Unarmed Defense against an Armed Attacker: a last-ditch solution

I've watched a lot of videos on YouTube where an "instructor" teaches "students" to disarm an attacker who is pointing a gun at them.

Do you believe that the techniques being taught there are going to save your live?

No, I don't either.  Perhaps they are better than 'doing nothing', but I'm not sure about that either.

What DOES concern me is that there are some gentle folks who watch these videos, and say to themselves: "Okay, got it.  I'm now prepared to defend myself against an armed attacker" ...

... and that's as far as they go.  They haven't done anything physically to prepare themselves, but they saw this guy slap the gun out of the hand of this other guy, and it looks easy to them.  So they don't have to do anything more constructive than watch a movie.

BREAK:
What the French Train Attack Doesn’t Prove | chrishernandezauthor:
(August 25, 2015)

 I’m a cop and I’ve always got a gun; if I’m minding my own business in a convenience store and a criminal with a pistol suddenly comes around the corner, and is within arm’s reach, the best thing to do is probably attempt to disarm him before he can shoot me. I’ll go for my gun eventually, but the first priority is to get control of the criminal’s gun. THAT DOESN’T MEAN IT’S ALWAYS BEST TO GO HAND-TO-HAND AGAINST A GUN. It just means that not every situation is the same, and sometimes you don’t have time to go for a weapon. In almost every incident where unarmed people took down an armed murderer, it was because they had no other options. It wasn’t because they were better off unarmed.

Okay, posit this:
I watched the move "Jeremiah Johnson" eight times, and now I'm fully prepared to live through Rocky Mountain Winters for decades by trapping beavers and carrying a percussion cap rifle.

 ("But by Gawd it were a Hawkins!")

Okay, posit this:



You just parked your car in a metropolitan car-park structure, and while you're putting your keys in your coat pocket you notice a trio of thugs approaching you.

You:
(a) turn to face them, and insinuate that you have a gun by putting your hand in your coat pocket;
(b) you either have a gun in your pocket, or;
(c) you don't have a gun in your coat pocket.
(d) you chicken out and you move "expeditiously" (which means "run as fast as you can, you're the Gingerbread Man") for the nearest exit, or;
(e) you try to bluff them out, and they either believe your bluff and run away, or
(f) ... they kick your ass and take everything that you own and then leave you bleeding on the tarmack
(h) ... you DO have a gun in your pocket, and you shoot one or more of them; and
(i) ... the police believe your claim of self defense; or
(j) ... you don't have any legal claim, because the juveniles were not armed even though they were younger and stronger than you, and outnumbered you; and/or
(k)  .... make up your own scenario


I don't know. What do you think would have been your best defense against surprising gang activity?

Probably the best defense would have been that you didn't put yourself in a dangerous situation.  You can define the term "dangerous situation" to suit yourself.  However, the definition of an ambush includes that you walk into a situation where you could not "reasonably" expect to be attacked.

If you don't do that, then your options are limited, and all of them are bad.

(For the attackers, the term is "Hey, that was a GOOD ambush!")

I don't have any solutions.

But I do have some advice: 

stay alert, stay alive, prepare for the worst case scenario, use anything you can find to repel an attack, run away if you can, hurt the bad guys more than they hurt you, and find a very good lawyer when (and if) you survive it.