In Massad Ayoob’s blog, the question of an American Mumbai seems to be flying with authority.

I live very close to an elementary school and my nightmare has always been Beslam. I hope neither takes place.

According to the FBI Director Robert Mueller, the possibility of a Mumbai-style attack in the US could be replicated seems to have the Government in somewhat nervousness. I work in the Hospitality Business and I am here to tell you that I am more than a little worried, I am scared shitless about the issue. By definition, hotel corporations are reactive in nature. They don’t want to change unless change falls on them like a mastodon in heat and then they will cry and complaint all the way to court. In a Hotel Security trade magazine a less than stellar article was written about the Mumbai attack and the genius writer came to the conclussion that the reason the attack was successful was because the terrorists gained access through a kitchen entrance thus laying the blame to an unlocked door. Are you frigging kidding me? A terrorist sporting an AK 47 and a backpack full of grenades has pretty much all the tools required to do an entrance anywhere in the hotel and using pretty much any door including the main entrance of the hotel.

Some less stupid and more insightful articles in different military and police website reveal that the first targets of the attack were anybody that looked like security. 99.99% of security officer that work at a hotel are unarmed and they may only have a radio for “defense” but still they were mowed down so the terrorist could have a wonderful time spreading the will of Allah via 7.62×39.

More and more people are now carrying a concealed weapon and although a sidearm is a poor match against a rifle, it beats being unarmed. If you spend any time in a hotel, you must now add to your list of security concerns the probability that a horny jihadist will decide that your trip to the latest amusement park off state or a business opportunity is a good time to crate mayhem.  Create a plan, be ready and be deadly if necessary. Again, do not depend on the hotel for your protection since we are trained only to be “good witnesses” and nothing else.

As for me, I’ll just bow my head and mumble quietly the Secret Service prayer: “Dear Lord. Not on my watch.”

Mumbai photographer: I wish I’d had a gun, not a camera. Armed police would not fire back

This a headline and pictures that are been published around the world. Terrorist attacking the  Chatrapathi Sivaji Terminal railway station in Mumbai, India, doing their deed completely unchallenged and the the sad lament of the photographer who realized he could do nothing more than being a good witness instead of stopping the massacre.

Although we hope an attack like this never happens in the US, the sad truth is that we cannot depend on hope and wishful thinking. And we cannot depend on government to save our lives. The terrorists in Mumbai initially targeted anything that was uniformed or visibly carried a weapon and then started on the civilians so the government sponsored “protection” was neutralized at the beginning of the attack. The rest was just a literal excursion into finding the most appropriate/desirable/random victim to be executed on the spot.

When I saw the first picture, my first reaction was of surprise at how nonchalant the terrorist were behaving. But it makes sense when you realize that they were unopposed in a target-rich environment. The second thought that went through my mind was: “Shooter, Do you understand the Course of Fire? Shooter ready, Stand By! (beep).”

For the benefits of those who got lost in the last sentence, that expression is the final questions & warnings that an IDPA shooters hears at competitions just before engaging targets.  And although we shoot paper targets that do not shoot back and these idiots were carrying & shooting AKs, they were easy prey for any IDPA, IPSC, ICORE, SASS or any competition shooter with barely six matches under his or her belt.  Somebody with a basic training in sidearms could have stopped two islamofacist in their unholy tracks.

Yet we hear that our leaders want to make all areas of mass transportation Gun Free Zones and not just those deemed sterile by federal law. In other words, they want to increase the tract of unprotected, target-rich environment for terrorists under the pretense on making us safer. If they have not figured out with Mumbai that those regulations beacons that attarct the criminal and the derranged, we will be facing many more of these government-sponosred massacres in the future.