Hollow-Points
As a military veteran and firearms owner, I find it unconscionable that the United States Federal Government continues to mislead the American people about its activities and its intentions. The Geneva Conventions of 1949 outlawed hollow point ammunition for use on the battlefield because of the particularly cruel nature of the round. It does not merely incapacitate or kill, but inflicts gruesome injuries, maiming living targets in a manner that can be best described as catastrophic. It’s designed to impact, penetrate, and expand, essentially mushrooming out to deliver tremendous damage. Prohibited in war, our combat troops deploy with standard ball ammo instead, (known as Full Metal Jacket,) that has a clean ballistic profile. While it penetrates and is certainly lethal, it does not do additional damage by virtue of its construction. Claims by government agencies and their lackeys in the media that the 1.6 Billion rounds of hollow-point ammunition is intended for target practice simply isn’t credible. For whom is this ammuntion intended? One needn’t be a rocket scientist to do this math. The government is bound to abide by the Geneva Conventions in wars with foreign enemies, but there is no explicit prohibition against the use of hollow-point ammunition by civilian agencies on a nation’s own citizens.
I go to the range a few times per year, both to keep up my skills and to re-zero the sights on various weapons. This is a common practice, and our combat troops do this routinely in order to keep their weapons combat ready and practice their skills. While durable and resilient, even modern combat arms need to have their sights re-verified periodically because all of the jostling and bumping and dropping means that the sights can be off, meaning the strike of the bullet may not match the point of aim. This is best practice with firearms of any description. When I go to the range, I generally take enough ammunition that I will be able to [re]zero my sights if necessary, and get in a little target practice. Since clean ballistic performance is what you’re seeking for such circumstances, consistency being the basic object and necessity of setting up one’s sights, I use standard full metal jacket rounds at the range. Unless I’m attempting to discover performance differences for a particular ammunition type, that’s ordinarily all I will shoot at the range.
There are some valid reasons to use hollow-point ammunition for some training, but the difference in cost alone would demand that one make sparse use of the more expensive types, opting instead for plain FMJ. A high quality HP round will generally be between 180-300% of the price of a comparable quality FMJ round. Until the recent price spikes, it was not uncommon to buy fifty rounds of .45 ACP in FMJ for $15, but to spend upwards of $35 for comparable HP rounds. The price difference alone dictates that at the range, one shoots primarily FMJ, because it’s foolish to use expensive ammo to shoot at targets. Never mind this reality, the leftwing media lackeys insist that the government is stockpiling billions of rounds to shoot at paper targets. According to one federal agent with whom I spoke, there’s no real reason to use anything but the less expensive Full Metal Jacket ammunition in most training. Frankly, it’s just not believable that all of this high-priced hollow point ammunition is intended for training purposes.
Let us be blunt about the numbers. Let’s consider how many rounds of ammunition the average federal agent needs to shoot annually to maintain his or her proficiency. According to my sources, it’s likely that the average federal agent/officer is expending many fewer than 1,000 rounds per year in training, most less than half that number. It may vary somewhat from agency to agency, but as a general rule, that’s a generous average number. Compare this with our soldiers, for whom Army rifle qualification involves forty shots at forty targets at varying distances, from fifty to three-hundred meters. Once a soldier has been through basic training, apart from a few practice ranges here and there, and the zeroing ranges, a soldier is going to re-qualify twice per year. That’s eighty rounds for record-fire. Even if the soldier uses an equal number in practicing, and another twelve to eighteen in re-zeroing his sights(generally fired in three-round sets,) there will be fewer than two-hundred live rounds fired per year unless the soldier is a special operator, who do many more live-fire training exercises, or is deployed in combat. I am sure a number of federal officers spend a good deal more time at the range. Still, let’s consider the math. 1.6 billion rounds to Homeland Defense is a sizable delivery, even admitting that half these rounds are to be delivered over the next five years. How many federal agents are there anyway?
In order for Federal agents to consume 1.6 billion rounds in five years of training, even at the generous rate of 1,000 rounds per year, the number of officers needed to expend this amount of ammunition would be around 320,000. The most recent figures I can find suggests that as of 2004, there were roughly 105,000 armed federal agents in all civilian agencies. That would mean that the government and its media lackeys expect us to believe the average federal agent is shooting up 3,000 rounds of ammunition per year at the range, but remember that this purchase of 1.6 billion rounds represents only the Department of Homeland Security. It doesn’t include the purchases of other federal agencies, but only the subordinate agencies of DHS, including the US Border Patrol, ICE, Secret Service and the Coast Guard, among smaller agencies.
I find that preposterous on several levels. If it were true, it’s a colossal waste of money and a bunch of trigger-happy baloney at tax-payers’ expense, but I doubt it’s true or even close to that number. If it were true, the government is expending colossal sums on firearms practice that should not be necessary, and is not necessary for our soldiers, generally speaking. If a couple-hundred rounds per year in training is good enough for our soldiers, I cannot fathom how it wouldn’t be enough for federal officers, generally speaking. 1.6 billion rounds is a fantastic number and would represent training ammunition for at least 15 years, if not longer.
Ladies and gentlemen, we’re being fed a colossal lie. There is no rational explanation for this number of rounds in the realm of training. This story has been out for some time, with little comment from the administration, until Sarah Palin mentioned it in a Facebook post last week, covered here by Gary Jackson. Jackson offers another post to debunk the various attempts by the lapdog media to explain away the purchases. The media would have you believe that this is all very harmless, and that there’s nothing sinister in this number of rounds, that while seemingly fantastic, is easily explained away by the government trying to get a good deal on ammunition, acting therefore as budget-minded guardians of the public trust.
No, this is something else, and I have two possible bits of speculation in mind. One is less diabolical, but would make perfect sense with the current administration. As Breitbart suggested, the government may be trying to induce a shortage in the market and drive up prices. We’ve certainly seen rapid price increases for ammo, even before the mad rush that commenced after the Sandy Hook tragedy. Some in this administration may be thinking that if they buy it up in huge contracts, there will be a good deal less out there for the populace to stockpile, and such ammunition that is available will come only at a premium price.
The other explanation is more sinister, and I believe entirely possible, because the condition of the economy is unraveling much faster than expected. There’s no doubt that we are being engineered to economic collapse on the basis of a fundamental monetary breakdown that will result from the endless money-printing habits and debt accrual of this president. It’s the Cloward-Piven strategy, being played out in living color. When this happens, there will be chaos in the streets and in the towns and villages of the country, and there will be a move by government to suppress the violence by any and all means necessary. They won’t discriminate much either, because if you are armed, you will be seen as a threat, even if you’re doing no more than defending yourselves. In that light, it makes a good deal of sense for the government to procure vast stores of ammunition now. It reduces the amount available to the rest of us, and it provides a ready stockpile…”in case of emergencies.” The best part from the point of view of the people in government driving all of this is that the people who they expect to “suppress” are the same people now finding it difficult to find ammunition at any price, but they’re the ones paying for it. It’s win-win-win. You don’t get the ammo, you pay for theirs, and they have a ready stockpile for use against you. If you’re a statist in the Obama administration, what’s not to love?
Besides, remember this guy:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWMIwziGrAQ]
