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Excaliber wrote:

ammoboy2 wrote:

MoJo wrote: When you are facing an opponent armed with a knife once he starts to rush you MOVE off the line of attack. You can gain valuable seconds by moving back and to one side or the other.

I agree with this except the backing up part. If you are lucky you can back up half as fast as someone running forward. The best strategy is to step to the side, this forces the attacker to reajust and change their vector. It is also more difficult to turn while running forward which increases the targeting problem for the attacker. The step to the side provides significant time to engage the knife wielder. The simple side step works even at distances as close as 10 ft while this drill demonstrates you need 21 ft straight for striaght on. Additionally without the side step off the line of attack, a successful handgun shot, which is frequenly not an instant stop anyway, you most likely will be injured. So if you are still on the line of attack then the wounded attacker can still severly injure or kill you. That is not a winning combination, but bringing a gun to a knifefight.

A subtlety to the tactic of stepping to the side off the line of attack is to do so to the side opposite the one that holds the BG's weapon. If timed right, this sharply limits the range of his edged or impact weapon to just slightly beyond his torso because he has to deploy it across his body instead of to the side on the strong side, where he has a full arm's reach. Of course, if he's trained, he'll simply change hands, but most aren't so trained.

Another subtlety (although more debatable) is to focus the one shot you may get off into the pelvic girdle to try to take the BG's undercarriage out from under him so he can't run or maneuver. This too holds no guarantees, but it's a more likely stop than a center mass shot and a more likely hit than a head shot attempted under these circumstances.

Offlining opposite the weapon could, depending on the weapon and the person, get you out of the sweep of it... or into it. A right-hander swinging a weapon across to his left can keep turning his arm and torso a bit to continue the sweep, or swinging left to right can continue in the same fashion. A stab will be easier to evade, going either direction. The key point is, though, don't be where he expects you to be, whether it's "away" or "towards" his weapon arm. Practice getting out of the way first, practice both directions irrespective of where the weapon is, and -then- you can focus on determining whether left or right is better.

And I'd really advise against shooting for the pelvic girdle. Odds are, you're going to be putting rounds all over, anyway; aiming for a specific, non-center-mass point on a moving attacker (and you are moving, too, aren't you?), while dealing with an adrenaline dump, is a sure recipe for a miss or three. Try to put those rounds in the center of what you can see, so that you don't wind up pulling a Bat Masterson and hitting something - or someone - you don't want to.

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Also, with regard to carrying a round in the chamber, consider this: most police and law enforcement departments have a very firm policy that their officers' guns -must- be chambered, at any and all times the officer is on duty. This is in an easy-to-access, openly-carried, and oftentimes designed for speed, holster. If they carry one in the pipe all the time, when they can get to it faster than a concealed firearm, and it still isn't fast enough sometimes, why slow yourself down with an empty chamber in a concealed, harder-to-access, designed to hide, holster?

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As before, as always, I'm just some with opinions on the internet. Check these opinions past people who make a living knowing what they're talking about.

Here's another thing to consider: how accessible is your gun?

I know on my duty rig, where my sidearm is openly carried, I can fairly easily draw and fire within the time it takes someone to rush me with a knife from 21 feet - if I'm expecting it. I also know that, if they're at 21 feet, it doesn't matter if I hit him; unless I put a round right through his forehead, I'm fairly guaranteed to get cut/stabbed.

Now, factor in drawing from concealment. Factor in drawing against someone who has already taken the initiative to attack you, someone who is rushing you RIGHT NOW with a cutting or stabbing tool. Or even a club.

You're going to take a moment to recognize the threat, decide on a reaction, and perform the reaction. You're probably going to get cut, stabbed, or whacked. You're probably going to bleed.

That being said, there are a couple things one can do to "practice" for this. The first is the side-step, or "off-lining" as I was taught. Regardless of the martial art, whether hand-and-foot or gunpowder-and-lead, the ability to off-line is fairly crucial in avoiding or lessening the impact of whatever attack is coming at you. Once the attacker has committed to the rush, he has to fight his own momentum in order to change direction. Stepping to the side, while you may still get whacked or cut, removes you from his immediate front, and he has to change direction in order to continue. It also gets your head and vital organs out from his funnel. There's several things one can do here, from trying to trip him (which, of course, can also take you down if not done right), to spinning around behind him, to continuing to the side to escape or maneuver for distance and advantage. These things are probably better told by actual instructor (although I have stayed at a few non-Holiday Inns in my time).

The second is the snap-shot from the hip. My job does not train for "long distance" instinctive shots, but we do work at close-up draw-and-fire drills, from as close as four feet. It's not a perfect solution. It's far from perfect. If you're good, if your gun is easily accessible, drawing from concealment is probably going to take most, if not all, of the time it takes for an attacker to cover 21 feet, and possibly then some. However, it's still useful. If you practice (carefully, of course! - we don't want to see any of US on Youtube!), at drawing and "hip-shooting" at close-range, you'll have an idea of where your bullet will land, and what your gun will do. Don't get any ideas of hip-shooting the knife out of his hand; we're not CASS shooters, and that kind of trick shot is incredibly difficult even under the best of circumstances. However, if you practice off-lining, then off-lining while drawing (empty guns or preferably dummy guns, please! - remember Youtube is not your friend!), then you may be able to get out of the way with only a cut on your arm, and get the gun into play before he comes back again for a second run.

Actual training in these is, again, probably best performed under the auspices of a qualified instructor, not the advice of some dude on the internet with an opinion, of course.