Articles
The Will Part : Daunting and deterring your opponent
EJournal Excerpt from George Williams, John Farnam.
As a cop or a peacekeeper, your job is not to kill, it is to serve and protect. To do that, you may have to kill.
First you want to deter and then stop the threat. The most effective way to stop someone is to fire a bullet into his central nervous system. It is up to God and the paramedics as to whether the man dies. Your job is to stop the deadly threat and the most effective way to do that is to make the threat die. Whether you are a warrior hunting terrorists in a distant land, a peacekeeper in Bosnia or a law enforcement officer patrolling our mean streets, there are rules of engagement in which deadly force can be used under authority. When you do it right, as you have been trained, the threat may die, a possibility you must accept as a warrior.
As a soldier or a marine in active combat, there is far less ambiguity. Your job is to kill the enemy. If he surrenders first, that is fine, because that is what we want. And you will play by the rules, and accept his surrender. However, one of the best ways to convince him to surrender is to kill sufficient numbers of his friends and leaders. You must accept the fact that you might have to kill.
As a cop, a peacekeeper or a combat soldier, what will you gain by accepting this dirty, nasty, four-letter word: kill? First, you will not respond with panic to a deadly threat. The worst thing in the world is Barney Fife with a bullet in his gun. “Oh God! I might have to kill him!” The correct response is this: “I think I’m going to have to kill this guy. I knew it might come to this some day.” By completely accepting the possibility, you maintain control of yourself and are better able to deter your opponent. Deterrence is something that law enforcement officers do over and over as peacekeepers in the streets of America, and it is something that soldiers do in the volatile streets of foreign lands. When people know that warriors are present, they slow their cars, they do not rob convenience stores, and they are less likely to commit deadly acts in the name of politics and religion. Warriors daunt and deter. Their very presence can save lives and stop killing.
Here are two case studies in deterrence: One is a tragedy and the other is a famous success story. First the tragedy:
One summer day in August 2000, I volunteered my time to train a major city police department that was experiencing a crisis of confidence as a result of a recent, violent incident. A man had fired a rifle at his girlfriend and then fled with officers in close pursuit. The suspect screeched to a stop in a driveway, with one police car pulling up behind him and the other stopping farther away. The officers in both cars got out and took cover behind their vehicles.
The suspect, armed with a 30-caliber M-1 carbine rifle, began advancing on the closest officers. As he got near their car, the officers shouted, “Police, drop the gun. Police drop the gun. Stop. Stop.” The officers in the car that was farthest away shouted to the closer officers, “Shoot him! Shoot him! Shoot him!” But no one shot, and the suspect continued to advance until he moved around the police car and came upon one of the exposed officers. “Don’t hurt me,” the officer said, setting the weapon on the ground.
What do wolves do to sheep? They rip their throats out. That is what happened in this case. The suspect fired, and the .30-caliber round blew out the officer’s spinal cord, leaving the officer paralyzed from the neck down. Sadly, this officer died from this wound two years later. Only after the officer fell, did the officer’s partner open fire and drop the suspect.
As a warrior, you might one day face the single most difficult task any person will ever have to face: to decide whether to use deadly force and take a life. Most likely, you will have to make that decision in a split second, in the most toxic, corrosive environment known to man: combat, the realm of the universal human phobia. If you chose to take a life when you should not, or if you fail to take a human life when you should, a world of hurt will come down on you.
This is not an impossible task; it is a hero’s task, a warrior’s task. It is immensely difficult, but if we did not have men and women willing to walk out the door and face that challenge every day, within the span of a generation our civilization would no longer exist.
The time to decide whether you can kill another human being is not in the middle of combat. The time to decide, to the utmost of your ability, is right now.
As a cop or a peacekeeper, your job is not to kill, it is to serve and protect. To do that, you may have to kill.
First you want to deter and then stop the threat. The most effective way to stop someone is to fire a bullet into his central nervous system. It is up to God and the paramedics as to whether the man dies. Your job is to stop the deadly threat and the most effective way to do that is to make the threat die. Whether you are a warrior hunting terrorists in a distant land, a peacekeeper in Bosnia or a law enforcement officer patrolling our mean streets, there are rules of engagement in which deadly force can be used under authority. When you do it right, as you have been trained, the threat may die, a possibility you must accept as a warrior.
As a soldier or a marine in active combat, there is far less ambiguity. Your job is to kill the enemy. If he surrenders first, that is fine, because that is what we want. And you will play by the rules, and accept his surrender. However, one of the best ways to convince him to surrender is to kill sufficient numbers of his friends and leaders. You must accept the fact that you might have to kill.
As a cop, a peacekeeper or a combat soldier, what will you gain by accepting this dirty, nasty, four-letter word: kill? First, you will not respond with panic to a deadly threat. The worst thing in the world is Barney Fife with a bullet in his gun. “Oh God! I might have to kill him!” The correct response is this: “I think I’m going to have to kill this guy. I knew it might come to this some day.” By completely accepting the possibility, you maintain control of yourself and are better able to deter your opponent. Deterrence is something that law enforcement officers do over and over as peacekeepers in the streets of America, and it is something that soldiers do in the volatile streets of foreign lands. When people know that warriors are present, they slow their cars, they do not rob convenience stores, and they are less likely to commit deadly acts in the name of politics and religion. Warriors daunt and deter. Their very presence can save lives and stop killing.
Here are two case studies in deterrence: One is a tragedy and the other is a famous success story. First the tragedy:
One summer day in August 2000, I volunteered my time to train a major city police department that was experiencing a crisis of confidence as a result of a recent, violent incident. A man had fired a rifle at his girlfriend and then fled with officers in close pursuit. The suspect screeched to a stop in a driveway, with one police car pulling up behind him and the other stopping farther away. The officers in both cars got out and took cover behind their vehicles.
The suspect, armed with a 30-caliber M-1 carbine rifle, began advancing on the closest officers. As he got near their car, the officers shouted, “Police, drop the gun. Police drop the gun. Stop. Stop.” The officers in the car that was farthest away shouted to the closer officers, “Shoot him! Shoot him! Shoot him!” But no one shot, and the suspect continued to advance until he moved around the police car and came upon one of the exposed officers. “Don’t hurt me,” the officer said, setting the weapon on the ground.
What do wolves do to sheep? They rip their throats out. That is what happened in this case. The suspect fired, and the .30-caliber round blew out the officer’s spinal cord, leaving the officer paralyzed from the neck down. Sadly, this officer died from this wound two years later. Only after the officer fell, did the officer’s partner open fire and drop the suspect.
As a warrior, you might one day face the single most difficult task any person will ever have to face: to decide whether to use deadly force and take a life. Most likely, you will have to make that decision in a split second, in the most toxic, corrosive environment known to man: combat, the realm of the universal human phobia. If you chose to take a life when you should not, or if you fail to take a human life when you should, a world of hurt will come down on you.
This is not an impossible task; it is a hero’s task, a warrior’s task. It is immensely difficult, but if we did not have men and women willing to walk out the door and face that challenge every day, within the span of a generation our civilization would no longer exist.
The time to decide whether you can kill another human being is not in the middle of combat. The time to decide, to the utmost of your ability, is right now.
