CS: Misc-police weapons
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] Would they check the suspects for DNA matches against the recovered shot gun in our contributor's novel before or after they had attacked them with their personal thermobaric weapons. On a less sarcastic note I suppose that at least it now means the Army has at least one Geneva and Hague "illegal" weapon against the Police's two...the first such is easy...but can any fellow "Cybershooter" tell us what BOTH the police's two "illegal" items are? -- CS gas and expanding bullets? Please let's stop recirculating this urban myth. Both the Geneva Convention and the Hague Accords apply only to international warfare between nations and 'domestic problems' were specifically exempted from both sets of documents. There is nothing illegal under international law about the Police using soft nosed bullets or CS sprays. With respect to UK law, under Section 54 of the Firearms Acts, Crown Servants like the Army, MOD and Police do not require firearms certificates if they possess firearms or other prohibited weapons in connection with their official duties. On what basis do you also suggest that fuel/air explosives are illegal for the Army? I fail to see how they differ fundamentally from other military high explosive devices. I find the media fuss about some military weapons to be fairly perplexing when you compare them with the horrific injuries that can be caused by common or garden mortar bombs or artillery shells. Hugh Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Learn More. Surf Less. Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Topics You Choose. http://www.topica.com/partner/tag01
CS: Pol-Israeli Riot Control.
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] Whilst we are on the subject of the Israeli's approach to riot control, does anyone know the purpose of the muzzle attachment seen on some of the Israeli M16s? My guess is that it is either a muzzle-loading launch tube for the Israeli 'mouse ball' rubber-covered bullets mentioned by Nick Steadman; or else it might be a small suppressor designed to cut the sound of discharge to below the ear damage threshold. My guess is its the former, since the tube seems to produce a fair flash when the rifle is fired. Hugh -- I'm not sure either but whatever they're shooting does not cycle the action as they are clearly shown manually working the action. Steve. Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
CS: Legal-anonymity
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] I must disagree with Hugh here and agree with IG. Any police officer disagreeing with policy directions given by senior officers is 'sticking his neck on the line' and any officer putting himself in this situation can find life very difficult indeed. Ah, but IG has said that he has already stuck his neck out over 'long barrelled pistols, moderators and other things that cause grief'. My point was, why should he have to stick his neck out at all? It is only because some of his fellow officers appear to be prejudiced against certain 'nasty' section 1 items. I was merely pointing out that it is this prejudice, often put forward by ACPO and sadly, some grass roots police officers, that often causes the flames to rise in CS when the subject of our friends in blue is discussed. IG - I hope that you are not too disheartened (I agree with Brian: the list would be a duller place without our Police subscribers). If you had any doubts before about the strength of feeling about the '97 act, you surely have none now. Ordinary people who enjoyed their hobby don't easily forget being called 'perverts' by the media and having their property taken away. Hugh Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
CS: Pol-police guns
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] My view is that the police should ditch the MP5s and assault rifles which scare the crap out of the public (with rare exceptions) and learn how to use pistols. In an ideal world yes. It used to be amazing to watch the top pistol shots do a flash sight picture and compressed surprise-break and achieve accuracy at high speed - in fact I wasn't that bad myself once (very big nostalgic sigh!). However, I think that we have to be realistic and realise that most AFOs outside of the elite units like PT-17 are never going to be given the range time and training to be able to reproduce that sort of performance under stress, even if typical ranges are 10 yards or less. If police are still taught "instinctive, sense of direction shooting techniques" for close-range incidents rather than make proper use of the sights (as was suggested in the ACPO report quoted by Rusty) then they _will_ miss with pistols most of the time. Given the apparent level of training of most AFOs, the self-loading carbine is a better choice, given that it gives 3 index points on the weapon: surely much easier to hit a target with under stress, and better accuracy if a longer range shot is required. In any event, the police seem to be going to 5.56mm and even .40 SW (in the UMP40) which beat 9mm FMJ or JSP. I agree that 5.56mm is a better choice ballistically, but have you ever experienced the flash and muzzle blast from a short barelled 5.56mm in a confined space? It's not something that you forget in a hurry and I would definitely not like to experience it without good ear defenders, especially if my next shot was likely to be an important one. Therefore the best UK police firearm would probably be something like the G36K, fitted with one of Gerry Lapwoods compact Husher 1 moderators - but that would definitely be un-PC in a big way! I understand that PR concerns were a big motivation for the RUC use of the M1 carbine and Ruger Mini14 in the past - nice folksy wooden stocks with no pistol grips or wicked black plastic. Hugh -- I totally disagree - if virtually every patrol officer on the face of the planet outside the UK can carry a pistol then it makes no logical sense to argue that a tiny proportion of our officers cannot be given sufficient resources to learn how to shoot a pistol properly. Pistols also cost half what an MP5 or G36K costs, which means more money to spend on ammunition. If officers are missing 70% of the time at less than 10 metres with MP5s then the training must be so dire that having an MP5 confers little or no benefit over a pistol. There are two seperate issues here. The first is that the training needs to be a hell of a lot better and the second is that the pistol is a better choice for various reasons (easier to carry, less intimidating to the public, cheaper etc.) than the MP5 or other carbine. The trick to using 5.56mm indoors is to get some of the earplugs that attenuate the muzzle blast but still allow voices to be heard. Steve. Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
CS: Legal-anonymity
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] I have stuck my neck out for shooters over long barreled pistols, moderators and other things that cause grief. IG, I have a lot of sympathy for many of the views expressed in your post, but this one line made me do a double-take. What 'grief' could possibly be caused by these legal section 1 items? The implication from your statement is that some people in the Police just don't like 'civilians' owning these items, despite the explicit wording of the Firearms Acts. I am lucky in that my own licensing department is superb - they genuinely seem to believe in the 'service to shooters' line put out by the Home Office. However many aren't so lucky, and we regularly hear horror stories on Cybershooters of inappropriate behaviour by some police officers. IG, you are clearly one of the enlightened; but as long as such views are held by some of your colleagues, are you really surprised that many Cybershooters get upset at the Police in general? Hugh Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
CS: Legal-9mm hollowpoints
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] JHP should also be used, where applicable, but we cant have it 'cos the Hague convention says so. Comments on this would be gratefuly received. (Article 29 of the Hague convention on Warfare on Land, 1899 refers I think!). We use JSP instead. I think that this is definitely in the urban myth category. Both the Geneva Convention and the Hague Accords apply only to international warfare between nations and 'domestic problems' were specifically exempted from both sets of documents. I believe that it is the Police Scientific Development Branch that sets the UK police standard for 9mm para as a 90 grain soft point bullet. Quite why they think that this is acceptable ammunition for police, I have no idea, but I suspect that it is to do with PR concerns over JHP as (I think) Steve has suggested. I have an article written 12 years ago by the US writer Massad Ayoob which puts the case for JHP for police work, in particular why they were legally defensible in court. In essence his argument was: (a) The majority of American police use them, including the FBI and Secret Service; (b) hollowpoints are less likely to go all the way through an assailant's body and jeopardise hidden innocent bystanders located behind them; (c) hollowpoints are more ricochet-proof; (d) hollowpoints are more humane, because they penetrate less and assailants have to be shot fewer times to cause them to cease hostilities. If the police AFOs have to use 9mm firearms, then my personal opinion is that they should be issued with 115gr JHP +P+ ammo (which I believe has about the same velocity as NATO spec 9mm ball). Hugh -- Illinois State Police were the first large agency in the US to switch to 9mm pistols in the 70s, and they helped develop the Winchester Ranger 9mm JHP +P+ load. This was before everyone and their a---hole had an opinion on the subject after the FBI shootout in Miami. I've never heard any significant complaint about the performance of that load other than it cannot always sufficiently penetrate clothing. There are a lot of people who have _written_ about how it doesn't penetrate enough and so on but ISP seem perfectly happy with it and have used it for 20 years or so. In any event, the police seem to be going to 5.56mm and even .40 SW (in the UMP40) which beat 9mm FMJ or JSP. Steve. Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
CS: Misc-Blank guns for Aliens
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] The Aliens Pulse rifles were fully operational Thompson M1s using vicious .45ACP blanks made by BMS who then became Perdix. There was also a grenade launcher on the pulse rifle which seemed to be made from the front end of a SPAS12 shotgun. These pulse rifles were certainly an impressive feature of the film - certainly the most eye-catching firearms that I can recall seeing on the screen, with perhaps the Robocop gun (a modified Beretta 93R) a close second! I've often wondered how the blanks are constructed for the self-loading and full-auto firearms that are used in films. My guess is that they might be made from cut-down 7.62 brass for 0.45ACP and 5.56 for 9mm, so that the crimp can form an ogive to allow reliable feeding. Or is special 'blank' brass available to the theatrical companies? I imagine that these firearms would also require modification to achieve reliable functioning. I suppose that a baffle inside the barrel and/or lightened springs as well as perhaps the removal of the locking lugs for short-recoil pistols would be required. I believe that theatrical blanks use different compositions to military blanks - I would imagine that the military would have little use for a 1 foot long muzzle flash! I seem to remember reading somewhere that the theatrical armourers jealously guard the particular pyrotechnic recipes that they use. If it's not revealing too many trade secrets, perhaps Guy could enlighten us a bit more. Best wishes, Hugh Bellars -- I know a bit about it, there are several different methods for the blanks and the blank adaptation. One Glock I've seen essentially had a rod screwed into the barrel with a small hole through it, then the corner at the front of the chamber was ground off. Thus you need less power to cycle the action, and they use powders which create a big flash, enough of it getting through the hole in the rod. Most conversions work in a similar way, you restrict the muzzle or something so that there is enough power for the blank to cycle the action. The difference between a military BFA and Hollywood is you still need a muzzle flash, so it requires careful measuring of holes and so on, and careful loading of blanks. Blanks are handloaded, quite often the gun is rechambered for a different calibre than the original to get it to work. There all kinds of different blanks, crimped, open ended, sub calibre, you name it, it's been tried! Tim LaFrance is heavily into making movie prop guns, he has a website but there's not much on it about his blank guns. Do a websearch on "Stembridge" and you will get a zillion hits on the subject. Steve. Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
CS: Misc-US Military Terminology
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] Now to the translations. You are talking about grazing fire in defilade (not duffel-A), which makes no sense. snip In both WW I and WW II, machine gunners were trained to arch machine gun fire so as to have it come down on the reverse slope of hills. As air craft became more reliable, this practice fell into disuse. Sorry to contradict your US friend Alex, but I understand that the practice is still taught to British Army machine gunners that use the L7A2 GPMG (AKA the FN MAG) in its sustained fire mode with a tripod and the Trilux sight.
CS: Misc-US military terminology
From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED] "When you reach this bunker, lay down grazing fire on this duffle-A." Did Anthony mishear "Triple-A", ie anti aircraft armament? Grazing fire doesn't ring a bell. Sounds like it would ruin a bullock's whole day. Sorry that I'm a bit late into this one... 'Grazing fire' sounds like it is related to the military terminology 'first graze'. This is the point in the flight of a bullet where it will strike the ground, or a prone man. The point where the trajectory will strike the head of a standing man is known as the 'first catch'. The point between them is the 'beaten zone'. I guess that 'grazing fire' in this context is supposed to mean long range fire onto a fixed point on the ground - in this case the 'defilade'. Hugh -- I can't find anyone at the MoD who knows what the "beaten zone" is, they all seem to think the LSW is a counter-sniper weapon, not a machinegun. Steve. Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16 Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
