Considering Calibers

JimConway

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From Scottie Reitz's monthly offerings:

Considering Calibers

By: Scott Reitz, ITTS Lead Instructor

The question arises concerning the 9mm versus the .40 caliber versus the 10 mm versus the .45 caliber. At this point I suppose arguments can be made for all calibers. First and foremost, you need to work with a caliber with which you are willing and can afford, to practice with. Inspector Harry Callahan (Clint Eastwood of S.F.P.D.) used a
.44 magnum but I am willing to guess that practice was somewhat infrequent and the full house loads, (unless you're Clint) were somewhat unworkable for rapid follow up shots. If you're Clint you can pull this off and if not...you can't!

The LAPD had many dozens of documented failures of the 9mm to stop the threat. I am personally aware of these and have worked OIS cases involving this caliber. The .40 caliber has recently been adopted by the department so from my perspective the jury is still out. It has a sharp recoil and is only 2 tenths of a caliber larger than the 9mm which for all intent and purpose is .38 caliber. The .45 is precisely that - .45 caliber. If it should expand beyond .45 then so much the better. For a period of time every member of Metro, SWAT and S.I.S.
carried .45's. This should tell you something as for a collective group they were involved in more O.I.S.'s than any other entity on the department.

The argument arises that the 9mm or the .40 caliber round itself had been improved to upgrade its performance. Yes...and guess what?
They also improved the .45 caliber bullet as well. What they did for the other calibers they also did for the .45. These manufactures are not going to improve just one round. They are going to improve them all. Consider this as well.
Another point to consider is that even a 12 gauge shotgun round with full house loads may not instantly cease a threat. Since the pistol round delivers a portion of the shotgun rounds effective stopping capacity this is a point worth considering.

There is of course, the argument of magazine capacity and the amount of rounds which an individual can carry. I came up against this argument when presenting a case for a voluntary adoption of the .45 for field grade, LAPD Officers. The command staff pointed out the 'limited' number of rounds of the .45 versus the 9mm. My argument?
If I have twenty loaded magazines yet I can't hit with the first 15 rounds...what's the point? From the shootings I've investigated and worked on, the more rounds downrange oftentimes equates into more misses. Fewer rounds downrange seem to equate into more hits. This is worth noting.

For myself I prefer the .45. I have used it (read the book) and it seemed to work. If and when I can no longer control it, I will opt for a different caliber. This is a highly personal choice and so I stand by it. What another individual feels comfortable with is their personal choice and I would stand by that as well.

The caveat to all of this is that the human body reacts in a different manner to a similar infliction of gunshot wounds. What seemed effective in one case may not be in another. I have observed this, first hand in many of the cases on which I have worked. The terminal effectiveness of gunshot wounds is an inexact science at best. There are many mitigating factors which would take an entire book to cover that correspondingly determine the effectiveness of gunshot wounds.
The goal is to deal an effective stopping force with the least amount of rounds possible. Theory is one thing and reality is quite another.

Whatever caliber you choose you should practice with. If you do not practice - then all of the foregoing is a moot point. The gun magazines and internet will continue to argue on and on over the question of caliber. It sells magazines and continues these information threads. Most of it is marketing. A lot of it is uninformed drivel. A point worth considering: if you can't hit in the first place then caliber choice is purely academic. A hit with a BB gun is more effective than a miss with a five inch shell.
 
"Hits" seems a very relative term. Hit WHERE exactly. Shot placement is king.

Every caliber has it's drawbacks: recoil, weakness, capacity, etc.

Personally I still hold to the 10mm as the bottom line most effective caliber out there. but you DO need to know how to shoot and shoot reasonably well, to manage it.

Out here we have a lot of officers that fail to re-qual with the .40, repeatedly. Yes, they get sent to remedial training etc. But there is a fundamental failure in their training if they fail to re-qual on a not terribly difficult test in the first place.

I won't go into calibers. For almost all cases, any caliber over .380 will drop the vast majority of people with two shots to the thoracic. If they don't drop, REGARDLESS OF CALIBER, it's time for failure drill. -A solid headshot to the ocular cavity will drop pretty much anyone, under pretty much all circumstances, every time.

I would like to see agencies stop blaming the gun and start blaming their crappy training.
 
Bill
Thanks for an excellent reasoned response.
i would expect nothing less from you

I have coached/trained a number of officers to pass their qqualifications
It has never taken very long to achieve excellent results
Every year I get emails from some of these officers, telling me their qualification scores
Instead of being worried about passing, they seem very annoyed when they do not shoot perfect scores
My conclusion agrees with your conclusion. It is their training that is at fault.

I have concluded that their trainers do not know or understand how to teach the required material or how to diagnose and correct the shooter's problems. To make matters worse, the trainers sometimes offer bad advise. For example, I am aware of one officer being told to aim high right when the trainer noticed his shots normally hit low left. This advise, may help an officer pass a test, but could cause his death in a real shooting situation
 
Jim:

Just a thought: I've been working with the instructors guidelines for passing the LE instructors shooting quals here in WA state.


3 Yards
Draw and fire 4 rds. (Failure drill – 2 Body, 2 Head “T” Zone)
4
4 sec.

2
5 Yards
Draw and fire 3 rds. using a strong-hand only. 5 sec.

5 Yards
Draw and fire 3 rds. using support-hand only. (Draw with strong hand, transfer pistol to support hand) 8 sec.

7 Yards
Draw and fire 10 rds. Including a Type One malfunction clearance - (an inert round inserted somewhere into the magazine will be used to simulate the failure to fire). 15 sec.


10 Yards
Draw and Fire 10 rds. (5 rounds, speed reload, 5 rounds) 15 sec.

15 Yards
Draw and Fire 10 rds. (5 rounds, speed reload, 5 rounds) 20 sec.

25 Yards
Draw and fire 10 rds. From barricade, any position(5 rds left side, speed reload then 5 rds. right side, then tactical reload). (Barricade must be used as cover; may be used as support.)
60 sec.

These are closely measured and tested when getting your LE instructor credentials. My question is, why aren't these the same standards used in testing officers? They are all eminently achievable by the average shooter given some time and instruction. But every LE agency I deal with has lesser standards in place for re-qual. WHY?

I deal with outstanding people. They care, they are dedicated and they want to be top par. But all of them have lesser standards, as do the State Police in their academy standards. These are standards that anyone coming out of Gunsite or Frontsite or Seattle Firearms Academy (The schools with which I'm familiar) could easily master.

Why are our officer standards so low? And why do we accept such poor standards and at the same time hold those officers liable under a standard that doesn't match their training?

Obviously something is out of kilter. Could it be us? Or are the training standards simply out of touch?
 
Bill, those that make the policies on how often, how many rounds, etc. that officers practice are the "brass" who live in "lofty towers". They look at the budget for OT (instructors and off-duty officers), ammo costs, etc. for practice sessions or holding qualification events more frequently than state law requires and frequently cut this budget as "of lesser importance"!

Add to that that the average officer takes on a "union mentality" of "if it's important to practice, they will pay me OT to do it and provide free ammo" and you have what we have in many parts of the US. LEOs who are "gun people" will take this seriously and practice on their own, pay for their own ammo and range time/club memberships. The rest will only do what is required of them by their bosses.

The training curriculum also seems to be decided by those that are "desk jockeys"and rarely leave their cozy offices. I get the impression (empirical data from when I worked for a PD, no inside info) that they never seem to get input from the "boots on the street" as to what is realistic and important for officer survival. I hope I'm wrong here and that at least other states do things sensibly.

That is the unfortunate reality.
 
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