In most shooting situations, people near the shooter or the victim do NOT have time to pull a gun, aim and fire. It takes at least two seconds from you seeing someone open fire AND pulling your own weapon and open fire (And by that time you are long dead, if the shooting is trying to shoot you).
The better solution is to have someone some distance away (50-100 yards) with a a semi-automatic short barrel weapon (This is the role of the MP-5, and even Thompson sub machine gun). The shooter should be trained to used the weapon in the semi-automatic mode in an emergency situation (and keep the Automatic Fire reserved when you have time to think and decide how the automatic fire should be used). The MP-5 is a modern "sub-machine gun" designed for police work (a lot of Special forces and SWAT teams used them). It fires a pistol bullet, for minimum range, but since it has a stock is fired like a rife (with a rifle's enhanced accuracy).
As to the agents next to the President, they job should NOT be to return fire, but to man handle anyone around the President (including the President), to get the President out of harm's way. If that means attacking the shooter one on one, do so. If that means forcing the President behind cover, do so. Leave any shooting to the man with the MP-5 or whatever is the weapon of the person providing potential cover fire.
When I was in the National Guard, and was setting up perimeters including guards checking on incoming people and trucks. The Gate Guard had a M-16 but he was not told to use it to stop someone rushing the gate, but to get down and leave the Machine gun behind him a clear fire zone. It was the Machine Gun that was going to stop anyone rushing the Gate NOT the Gate Guard.
The same with the people around the President, they have to accept the unpleasant fact that they will NOT have the opportunity to open fire to defend the President. They did not do so when Kennedy was Shot, when George Wallace was Shoot (in 1972 the law had been passed providing Secret Service protection to all presidential candidates, so when Wallace was shot he had Secret Service protection), when ford was attacked TWICE, when Reagan was attacked etc. (Both Bushes seems to have to Scripted a campaign for anyone who wanted to kill either of them near them, Clinton and Obama seems to be more open, but they also tend to be more Scripted campaigning then was the norm in the 1960s and 1970s).
Most Prisons follow the same policy, the only Guards with guns are the Guards on the wall, in the Guard towers, on on the "Gun walks" which prisoners have no access to (They overlook the cells and the common areas and have shooting slits that the guards in the gun walks can use to take out prisoners if that is necessary. The Guards among the prisoners never carry guns. To easy to be overtaken by a prisoner and the gun taken.
As to School guns, if guns are permitted, the same policy should be adopted. Someone providing Cover while another confront any "attacker". If the Confronter falls for any reason, the person with the rifle should open fire, but if no one falls, no fire. In most cases, Schools are not really set up for such situations. You do NOT have independent access to each school room that the students and anyone else who enters the school does NOT also use. Schools tend to have very small hallways (minimum standards for the number of students at peak times, which leads to small hallways with a lack of room to move around in).
Thus in schools, you have a problem due to the size and design of schools. Some schools remind me of Prisons (limited exit and entrances for example) but they still are school, you do not design them with a completely inaccessible hallway that provide cover for gun guards. They also tend not to be separate buildings for each class, with a high wall for Gun Guards to look down on each students as they move from one building to another.
Some details on Reagan's assassination attempt and HOW the shooter was captured"
After the shooting, Alfred Antenucci, a Cleveland, Ohio, labor official who stood nearby Hinckley, was the first to respond.[16] He saw the gun and hit Hinckley in the head, pulling the shooter down to the ground.[25] Within two seconds agent Dennis McCarthy (no relation to agent Timothy McCarthy) dove onto the shooter as others threw him to the ground; intent on protecting Hinckley to avoid what happened to Lee Harvey Oswald,[6]:84 McCarthy had to "strike two citizens" to force them to release him.[16] Agent Robert Wanko (misidentified as "Steve Wanko" in a newspaper report) took an Uzi from a briefcase to cover the President's evacuation and to deter a potential group attack.
On how the attempted shooters of Ford were handled:
Secret Service agent Larry Buendorf grabbed the gun, forced it from Fromme's hand, and brought her to the ground
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_assassination_attempt_in_Sacramento
After realizing she had missed, she raised her arm again, and Oliver Sipple, a Marine no longer on active duty, dived towards her, knocking her arm the second time, perhaps saving President Ford's life
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sara_Jane_Moore
The Attempt on Truman in 1950:
While President Truman napped on the second floor, one of the attackers, Oscar Collazo, shot a White House police officer at the guard house and began walking up the front steps of Blair House. After hearing the gunshots, Secret Service agent Vincent Mroz ran through a basement corridor and stepped out of a street-level door on the east side of the House, where he opened fire on Collazo
Notice it was the Agent who had TIME to react to the shooting of the police officer, to stop the attempted assassin. The Police Officer killed did not even have time to reach for this gun.
The 1933 attempt at President Elect FDR also shows that the shooter was stopped by Physical hands on attack NOT by someone pulling a pistol:
After the first shot, Cross and others grabbed his arm,
The Kennedy Assassination was a long range affair, not someone getting close to the President and pulling a pistol. Oswald used a rifle, in many ways a classic "Cover Fire" weapon. No one ever confronted him or anyone else during the assassination. The Secret Service had pistols, but never fired them.
My favorite attempt was the 1835 attempt on Andrew Jackson, the assassin walked up to Jackson, fired both pistols before Jackson could do anything, both mis-fired, which gave Jackson time to react, and he proceeded to hit the attempted Assassin with his cane.
List of all attempted and successful assasination attempts against US President (that are known):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presidential_assassination_attempts_and_plots
And lets look at the often forgotten attempted assassination, that of George Wallace in 1972:
About 4 p.m. that day, Bremer emptied his gun into Wallace’s abdomen and chest. One bullet lodged in his spinal cord. Three other people — a Secret Service agent, an Alabama state trooper and a campaign volunteer — were unintentionally hit and wounded. Bremer was tackled to the ground and put in a headlock by Prince George’s County Police Cpl. Mike Landrum, who pushed him through an angry crowd for about 60 yards to a police cruiser.
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-05-09/local/35454828_1_arthur-bremer-george-wallace-alabama-gov
Similar situation occurred when an attempt was made on Theodore Roosevelt, with the assassins of McKinley and Garfield (in all three cases, members of the crowd detained the assassin)l John Wilkes Booth escaped, but he made sure no one was near him when he shot Lincoln.
Notice, the one thing all of these attempted assassinations and actual assassination have in common. In none of them were pistols use or even useful in preventing the assassination attempt OR in the arrest of the assassin (With the sole exception of the attempt on Truman, but that was more a full scale military assault with pistols, as oppose to a conventional assassination attempt).
All, but the Truman attempted assassin, were arrested by PHYSICAL force (i,e, someone grabbing them with their hands), they walked away (as was the case of JFK's and Lincoln's assassins) OR killed by someone in a cover position NOT near the original shooting victim (The attempt on Truman in 1950).
Thus a comment could be made that we would be better off, giving one man (or woman) who guards the President a M16 or a MP-5 and keep him or her away from the President about 50-100 yards (but give him or her a clear field of fire) and disarm everyone else (or give them all billy clubs, a more useful weapon in a very close battle situation).
Pistols are almost useless if a full military scale attack is made (even if done by two people with pistols, as in the Truman 1950 attempt) and, except for the 1950 attempt, no such attempt had ever been made (and the best defense, is one of depth, a front guard that has to be rushed, who is covered by someone else, preferably with a heaver weapon then a pistol). In the case where rifles have been used (JFK's is the only known attempt) pistols are useless (as seen in the JFK assassination, the pistols were pulled but since no one knew where the shots came fire, no one opened fire, thus they were more decorative then actually useful).
In all but two attempts, the weapon of choice was a Pistol and the location was the campaign trail. In these cases, the pistols of the Secret Service, may have been pulled (as in the JFK assassination) but never fired, for the assassin was subdued by physical hand on efforts before pistols were even drawn.
Sorry, even for the Secret Service they be better off armed with billy clubs, with cover provided by someone 50-100 yards away.
The same with Schools, if you want to arm teachers you have to understand that it has to be a team effort, with someone during the confronting and the someone else providing any cover fire if and when needed. Furthermore, you have to have space to provide cover and most schools do not have such wide open spaces. Thus you have the possibility that the cover will be next to the confronter and both being taken over by any killer who breaks into the school.
I am sorry, the better solution is to provide every class room two ways in and out. Both ways should NOT be able to be seen from one location. Students should be trained to vacate school rooms (just like in a fire drill). The two ways should be large enough to provide the maximum number of people out of the room as quickly as possible (double fire rated doors would be best).
Remember a person with a weapon that has a 30 round or larger magazine, needs to have 30 targets, if the "targets" are running out the door, you rapidly reduce the number of people the killer can kill.
Maybe because I do have some military training, and in that training losses were expected. The duty was to minimize the losses not to totally eliminate them, on the grounds such elimination is impossible. Thus I view New Town as a product of a bad school design, and the concept of total security, which by its nature will always fail. Total Security is impossible to achieve, you need to accept that unpleasant fact and work with it, not ignore it as a lot of people have been doing. Thus the best solution is schools with multiple exits so the disburse children whenever that is desired (and that is desired in fire and other disasters such as a shooting). Such double exits are NOT that expensive (if you opt for one door instead of double doors) for most class rooms have windows and they can be converted to a door. If the class room is on the second floor and exterior staircase can be installed. These are NOT that expensive, but it shows that the school is willing to disburse children if that is want is needed. If kids can run, they will run. They have to know that it is an option (thus use of such "Fire Exits" should be common, for example used in fire drills).
Yes, fire doors and outside fire stairs look "Ugly" but it provides the ability to disperse students if needed.
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