A Geek With Guns

Are you looking for an expensive, although wickedly cool, means of correcting your poor aim? Worry not for Sandia National Laboratories has you covered:

Sandia National Laboratories have invented a small caliber self guided bullet. The bullet contains an optical sensor, CPU, battery and electromagnetic actuated fins. It is able to track laser designated targets out to 2,000 meters.

Sometimes I feel as though I live in a science fiction universe. Sure we don’t have spaceships, flying cars, or man portable laser cannons but we do have extremely powerful computers that are so small the fit in your pocket, an effective worldwide communication network, and now we have self guided bullets.

When I stop to think about what this bullet entails I’m amazed at the human capacity for engineering awesome stuff. We’ve actually shrunk central processing units, batteries, and optical sensors down to the point that they can all be fitted into a single bullet. How cool is that?

As this technology is new it’s not ready for prime time but if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that technology only improves over time so I’m sure we’ll have extremely cheap self guided bullets in our future.

Remember that somebody, somewhere thought this was a good idea:

Less Lethal Africa, a South African company, had their less lethal .50 BMG rounds on display at SHOT.

So instead of having a mere 110 percent chance of killing you these rounds will only have a 100 precent chance of killing you? These seem to be the most pointless rounds developed in recent history. What’s next? Less lethal nuclear weaponry?

I talk about a lot of bad police decisions but most of those situations are black and white. That is to say a police officer obviously abused his or her power or otherwise initiated violence. Sadly not every situation is black and white, many shades of gray exist. Take for instance the story about a police officer who show a 15 year-old kid brandishing a realistic pellet gun:

The parents of an eighth grader who was fatally shot by police inside his South Texas school are demanding to know why officers took lethal action, but police said the boy was brandishing — and refused to drop — what appeared to be a handgun and that the officers acted correctly.

The weapon turned out to be a pellet gun that closely resembled the real thing, police said late Wednesday, several hours after 15-year-old Jaime Gonzalez was repeatedly shot in a hallway at Cummings Middle School in Brownsville. No one else was injured.

A picture of the gun can be found at the link and from a distance I can see how an officer would mistake it for a real handgun. Some may say this is a valid case of using violence while others will claim it wasn’t. Others have also questioned the amount of force used by the officer, which I will address in a bit.

So far the story is mostly he-said-she-said. The officer is claiming the kid was pointing the gun at him. Without any way of knowing the weapon was fake that certainly qualifies as immediate threat to life. When I read about these kinds of situations I try to put myself in the shoes of the shooter. What did the cop see? Did the kid point the pellet gun at the officer? Was anything said during the altercation? In this case I have no answers and desire more data. Unfortunately more data isn’t always available and we may find ourselves in these kinds of situations. This reality must be acknowledge by anybody who carries a gun and should be given, at least, a cursory consideration. Most of self-defense is mental preparation and state of mind.

Now let us return to the amount of force that was used:

“Why was so much excess force used on a minor?” the boy’s father, Jaime Gonzalez Sr., asked The Associated Press outside the family’s home Wednesday night. “Three shots. Why not one that would bring him down?”

Let’s consider the use of a firearm. A firearm is a lethal weapon designed to kill, we shouldn’t kid ourselves otherwise. Employing a firearm should only be done when you have decided the situation requires the use of lethal force. Therefore it is safe to say when a firearm is drawn the amount of force necessary to end the situation becomes whatever is necessary.

Any self-defense class and, I’m assuming, police training class will teach you to shoot until the threat has stopped. If the threat stops at the presentation of the firearm you shouldn’t shoot, if it stops after a non-lethal wound you stop, if it stops only after the assailant is dead then that is what you must do. We must also realize that handgun cartridges are anemic and overall poor man stoppers. To overcome this limitation standard procedure is to fire two shots immediately at center mass. If the threat has not ceased after two shots you must take more, possibly even attempting to shoot the attacker in the head. Needless to say the round count is likely to start at two and escalate from there so three shots in this situation shouldn’t be surprising.

In the end the kid may have simply committed suicide by cop. While I’m not willing to pass final judgement in this case I am leaning towards this conclusion unless further data becomes available. Beyond the situation there is something else to take into consideration:

About 20 minutes elapsed between police receiving a call about an armed student and shots being fired, according to police and student accounts. Authorities declined to share what the boy said before he was shot.

Had the kid been in possession of a real weapon and malicious intent he would have had 20 minutes to do whatever he please. Schools, being gun-free zones, don’t allow for lawful self-defense. Teachers and faculty with valid carry permits are not allowed to carry in a elementary or high school so the only solution that really exists for stopping a violence individual is to wait for the police. A lot can happen in 20 minutes and the state prohibits use mere serfs from defending ourselves inside of these gun-free zones. This situation could have been far worse because of government decree.

I’m sure most of you have read the horror stories about developers submitting their application to the Apple App Store only to have it rejected based on unpublished requirements that seem arbitrary. Wouldn’t you know it, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) have a very similar system for determining whether or not a manufactured firearm is legal for production:

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is in charge of determining whether a gun model is legal, but the agency won’t say much about its criteria.

Despite overseeing an industry that includes machine guns and other deadly weapons, ATF regulations for the manufacture of weapons are often unclear, leading to reliance on a secretive system by which firearms manufacturers can submit proposed weapons for testing and find out one at a time whether they comply with the law, critics say.

Much like the Apple App Store the ATF is also inconsistent with their rulings:

The ATF recommends that manufacturers voluntarily submit weapons for case-by-case determination. But those judgments are private and, it turns out, sometimes contradictory. Critics say nearly identical prototypes can be approved for one manufacturer but denied for another.

One major difference exists between rulings of Apple App Store reviews and ATF reviewers, if the ATF declares something verboten it is illegal and grants men with guns the power to enforce the decision. Anybody with the capacity to think can also see the huge opportunity for abuse arbitrary regulations grant. A manufacturer not only has to submit to the ATF’s rulings but must remain on their good side for pissing off an agent may lead to every submitted prototype being rejected, which eventually would force the manufacturer into bankruptcy.

I always believed that Russia and the AK-47 were tied at the hip; never did I imagine that I’d see the day when one would exist without the other. Sadly the era of the AK appears to be coming to an end as the Russian army has stated they will no longer be purchasing AK rifles:

The Russian army says it is halting orders of the famous Kalashnikov assault rifle until a newer model is developed by its manufacturer.

The AK-47 became the most recognizable firearm in the world and stood against the test of time. Even today AK type rifles are very effective at what they do, and that’s kill capitalist pigs dead (or whatever else they’re pointed at). Although the ergonomics could use some updating and the platform could certainly use a longer site radius, I’m not really sure what needs to be fixed on the AK. Firearms are the very definition of a mature technology and no major advancements have been made around World War II (I’m considering the proliferation of automatic and semi-automatic rifles becoming reliable enough to be primary battle rifles a major advancement).

It also seems people are underestimating the badassery of the AK-47′s designer, Mikhail Kalashnikov:

News of the army’s decision is reportedly being kept from the rifle’s designer, Mikhail Kalashnikov, now 91.

“We do not want to take it upon ourselves to tell him,” an unnamed member of his family told Russia’s Izvestia newspaper.

“It might kill him.”

I don’t think you can kill him. Perhaps he plans to fade away with his rifle but no mere mortal on this planet could actually kill the man. Honestly if I were him I’d be happy my designed lasted so long; the AK probably enjoys the record for longest platform design to continuously serve in a major military. With out quickly militaries like to swap out equipment these days I’m doubting the AK’s record will ever be broken.

While I’m excited to see what Izhmash’s new rifle looks like I’m betting it’s going to be heavily influenced by the AK-47.

It seems building damn fine pistols isn’t the only thing Gaston Glock is good at, he’s also good at picking up women younger women:

Gaston Glock, 82, founder and owner of Glock g.m.b.H., has married Kathrin Tschikof, 31, after a seven year relationship. Kathrin is the CEO of the Glock Horse Performance Center, an equestrian organization owned by Gaston Glock.

Not bad for an 82 year-old man. It is my firm belief that Mr. Glock needs to write a book, I’d read it.

Since the release of the Gen4 Glock 17 there have been a great number of reliability complaints. I’ve seen some of this first hand with my Gen4 Glock 17. Although it functions flawlessly in my hands it’s a regular jam-o-matic when a smaller person tries to use it. After long last Glock has finally issued notice that they are swapping recoil springs free of charge.

It has been discovered that Chiappa is going to start adding radio-frequency identification (RFID) chips to their handguns for inventory and quality control purposes. RFID, like any technology, has good and bad uses. The Firearm Blog has a nice writeup on the whole situations including a press release from MKS Distributing which is rather snarky:

RFID Removal: For those still concerned you can simply remove the grip and remove the hot glued RFID from the frame in the grip area when (over a year from now) these begin to appear. Others may prefer to wrap the revolver and their head in aluminum foil, curl in a ball and watch reruns of Mel Gibson’s 1997 film, Conspiracy Theory. Well, that’s a plan too!

I smiled a little at the snarky remark and then shook my head as its obvious MKS Distributing doesn’t understand the very real concerns over implanting RFID chips into firearms. Although MKS Distributing claims the RFID chips can only be read a few inches a way that was proven to be completely incorrect at last year’s Defcon. RFID chips are very simple, thus they have no built-in security mechanisms meaning anybody with the right equipment can read them without your knowledge.

Combine this with the fact that obtaining RFID readers is pretty cheap these days and you can see a problem for people carrying concealed. Although I would rip these chips out the second I obtained a gun with embedded RFID chips, most people would not know to look for or pull out these blasted little identification chips. With simple equipment somebody would be able to read the RFID chip on your firearm and instantly know whether or not you were carrying a firearm. Part of the reason people carry concealed is because they don’t want anybody else to know they’re carrying. Often this is to make others feel more comfortable but another reason is to have the element of surprise should you ever have to pull it. Embedding RFID chips into firearms would give criminals a means of know whether or not you were armed and take appropriate actions.

Of course there is also the possibility of using the RFID chip to identify homes of gun owners (a person staking out your home could just drop an RFID reader in your area and see if they come across any hits). If a person has one gun (for instance if they’re carrying it out the door when leaving for work) it’s likely they have others which would make their home a desirable target for the would be thief. On top of that, if you left the reader in the area for a couple of weeks a potential thief could figure out when the homeowner is away so they could move in and rob the place without resistance.

Putting a passive remotely readable device into anything isn’t a great idea, but that idea becomes far worse when that object is a firearm. Personally I won’t support Chiappa as I feel that would be promoting this type of behavior but I also believe what MKS Distributing said is true, RFID chips will become far more prevalent in firearms down the line.

Kahr Arms was recently sued by the family of a man shot by one of their firearms. Kahr settled and ended up paying the family a sum of $600,000. Why was Kahr responsible? Because they hired a guy who was stealing guns from their production line:

The lawsuit alleged that Kahr employee Mark Cronin — who had a drug problem and a criminal record — stole the gun before it had a serial number stamped on it and sold it to Robert Jachimczyk for a gram of cocaine. The man charged in the shooting, Edwin Novas, then bought the gun from Jachimczyk for some heroin, according to the lawsuit. Cronin pleaded guilty to the gun theft and was sentenced to two years in prison. Novas was never caught; he is still listed on the Worcester Police Department’s website as being wanted in the unresolved killing.

I agree with Jay G, this settlement is a bunch of malarkey:

Since dirtbag drug addicts don’t have deep pockets – but Kahr does – they wound up on the wrong end of a wrongful death suit.

Kahr didn’t kill Mr. Guzman, Edwin Novas did. Kahr was a victim of theft plain and simple. Of course Novas was never found and even if he was I doubt he has a sum of $600,000 lying around.

It’s a liability to be successful in this country. When a crime is committed the criminal isn’t the one targeted for punishment, whoever has the most money that can be tied to the criminal act in any way is targeted. When somebody is killed by a scumbag that scumbag usually becomes a secondary concern to punishing the company that produced whatever weapon was used to commit the murder. Why? Because we don’t have a justice system in this country, we have a monetary exploitation system. If you’ve been successful in life by providing a good that consumers want you will likely be sued some day because your product was used by a criminal in some illegal capacity.

Now that the family of Mr. Guzman has $600,000 from Kahr they may want to look into whether or not Novas used a vehicle to flee the scene of the murder. Who knows, maybe the family will be able to get another $600,000 from Ford, Chevy, Toyota, or Volkswagen.

I understand that the AR-15 is a great rifle and producing one generates easy income. As I have this understanding I hold not ill-will towards companies that manufacture some kind of AR-15 pattern rifle, it’s good business, but I will also admit that it’s getting to be a complete non-issue when a new company introduces a new rifle. Why is it a complete non-issue now? Because every new rife announcement is yet another AR-15 pattern rifle and honestly it’s boring.

I’m saying this as Mossberg has introduced an AR-15. The fact that Mossberg has made this announcement isn’t the news item, the fact that they didn’t already have an AR-15 on the market is a news item. Every time another gun manufacturer announces that they’re producing an AR-15 I’m not shocked by the introduction, I’m shocked by the fact that a manufacturer still existed that didn’t have such a rifle on the market.

I love the AR-15 but honestly I’d like to see a new rifle announcement that isn’t yet another AR-15. How about a manufacturer drum up some hype about a new rifle they’re going to be introducing and actually introduce something completely new. I’m not talking about yet another AR-15 style rifle like the SCAR; No, I’m talking about something totally off the wall. I’m getting bored with all of these AR-15 announcements and damn it it’s the job of the gun industry to keep me entertained and excited.