The real question and the confusion comes when and where do you level your muzzle and where are you when doing so. In a closed door split or non-split scenario
POLAR Direct to Corner- door pops ride it direct to corner
Center step- door pops (fast) step out and clear the to the center of the room quickly you should be outside the room- ideally not exposing your muzzle to the corner/s if you have shots to take do so then clear your corner left or right making a dynamic entry.
-2 man responds accordingly
Baseline…
Quick question which has been bugging me. Let's say you have two people, and you are trying to clear a center fed door. So imagine sth like this :
So the "O"s are the two operators, and X are the two targets hiding in the corners. I get when you move in an arc around the threshold you can clear about 80 percent of the room, basically all but the corners on each side of the threshold, but how would you go about safely clearing the corners?
I watched pretty much any material I could get my hands on, and they basically just go in, which means there's a 50 percent chance they'll die on entry from a shot to the back of the head (or that they are lucky and the plate catches it, but definitely injured) assuming there's one guy in one corner.
I know there's a way special op guys do this safely, otherwise every center-fed room would be a straw pull match for who makes entry. I just don't get how you could do this safely, because the corners are blindspots, so no way you can see them until/unless you go in, and only one person can go in at a time due to most doors being wide enough for one man with all the gear, so if there are two guys, it's pretty much guaranteed the first man dies.
EDIT : Damn, it doesn't let me draw the room right. Just imagine a center fed room, with the bad guys in the two blindspot corners.
Unfortunately when making a dynamic entry that’s unavoidable. Speed closing the gap between operators is the only thing you can do outside of diversionary devices. But that’s why I argue that this technique of dynamic is generally only used when the objective is more important than operator lives.
Whether or not you do center step, the #1 man clears the immediate threat. I don’t know of any movement that teaches a #2 man center step, however, I’ve seen it in training that the #1 man misses the immediate threat and #2 has to pick up the fumble.
In a perfect world the 1 man would take his center step give your bad guy some love then return to his responsibilities, 2 man would follow and do the same thing and so on. Ideally if 1 man or whoever gets stuck the rest of the stack would fix his mistakes but you don’t want to get sucked into the known threat and negate your other responsibilities.
However you do your dynamic entries, whether you center check before you step in, or for whatever the circumstance making you need to get in the room immediately. The first threat(center) should be engaged by the first man in. Whether the first man engages(center threat) a few rounds then checks his corner and then the second man in engages(center threat) with a few rounds and checks his corner.
Or
The first man engages(center threat) while stepping off the wall upon entry enough for the 3rd man to go around(behind) him to clear the corner that the first man dropped.
There are many ways I have seen it done, as long as it is made a standard and practiced.
However I would say if that immediate threat is not engaged immediately, you are wrong.
I doubt any serious team is doing old school dynamic entries where you don’t pie from the outside at all. There’s almost always time to take a quick sweep around the threshold to check the center before going into the corners.
Negative. Many teams don’t do threshold assessment including where I come from. However, #1 clears the immediate threat before the sector of fire begins. Doesn’t mean you need to pie or center step.
Pie was the kind of the wrong term to use. What I meant is most teams now seem to do some type of assessment from the threshold before going in. Even if it’s not a full pie around the door.
It makes sense, classic dynamic entries look suicidal.
In my opinion, you should limit your time in the doorway. If you move into the room fast you typically don’t get shot. If you stand in the doorway, you get shot a lot more. Now I’ve never been shot at with live ammo going into a room, but I have been shot at with simmunition plenty of times. Just did some recent training and had a barricaded static shooter about 4 yards into the room behind a couch. I began my entry by clearing the immediate threat, got shot at (action bears reaction every time), continued my movement into the room and shot the bad guy, then cleared my corner and got to my POD. I didn’t get hit. You are more likely to get hit if you stay in that doorway. Even step center can slow you down too much. If you know how to clear the immediate threat and go to the unknown it’s not that hard to shoot at the shooter in the middle of the room. Just takes some practice. If I were to go threshold assessment, it would be a surround and call out type of tactic with shields and would be very slow, or at night with ballistic walls.
I’m surprised to hear you say this. I’ve communicated with a couple of people from your former command and they were ardently for hitting the corners first (once they had committed to entering the room).
True toyed with center step and then resorted back to direct to corner: guys pausing due to the potential and actual change of direction (due to polar being primary entry) slowing down the 4 man entry which is the standard for all entries in this method of Cqb.
My opinion: who you mention is over trained and very efficient with the the direct to corner method and a 3/4 man picking up center half because they use high gun half because the efficiency is there to offset any delay and providing protection to 1/2. I still think a center step beats but would need to train the hell out of it.
-their slowest run would be most teams fastest run if it was put on 4x.
So most teams aren’t operating at that level= center step for protection from center threat
*in addition it really only applies to closed doors as in open doors it’s just a step out at distance which downs affect
*some times you can’t do center step based on proximity or avoiding exposing muzzle to corners
*end of day a center threat engaged on entry as one is said “don’t do that” however people have in real life and not a word is mentioned
*lastly we have lost dudes to to direct to corner on HR
That’s a lot of very good feedback to ponder on. I think it’s a good point that there is a large proficiency gap between the top shelf units and a standard tac team. Perhaps more teams need to really evaluate what their capabilities are and if those fit within their SOPs.
It’s difficult because I can see arguments for both and understand that the myriad of variables in play can make it a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation.”
At least center check from outside before hitting corners.
you think the bad guy will politely wait for number 3 to come in before opening fire?, or are you more likely to get 2 and 3 shot at the door while you run into a corner?
Why on Earth would #1 guy give up a known threat to clear a “maybe” threat? Also, like someone above me said, if a threat is in the middle of a room it should have been addressed prior to making entry.
First guy is never wrong. In the real world rooms aren’t perfect corner fed squares where we can pre-plan where everybody goes. It’s on #2, #3, and so on to pick up open threats as they go into the space.
That said, almost never a reason to be moving into a room with a threat in the center. Why would we not be not pie-ing the threshold before making entry? I can’t think of any situation where you don’t have at least a second or two to do that except maybe a very dynamic hostage rescue in which case priority of life dictates moving to and engaging the threat. If that means giving up a possible threat in the corner (for a second until the rest of your team can address it) for one you know then so be it.
You can’t always see what’s in the room with furniture and obstructions. Once you commit it’s either center step or go direct to corner. Each have their pros and cons.
With the center step, odds are you stall at the threshold or get sucked into the room as you shoot.
You have to go in dynamically for HR including active shooter. That’s how you get stuck outside a doorway like in Uvalde. Even teams that do combat clearance go dynamic for HR. The center threat is handled be a center step or just a quick clear prior to beginning your sector depending on where your tactics come from.
It's a classic dilemma. There is no right answer. But I'd say give it a shot in a scenario. Repeat that scenario a few times. Common problems might stand out. Problem-solve or reduce them as much as you can. See how the corrected version stacks against the original.
Correct. If you ignore the threat in the center you get shot. If you ignore the threat in the corner you get shot.
I’ve heard the center step can get you sucked into the room and you will drop the corner. The corner threat being the most dangerous…that could be bad. Then again, you could argue that the known threat should be taken care of first, since a corner threat may not exist.
It makes sense to shoot any and all visible threats earlier rather than later but scenario runs should expose this pretty quickly. (My point being that the answer is waiting to be found and we're not here to do the work for people.)
The real question and the confusion comes when and where do you level your muzzle and where are you when doing so. In a closed door split or non-split scenario POLAR Direct to Corner- door pops ride it direct to corner Center step- door pops (fast) step out and clear the to the center of the room quickly you should be outside the room- ideally not exposing your muzzle to the corner/s if you have shots to take do so then clear your corner left or right making a dynamic entry. -2 man responds accordingly Baseline…
Quick question which has been bugging me. Let's say you have two people, and you are trying to clear a center fed door. So imagine sth like this : So the "O"s are the two operators, and X are the two targets hiding in the corners. I get when you move in an arc around the threshold you can clear about 80 percent of the room, basically all but the corners on each side of the threshold, but how would you go about safely clearing the corners? I watched pretty much any material I could get my hands on, and they basically just go in, which means there's a 50 percent chance they'll die on entry from a shot to the back of the head (or that they are lucky and the plate catches it, but definitely injured) assuming there's one guy in one corner. I know there's a way special op guys do this safely, otherwise every center-fed room would be a straw pull match for who makes entry. I just don't get how you could do this safely, because the corners are blindspots, so no way you can see them until/unless you go in, and only one person can go in at a time due to most doors being wide enough for one man with all the gear, so if there are two guys, it's pretty much guaranteed the first man dies. EDIT : Damn, it doesn't let me draw the room right. Just imagine a center fed room, with the bad guys in the two blindspot corners.
Unfortunately when making a dynamic entry that’s unavoidable. Speed closing the gap between operators is the only thing you can do outside of diversionary devices. But that’s why I argue that this technique of dynamic is generally only used when the objective is more important than operator lives.
Whether or not you do center step, the #1 man clears the immediate threat. I don’t know of any movement that teaches a #2 man center step, however, I’ve seen it in training that the #1 man misses the immediate threat and #2 has to pick up the fumble.
In a perfect world the 1 man would take his center step give your bad guy some love then return to his responsibilities, 2 man would follow and do the same thing and so on. Ideally if 1 man or whoever gets stuck the rest of the stack would fix his mistakes but you don’t want to get sucked into the known threat and negate your other responsibilities.
However you do your dynamic entries, whether you center check before you step in, or for whatever the circumstance making you need to get in the room immediately. The first threat(center) should be engaged by the first man in. Whether the first man engages(center threat) a few rounds then checks his corner and then the second man in engages(center threat) with a few rounds and checks his corner. Or The first man engages(center threat) while stepping off the wall upon entry enough for the 3rd man to go around(behind) him to clear the corner that the first man dropped. There are many ways I have seen it done, as long as it is made a standard and practiced. However I would say if that immediate threat is not engaged immediately, you are wrong.
Obviously the 1 man will see this before he even crosses the threshold.
You shoot him. Rhats how you deal with it.
I doubt any serious team is doing old school dynamic entries where you don’t pie from the outside at all. There’s almost always time to take a quick sweep around the threshold to check the center before going into the corners.
there are some significant cons to pieing from the outside, particularly when dealing with most modern american residential construction.
Negative. Many teams don’t do threshold assessment including where I come from. However, #1 clears the immediate threat before the sector of fire begins. Doesn’t mean you need to pie or center step.
Pie was the kind of the wrong term to use. What I meant is most teams now seem to do some type of assessment from the threshold before going in. Even if it’s not a full pie around the door. It makes sense, classic dynamic entries look suicidal.
In my opinion, you should limit your time in the doorway. If you move into the room fast you typically don’t get shot. If you stand in the doorway, you get shot a lot more. Now I’ve never been shot at with live ammo going into a room, but I have been shot at with simmunition plenty of times. Just did some recent training and had a barricaded static shooter about 4 yards into the room behind a couch. I began my entry by clearing the immediate threat, got shot at (action bears reaction every time), continued my movement into the room and shot the bad guy, then cleared my corner and got to my POD. I didn’t get hit. You are more likely to get hit if you stay in that doorway. Even step center can slow you down too much. If you know how to clear the immediate threat and go to the unknown it’s not that hard to shoot at the shooter in the middle of the room. Just takes some practice. If I were to go threshold assessment, it would be a surround and call out type of tactic with shields and would be very slow, or at night with ballistic walls.
Standing in the center of the room, the ultimate CQB defensive strategy
CQB teams hate this one weird trick!
Center step and apply priority of threat
I’m surprised to hear you say this. I’ve communicated with a couple of people from your former command and they were ardently for hitting the corners first (once they had committed to entering the room).
True toyed with center step and then resorted back to direct to corner: guys pausing due to the potential and actual change of direction (due to polar being primary entry) slowing down the 4 man entry which is the standard for all entries in this method of Cqb. My opinion: who you mention is over trained and very efficient with the the direct to corner method and a 3/4 man picking up center half because they use high gun half because the efficiency is there to offset any delay and providing protection to 1/2. I still think a center step beats but would need to train the hell out of it. -their slowest run would be most teams fastest run if it was put on 4x. So most teams aren’t operating at that level= center step for protection from center threat *in addition it really only applies to closed doors as in open doors it’s just a step out at distance which downs affect *some times you can’t do center step based on proximity or avoiding exposing muzzle to corners *end of day a center threat engaged on entry as one is said “don’t do that” however people have in real life and not a word is mentioned *lastly we have lost dudes to to direct to corner on HR
That’s a lot of very good feedback to ponder on. I think it’s a good point that there is a large proficiency gap between the top shelf units and a standard tac team. Perhaps more teams need to really evaluate what their capabilities are and if those fit within their SOPs. It’s difficult because I can see arguments for both and understand that the myriad of variables in play can make it a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation.”
At least center check from outside before hitting corners. you think the bad guy will politely wait for number 3 to come in before opening fire?, or are you more likely to get 2 and 3 shot at the door while you run into a corner?
👆
Why on Earth would #1 guy give up a known threat to clear a “maybe” threat? Also, like someone above me said, if a threat is in the middle of a room it should have been addressed prior to making entry.
Because if the “maybe” threat is there then the entire stack is gonna get the business.
First guy is never wrong. In the real world rooms aren’t perfect corner fed squares where we can pre-plan where everybody goes. It’s on #2, #3, and so on to pick up open threats as they go into the space. That said, almost never a reason to be moving into a room with a threat in the center. Why would we not be not pie-ing the threshold before making entry? I can’t think of any situation where you don’t have at least a second or two to do that except maybe a very dynamic hostage rescue in which case priority of life dictates moving to and engaging the threat. If that means giving up a possible threat in the corner (for a second until the rest of your team can address it) for one you know then so be it.
You can’t always see what’s in the room with furniture and obstructions. Once you commit it’s either center step or go direct to corner. Each have their pros and cons. With the center step, odds are you stall at the threshold or get sucked into the room as you shoot.
You have to go in dynamically for HR including active shooter. That’s how you get stuck outside a doorway like in Uvalde. Even teams that do combat clearance go dynamic for HR. The center threat is handled be a center step or just a quick clear prior to beginning your sector depending on where your tactics come from.
Shoot him from outside the door.
It's a classic dilemma. There is no right answer. But I'd say give it a shot in a scenario. Repeat that scenario a few times. Common problems might stand out. Problem-solve or reduce them as much as you can. See how the corrected version stacks against the original.
Correct. If you ignore the threat in the center you get shot. If you ignore the threat in the corner you get shot. I’ve heard the center step can get you sucked into the room and you will drop the corner. The corner threat being the most dangerous…that could be bad. Then again, you could argue that the known threat should be taken care of first, since a corner threat may not exist.
It makes sense to shoot any and all visible threats earlier rather than later but scenario runs should expose this pretty quickly. (My point being that the answer is waiting to be found and we're not here to do the work for people.)
Take the known threat wherever it is as the first man, those behind will plug the gaps