Ammunitions (small arms bullets, cannon projectiles, and rocket warheads)

[dy031101]

Curiosity- various international conventions banned the use of expanding bullets during military conflicts of signatory nations.  What about PMCs, especially those hired as bodyguards and auxilliaries?

[rallymodeller]

The rules are supposed to apply to them as well, but are often ignored. An infamous case involved Blackwater contractors using so-called "blended metal" bullets in Iraq; these bullets essentially explode in flesh. At the time the contractors were employed by the US State Department and were censured (and fined, IIRC) for using the rounds.

[rickshaw]

I think, most of the Hague Conventions on arms and ammunition the limitations tend to apply to international conflicts between "civilised nations" which are signatories.  For many years the British Empire used expanding ammunition in colonial conflicts but didn't in WWI and WWII for the above reasons.

PMCs would be bound by the national policies of their employers, if government and if non-government?  Well, who knows?

[Maverick]

Regarding the use of 'outlawed' munitions, there was a case during WWI where British Officers were issued with a 'manstopper' round for their Webley revolvers that was described as a 'flat faced cylinder' in essence an extreme version of a 'dum-dum' projectile.  These were quickly withdrawn from service when it was thought that officers captured with these rounds in their possession might be looked at in a negative light by their German captors.

One thing I've never quite understood about this whole issue of 'nice' vs 'nasty' rounds is that getting shot isn't a 'nice' experience in any way, shape or form.  Whether a projectile enters a body and stops completely, passes through or some 'explodes' when in the body is moot, IMO.  The casualty is hit, nasty things happen in their body and they are either wounded or they expire.  Trying to define what's right and wrong within that framework is ridiculous.

There's also the issue of 'silencers'.  Outlawed by various conventions, but now called 'suppressors' and therefore acceptable.

These sorts of things show how beancounters and politicians try to justify the slaughter of humans in some way that makes it acceptable.

Go figure.

Regards,

Mav

[rickshaw]

One thing I've never quite understood about this whole issue of 'nice' vs 'nasty' rounds is that getting shot isn't a 'nice' experience in any way, shape or form.  Whether a projectile enters a body and stops completely, passes through or some 'explodes' when in the body is moot, IMO.  The casualty is hit, nasty things happen in their body and they are either wounded or they expire.  Trying to define what's right and wrong within that framework is ridiculous.

Sad but true.  Its also all part of the effort to civilise and control warfare.   Some weapons are considered simply too horrible for use, such as Chemical and Biological weapons.  These sorts of rounds fit into that mould, simply because well, gentlemen don't do that to other gentlemen.  So they get banned.   Its a bit like the current ban on landmines and cluster munitions.   One wonders how long they'd last in a long-term war when a nation is on the defensive. frantically looking for a means to ensure their survival?

There's also the issue of 'silencers'.  Outlawed by various conventions, but now called 'suppressors' and therefore acceptable.

Only within the legal letter of the law.  If the intent was followed, they'd still be outlawed.

These sorts of things show how beancounters and politicians try to justify the slaughter of humans in some way that makes it acceptable.

Go figure.

Regards,

Mav

You left out philosophers and ethicists who will turn somersaults in order to show a change in thinking.   The effort to civilise warfare has been going on in the west for 2,000+ years that I'm aware of, so its not something thats really new.    I'd recommend reading Michael Waltzer's "Just and Unjust Wars" for a good overview on the subject.   Hard to get a hold of for a long time, its been republished several times in the last 10 years (funny that). 

[Maverick]

I've read something similar whilst doing a thesis for a Uni course regarding 'just' wars.  The same sort of BS that justifies one nation's involvement in certain (technically illegal) actions, whilst lambasting the 'bad guys' quite a bit.  Whilst I was obviously reading the like from a serious perspective, there were times when I had to laugh at the double-speak employed to justify things.

Regards,

Mav

[Jacques Deguerre]

Curiosity- various international conventions banned the use of expanding bullets during military conflicts of signatory nations.  What about PMCs, especially those hired as bodyguards and auxilliaries?

It's an "iffy" situation, at best. Technically, these outfits are private security companies and can use non-military ammo in the same sense that a police officer or private armed security officer can use say, hollow point rounds, for example. The argument that emerged from the controversy of PMCs using blended metal and other non-compliant rounds is that, when the employer is the US government, the employees are or should be bound by the same rules as US troops. Also, Congress and the Executive branch can and will change the terms of such contracts at any time, so just because it was OK to go out yesterday with a few magazines full of non-compliant ammo doesn't mean it'll be OK tomorrow.

Two interesting asides that are strictly based on anecdotal conversations I've had with people supposedly "in the know".
- In certain operations, para-military and/or special ops teams are exempt from the requirement to use only FMJ. Is that true now or was it true in the past? I dunno, I'm just relaying what I was told!
- At least here in the US, federal law enforcement units of various kinds also face no restrictions on ammo type, even when on international "combat type" missions. Again, I don't know if this is still the case but two friends who worked for the same federal agency at different times told me this in the mid 1980s and early 2000s.

Pardon me if this all sounds a bit vague but I'm trying to avoid giving out too much identifying information regarding the people I mentioned above.

[Old Wombat]

Police forces often use &/or issue soft-nose/hollow-point ammunition to reduce the risk of projectiles passing through the officers' targets & hitting (innocent) bystanders on the through-&-through.

In the NT Police in the 1980's we were issued with soft-lead ammunition which fouled the barrels of our issue S&W .38 revolvers quite quickly. However, NT Police, at the time, could & did purchase & use non-standard firearms & ammunition for duty purposes & many of us did so. I personally bought & loaded semi-jacketed, soft-nose, hollow-point rounds in my issue weapon. Others did pretty much the same with their Beretta, Browning, CZ, Ruger, etc., auto pistols.

Why these rounds are banned for military use.... who knows!

[Maverick]

Funnily enough, in Victoria, Police were issued K frame S&W .38s with standard ammo, whilst in the Prison service we were issued with hollowpoints because of the requirement for the round to stay inside the target and not potentially punch through to a civilian on the other side. 

I always found this odd, given that part of our training specifically stated we were not to engage a fleeing offender if said offender was around or near civilians, in fact, when training to miss the target was considered a 'granny shot', that is a shot that missed the offender and hit the granny near him.  Conversation with Police lead to the questions of hollow point vs conventional ammo and how we were fortunate in that our rounds would deliver much more kinetic energy than the police rounds. 

Whether Victorian police are now issued with different ammo for their new semi-auto weapons is an unknown factor, but I have heard that hollow-point ammo isn't friendly with autoloaders.

Regarding the issue of military forces using ammo other than FMJ, I've read that SAS troops during hostage situations were issued with hollow points for similar reasons above, but that this was a contentious issue, even though they weren't technically fighting a 'war' but engaged in a civil action as a hostage situation would be technically defined.

Regards,

Mav

[icchan]

Pretty much any modern autoloader will be happy with modern JHPs.  There were issues of feed ramps and bullet ogives not being happy with each other, but modern construction has a lot of testing (especially with the CAD work) and bullet shapes are pretty well agreed on by now.  There's a few that still have fits, namely the smaller autoloaders that are a lot less forgiving on timing tolerance, but your typical service pistol isn't going to have problems with factory JHPs.

That said, I'll still take a wheelgun any day.

[lenny100]

back in the early 90s i tried out a ceramic 9mm round. it was supposed to be used when fighting in close quarters aboard ships and oil rigs were chucking lead around was a bad idea as these would break up into a powder when hitting anything hard. it worked fine in theory until we did a live trail using pigs carcases aboard a training ship then it was found to shatter when ever it hit bone then it was almost like using a small grande as large parts of the pig were removed and it was cancelled because it was illegal to use

[Maverick]

Still returns to the whole 'nice vs nasty' thing which is a joke to be honest.  Anything that causes maximum damage to the target can't be a bad thing IMO.  But then, there's that other debate over 'wounded vs dead' where the wounded casualty takes up time, manpower and affects morale whilst the dead casualty is just that, dead.

Regards,

Mav

[dy031101]

The muzzle velocity of 7.63mm Mauser is the highest until the advent of .357 Magnum, and 7.62mm Tokarev, an evolution of 7.63mm Mauser, is known for good penetration against contemporary body armours within effective range.

So revisiting a discussion on Mauser C96 handgun, I was wondering about this: out of the currently-available projectiles, which emphasis is relatively-competitive (if only relatively) nowadays for the Mauser cartridge, penetration-oriented or wounding-oriented?

[Maverick]

Donny, pistol calibre rounds operate in one of two basic ways.  One the one hand, there's the large, slow moving round like the .45cal ACP or a faster, smaller round, like the Mauser. 

Each has their advantages and disadvantages of course, but as the Mauser round is a small 85 grain bullet travelling at 1400 fps (compared to the .45s 230 grain, 850 FPS), one would assume that it would be a moreso penetrative round rather than a wounding round.  Although high-velocity rounds can be designed to wound, the 5.56mm NATO is an example of this because of its designed instability, a high velocity handgun round will routinely pass through the body rather than remain in.  This causes a temporary wound cavity due to the speed of the round, but the permament wound cavity is markedly reduced because of the size of the round.  A .45cal round travelling much slower delivers greater kinetic energy on impact and will, in some instances, remain in the body delivering even more damage.  Hollow points are specifically designed to do this but are of limited, if any, value against body armour.  All of this obviously takes into account the bullet striking flesh only.  Rounds that hit bone will splinter bone or deviate from their course, usually the former which causes extra wounding due to the fragments of bone within the wound.

Although a modern round for the C96 could be developed with wounding properties (the Hydrashock rounds come to mind), I would suspect that if the weapon were chambered for modern rounds, they would be of a more pentrative nature such as the Russian catridges specifically designed with that purpose in mind.

Regards,

Mav

[rickshaw]

Still returns to the whole 'nice vs nasty' thing which is a joke to be honest.  Anything that causes maximum damage to the target can't be a bad thing IMO.  But then, there's that other debate over 'wounded vs dead' where the wounded casualty takes up time, manpower and affects morale whilst the dead casualty is just that, dead.

Regards,

Mav

The "wounded versus dead" debate has had a lot of work put into it.  However, what we must understand that there are certain situations where dead is better than wounded and wounded is better than dead.  In a mass conflict, a'la WWI/WWII/WWIII where attrition is a big factor in strategy, obviously wounding a soldier is better than killing them, because of the large quantity of resources which are required to evacuate, treat and rehabilitate the soldier.   Anything that removes resources from the enemy's war effort is to be appreciated.  If they fail to provide for evacuation, care and rehabilitation, their morale will suffer particularly if they see that on our side, we do make such efforts.  If they fail to make such provision they then are wasting a valuable resource - wounded soldiers who could be returned to the battle at a later date.

In smaller conflicts, such as we are involved in, in Afghanistan where there are no real efforts to evacuate wounded, where this is next to no medical treatment and rehabilitation by the insurgents, then killing them becomes more important.  Once dead, they are removed from the battle.  If wounded, they may recover, despite the best efforts of their own side and therefore they may will still be available to fight.

Common humanity though, ensures that if we recover one of their wounded from the battlefield, we must utilise our resources if possible, to save them.  Does this mean we are wasting our resources to the benefit of the enemy?  Perhaps.  However, if we do save them, their is a chance that their gratitude will work to help our cause.  This is part and parcel of the "hearts and minds" campaign which should be waged at the same time as the military and political ones.

While, for the soldier on the ground the "wounding versus killing" debate may be a little abstract and they unfortunately may suffer because of the outcome (ie a wounded soldier can still kill), they must understand that there are long-term consequences not only for themselves but for their cause which need to be addressed.  Cold comfort for the soldier though, I admit, who in Kipling's term should nurse that last bullet so:

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.