By Jack Lee (retired law enforcement)
In the most general terms our state’s have defined an assault weapon as a semi-automatic rifle, meaning it fires one shot with each trigger pull and it automatically chambers another round (bullet). Further, its equipped with a collapsible butt stock, a high capacity magazine, a quick release magazine button, a bayonet lug, a pistol grip, a grenade launcher and a flash hider to obscure the flame caused by gun powder when fired. Some states that have assault weapon bans will allow one of two of these features on a rifle, but not all of them.
A reasoned mind might therefore conclude these features make an assault extra lethal right? Okay, let’s take a look at each one and see how lethal they are:
A bayonet is a knife attached to a gun barrel to form a sort of spear. Fixing a bayonet to a rifle is usually a last resort. Typically this is done when the ammo runs out. If you have ammo, using a bayonet is not that desirable. A bayonet is mostly psychological, and it’s a carry over from the days when we also had cavalry charges and fired black powder cannons.
As of this date there’s no record of any mass bayoneting, bayonet charges or rifles with bayonets used to hold up your neighborhood 7-11. Your odds of being bayoneted are slim to none. A bayonet lug is therefore a moot point.
What about that collapsible butt stock? A collapsible butt stock typically has 3-5 positions and it is used to compensate for different arm lengths, other than that it serves no practical purpose. No soldier I know would prefer to completely close down the butt stock and fire from hip the ala Rambo style! This tactic works great in movies, but it’s not so good in real life. Accuracy drops by at least 70% or more when firing from the hip. It does make a rifle more concealable, but consider that the rifle (carbine) is still well over two feet long and at least 12 inches wide when that big magazine is inserted. Try hiding that hunk of metal in your pants! She’s gonna think you’re extra, extra, glad to see her!
In lethality terms there’s nothing gained by a collapsible stock. Overall for accuracy there as many pluses as there are minuses, but it looks mean and to a non-gun person this makes it [appear] more dangerous, even though it’s really not.
Next, a semi-auto and full auto are two vastly different concepts in rifles. A full auto hand carried carbine (short rifle), better known as a sub-machine gun, fires automatically as long as the trigger is held down and you have ammunition. Many people confuse semi-automatic and full automatic as one in the same. This confusion seems especially true in the mainstream news media when they lecture us about assault weapons.
In terms of cycle rate (rate of fire) between as so-called assault weapon and a semi-automatic rifle or shotgun, there is no difference. Both operate on the same principal and have the same cycle rate.
I heard a questionable expert on TV say that a semi-auto Bushmaster rifle (used at Sandy Hook) can fire 6 rounds per second. Let’s stop and think about this. Try to move your index finger like your squeezing a trigger, see how many times can you move it in one second? Even if you could, your accuracy drops dramatically – not the way to go if you want to hit what you are aiming at. But, it sounds scarey and it inflames passions to hear that baloney.
We have very strict laws about the sales and ownership of full automatic weapons and unless one was obtained illegally or created illegally, their contribution to crime is virtually nil. Another moot point, but one raised all the time to scare people and confuse the issue on gun control.
A flash hider is next on our list of banned items. The flash hider really doesn’t hide the flash, it diffuses it. And only modestly. In the dark you can still see the muzzle flash from a long distance. I’m not sure what great advantage there is by banning the flash hider. This is not a silencer, it merely reduces the flash, and just a little. however, in combat with gunfire everywhere, we want every advantage we can get, no matter how slight. So modern military weapons have flash hiders. Once again a military look means more than reality. So the humble flash hider was restricted by non-gun legislators who lacked the basic information in this article.
This brings us to high capacity magazines. When we think of an assault weapon or military weapon we tend to think of a long magazine that holds 30 or 40 round (bullets). Large capacity magazines for an AR-15 rifle (black rifle) tend to jam, so most AR owners prefer a 20 shot or less magazine. In California, and many other States like Connecticut, the capacity of a legal magazine is 10 rounds. Connecticut and California law limits 10 rounds to even pistols. California also bans the standard release button to drop the magazine.
The Bushmaster carbine used in Sandy Hook was not on the list of banned weapons in Connecticut because it was not an assault weapon, but that doesn’t stop the mainstream media from telling your an assault weapon was used. In fact, assault weapons are just about all you hear talked about! This is because of it’s military style appearance more than anything else. A black rifle looks mean and it scares some people. As a result of the bad press I can virtually promise you that the assault weapon ban will be put back into effect, regardless of the facts.
BONUS SECTION: The problem from my perspective is, drawing the line between an assault weapon and regular semi-auto rifle. This is a very fine line; it’s a mere baby step between finding an assault rifle too dangerous to be owned by the public and a semi-auto rifle also too dangerous. There is almost no rational difference, in terms of lethality, between these two classifications of weapons. This is a legitimate concern and foremost among the other concerns why we should resist anti-gun legislation.
Law abiding people are the only people harmed by gun bans. Gun free zones, bans on high capacity mags, so-called assault weapons, have no meaning to law breakers, we’ve simply made their mission easier.
Police react to shooting crimes after the fact almost all the time. Rarely are they lucky enough to prevent a shooting. When seconds count the police are minutes away. When your life or a loved one’s life is at risk, you can bet you’re on your own, Sandy Hook is a good example of that and look what happened.
The reality is we have over 200 million hand guns alone in America, not counting long guns. We should focus on ways to assist mental health professionals to reduce the threat from people with mental illness. That would do more than a ban on assault weapons. We should reverse the ban on certain qualified teachers being trained and licensed to carry a weapon. There’s a reasonable and safe solution waiting for us if we would only pursue it and work it out, just like we did for airline pilots.
No matter what we do there will be risk, we can’t legislate that away. No solution will ever be perfect…that’s a given. But, we should engage in talking about ideas using the facts and reason to reach a responsible plan. What I’m hearing from legislators and the media is hysteria and knee-jerk ideas…ban this, ban that, chip away at our 2nd amendment right … I think we can do better, if we want too.
Liberals want us as disarmed as Sweden, home of the world’s worst mass murder spree by a man armed with an illegal sub-machine gun. The want all states to have laws as tough as Washington D.C., murder capitol of the world. How rational is that?
The responsibility of gun ownership is first and foremost common sense. The weapons used at Sandy Hook were not cheap Saturday night specials and certainly not assault weapons as the press and anti gun politicians would try to make an uninformed public believe. Thank You Jack for the first half of your post about what does NOT make a particular style of rifle an assault weapon. I hope that it will give some insight to people so they realize it is not the weapon that makes it dangerous as much as the person using it. What if there was no federal laws about loaded weapons not being allowed on school grounds, and just one of the adults trying to prevent this tragedy been armed and trained, the deranged shooter could have been stopped prior to all the carnage that he and he alone created. He used the tools he had, and with no lawful right to handle them given his reported mental issues, in fact he is just as guilty of illegal possession as any felon street criminal, but laws did not stop him nor will stop it other criminals. Also he could easily have caused death with a blade weapon, chainsaw,and even a hammer, what ever he was inclined to do he could achieve with laws banning guns.
Come on Jack. What do you care about the most. A little boy or girls innocent life or a piece of steel. I’ve been to war Jack. There is nothing rational about an assault weapon. Ever shot a deer with an assault weapon Jack. If you need one you are a pretty damn poor shot. Stop cloaking senseless death with a 2nd Amendment right. I support the 2nd Amendment. Own a hand gun and a hunting rifle or shotgun. But you don’t need a magazine with 30 rounds to hit your target. If you do, give up the sport! And if you think your life is in danger, shoot first and ask questions second. The law will decide whether you were right or wrong! Then you can preach your second amendment right to a jury…YOUR PEERS and trust them with YOUR life!
Aye, but Jack is right in that … this case … has nothing to do with assault rifles, and everything to do with the dearth of options available to a Mommy with a disturbed boy.
For, in her floundering, and choosing target shooting as therapy … she’s paid.
She should be the very, very last to do so.
Rick you may well want to read Jacks post again, he tried to inform people of the very thing you claim was used and wasn’t. Jack, well at least you tried! The past events will be spun to read a lot like Ricks comment about what you care the most about, sadly that isn’t even close to the root of the problem and no gun law or restrictions are going to make a difference to a deranged murderer, they will find a way! It was a semi automatic weapon, not a full auto military version, it should have had by law a 10 round magazine, and it should have been locked up by the mother/owner and away from this murderer to prevent him from using it. And a 22 caliber semi auto rifle or hand gun could have been used with the same results. The issue with me is the weapons used needed to be safely secured and what the killer could get his hands on at the time.
“The term ‘assault weapon,’ as used by the media, is a media invention,” said Robert Crook, executive director of the Coalition of Connecticut Sportsmen. “These are semi-automatic firearms that have military cosmetic characteristics. They look like our military firearms, but they’re not.”
Connecticut has an assault-weapons ban, modeled after a federal law that was enacted in 1994 before expiring a decade later. But it takes more than a dark fiberglass body and a menacing shape to fall under the ban.
The Connecticut law restricts semi-automatic rifles — those capable of firing a bullet with each pull of the trigger — only if they include a detachable magazine as well as at least two of five specific features. One of those features — a pistol grip — is ubiquitous on military-style weapons. But to be banned, an AR-15-style rifle would also need to include a folding or telescoping stock, a bayonet mount, a grenade launcher or a flash suppressor, a device typically screwed on to the end of the muzzle to limit the bright flash caused by gunpowder that ignites outside of the muzzle.
“has nothing to do with assault rifles, and everything to do with the dearth of options available to a Mommy with a disturbed boy. For, in her floundering, and choosing target shooting as therapy … she’s paid. She should be the very, very last to do so.”
And thank you again Libby… : ) -jack
Rick, thanks for your comments and thank you too Harold for trying to help Rick understand.
Rick, you sent me an email telling me I didn’t even know what an assault weapon was…check your email for my response.
Like I said minutes ago in another comment… it’s way to early into this investigation to label something the proximate cause and pass a one-size-fits-all law to correct it.
We need to get the facts first and a good place to start is analyzing these shooters. We need to know what motivated them, what do they all have in common? What do the health professionals know about this and what are their suggestions? How can we use this information to best prevent future crimes?
Sure…We could ban assault weapons, but Sweden went a step further and they just banned almost every gun you can imagine, yet Sweden had the world’s worst mass shooting spree.
Where there is a will, there is a way… we can’t ban everything. I can make a bomb big enough to level a school with just household ingredients, so if I know how, then a smart and determined madman could find out too!
With or without assault rifles madmen will wreak havoc…that much is guaranteed, so we better start finding out what’s up. There’s a long list of things to be known and considered before we rush into passing sweeping legislation.
Rick, lead with your brain…not you’re heart. Think long and hard about this one before you start advocating solutions. Right now we simply don’t have a handle on what the problem is…let’s identify that first and then work on a solution.
A little late with my comment, but it is still valid. There is no such thing as an “assault weapon”. There is no such formal classification. The term “assault weapon” is a political weapon invented by anti-gun nuts to control the language and promote their anti-gun agenda which is ultimately aimed at rendering law abiding citizens armless.
Any weapon, firearm or otherwise, is an “assault weapon” when used to assault instead of defend.
It should be fairly clear at this point that mentally disturbed mass murderer creeps pick easy targets. Had any one or two persons at Sandy Hook been a trained and allowed to carry a handgun, the outcome would have been much different.
Must read —
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2012/12/news-medias-performance-on-newtown-murders-has-been-dismal.php
http://www.amazon.com/More-Guns-Less-Crime-Understanding/dp/0226493660/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1355687849&sr=8-1&keywords=more+guns+less+crime
Pie, good article.
Here is a new tax I could support to pay for professional guards to protect our innocent children and school employees. Cigarettes and alcohol are taxed for the harm they do, why not the media and “V” rated games and movies?
“We could impose a tax on Hollywood–so many million dollars for every movie in which more than one person dies violently. Same for video games. And we could tax media outlets: any media outlet that has publicized mass shootings in the past pays one percent of its gross revenue to contribute to the cost of armed guards at schools”
Pie, respectfully, the whole United States Military would disagree with you that there is no such thing as an ASSAULT weapon. When you use a weapon against another human being you are not holding out your hand and saying “How ya doing?” You are assaulting the recipient of that projectile. And Jack, I do not disagree with your reasoning nor the legal definitions of your rationale. I don’t disagree with Harold either, But in Nam I watched a ship get hit with an RPG. It fell to the ground and the 32 men that were in it were consumed by fire from the JP4 fuel. As they ran burning from the ship they were all mowed down with assault weapons by the NVA. One of them was my room mate. The slaughter there was the same as the slaughter in New Town. They were ALL dead. So excuse me gentlemen if I don’t swear my allegiance to the 2nd Amendment and I darn sure have no use for the liberals either. Respectfully!
“…the whole United States Military would disagree with you that there is no such thing as an ASSAULT weapon.”
War requires actions that would rightly be described as assault but it is still not the weapon that mounts the assault.
The action word, assault, may describe what the shooter is doing, and I have no problem with reporters and politicians using it in this way, but it does not accurately describe the weapons used in Connecticut. If accurate reporting is important, and it should be, the weapons should be identified using their names.
A baseball bat could be described as an assault weapon if we follow the media template. We all know this would never happen because their is no political payoff…who would be inclined to put an end to baseball because an instrument that is used in a popular American sport could also be used to commit horrific murders?
“So excuse me gentlemen if I don’t swear my allegiance to the 2nd Amendment”
In defending and standing behind the Second Amendment we protect the Constitution. This is no small thing. But in no way does it signal a defense of this murderer…a very sick person who has horrifically taken the lives of young children and their teachers.
Our nation hasn’t the ability to deter the type of murder because our citizens refuse to hold people responsible for their actions. Blame is placed on the weapon. Blame is placed on those millions who use and keep weapons responsibly. Blame is placed on the second amendment. This is insane, irrational, emotional thinking. There is a reason people refuse to hold people responsible. At the deepest level it’s because they don’t want to be held responsible themselves. It’s an unstated mutual agreement, “I’ll let you off the hook if you let me off the hook and in this way we establish peace.” Something must be blamed so they agree to blame the weapon!
“I darn sure have no use for the liberals either.”
That’s good news.
Rick I’m so sorry for the continued anger and sense of loss you endure as a result of the loss of your friend and your experiences in Vietnam. It’s a horrible reminder to all of us of the serious hellish business of war. No one can blame you for these emotions that remain very raw and personal. I wish we could change the evil in the world with something as simple as passing a law, unfortunately we can’t.
Placing limits in the Second Amendment by creating another new law wouldn’t change a thing. Someone as twisted and sick as this young man will always find a way to do horrific, sensationally evil deeds.
I’m more interested in finding what has changed in our society to create so many misguided, deeply troubled or untreated mentally ill kids. Of course that would require that we face some uncomfortable truths about how we value life and what we tolerate on a daily basis in the public sphere. Too many of us would give up our freedoms before we would acknowledge that we have lowered moral standards, confused our children about right and wrong, and failed to teach even basic clear guidelines regarding right and wrong.
Rick, you can’t honestly say the whole United States Military would disagree, c’mon now. That’s a sweeping generality. I’m former military and many of my friends are current military and I know of no such consensus.
Many of us can relate to your observations about war Rick, and by the way, thank you for your service! But, you did swear allegiance to the second amendment, remember these words? “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; …” I took that oath 3 times and for me it’s been a lifetime commitment.
Rick, the 2nd Amendment was not about your right to keep a deer rifle, it was about your right to keep and bear arms, in order that you may be able to protect defend your country and it’s citizens from tyranny.
Our founders believed that lethal force was the choice of last resort, but a necessary one in order to preserve freedom and the nation, as it was founded.
Respectfully, -Jack Lee
Tina, thank you for your kind words. I disagree with you on a couple of things. Any weapon, whether it be a fist, a bat , a gun, when used to assault someone, the weapon becomes a part of the assault’s completion.
There is only one element that will eliminate evil and that is fear. Real fear. I’ve always advocated the way to stop gang violence is to send each gang member convicted in Court immediately over to Afghanistan. Strip them of any self defense and plant them dead center in Taliban territory. Give them a simple set of instructions. “If you make it back alive then you can return to the United States”. When they find themselves being hunted, defenseless, and they can’t call law enforcement for help; only then will they comprehend what their victim felt like and the real fear their victim felt because of them”. I guarantee you, if they did make it back they would never commit another crime.
Our society doesn’t understand that kind of fear. You can’t buy it, and you can’t educate it into everybody. War is the only theater where one can experience and learn what real fear is. The rest of society relies on their fear of God or their conscience. Therefore in my opinion, it is better to remove any part of the equation you can. Fire must have oxygen, fuel, and an ignition source to exist; just as an assault must have an attacker, a victim, and a weapon to exist. Remove any one of the three and you take away the level of it’s completion.
I know that got off the track of what an assault weapon is but I just wanted to point out that you cannot educate 250 million people all at once. So you consider what Japan, who by the way has the lowest level of crime involving guns in the world, did. Take their ability away by taking their semi-automatic weapons away. Yeah it will take time or are we running out of that too?
Jack, you are right. I swore an oath and I am bound by it. You have I hope, noticed that I do not advocate taking away our right to bear arms. I am advocating taking away the right to own semi-automatic that can easily be converted to automatic weapons and magazines that hold more than 7 rounds. Maybe kick the age to own a gun up to 25 when the hormones calm down. These are just suggestions. If adults want to kill themselves, fine, but the minute you kill children of that age group it’s time to look for a solution. You already know what I would do with criminals. It would save the taxpayers a lot of money housing them all, cost us all a plane ticket, probably one-way, and once word got out it would be the best deterrent ever.
Rick, I know a guy who can take your semi-auto rifle and convert it to full auto pretty darn quick, I can do that to a few rifles too. But, are full auto rifles really the problem here? I don’t think so. I think these weapons are a side issues and the main problem is with mentally ill people.
Here’s my profile of a potential shooter, so far:
White male, generally 14-23, a loner, quiet, typically bright. Has a personality disorder. May be suffering from mild autism. Socially awkward and not athletic. Possibly has some psychopathic issues, doesn’t have the ability to feel remorse. Has issues with parents or siblings. Low self esteem. May have suicidal tenancies. Suffers from depression. Has grudge against society and deeply suppressed anger. He exhibits eccentric behavior patterns, dresses weird, has strange habits, compulsive.
When he turns to killing it’s like his final stand and there is no turning back. Something in his life has gone seriously wrong and this triggers his homicidal rage… he reacts by targeting the helpless, could be little school kids, a crowded theater, or a social gathering. No doubt there is much more to be learned about the shooter’s disorder….and this is what we need to start focusing on and find out what we’re dealing with… if we’re really going to do something meaningful here.
When parents and teachers see these traits in kids growing up they should be able to get the mental health professionals involved. The law needs to give the professionals serious authority to take action, even to confine the individual, if necessary.
My thanks to Jack Lee whose intelligent and factual comments were very succinct and helpful. This direct post is in response to Pie Guevara’s comments on assault weapons. Pie, I understand where you are going and I agree about the ridiculousness of the term “Assault Weapon”, but there IS a legal definition for an assault weapon, and that language is in the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban legislation and law that ended in 2004. The definition is: “all semi-automatic firearms, that can eject spent shell casings and chamber the next round without additional human action, but (as opposed to automatic firearms) only one round is fired per pull of the trigger”.
As a 2nd Amendment Supporter with 3 Concealed Carry permits, and CC privileges in about 40 some states, and highly trained (for a private citizen in intermediate and advanced tactical self protection using CC, that definition of Assault Weapon used for semi auto handguns is ridiculous and ignorant. A Glock or any other magazine fed pistol uses a magazine to introduce the next round to the chamber; a revolver uses a cylinder with 5-9 chambers to dispense the next round. In each, the trigger needs to be pulled to fire a round. My humble opinion is that the term assault weapon should be used to describe an automatic weapon which can fire multiple rounds holding down the trigger, with a high capacity magazine, holding 20-50 rounds.
Maybe there should be a ban on weapons like AR-15 or AK-47 “assault style” rifles for private citizens (I’m not for it, but if is has to be a negotiation tool for a law that makes sense, so be it). However,to put a ban on magazine fed “so-called semi-automatic” pistols like Ruger LC9s, Glocks, Springfields, Berettas and so on is ridiculous. Those pistols are magazine fed; S & W revolvers (and others) can be fed with speed loaders. What’s the difference?
If we do end up with an assault weapons ban, to Congress: please consult with knowledgeable weapons experts (like the Military, and police officers) to decide which guns to ban. It would be a moronic thing to ban magazine fed (note I don’t use the word “automatic” in this sentence) pistols, for which you must pull the trigger for each round fired, just like a revolver.
Finally, to Tina, I heartily agree with your assertion that the phrase “assault weapon” is overly general (I take that as the gist of your earlier comment to Mr, Clements…where you said “A baseball bat can serve as an assault weapon using the media template”) The operative word is assault. You don’t say “wassup dog” to somebody with a pistol; you assault someone with a pistol.. ANY pistol.
Brian, I’m glad you could weigh in on this one and thank you for your kind words. Obviously you know a lot about the subject and you’ve made a lot of good points that I totally agree with.
I don’t know where this tragedy will lead the country, but I have a feeling more bad than good will come from it. Hope I’m wrong. -Jack
You guys are all deeply weird … all too commonplace … and therefore, profoundly depressing.
Libby, deeply weird was often a term used to describe extremely intelligent. You’ll have to be more specific so they deeply weird can respond to your concerns and perhaps bring you out of your profound depression?