"Effectively, our bases across the country were gun-free zones. Unless you're training or unless you are a military policeman, you couldn't carry, you couldn't bring your own firearm for your own personal protection onto post."

That's a pretty stark way to describe a policy that's been sitting there for thirty years. Active duty guys I've talked to at the range over the years found it genuinely bizarre — carry legally off-post, then lock it up the moment you cross the gate.

The Brady org's counter that bases were never "truly" gun-free zones is technically fair — MPs are armed, armories exist — but that's a thin distinction when you're a non-MP servicemember and your personal carry piece is sitting in a storage locker. The suicide concern they raised is legitimate and shouldn't be waved off, but it's also a separate policy conversation from the carry access question itself.

The real variable here is what happens at the commander level. A presumption of approval with a paper trail requirement sounds clean on paper, but "how consistently that paperwork requirement gets enforced across 750-plus installations" is exactly the right thing to watch. One base could run this like a shall-issue system, the next one makes the documentation process painful enough that nobody bothers to ask.

Any veterans here who carried personally off-post during their service — did the gate-to-storage requirement ever actually affect how you thought about your daily carry setup, or did you just leave the gun at home?

Read the full article in The Handbook → | By Steve Duskett