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Under gunned?
- Thread starter Steve
- Start date
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ME’s only see .45 wounds. If it were a 9mm, the guy would be home from the ER by now.
I've carried at various times a bit of everything. .22 lr, .32, .380, 9mm, 38, 357, 44, 45. Each has its plus and minus points. Shot placement is to me the critical aspect I look for. Second is followup shot times. More rounds in, more likely to hit a vital organ. Third is ammunition that is designed to maximize expansion and penetration to the vital organ. That being said. I carry on 'lite' days a j frame .38. The rest of the time its a 9mm, with only the occasional strapping on a 1911 in .45 or my .44 during deer season. I simply shoot the 9mm more accurately, faster follow up shots, and carry more rounds. With proper bullet design (federal HST) its what works for me.
Disposable Heart
Grandmaster
Everytime I hear a "former police officer" or "former state trooper" gas at others in the gunstores about how 9mm and .38 Special didn't do well in the street when they were cops makes me want to get a 40 ounce and drown my sorrows in Colt 45... Or how the "I was in Vietnam and the country still shudders at the mere whisper of my name" talk about .45 ACP being the end all be all, makes me wonder about the people being exposed to this garbage if they should get a shot or vaccine booster against foolishness-gone-to-seed.
Do you know why your .45 ACP 1911 worked in Vietnam? BECAUSE IT WAS THE ONLY HANDGUN YOU WERE ISSUED! Sure is going to feel like the hammer of God when you shoot someone, shoot right and hit vitals. Just like any other caliber. $5 says there's a old guy hanging out in Vietnamese bar right now, drunk on his war hero money, yelling in Vietnamese that 9mm Mak or 7.62 Tok are manstoppers, no other round works. Why? Cause it's the only handgun you were issued. The first war in recent history (outside of the cursory familiarity training and range work they did in WW2) that we actually took handgun training seriously due to cave and tunnel clearing, you're well trained compared to the myriad of defeated and active armies of the day and you think it's that majickal bullet in your 40s rearsenaled Remington Rand that did it? No! It was you all along (to sound like an after school special).
Do you know why your Federal Hi-Shok and Hydroshoks didn't do well in the 80s-90s? Because they were suck bullets, marginal velocity and designed poorly to take advantage of the expansion and penetration needed to match the performance that even Cheapo-Brand (TM) hollows do today. There was no metric for performance given. You had round nose or drill a hole in the end and call it a hollow point from the manufacturers at the time. That's it. Ammo choice hindered their performance and is fuel for the gasping and gagging of caliber denigration everywhere. Combine that with the fact that departments were scraping for recruits and lowered standards nationally in the late 80s when it came to marksmanship to reduce training costs because their budgets were being slashed to make way for more 'social' spending. You can massacre a guy with FMJ 115 gr 9mm, but doesn't matter when your training consists of 'hit the paper at 25 yards and you pass'. Shoot some guy in the stomach or crease his shoulder with 9mm, .45, anything, you're going to have a really mad but likely not dead/stopped guy.
Do you know why your lead round nose .38 Special (or hollow points) sucked in the 40s-80s? 'Cause it's lead round nose. It deflects off rib bones due to shape (flat points at any velocity deflect less) and low velocity wouldn't allow for .38 hollows to expand, has absolutely no cutting edges to damage organs outside of immediate area damage and were likely loaded by some prison trustee who didn't care if he was loading your department's practice ammo or stamping license plates.
And none of this is even getting into OIS events and what they have to teach us. We just keep spouting about "well, I heard about this one shooting where a guy on a scooter soaked 14 rounds of Gold Dot .45 and drove away" or "my cop buddy said..." Here's what works, regardless of the caliber: Shoot them in the face... alot. Doesn't matter what you have. Shoot them in the upper chest, hope you catch their aortic arch. Practice. Shoot them in the chest... alot. Practice.
Do you know why your .45 ACP 1911 worked in Vietnam? BECAUSE IT WAS THE ONLY HANDGUN YOU WERE ISSUED! Sure is going to feel like the hammer of God when you shoot someone, shoot right and hit vitals. Just like any other caliber. $5 says there's a old guy hanging out in Vietnamese bar right now, drunk on his war hero money, yelling in Vietnamese that 9mm Mak or 7.62 Tok are manstoppers, no other round works. Why? Cause it's the only handgun you were issued. The first war in recent history (outside of the cursory familiarity training and range work they did in WW2) that we actually took handgun training seriously due to cave and tunnel clearing, you're well trained compared to the myriad of defeated and active armies of the day and you think it's that majickal bullet in your 40s rearsenaled Remington Rand that did it? No! It was you all along (to sound like an after school special).
Do you know why your Federal Hi-Shok and Hydroshoks didn't do well in the 80s-90s? Because they were suck bullets, marginal velocity and designed poorly to take advantage of the expansion and penetration needed to match the performance that even Cheapo-Brand (TM) hollows do today. There was no metric for performance given. You had round nose or drill a hole in the end and call it a hollow point from the manufacturers at the time. That's it. Ammo choice hindered their performance and is fuel for the gasping and gagging of caliber denigration everywhere. Combine that with the fact that departments were scraping for recruits and lowered standards nationally in the late 80s when it came to marksmanship to reduce training costs because their budgets were being slashed to make way for more 'social' spending. You can massacre a guy with FMJ 115 gr 9mm, but doesn't matter when your training consists of 'hit the paper at 25 yards and you pass'. Shoot some guy in the stomach or crease his shoulder with 9mm, .45, anything, you're going to have a really mad but likely not dead/stopped guy.
Do you know why your lead round nose .38 Special (or hollow points) sucked in the 40s-80s? 'Cause it's lead round nose. It deflects off rib bones due to shape (flat points at any velocity deflect less) and low velocity wouldn't allow for .38 hollows to expand, has absolutely no cutting edges to damage organs outside of immediate area damage and were likely loaded by some prison trustee who didn't care if he was loading your department's practice ammo or stamping license plates.
And none of this is even getting into OIS events and what they have to teach us. We just keep spouting about "well, I heard about this one shooting where a guy on a scooter soaked 14 rounds of Gold Dot .45 and drove away" or "my cop buddy said..." Here's what works, regardless of the caliber: Shoot them in the face... alot. Doesn't matter what you have. Shoot them in the upper chest, hope you catch their aortic arch. Practice. Shoot them in the chest... alot. Practice.
Have you considered a Phased Plasma Rifle in the 40-Watt range?
Yep. When only talking human body parts surgeons may be subcaliber prejudice. However, with urban materials that get in the way of a point blank torso shot, I prefer more power on my hip. That way Game, Beast, Pepper poppers, Sport, Practice AND perpetrator will all go down if I do my part.
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It's the only way to be sure
Aliens v Terminators? Hhhhhmmmm....
If you like the .357 Magnum round, why not switch to a semi-auto in .357 Sig?
It was created because law enforcement officers missed the .357 Magnum when departments switched over to 9mm semi-auto pistols.
They came pretty close with 357 Sig if you buy rounds loaded to full spec.
I carry it and it's an accurate hard hitting round.
For example Underwood has 125 grain bonded jacketed hollow point among other loads.
- Muzzle Velocity: 1475 fps
- Muzzle Energy: 604 ft lbs
https://www.underwoodammo.com/
You can also find reasonably priced ammo for practice too.
I use https://www.sgammo.com/
I say this as someone who often carries a model 60. Something like the Shield, is a lot more "firepower". Good 9 ammo out of a 3in barrel will usually perform as well or better on people than most loads from a 2in 357. You would be nearly doubling ammo capacity and getting a better trigger, faster reload, and probably better sights.
The energy difference between common handgun calibers is really not worth debating. You would need to step up to something fairly "nuts" to up your muzzle energy appreciably, and even then, it is laughably small compared to a rifle. Carry a quality round, in a reliable handgun, and get shots on target.
This +1
