“We should remember that one man is much the same as another, and that he is best who is trained in the severest school.” -Thucydides

In Special Forces, cross training is prioritized on the team. Medics teach the rest of us TCCC, Engineers teach us breaching, Weapon sergeants run live fire ranges, and so on. We are all expected to be competent in each area. Competence however is not mastery, far from it. No one person could achieve mastery in as many skills as we were expected to maintain competence in.

I see tactics instructors, some very well known, teaching subjects they have not personally mastered. Performance shooting can be learned without ever being in a gunfight, and in my opinion is best learned from the competitive arena, but tactics is a different story. Mastery requires not only study, but experience.

At one time, before the towers fell, there had been enough time between wars that most tactical knowledge was academic. In our current situation, after two decades of war, that is no longer the case. Academic knowledge can help prepare you, but it is no substitute for experiential knowledge. Would you learn boxing from a coach who had never fought? To learn how to fight, you need to learn from a fighter. Gunfighting is no different.

I personally will not teach something I haven’t done operationally at a high level. If I’m contacted for TCCC training, or a sniper course, I’ll organize and facilitate it, but I’ll hire someone I know whose a subject matter expert to teach it. I’ve done TCCC but I’m not an 18D and I’m not an expert. I’ve made long range rifle shots, but I’m not a SOTIC graduate and it was never my job. Now, if you want pistol or carbine shooting, combatives, or CQB, I’m happy to teach any of those, as well as fighting around vehicles. I’ve studied and practiced these things extensively, and done all of those things in conflict either at home or overseas, or both.

And that, for me, is my dividing line. If I don’t have both a deep study of, and practical experience in, a given topic, I won’t teach it. Without personal mastery of a skill, instruction of it becomes purely academic. Mastery and Instruction.