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Giving Thanks – At An Appleseed Shooting Event
By Chris Knox

FirearmsCoalition.org

Phoenix, Arizona --(AmmoLand.com)- Thanksgiving is a time for reflection on our blessings, including the blessings of liberty and on the sacrifices our forebears made for us.

With that in mind, son Brandon and I wrapped up our Thanksgiving observations slung into battle rifles on the firing line at the beautiful, newly remodeled and re-christened Joe Foss Shooting Complex near Buckeye, Arizona.

As I concentrated on sight picture, breathing and trigger control, I was truly thankful.
Over the past four years, as regular readers of this space will be aware, a group that goes by the delightfully seditious name of “Revolutionary War Veterans Association” has spread across the country with a simple but ambitious goal: To turn the United States once again into a nation of riflemen. Barely on the radar of the mainstream shooting organizations, and totally off the major media’s screen, the RWVA’s Applessed Project has quietly grown at exponential rates.

The Appleseed shoots are superficially similar to any other shooting clinic. There’s a lot of shooting and a lot of discussion of sight picture, breathing and trigger control. But Appleseed adds another dimension: One of historical perspective. Between each relay, along with the shooting fundamentals, there’s a discourse on events in and around Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts on April 19 and 20, 1775. Along with the history lesson, comes a discussion of what it means to be a rifleman, what riflemen have meant to America, and what our rifles should mean to us.

It’s strong stuff. But there’s not a whiff of extremism. It’s simple application of the Second Amendment: The Right to Keep and Bear Arms only takes on meaning if we are skilled in the use of arms. Come to think of it, some politicians might consider the Appleseed message dangerous. Good. That’s exactly how they should perceive it.

The message is resonating – and gathering momentum. In 2006, the first year of the program, there were 18 events with just over 1000 participants. 2007, the year I shot my first Appleseed, saw 47 events and nearly 1900 participants and everyone was amazed at the growth of the project. In 2008 there were 138 events training some 3700 participants. 2009 should close out with nearly 400 events in 46 states training 10,000 participants. The goal for 2010 is to double 2009’s record.

This past October saw the biggest single event in Appleseed history when RWVA volunteer instructors trained some 600 members of the South Carolina National Guard at Ft. Stewart, Georgia. These citizen-soldiers had been working regular jobs but had been mobilized for deployment to Iraq. A member of the battalion staff did not feel that the troops had been adequately trained in riflery and asked the RWVA for assistance. National Guard troops view themselves as inheritors of the minuteman tradition, so the historical perspective of the program had special significance for these soldiers as they prepared for deployment.

The mechanics of the shoot are straightforward. The objective of the course is to get participants to a “Rifleman” level – that’s scoring a 210 or better out of a possible 250 on a modified Army Marksmanship Qualification Test (AQT) target. Most of the shooting is at an AQT target with multiple silhouettes scaled to simulate distances out to 400 yards. The reduced AQT target allows the entire course to be fired at 25 yards with any rifle from full-sized battle rifles to .22 caliber rimfires. The reduced range also allows for more shooting, and practice on the 25-yard course, with whatever rifle, has been proven to improve shooting at real distances with centerfire.

Brandon and I banged away at our targets with a couple of historic rifles, he with an M1 Garand, I with an M1903 Springfield. We had demonstrated early in the day that both rifles would shoot, turning in some promising groups, but neither of us managed to put together a string that would earn a Rifleman patch. But “a rifleman is persistent,” as the Appleseed instructors constantly reminded us. The day will come. Meantime, I’m going to invest in some battle sights and a sling for my 10/22.

The future of the Appleseed Project looks bright. With over 170 events already scheduled for 2010, there will be an Appleseed shoot within a few hours of just about anywhere in the lower 48 states. Check their calendar at http://www.appleseedinfo.org/ and start planning your Appleseed weekend. Get a few buddies together or take the family.

The cost is modest and the shooting instruction is outstanding, and geared to any level. But the bonus is the historical view that puts shooting in a context that “sportsmen” or competitive shooters may not have thought about. Shooting is not golf. Appleseed reminds participants of the purpose of the rifle: To secure liberty.

Neal Knox Associates – The most trusted name in the rights movement.

About:
The Firearms Coalition is a loose-knit coalition of individual Second Amendment activists, clubs and civil rights organizations. Founded by Neal Knox in 1984, the organization provides support to grassroots activists in the form of education, analysis of current issues, and with a historical perspective of the gun rights movement.

Filed under: Competitive Shooting News, Gun Rights News by Ammoland 2 Comments »

Time to Eradicate VD
VD & Its Effects on Gun Owners VD = Victim Disarmament
By Jeff Knox

FirearmsCoalition.org

Manassas, VA - There has been a close association between sexually transmitted diseases and the military for as long as the two have existed, but the focus of this article is not Venereal Disease, but a different kind of VD that has shocked the military community and the nation.

The VD which currently plagues the military and puts our soldiers at grave risk is the policy of Victim Disarmament which has been increasingly prevalent even as laws in the civilian world have been moving in the opposite direction.

While some have pointed to regulation changes during the Clinton administration as the turning point, VD on military bases has been the trend since at least the 1960’s and to a lesser extent even before that. In military society, so heavily steeped in discipline and control, it is only natural that those in power would be inclined to drift in the direction of micro-management and centralized control. Commanders in the modern military seem to have gravitated toward a paternalistic role and that paternalism runs all through the chain of command and seems to apply to all subordinates regardless of their age, rank, or experience.

When a Muslim major decided he was on the wrong side in the War on Terrorism and began shooting soldiers and civilian workers in a premeditated attack at a Ft. Hood processing center, we were all shocked. Shocked that anyone in the U.S. military could turn on his brothers- and sisters-in-arms with such viciousness. Shocked that a commissioned officer could hold such radical religious views and not be recognized as a threat.

But we were especially shocked that anyone could go on a killing spree in the middle of a busy Army base and not run into any armed resistance for over 10 minutes.
The public was dumbfounded to learn that virtually everyone on all military bases outside of war zones is required to disarm while on base. Even officers and senior NCOs who are licensed to carry concealed in the state where the base is located are forbidden to have a readily accessible firearm virtually anywhere on base. Only MP’s and contract security guards may legally go about a military installation armed and even they are generally forbidden to carry when not on duty.

But who could have imagined that anyone would ever dare to attack soldiers on an Army base? Well, just as the “unimaginable” idea of using commercial aircraft as guided weapons had been widely publicized in popular novels and was officially included in national threat assessments as a likely scenario, the idea of attacking personnel on a military installation was not novel or new. A group of home-grown wannabe Muslim terrorists made elaborate plans to do just that back in 2007. After their plot was uncovered, many in the rights community pointed out the huge vulnerability created by the Army’s Victim Disarmament policies and called for changes, at least to allow qualified officers and senior NCOs to keep weapons handy. Those calls went unheeded. Some commands went in the opposite direction with commanding officers tightening restrictions on weapons in base housing units and even forbidding soldiers from legally carrying when off-base and out of uniform.

In the wake of the atrocity at Ft. Hood the Army says it – along with the other branches – will be reviewing security policies and procedures. I don’t expect to see them give up their VD policies. It is much more likely that they will conclude that they need to hire more civilian security guards and perhaps implement some sort of alert system similar to those implemented by universities, based around text messages sent to cell phones.

After all, what if the Army allowed soldiers to be armed and they used them to commit crime, or to shoot each other over traffic disputes? What about the danger of police mistaking an armed defender for the active murderer or an armed defender accidentally shooting innocent bystanders?

We’ve heard all of the “what if” arguments in every state that has ever debated concealed carry legislation or talked about extending the right to carry to college campuses. For some reason the fact that none of the dire “what ifs” have ever materialized and that armed defense is consistently demonstrated to be safe and effective, just carries no weight with paternalistic authoritarians who don’t fully trust their charges.

More than two years after the Army received a dramatic warning about the vulnerability created by their VD policies, that vulnerability has been horrifically exploited. And in the face of that experience, soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines remain helpless in the face of threats of armed attack.

Unlike Venereal Disease, Victim Disarmament can be easily eradicated, particularly in the military. All it takes is the will and a little bit of trust.

Visit www.FirearmsCoalition.org where you can also order your copy of Neal Knox – The Gun Rights War.

To receive The Firearms Coalition’s bi-monthly newsletter, The Knox Hard Corps Report, write to PO Box 3313, Manassas, VA 20108.

About:
The Firearms Coalition is a loose-knit coalition of individual Second Amendment activists, clubs and civil rights organizations. Founded by Neal Knox in 1984, the organization provides support to grassroots activists in the form of education, analysis of current issues, and with a historical perspective of the gun rights movement.
©Copyright 2009 Neal Knox Associates – The most trusted name in the rights movement.

Filed under: Gun Rights News by Ammoland 1 Comment »