Double Tap Unit or Dtap was born in 2007 here in Honolulu, Hawaii. In fact, Dtap has just celebrated its birthday last November the 27th. We started off as a small group of guys who just recently got back from the war. We wanted to get into something as a group, and we wanted to do something fun. Six months prior to the commissioning of the
Unit, just one day I happened to be browsing the Internet and came upon the word “Airsoft.” I was like, “what the hell is that?”

I started going to all sorts of sites and online stores. I motioned to the guys, “hey check this out.” We were amazed at the realistic look of the weapons and how much they were compatible with the gear that we used in the war. After that, we were sold.

We started purchasing airsoft guns like it was cool. I noticed we were winning a lot of our games, and we just used
basic infantry tactics, hand and arm signals. We introduced radios to our game and all of a sudden, what were originally great games became phenomenal games. We started getting the reputation for absolute aggressiveness on the field and professionalism off the field. As a Unit, we pride ourselves in loyalty to each other, something we found when we all fought side by side in the war. Although some of us all came from different commands, we understood that particular value and adopted it to Dtap.

We like to describe ourselves as an In-Your-Face style of airsoft. A lot of other local teams have gone to us for
advice on scenarios, drills and basic contingency plans. It’s funny how some of these teams would say, “Wow! You guys come up with this stuff pretty fast?” Our response would always be, “Hell, we get paid to this already, it’s our job.”

Of course we have to tailor a lot of things around your basic airsoft type games, but it’s almost similar with rarely
any changes. I know I mentioned we are very particular with keeping our identities hidden. We do this because we
don’t want you as an opponent to wonder who is kicking your butt individually, we just want you to know a Dtap
Operator is doing it, and that’s all. We just want you to know us for our skills, not for any individual Operator. We
teach our new recruits during their two-month probation that no one man can win a fight alone, it is a collaboration
of everyone’s skills, that’s when we win. If we do lose, we sit back and conduct an After Action Review and go over
individual steps to see what went wrong. Some say isn’t that too much thought into a game? Well, not really, because
remember there still maybe a chance that some of us may have to go back to the war. We consider it good training
for the real deal. In fact our newest Operator “Reaper” who just completed his recruit probation just left to fight in Afghanistan. He was featured on the local Hawaiian news, with the following headline: Double Tap Unit Operator Reaper Deploys to the Fight. We understand its just airsoft, but if we commit to complacency on an airsoft field, what the hell is going to happen on the battlefield.

Our Unit

The Unit is comprised of personnel from three different branches of the military. We have members from the US Navy, US Marine Corps and the US Army (nobody from the Air Force or Coast Guard has tried to apply yet). We also have very exceptional civilians that have proven to match the skills of our seasoned war vets. We are very selective of our recruits—who have to complete a two-month or eight-game requirement, where each game must be witnessed by a Dtap Operator, or the candidate can participate in a Dtap sanctioned event and get credit towards their probation.
Before the “Boots” start their probation, at least one Dtap Operator must vouch for the candidate. Then HQ will decide if the candidate will begin his probation. Upon completion, we give them a small ceremony where they will be read their standing orders as a full-fledged Operator of Double Tap Unit. They will also then be allowed to wear the Operator Patch. We have a small article on our Website regarding the meaning of the Operator Patch we dubbed the “Sea Donkey.”

Our Commitment

We have just concluded a milsim game called Operation Unknown, held at Kualoa Ranch (where they filmed Jurassic Park), on the famous North Shore of Oahu. It was our first major hosting of an airsoft event. Operation Unknown was a collaboration between Dtap and another well-known Hawaii airsoft organization known as Combat Sims. Operation Unknown was based around the Black Hawk Down theme, with a few interesting twists that we came up with. With the success of our event, we hope to turn it into the basic template for milsim operations here in Hawaii. I think working with some of the folks at Combat Sims and their knowledge of airsoft made it a very exciting event.

Our Promise

The senior leadership got together to watch fireworks with all of our families. That’s when we made the promise to the Unit that we will make Dtap huge. We had the idea of when you say the word Airsoft, you also think of Double Tap Unit. We want it to be a household name for airsofters. We are currently working on opening up Dtap Units in San Diego California; New River, South Carolina; and Chicago, Illinois. We even have a few takers in Canada and Virginia as well. Each Unit sees its local area code as their Unit title; for instance here in Hawaii we call it Double Tap Unit 808, and in San Diego they are called Double Tap Unit 619, and so on. Just like the actual military’s use of a three-digit designator to title their commands."

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Los Gatos is the founder and commandant of Double Tap Unit.