Posted on 05/24/2021 6:19:29 AM PDT by LuciusDomitiusAutelian
Red 6. I totally agree with you about the body armor. They have addressed this in the 5.56 round. About 2 more years for the M4/M16.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a29613974/us-army-better-bullet/
As for the Sig P320. I know of several operators in the SOF community, who get to pick their own kit, choose this as a sidearm. But they also say in these days if you have to use your sidearm you have failed your mission. Makes a lot of sense when most heavy duty stuff is over the horizon. But the mujis are crazy. I think of Mike Spann in regards to a side arm. Capacity would be everything in a situation like that.
Overall, the P320 is a great pistol. But I think there are more politics behind the choice of weapons platforms these days than there is common sense. As far as solving the body armor problem don’t know of any sidearm that wouldn’t weigh you down in combat that could penetrate modern body armor. They need to change the ammo. 9mm is fine if it is armor piercing. I got to meet a fellow from the Triple Nickle (ODA 555). I asked him what was the favorite tool in his kit. He told me his 18E (comms sarge)...lol
As far as a civilian pistol I really like the high bore. Allows me a better grip with the left thumb placed on the lower frame. No safety on the commercial version which isn’t really a problem for me. If you need to shoot it in a non-combat zone you aren’t going to have time to chamber a round or even bother with a thumb safety.
The Glock 17s or 19s are good too. But S&W has always produced the best gripping semi pistols for my weird hands.
I love gun debates. lol. I’m pretty apathetic though in the debates. A firearm is just like any other tool. If i’m hunting bear I don’t want a .22, or if I’m hunting rabbits I don’t want a .45/70. You need the right tool to get the job done like any other tool. If I’m driving up the side of a mud hill I’d like to have a good 4-wheeler but I also like Aston Martins.
As you have been in combat, just curious, how many times did you have to resort to your sidearm if you care to share?
I like a humorous approach.
If it were the zombie apocalypse, there are a lot of targets, none wear helmets or body armor... If it’s Katrina and it’s sort of like the zombie apocalypse, then too I would want something like the Sig.
If I am conducting operations in West Africa against guys that in part wear body armor and helmets, I would want something different.
Police don’t face folks with body armor often, the DoD does:
If it were just the Russians (who don’t really want an armed conflict with us) or the Chinese, that would be one thing. But today, you’ll find the use of body armor in Iraq ~20% of their troops it in 2003, Iran, even with the cartels, in terrorist groups in West Africa, Hezbollah, in the Philippines, East Timor, Somalia... It’s proliferated, and it’s something that is not a rare exception. Fielding a service weapon that is BY DESIGN not really capable of dealing with that threat, is not well thought through, IMHO.
Even a backup weapon, your secondary gun, needs to be effective.
Yes, these smaller calibers do not cause the massive damage of a 45. That’s not the issue. Yes, the Sig 320 is a great gun. That’s not the issue. The issue is that these big calibers and this great gun (in the caliber they are fielding it in) are not good at dealing with the threat that is out there.
Never for real used an M9.
Only once to make a dude stop, I shot him in the radiator. He stopped.
I used an MP5 (I was often in a vehicle and things were very close/tight), M4, and shotgun.
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I always wanted a real H&K MP5. Never have shot one. I hear they are no longer in use now. Too cool. Thank you for your service Red6 and glad you came home with your eyes open!
I use a 1970s .38 special for my concealed weapon. lol. Also have a snub .357 but its bulky. All my buddies with their GLOCKS that hold a large capacity think I’m stupid. Great, but in the civy world, if you are gonna use it, you better be able to prove you had no choice. So a belly gun is what I carry. Revolvers don’t jam. The only thing you have to worry about is a bad cartridge/primer. Based on statistics most shootouts occur from 10-15 feet and don’t last long. My own personal experience a good k-bar when i was younger and quicker would be just as useful inside 10-ft. I keep a little Stoeger STR-9 compact in the glove or console or if i’m in a bad neighborhood I’ll carry it directly in front of my torso. But my little .38 is enough to get some room or escape. And if continues past that point the STR-9 is a pretty good gun with high capacity and cheap. Huge difference between military use where you intend on killing people and and civilian use where you just don’t want to get dropped by some meth snorting POS.
With a SIG it’s a simple barrel swap to go to the 22TCM9r which is a 5.56mm rifle round shortened to fit in a pistol mag. 5.56mm rifle rounds even fmj ball rounds already pierce soft armor out to 300+m in a pistol the 22TCM does it to 100m. With steel core bullets the 22TCM will pierce level III hard armor with ceramic plates out to 75m. The simple fact is a handgun is a back up weapon to fight back to the rifle you never should have been without in the first place. I say that with 11 years plus in the service on 5 of 7 continents.
They’re made in New Hampshire. The Beretta was made here as well. I believe it’s a law requiring domestic production of military small arms.
CC
I was gonna say the same. If it’s got the strength and size for a 45, I was surprised there wasn’t an option for 10mm.
Maybe the necked 7.62x25 in a CZ-52.
That’s fine...
I’m not anti-sig, some 45 fetishist, or have any other bone to pick other than I believe in todays world with the proliferation of soft body armor even in third world nations and with asymmetric threats, it should be a “requirement” to field a weapon that can deal with that.
Iraq militias (2016): https://www.iraqinews.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Iraq-Shia-Militia-2.jpg
Iraq militias (2015): https://cdn.nybooks.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Iraqi-Shiite-fighters.jpg
Very few bad guys have advanced body armor with ceramic plates... But heck, in some cases you see the bad guys running around with our old PASGT body armor that somehow trickled back to them... When something is a 1% scenario, it’s rather an exception than a rule, but when 20% of the Iraqi troops in 2003 already had an aramid based soft body armor capable of stopping a 9mm, you’re no longer dealing with a rare exception and should factor that into what sort of weapon/caliber you use.
I get the need for NATO standardization, but this is a case where the US DoD needs to push NATO to revise it’s standard, or we go our own way not because we’re irreverent, but because we should not give our boys equipment that isn’t effective.
I suppose a “stop-gap” measure is to field as standard ammo a 9mm armor piercing round as the Russians do, but what we have today is unacceptable, IMHO- Ideally, if we’re going to a new handgun, we should be thinking about penetrating body armor (include that as a heavy weighted variable).
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