TARGETING LAW ENFORCEMENT: "... Law enforcement officers should stop [being trained to shoot] at targets of human shapes that pose no threat and start requiring decisionmaking as part of the qualification process...".

• Author: Sajnog, Chris
• Position: LAW & JUSTICE

IF SOMEONE had a simple solution to help reduce the number of unarmed Americans being shot by law enforcement, do you think anyone would listen? I don't. I described the solution in a YouTube video a few years ago and started getting death threats. I sent this easy fix to every antipolice violence group I could find and not a single one even responded. I only can assume that if the problem is fixed, these groups no longer would be able to claim racism as the reason for these tragic events.

I know this will sound too ridiculous to be true, but indulge me: Google "NRA Official Qualification Target" or "LE Qualification Target"--or try Googling, "What target will I shoot at for my concealed carry permit?" You will see the unarmed silhouettes of humans.

These qualification targets were not designed and are not used because of their color. Originally, they were military targets--shooting at enemies in battle--and no one has taken our recent understanding of how the brain works when it comes to training, especially training under stress, and applied it to the targets being used. The issue of race has even been addressed by some who have changed the silhouette color from black to green or blue in an attempt to remove any questions about race--the problem is we all become silhouettes at night.

To maintain their weapons qualifications, many police officers receive just 50 bullets per year to practice their weapons handling skills and then, under stress, take aim at an unarmed human shape and shoot the target within the department's time limits. Common sense should tell us that if we are training police officers to shoot at unarmed silhouettes, they are going to do what they were trained to do in the line of duty, but it is not the officer's fault and it is not racist; it simply is bad training.

I have spent many years as a firearms instructor, training everyone from local law enforcement, SWAT, Federal agents, and military units. I also wrote the Sniper Training Manual for the U.S. Navy SEALs. After retiring from the SEALs in 2009,1 developed a method to teach shooting called the New Rules of Marksmanship, a fundamental shift in the way firearms training is conducted.

I began studying the world's greatest athletes, classical musicians, and chess grandmasters. I studied how they practiced, trained, and learned. I researched the latest discoveries in neuroscience and how the brain masters any new skill. I researched scientifically proven methods of...