Eating laser-flavored crow - Tactical advantage: tips and training on tactics, guns and equipment

I'm often asked what I think of laser sighting systems for handguns. For years I've said they are gimmicks and gadgets having little value on self defense sidearms. The fact is many of the laser sighting devices sold are of questionable quality, fragile and nearly impossible to keep zeroed. For use with a ballistic shield though, a handgun equipped with an effective laser is the way to go. Beyond that, I was not sold on lasers and said so publicly. Let me tell you folks--I was wrong about lasers.

After nearly a year of training and testing with the laser on a number of handguns, I have to eat some crow. They do offer serious advantages in certain situations. When luminous tritium night sights first came on the scene in the late 1980s, they were considered a gimmick with limited value. Today, nearly everyone who has used them in low light will tell you how well they work compared to regular sights. The improvement with lasers over night sights is as great as night sights are over standard sights when shooting in low or limited light.

In the Winter of 2003 I began my laser aiming testing program because it gets dark early and I could conduct range sessions in the hours of darkness. Range training involved a series of skill drills, shoot house scenarios, and shooting on the move exercises, all at typical pistol combat distances. In tact, when I first started shooting lasers, I found I was purposely doing things to prove that laser equipped handguns were not as good as the night-sighted pistols I was accustomed too. When I finally recognized the laser equipped handguns provided a higher performance level, I went with the flow.

These things give you a distinct edge when shooting in the dark. After mouths of use, I had to admit I could do things not possible with a normally sighted handgun. My belief is that I would still want night sights on my handgun, and make no mistake, if the lighting is such that I can see my sights, they are faster to use than the laser. The one great fact about using a laser-equipped handgun is if you only train during daylight hours, there is no advantage to the laser.

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COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group