Does law Enforcement really need select fire?

[SactoDoug]

After SactoDoug linked us to an obviously unskilled shooter firing a select fire AR pattern rifle, I wrote,



Yes, he does get three hits out of 30 rounds. Because he, as an unskilled shooter apparently untrained in using a select−fire rifle, sprays a pattern of rounds across the hillside where the targets are spread out, firing many of the rounds into the ground between them. Someone trained in FA fire would not do this. Instead he'd aim at each target and would them fire only 2-3 rounds at each of them, getting hits with all of the rounds in about 1/3 the time that it takes this shooter in the video to do the same thing with semi−auto fire.

Watch the video again and see how much longer it takes him to hit the targets, I think he misses at least once, when he tries it on semi−auto.

Who do you think you are kidding here? In a burst the only round that is aimed is the first one. I have fired FA weapons. At a 25 yard target using 3 round bursts, the first one will hit, the 2nd one will be lucky to hit somewhere on the paper high and the third round always misses the entire target. FA will only have a high hit rate at extreme close range.

Using full auto fire, the rounds are walked up to the target because it is impossible to aim any round past the first.

You have no credibility talking about select fire after that post.

[lavey29]

You just proved my point.

A whole beta mag and they hit nothing. If I get engaged in a shootout with someone, I hope full auto and spray and pray from the hip hollywood style are the exact tactics they deploy.

Are you lost? 26 people were shot that day including a number of officers by the 2 suspects with their automatic weapons. The primary suspect fired his beta magged Bushmaster through his front window at the 2 officers as their car blocked his get away path. If you notice in the video he was not firing from his hip and had pretty good control of his weapon under FA. He laid down quite a bit of suppressing fire using decent tactics actually until he was taken down by those 2 brave officers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejD1Gml-ZGc

[lavey29]

So anybody who disagrees with you on a single point is basically on par with Feinstein and Boxer?


Good to know that so-called patriots are always up for a lively civil debate and discussion with well-reasoned and properly developed arguments.



No wonder the "right" is a disorganized mess.

Well, there you have it. We have been infiltrated by a libby lefty here. It all makes perfect sense now and your misrepresentation of the facts is a character quality well established with your party. How's that ocare workin out for you?

[KABA556]

Well, there you have it. We have been infiltrated by a libby lefty here. It all makes perfect sense now and your misrepresentation of the facts is a character quality well established with your party. How's that ocare workin out for you?

I thought maybe you had something to say that was worth clicking the "view post" although now I can see I was mistaken...

[KABA556]

ROFLMFAO. We didn't have drug problems of the nature that we have today, in 1810. We didn't have gang problems of the nature that we have today, in 1810. We didn't have rapid international travel in 1810. We didn't have terrorists in 1810. Earlier I pointed out "Don't look now, but it's not "the 1910s, 1920s, and 1930s [or] 1960s and 1970s" anymore. Times have changed. Warfare has changed. LE has changed." Guess what, it's also not 1810!



Those "private citizens" became the lawmen (read that as LEOs) of that era. Just one example, Wyatt Earp, famous for his work in LE, was at various times before he pinned on the badge, a freight hauler, a railroad worker, a boxer, a gambler, a horse thief, a pimp, a brothel owner, and a miner, in short, a "private citizen."

http://www.biography.com/people/wyatt-earp-9283338

Nonsense. Police have been around pretty much since we moved out of caves. Courageous private citizens did the work and eventually became "professional police."

So in 1810 there was no such thing as opium or laudanum? Just so you know, marijuana was legal in 1810, as was opium.


Also, it is very disingenuous on your part to claim that citizens acting as police in a one-off situation will become professional police.


A man who goes to a judge with three eyewitnesses who saw a creep move the man's horse into his barn and is issued a warrant to search the barn and if the horse is found to recover the horse and arrest the creep in question, is not going to be do anything more than recover his horse and apprehend the man. He is not going to wake up and decide to ride around the county shooting children who are playing with toy guns. He isn't going to ride around looking for people committing violations of building codes or statutory law.


Well it's not 1789 anymore, I suppose that means the Constitution doesn't matter because it was written before rapid international travel and before terrorism, right? That's in keeping with your "logic" of "the world has changed" isn't it?

Where do you see the future of law enforcement going? Are you hoping cops get to become some sort of Judge Dredd, riding around dispensing summary justice against all those who stand in their way?

[lavey29]

I thought maybe you had something to say that was worth clicking the "view post" although now I can see I was mistaken...

Dude, you need to move to Amsterdam or something so you can smoke your dope and not worry about any LE running around with automatic weapons.

[bigger hammer]

No changes, you're right. For now its just one company and someone else will gladly step in to take their money instead.

There will always be a gunsmith or armorer who will do the basic repairs/upgrades/maintenance work that is needed. Many departments have their own smith/armorers, particularly the larger ones.

I think it would be a different story though if MOST companies took that stance instead of just one.

I doubt it. I think you grossly overestimate the power that a PD has to influence legislation. I think that legislators pass laws exempting LEAs and LEOs from them, NOT because they think that having certain weapons will help police departments enforce the law, but because they want to appear to support law enforcement. It's more about the appearance than the reality.

[bigger hammer]

Earlier lavey wrote,

Tell that to the 2 SWAT guys that cut off his escape with their vehicle blocking his path and he unloaded a beta mag full at them through the front windshield.

You just proved my point.

A whole beta mag and they hit nothing.

You got it backwards falar. It was the criminal, Emil Mătăsăreanu, who had the gun with the Beta Mag. He fired his gun at the SWAT guys, through the windshield of his own car, hitting nothing. Actually if you watch the video of this incident, you'll see that he had pretty good control of his firearm during this, the last moments of the gunfight. THE SWAT LEOs, equipped with select−fire AR pattern rifles with 30 round mags, were the ones who, as lavey wrote,

... crawled out of the car and then engaged and neutralized him by firing underneath their vehicle and hitting the suspect in the ankle.

He fell to the ground and the officer continued to fire, continuing to hit him, ending the threat, and stopping the incident. IT WAS THE OFFICERS WHO USED DISCIPLINED FIRE, ending the shootout.

If I get engaged in a shootout with someone, I hope full auto and spray and pray from the hip hollywood style are the exact tactics they deploy.

If you "get engaged in a shootout with someone," I hope that he does not have a "full auto" weapon. Even if he " spray[s] and pray[s] from the hip, Hollywood style" he might get lucky and hit you.

[bigger hammer]

Earlier I wrote,

In reality you have no idea how many rounds he might have fired. PURE speculation. This is just a guess on your part.

More speculation. You have no idea whether he would have had the selector set to 'full' or to 'semi.' He seems to be a pretty fair shot. I didn't see any rounds hitting the ground or the wall behind the suspect or the car. Can you point out any that missed the suspect? And given that he fired immediately upon drawing, that is, he did not have his gun out and aimed before he fired, that was some pretty fair work. If he'd have had a rifle, his accuracy would have BEEN BETTER than with a handgun and he would have delivered more energy to the suspect with each round.

WOW! Your guessing really has no limits! AGAIN this is nothing but anti−cop speculation. Many departments are carrying anti−personnel ammunition in their AR's, such as Hornady's TAP rounds that penetrate LESS than HP ammunition from a handgun. Do you know what kind of ammunition this department carries in their AR's or if they even have AR's?

Plenty of agencies get cheap leftover M193/M855 also...........so what is your point?

My point is that your statements in the post I was responding to, were mostly anti−police rhetoric, consisting of lots of guessing. You have no idea if any of your speculation was actually what happened. All posts like this do is get people stirred up without anything worthwhile coming from them.

Focusing on the last part of your statement ... The departments that I know of use the "cheap, leftover M193/M855" for training and practice and use the TAP ammo (or something similar) for the street, so that they don't, have the situation that you described, "could have passed through and done more damage ... "

Your statement was just more speculation. And I noticed that you somehow failed to answer the question that I asked of you. In that post you wrote,

and a **** ton of them would have missed (hitting god knows what)

I responded, "He seems to be a pretty fair shot. I didn't see any rounds hitting the ground or the wall behind the suspect or the car. Can you point out any that missed the suspect?" Can you answer my question please?

[bigger hammer]

Who do you think you are kidding here? In a burst the only round that is aimed is the first one.

ROFL. Doug, like some of the rest of your training, this is wrong.

I have fired FA weapons. At a 25 yard target using 3 round bursts, the first one will hit, the 2nd one will be lucky to hit somewhere on the paper high and the third round always misses the entire target.

ANOTHER unskilled, untrained (or improperly trained) shooter gives his opinion. All this demonstrates is that you have little−to−no skill with FA weapons. Here's a hint for you ... they require different skills than precision shooting, firing semi−auto. Here's ANOTHER question that you probably won't answer. Can you tell us who trained you so that this is the result?

The fact is that a properly trained shooter with a select−fire AR pattern rifle will be able to keep his rounds on a man size target at the distances that most gunfights occur. If he's firing 2-3 round bursts, the average trained shooter can do it up to 50 yards. Skilled shooters firing from a rest, can maintain that accuracy up to 100 yards. Some perhaps even further. In the classes I taught at my department, in order to graduate from the MP−5 class, every student had to keep all rounds on a man size target from ten yards, with a 30 round burst.

FA will only have a high hit rate at extreme close range.

Pretty vague there Doug. What's your definition of "extreme close range?"

Using full auto fire, the rounds are walked up to the target

Doug too much TV, action movies and video games have you very confused. That technique is used with belt fed machine guns. It's not a good technique for magazine fed select−fire rifles. It uses too much ammunition and it puts out rounds that are not on target.

because it is impossible to aim any round past the first.

Nonsense. This might be your personal experience. But for anyone with proper training on these weapons, it's BS.

You have no credibility talking about select fire after that post.

Doug it's obvious that you have little−to−no experience or training with these weapons. If you think I'm wrong with this, please tell us of your experience and training in this area. One of us is certified as an instructor with both the MP−5 and select−fire rifles. The other is an armchair expert who probably has good scores on a video game. I'm content to let the readers decide who has credibility on this.

[bigger hammer]

So in 1810 there was no such thing as opium or laudanum? Just so you know, marijuana was legal in 1810, as was opium.

Earlier I suggested a class in critical reading for SactoDoug, but now I see that you might found it useful as well. Either you missed or you conveniently overlooked it or you just trying to confuse the readers, I CLEARLY wrote this (I'll emphasize the part that you have overlooked)

We didn't have drug problems of the nature that we have today, in 1810.

In 1810 there were opium dens where people could pay a fee and then quietly rest while the drug too effect. Laudanum was a common ingredient in many medicines, including many kinds of "snake oil." Today we have 12 year olds doing drive by shootings of rival gang members so that they can maintain control of their drug sales turf. See the difference?

Also, it is very disingenuous on your part to claim that citizens acting as police in a one-off situation will become professional police.

That's because it WON'T be a "one−off situation." As soon as one trouble maker has been dealt with, another one will popup. The sheep will again appeal to the same guy to deal with this new problem. He will, and soon it will become his usual routine. Then the community will want him to take over that position permanently and will pay him for his work. When the lawmen got started in the "Old west" this is often how it was. He'll need help to deal with bigger problems and so he'll need some deputies. Presto, a law enforcement agency.

A man who goes to a judge with three eyewitnesses who saw a creep move the man's horse into his barn and is issued a warrant to search the barn and if the horse is found to recover the horse and arrest the creep in question, is not going to be do anything more than recover his horse and apprehend the man. He is not going to wake up and decide to ride around the county shooting children who are playing with toy guns. He isn't going to ride around looking for people committing violations of building codes or statutory law.

You're right, he's not going to "wake up" and find himself a lawman. It will happen incrementally when the sheep, who don't have the courage to "arrest the creep in question " consistently go to him to help them with similar issues. Then they'll want him to take that job permanently and will pay him to do so.

Well it's not 1789 anymore, I suppose that means the Constitution doesn't matter because it was written before rapid international travel and before terrorism, right? That's in keeping with your "logic" of "the world has changed" isn't it?

The Constitution is as close to a perfect document to govern a country by, as exists anywhere in the world.

Where do you see the future of law enforcement going?

I don't see any major changes on the horizon. Tactics and techniques will evolve to keep up with the crooks. As better weaponry and protective gear is developed they'll filter down to street officers.

Are you hoping cops get to become some sort of Judge Dredd, riding around dispensing summary justice against all those who stand in their way?

Nope. I leave judging to judges. Police are in the apprehension business. I happen to think that it's better than any other legal system that exists today, but it's obviously not perfect. It never will be, because it relies on humans to make decisions.

And since you seem to have calmed down a bit, is there some reason that you have not answered the questions that I've asked you? There have been about a dozen of them, I'm pretty sure that you've not even answered one of them? I'm pretty good about answering the questions that others ask of me, but you, and some others don't seem to be doing the same thing.

[KABA556]

Dude, you need to move to Amsterdam or something so you can smoke your dope and not worry about any LE running around with automatic weapons.

I do not use marijuana and have never used marijuana, but it is nice to know that we have such immature and childish police on the streets as yourself... Childish and immature creeps who resort to wild accusations of "communist" and ad hominems about drug use.


Are you roid raging right now? Why are you getting so ugly with me and making this about personal insults when I haven't said anything PERSONALLY about you as an individual?

[jamesob]

I have seen both good and bad LEO's over the years. The ones that have contempt for the public are the ones that tend to be the bad apples. Those kinds of officers are the ones that demand respect and often abuse their authority.

I have also met and dealt with a few good officers too. They do their job, serve the community and have a good attitude about it.

One thing that is troublesome is the "circle the wagons" mentality that they have. The good cops will protect the bad ones. I always applaud any officer that reports poor behavior from other officers. It shows there is hope to get rid of the bad apples.

On this particular subject, I starting on a civil liberties stand that LEO's should have the same access to weapons as the average citizen. After reading the responses from various LEO's in this thread, including one self professed instructor, I am dead set against it. If the posters in this thread are any indication, they are reckless and dangerous. I question whether they should be allowed to have any weapons at all.

I was taught that self defense ends when the threat ends Fire three rounds at a time and reassess whether the threat still exists after each group of three. Even if all three rounds miss, the "threat" might stop or flee when met with gunfire. These officers are purposefully trained to fire as many rounds as quickly as they can into the "threat". My training was to preserve life if at all possible. Their training is reckless.

It reminds me of this video where about 2/3's of the rounds fired were made after the "threat" was on the ground writhing in pain. Yes, the initial rounds were justified, but the majority of the round IMO were not. The officer either failed to reassess the threat, or didn't care. He kept shooting, even slowed his shots towards the end to almost ensure that they were lethal.



They need full auto.

as a former l.e.o, that was a bad shoot imo.

[SactoDoug]

ROFL. Doug, like some of the rest of your training, this is wrong.



ANOTHER unskilled, untrained (or improperly trained) shooter gives his opinion. All this demonstrates is that you have little−to−no skill with FA weapons. Here's a hint for you ... they require different skills than precision shooting, firing semi−auto. Here's ANOTHER question that you probably won't answer. Can you tell us who trained you so that this is the result?

The fact is that a properly trained shooter with a select−fire AR pattern rifle will be able to keep his rounds on a man size target at the distances that most gunfights occur. If he's firing 2-3 round bursts, the average trained shooter can do it up to 50 yards. Skilled shooters firing from a rest, can maintain that accuracy up to 100 yards. Some perhaps even further. In the classes I taught at my department, in order to graduate from the MP−5 class, every student had to keep all rounds on a man size target from ten yards, with a 30 round burst.



Pretty vague there Doug. What's your definition of "extreme close range?"



Doug too much TV, action movies and video games have you very confused. That technique is used with belt fed machine guns. It's not a good technique for magazine fed select−fire rifles. It uses too much ammunition and it puts out rounds that are not on target.



Nonsense. This might be your personal experience. But for anyone with proper training on these weapons, it's BS.



Doug it's obvious that you have little−to−no experience or training with these weapons. If you think I'm wrong with this, please tell us of your experience and training in this area. One of us is certified as an instructor with both the MP−5 and select−fire rifles. The other is an armchair expert who probably has good scores on a video game. I'm content to let the readers decide who has credibility on this.

Post a video or it didn't happen. You are making stuff up. I want to see you fire burst and hit a target 100 yards away consistently with 2-3 of the 3 round bursts. Show your superhuman "skills" since you claim to have the ability to do things that no other human can do.

BTW, my trainer, SFC Robert Barton of the US Army. He is long retired now since the training was in 1990.

[A-J]

Without partaking in what seems to be a huge flame war between a few parties, I will simply say that IN MY OPINION there is no need for the average joe LEO to have FA capability. Which is a separate issue from them having patrol rifles, which (again IMO) are far better tools than the old shotgun.