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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   31474 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 7, 2022

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How likely is the situation when someone has access to 9mm ammo, but not 9mm firearms that can fire it?

  • you have access to 9mm pistols, but you need a 9mm carbine for that extra oomph and accuracy. Perhaps you have taken over a police station, but local military bases remain out of reach

  • you simply need more guns: you have a surplus of 9mm ammo and willing soldiers, but not enough guns to arm them with. Perhaps you're in a warzone, so the ammo is everywhere, but the weapons are all in someone's hands

Would I want an FGC-9 in the US? No. There's enough 9mm guns, including carbines, that I could own.

Would I want an FGC-9 in Germany? Probably not. If I can buy 9mm ammo, I must own a 9mm pistol. If my goal is assassination, it's probably enough. If it's a violent uprising, it's enough to "liberate" some MP5 from the police.

Would I want an FGC-9 in Russia or China? Probably not. I would rather want something semi-automatic chambered in a local hunting caliber. This way I could get a license for a break-open shotgun, buy buckshot or slugs and use them in a printed gun.

How likely is the situation when someone has access to 9mm ammo

Unsurprisingly, this issue has already been considered by the people who champion 3D printed firearms, and a solution has been proposed. Project: But What About Ammo? provides detailed instructions on creating your own 9mm ammo from widely available components in restricted areas.

I've gone through BWAA1, and it looks like waiting for BWAA2 will be necessary:

  • bullets: only hunting calibers are available. I guess one could cast their own ❓

  • casings: again, only hunting calibers are available ❌

  • gunpowder: nail gun cartridges ✅

  • primer compound: nail gun cartridges ✅

  • empty primers: I guess blank cartridges could be used to harvest them, but they are available only in rifle and signal gun calibers ❓

Bullets aren't that well controlled. If you're a sports shooter who goes through 500 rounds a week, shooting 300 and selling 200 to someone about whom you're sure isn't a police agent can be fairly lucrative.

You'd probably have to do something crazy like buy thousands of rounds and do little shooting to arouse attention of police.

Meanwhile, guns can't disappear. Well, they kinda can but eventually if police figure it out last owner is in middling deep legal trouble if it's just one gun. Mandatory to report it went missing and all that.

Another aspect is that 9x19mm Parabellum is simply just popular. Sure, Myanmar's military is probably still using AKs chambered for 7.62x39mm, for all I know, but 9mm has been around for a literal century at this point, there's probably no corner of the world where you can't have access to it; either a country's military uses it, or a country's police force uses it.

Thanks. So the target market for an FGC-9 in Germany is someone who needs a firearm, knows someone who's willing to sell some surplus 9x19mm, but has no access to actual underground arms dealers.

Not sure if it was made with that in mind, but that's someone who can benefit, yes.

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