea in theory, however you have to remember that the majority of officers never even have to draw, and what is effectively 'combat training' gets real expensive; real fast.

So yeah, it'd be nice, but you'd be funding something very expensive that the majority of the department will never use.

 

[cerebus23]

Any where you go is going to teach basic center mass technique.

The trigun stuff is anime only .

If you get that good to shoot a gun or knife out of someones hand, you do that on your own, and in a pressure situation, i guarantee you would pick the sure shot over the high degree of difficulty trick shot. You do not have time to get cute when considering deadly force to protect someone or yourself.

 

[Heronblade]

Shooting for the arm: significantly reduced chance of hitting target, significantly reduced chance of successful hit disabling the target.

Shooting for the chest: high chance of hitting target, high chance of disabling target

Frankly, given the choice between risking the life of a violent criminal and risking the life of those he threatens, I would choose the former every single time, and encourage others to do the same. If one is confident they can make the trick shot, sure, go for it. But even with trained professionals, that is VERY rare.

 

[Brian Tams]

1. You shoot the chest because its the largest target on the human body.
2. Bullets aren't nearly as destructive as movies portray them (neither are grenades, now that I think about it, but that's a discussion for another time). Cops are trained to shoot multiple times because a single shot to the chest rarely puts the target out of commission.
3. A lot of weight is placed on firearm training. You're taught if you draw, aim, and fire your weapon on another human being, you do it with the intent to kill. Not wound, not disarm, but to kill.

 

[deathzero021]

I love the concept and wished more games embraced it. It's one of the many reasons MGS is awesome. I beat MGS2 with using only the tranquilizer gun. It's also cool that you can take down bosses this way too but it's really hard. It adds even more difficulty and strategy to the game. Having to hide bodies, and be quick before they wake up is more challenging than run and gunning, although it depends, if you get caught gunning than you can end up fighting endless swarms which is impossible since it never ends once back up arrives. You get more than one option to deal with enemies in that game, such as shooting their weapons and radios to disable them. It's just cool to have more choices to deal with a situation, it's funner for the player and makes each choice more valuable as opposed to playing a standard FPS where you only get the option to kill everything on screen by holding down the trigger until all enemies are on the floor.

 

[Trivun]

Because killing someone stops whatever it is they're doing.

Shooting someone in the leg or the shoulder isn't a guarantee that they'll stop whatever threatening act provoked said shooting.

It's not ideal, but we don't live in an ideal world.

That's exactly the answer I would have given if I hadn't been beaten to it by our resident Ninja Master. Also, the fact that police/armed forces are trained to aim for the place where they have the most likely chance of hitting. It's like how soldiers are trained not to shoot at the head even though they're actively trying to kill the foe, the chest is desirable because there's less chance to miss (due to a larger target - the torso is much bigger than the head). Same reason for armed police, in all jurisdictions.

For the record, I'm British and agree with the Mark Duggan verdict, even though I don't want to see anyone killed by police in this instance I think they were right to shoot if they had no idea he'd already dropped the gun. Also, his family keep saying he wasn't a gangster - why was he being followed, with a gun, by police who'd already identified him taking a package (containing said gun) from a known arms dealer, when he also had a criminal record, if he wasn't involved in gangs in some way? Just throwing it out there... (hey, much like the gun!)

 

[Trivun]

I love the concept and wished more games embraced it. It's one of the many reasons MGS is awesome. I beat MGS2 with using only the tranquilizer gun. It's also cool that you can take down bosses this way too but it's really hard. It adds even more difficulty and strategy to the game. Having to hide bodies, and be quick before they wake up is more challenging than run and gunning, although it depends, if you get caught gunning than you can end up fighting endless swarms which is impossible since it never ends once back up arrives. You get more than one option to deal with enemies in that game, such as shooting their weapons and radios to disable them. It's just cool to have more choices to deal with a situation, it's funner for the player and makes each choice more valuable as opposed to playing a standard FPS where you only get the option to kill everything on screen by holding down the trigger until all enemies are on the floor.

Might be worth reading the OP at least before posting in future, just a friendly bit of advice. Seems to me you've gotten Off Topic mixed up with Gaming Discussion. This is a thread about real life shooting, not in games, though otherwise I agree with your point, being able to wound instead of/as well as kill in games would be a lot cooler as a concept (might be a bit hard to actually do though ).

 

[blackrave]

Actually ricochet and warning headshot wasn't meant seriously (sorry if it wasn't clear)
Everything else though...

I wasn't aware that police officers simply are taught to hit largest target possible (torso)
I knew that in most real life circumstances you're not shooting stationary target indors, that is why safest bet is aiming for the chest/back
But I thought that officers are at least being taught about other options (in theory and in shooting range)
Apparently not :/

As for irregular shooting positions and moving target training, I still am convinced that it isn't that bad idea.

let me show you this video:
<youtube=0ABGIJwiGBc>

why you ask?
because bullets are fucking unpredictable and more so if you shoot from you hips or any other position without using your sights and enough time to aim.

Fair enough.

as for moving target practise, they already do that.

Maybe it depends on country

as for irregular shooting positions, shooting a threat near a crowd while doing somersaults or john woo style shooting from the ground will result in everyone but the target to be dead. including you.
even holding your gun sideways is considered retarded.

Don't get ridiculous
By "irregular position" I didn't meant Max Payne stunts
I meant lying on the side (L and R), lying on the back and shooting over your head (I'm not sure how precisely describe this situation better), simulating left or right hand damage, that sort of things
Basically situations that can occur in real life conditions when you have no time or simply can't take regular shooting stance.

 

[Something Amyss]

I do see your point and I understand that shoot to kill can happen HOWEVER in certain situations why do they have to shoot the suspect in the back if they are running but not the legs where they would fall and stop. I know it's not guaranteed but there can be alternatives can't they?

Now you're shooting at a harder to hit target with lethal ordnance. Unless you are in an isolated area, you're now endangering more people, or rather, putting the same people in a more unreasonable danger.

Shooting for center of mass is useful for multiple reasons. You're most likely to hit, you're least likely to harm others (in most circumstances), and you're most likely to stop the person you're shooting your gun at.

People have mentioned how incredibly lethal a firearm is. Discharging one is the sort of thing one shouldn't be doing unless they're certain they're okay with whatever they're pointing it at being dead. Shooting in the shoulder, the leg, the hand, whatever. They can all be incredibly lethal due to the wound incurred, the shock, etc.

Alternatives, it seems, would be less than lethal devices when appropriate. Do your cops carry pepper spray, Tasers, or similar? Those can still be lethal (which is why they're called "less than lethal" now instead of "non-lethal") but they surely beat the alternative. However, the shooting of someone is serious business and should be treated as such, no matter how romantic the notion of shooting to disable or shooting to disarm may be.

 

[SuperScrub]

This is literally gun safety 101, when you aim a loaded gun at someone, you're not aiming to disable them or wound them, you're aim your gun at them to put them down and out for good. Because if a bullet where to hit a major artery, vein, or vital organ, whether by a slight slip of the hand or ignorance on where you intend to shoot, your shot to disable becomes a shot to kill.

 

[blackrave]

but if you drop to the ground and shoot from the side you end up screwing up your mobility i.e. the ability to back away from a target that is moving towards you.

again, a 9mm round wont stop you unless it destroys your brain stem. watch the video of the doctor on the first page and he will tell you usefull things like the impact force of a standard round and how low it actually is.

and no, these are not really "real life" conditions.
http://media.giphy.com/media/O0ZtSLkdSq2mQ/giphy.gif
real life conditions is that you try to stay footed so you can back away or run and get to cover.

and why would you use your left hand if you normally shoot with your right hand?
training to be ambidextrous takes years and a lot of practice. its "ineconomic" and the chances to be hit on the hand are pretty slim.

Because there never are circumstances when you are forced on the ground?
Or when only one hand is available?
According to you if ANYTHING strays away from usual shooting range conditions police officer is pretty much fucked, that's why teaching any other position than standing on 2 feet griping sidearm with dominant hand and securing it with other hand is pointless.
Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems that getting them acquainted with other shooting positions isn't that crazy.