"Are they worth if because they told you so?
Buck Snort,
...
I spent a career (I'm retired, too) as a civilian employee of the US Army, and the major part of that career at Ft. Bragg, NC. I worked in the US Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School, where the Army trains and educates its Special Forces soldiers.
You might note in passing that people don't just slap on a green beanie and proclaim themselves Special Forces soldiers. There's a hint there...
Now despite all the Hollywood fluff, Special Forces soldiers are in essence just glorified schoolteachers. True, they might commute to work via parachute, but much of what they actually do is teaching, plain and simple. While I was there, the first thing a new arrival at USAJFKSWCS did was go to ITC- the Instructor Training Course. In other words, they taught you how to teach.
In the years I spent at JFK, I saw a lot of teaching and training take place. And I saw a lot of good instructors at work, the old retired SFers that instructed a lot of the classes, the 'new guys' coming through Robin Sage where they had to 'train' their mock guerrillas in the Carolina woods, you name it. I had a lot of exposure to a lot of training, both good and not so good, and I can tell the difference.
We've had classes with Louis Awerbuck, Tom Givens, Southnarc, John Farnam and others. Without fail they are excellent at what they do.
And what is it that they do?
They care about their students, number one. They want to impart the maximum material possible in the few hours available, and they want their students to be able to perform the skills they are taught on demand, on the street, under pressure. They want the good guys to win and the bad guys to lose. And they make a career out of seeing to it there are better chances of that happening.
Number two, they TEACH, but they also LEARN. They teach novices, they teach cops, they teach soldiers, they teach other professionals. And they show everyone who shows up something new, something worth learning. Louis Awerbuck says the state of the art is a moving target. People learn new stuff every day. People who teach hundreds or thousands of students in a year, who see millions of rounds go downrange out of a variety of firearms outfitted with a variety of gear, have a chance to aggregate a lot of experiences, see a lot of changes, find out what works well and what doesn't work so well. And they teach based on that as well as what's been tried and true in the past.
And lastly, they are flat out good at what they do. I have never seen people better at watching what a shooter is doing, evaluating a problem, and offering several workable solutions all in a matter of seconds. It's amazing to see people like that at work, it's humbling to know that level of skill is present.
You know the best students I have ever seen, in any kind of class? Experienced Special Forces soldiers, that's who. Despite all they know, despite all the training they have had, despite all the experiences they've lived through, they are always looking for more. They always want one more edge, one more skill, one more bit of knowledge.
fwiw,
lpl "