Lest our ex-Author Wired Sisters or current Author Jack Shifflett prove to be physical threats to it, the Social Security Administration is ready, having recently contracted to purchase 174,000 rounds of .357 Sig 125 grain bonded jacketed hollow point ammunition (SSA-RFQ-12-1851.pdf, p. 4). This is good ammunition, guaranteed to punch a wound channel at least 1.5 inches wide by 15 inches deep in either of these two miscreants, should they get uppity.
This is just one of the smaller purchases by one of the more unlikely agencies.
According to one estimate, just since last spring DHS has stockpiled more than 1.6 billion bullets [sic], mainly .40 caliber and 9mm. That’s sufficient firepower to shoot every American about five times. Including illegal immigrants.
As a result of these domestic as well as military contracts which take priority over civilian purchases (including periodic hoarding purchases), standing inventory of common handgun and rifle ammunition has been sucked dry. For example, Winchester Ammunition will not be refilling many wholesalers’ orders before July, 2013 at the very earliest. My local gun range had no 9mm or .40S&W and had no idea when it would even see any. It is, of course, for this reason that many gun owners, particularly the 85%-plus who are not hunters, elect to maintain their own deep inventories of ammunition so that they will not have to skip quarters of or years between opportunities to fire their weapon.
If anyone has a good idea why President Obama has signed off on so many different agencies stockpiling so much common handgun and rifle ammunition at this particular time, let’s hear it.
H. M. Stuart
Alexandria
The paragraph from Investors Business Daily that follows the one you quoted is just as, if not more, disturbgin:
To provide some perspective, experts estimate that at the peak of the Iraq war American troops were firing around 5.5 million rounds per month. At that rate, DHS is armed now for a 24-year Iraq war.
WFT? My theory is two pronged. 1) It’s a method of gun control. Buy up all the ammo and no one can shoot their weapons. Maybe, they’re just trying to buy up enough ammo to keep people from stockpiling until they get a chance to enact draconian gun laws. 2) Since DHS and SSA are domestic agencies, perhaps they anticipate a major uprising of the populace and intend to be shooting more than 5.5 millions rounds per month. Bullets are cheaper than drones.
HM: I’ll look into the ammo situation ASAP–I’m admittedly a novice about such things–but in the meantime, I couldn’t be more honored than to be named in a post here at Alexandria!
H.M.: I’m on it. Again, given my lack of demonstrated expertise in this area, I went to a reputable source–the NRA’s Institute for Legal Action, which wrote about this issue last August when these stories were getting a good deal of traction (I remember reading about them at the time). The author here isn’t identified, but it’s the NRA-ILA’s take on the situation; basically, the article pooh-poohs the whole business:
http://www.nraila.org/news-issues/articles/2012/federal-law-enforcement-agencies-buy-ammunition.aspx
The author cited a Georgia Congressman’s explanation:
“After receiving numerous questions from his constituents regarding the contract, pro-Second Amendment U.S. Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.) and his staff set out in search of the truth. In a press release, Rep. Westmoreland’s office explains:
‘If you take the number of agencies that will be using this ammunition – CBP, Citizenship and Immigration Services, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), ICE, the U.S. Secret Service, Transportation Security Administration, the DHS police force, and all the guards that protect the various buildings these agencies are housed in, and spread that out over 5 years, you start to see that 450 million rounds really isn’t that large of an order. Especially considering it is used for training purposes like firing range and live fire exercises, on-the-job use (though that is very limited), and to shore up their supplies. In fact, there are 65,000 – 70,000 law enforcement personnel at DHS who would be covered under this … ammunition contract. If DHS were to purchase all 450 million rounds over 5 years, then that would equate to only about 1,384 rounds of ammo per year per law enforcement [officer] … assuming the lower estimate of only 65,000 law enforcement personnel at DHS. Considering those agents go through training exercises several times per year, that is not a lot of ammunition.’”
Since I know not one damn thing about types of ammo or what proper amounts of ammo would be for anyone to have, I’m happy to let you and DADvocate sort it out; maybe the Congressman’s explanation makes sense and maybe it doesn’t, and maybe the situation now has gotten worse or changed in some important respect. I do know this: I’m not afraid of my/our government, even though I’m quite opposed to what it’s doing overseas and what it claims to have the power to do anywhere on the planet (of course, I’ve had, and have expressed, that opinion since about 1965). Lord knows I could be naive–someone on another site told me today that I’m one of those dupes who will keep smiling “even when the train shows up to take you to a detention camp, and you’ll be happy that you’re getting a free train ride”. I thought that last bit was funny, and I admitted that I do likes me a good train ride. Still–I’m just not ready yet to get on board with the whole “My government is out to get me” bandwagon; especially not if I have to ride on it with Ted Nugent. (I tried, by the way, to check on “normal” levels of government ammo purchases in the past, but couldn’t find anything right off the bat; being congenitally lazy, I quickly gave up. You may have some comparative data, or know where to find it; it would be interesting, I suppose, to see.)
Thanks again for the tip of your hat–I’m a famous dissident now!
The chief of police of a small town in Ohio who taught my concealed carry class said he shot at least a thousand rounds a year for practice. 1,384 averages out to 26.6 rounds a week. I don’t shoot every week, but when I do shoot, I shoot at least double that number. 1,384 isn’t that much per year. Generally, you don’t target shoot with jacketed hollow points, too expensive.
DADvocate: “too expensive” for you, maybe, but not for DHS–remember, they’re either spending taxpayer money or just printing their own! (I wouldn’t, by the way, be all that surprised if DHS is in fact making a concerted effort to buy up as much of certain kinds of ammo as they can, as you suggested, as an alternative to trying to get them banned. Of course, I’m assuming that the “hollow points” in question are something that some people want banned–frankly, I don’t know. “Hollow point” is a nickname some people have given to my head, but beyond that, I’m clueless…)
Hollow points expand and fragment in the body of the target, making them more deadly. I’m nearly 100% sure they are outlawed for warfare in the Geneva convention. Hollow points have the safety benefit of being less likely to pass through the intended target intact and then hit an innocent bystander like a full metal jacket round would. I’m not an expert by any means, mostly general knowledge.
You’re right about the cost for DHS.
My good Jack,
Bonded jacketed hollow points of the type ordered generally cost five times as much as full metal jacket target/range rounds of the same powder charge. For anything but the most exquisite shooting senses of a trained assassin, differences in ballistics performance in standard training situations would be unnoticeable.
H. M. Stuart
Alexandria
H.M.: Thanks for the ballistics info. As you can see (above) DADvocate and I have agreed that the expense is a mere trifle for a government that has both a taxpayer base and a (so far) unlimited ability to just keep printing money–so hollow points for target practice it is! And if it gets them off the market, well, so much the better (from DHS perspective, I’m saying).
You think Nugent knows we had a Civil War? Probably not. Odd that of all possible people ot provide expertise, we are quoting a celebrity, burned out rock star.
Steve
He can’t take our guns away because of the Constitution. It will take some time to shut down the ammo maufactureres. In the mean time, he will call this ‘ammo buy’ a stimulus.
How did my name get taken in vain here? How am I a threat to Social Security, which provides a large proportion of my daily bread and thus gives me every incentive to protect and defend it? WTF?
WiredSisters: I can’t explain it, but you have my sympathies for having been unfairly bracketed with me–no one should have to endure that. Like you, however, I also depend on Social Security; and when and if the time comes, they’ll have to pry my benefit check from my cold dead fingers.