.45 ACP, still viable for military or police?

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How can anyone doubt the stories about "old slabsides" being used in 5000 yard one shot kills on Japanese generals? And sharp-eyed Americans knocking off whole German armored divisions with only John Browning's masterpiece. And .45 bullets not only killing bad guys but blowing the pieces all over the county and creating a mushroom cloud? Can any other gun do that? No! That is why we have to not only keep the .45 but buy more so our soldiers will win battles, which they can't do with just planes and tanks and artillery and nukes. Remember, we do not need an army with fancy weapons to destroy our nation's enemies - one man with a .45 automatic is enough, and he should need only one seven-round magazine.

Jim ;>)
 
As stated..."most" handgun caliber(s) are not the fight stopper we would like them to be! If I know I am going into a "high risk event", my plan is to take "more guns & bigger guns!"

L.E. Officers in the States carry handguns as a matter of convenience and based on what is "acceptable" in American society. Many officers do not have the option...they carry what their agency provides them and/or what their agency policy dictates!

I am fortunate as my agency allows me to carry a personally owned firearm. I made the decision years ago to carry a Glock 45acp and have no intention of switching back to a 9mm. I am confident with this weapon system and confident with the 45 round as well...therefore I feel no reason to switch.

Is the 45 still viable...yes! Are L.E. Officers in my part of the world still using them...yes, they are!
 
James K said:
How can anyone doubt the stories about "old slabsides" being used in 5000 yard one shot kills on Japanese generals? And sharp-eyed Americans knocking off whole German armored divisions with only John Browning's masterpiece. And .45 bullets not only killing bad guys but blowing the pieces all over the county and creating a mushroom cloud? Can any other gun do that? No! That is why we have to not only keep the .45 but buy more so our soldiers will win battles, which they can't do with just planes and tanks and artillery and nukes. Remember, we do not need an army with fancy weapons to destroy our nation's enemies - one man with a .45 automatic is enough, and he should need only one seven-round magazine.
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No doubt you recall Tom Hanks going one-on-one with a Tiger Mk VI with a 1911. Why do you even think that was? Two words: Stopping power. Panzers were rolling into Ramelle, Pvt. Ryan needed to be saved, and it was game on, JMB style.
 
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Carried a .45 cal pistol on three of my tours to Afghanistan. Carried a 1911 in 1/75th...

Carry a USPc .45 as my CCW.

It is still a very popular caliber by professional two way shooting range participants.
 
TunnelRat said:
This is some of the most blatant BS I’ve ever read on this forum, and that’s saying something.


This topic comes up every few months, and we go through the same dance every time. It changes no one’s opinion and devolves into people spouting off whatever they believe personally with little evidence to back it up or really even the most basic logic applied.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Check the stats for officer involved shootings with the various calibers,
you'll quickly find that 9mm is indeed, less lethal than .40 or .45acp.
Stats are there for ANYONE to read. Do your own homework.

Also a fact that twice as many whites are killed by cops than blacks,
but that's something nobody likes to look up either. Even though it's available as well.
It doesn't fit the narrative that the media wishes to portray.

Why are there more criminals than ever before?? More people jailed than ever??
Higher population levels mean that there's simply more of everything.
What's the upper population limit for the Earth's food & water supply??

Why are the US troops always asking for .45acp over 9mm??
There's a reason for that. 9mm ball ammo stinks for combat.
9mm JHP ain't much better
 
Stats are there for ANYONE to read. Do your own homework.
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My undergrad major was Applied Math Statistics. I understand statistics. I also understand people cherry picking statistics to serve their purposes and then encouraging people to "do your own research" to remove from themselves the burden of actually proving their claim. I'm also familiar with a good old straw man argument where you then go on to make what is a mostly unrelated point and then that somehow validates the original point. I've seen enough Alex Jones. The last paragraph is about as unrelated to the OP as we can get, and to my knowledge not something that really makes sense to discuss in this subforum.

Why are the US troops always asking for .45acp over 9mm??
There's a reason for that. 9mm ball ammo stinks for combat.
9mm JHP ain't much better
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They're not though. Even units that have essentially carte blanche when it comes to choosing their siderarms overwhelmingly use 9mm. Even MARSOC went back to 9mm after their jaunt with Colt.
 
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How can anyone doubt the stories about "old slabsides" being used in 5000 yard one shot kills on Japanese generals? And sharp-eyed Americans knocking off whole German armored divisions with only John Browning's masterpiece. And .45 bullets not only killing bad guys but blowing the pieces all over the county and creating a mushroom cloud? Can any other gun do that? No! That is why we have to not only keep the .45 but buy more so our soldiers will win battles, which they can't do with just planes and tanks and artillery and nukes. Remember, we do not need an army with fancy weapons to destroy our nation's enemies - one man with a .45 automatic is enough, and he should need only one seven-round magazine.
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Just wait until they hear about the 10mm!
 
A couple of years ago I did a citizens' police academy with the PD in the next town. Their duty weapon is a SIG something-or-other in .45 ACP.
 
Check the stats for officer involved shootings with the various calibers,
you'll quickly find that 9mm is indeed, less lethal than .40 or .45acp.
Stats are there for ANYONE to read. Do your own homework
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Citation required
 
"...Military and police use a handgun differently..." They have different requirements too. There's really no comparison between 'em. CCW has nothing whatever to do with either military or police.
"...Why are the US troops always asking for .45 ACP..." They read too many novels, gun rags and/or internet forums. Most troopies either never or very rarely even see a handgun. They have no basis of comparison. The average troopie has never fired a .45. And usually a 9mm only in training.
The whole .45 vs 9mm debate has been going on since the 1911A1's wore out. It's nonsense.
"...the stats for officer involved shootings..." There are no such stats.
"...one-on-one with a Tiger Mk VI..." It was Ernest Alva (Smoky) Smith who tangled with a Mk V and a few dozen German PBI, using a Thompson, a BREN and a PIAT. Only Canadian Private to win the VC in W.W. II.
 
JMO, FWIW, but if the guns being used are all much the same
the double stack 45ACP mag puts the caliber back in the game
 
this argument has been raging since the Army dropped the 45 Colt for the 38 s&w before the turn of the last century. Seems every three decades or so we have to change something up in the handgun choice for Military and Police. Hang around around and the current 9mm craze will die down again.
 
OP, you state the thread as though it is not viable. I'm confused. There are still tons of Police Departments that use .45. Just about every agency in my county (and we're a decent size, North of 200k residents) uses .45.

.45 isn't dead. It is not as widely used, mostly because 9mm can be had for half the price, is easier for officers to use, and has a significant package size/capacity advantage. I am in the camp that believes that there is a difference between the two in head to head, round for round, wounding potential with .45 having an edge. With that being said, I would not argue that it has a large edge over 9mm... and what benefit it does have is more than overcome by 9mm capacity advantages.

This...

I'll give the non-PC answer.
Dept's are leaving .40 & .45 for 9mm because they're less deadly when used by
the average officer...meaning less "Demostrations" for dead hoodlums in a given year.

Frankly, brass don't want the heat, they can't stand the heat...even though the
entire BLM movement is based on a lie. Roughly twice as many whites are killed
by cops than other races. Period. In 2015 it was 508 Whites killed by cops to 261 Black.
Average numbers ratios haven't changed much in the last 30 years.
There's plenty scumbags in every race to keep cops busy.

What has changed is social media. And that liberal groups will happily spend
tons of money to bus in protestors anywhere in the USA. They're using the
"Squeaky Wheel gets the Grease" method. And its working.

Downside is it's likely to cause a lot of unintended consequences...like more
scumbags running the streets that oughta be toes up. On the upside, more
Citizens than ever are arming up, more women are carrying guns and getting
proper training on how to shoot, and that will have an effect on bad guys, at
least in states that allow self-defense...
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...especially the bold, has nothing to do with caliber selection. The whole statement is quite asinine.
 
Danoobie said:
JMO, FWIW, but if the guns being used are all much the same
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Which they can never be, because a .45 ACP double-stack grip will ALWAYS be larger than a 9mm grip...
Danoobie said:
the double stack 45ACP mag puts the caliber back in the game
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Considering that the Glock 21 was introduced in 1990 and went into series production in 1991, one would assume that .45 should have been back in the game well before now if your assertion is true. :p

Before someone says something, I appreciate that the G21SF grip is more tolerable for those with small hands, but it still ain't exactly small, and it still hasn't prompted LE agencies and military forces to flock to .45 ACP as Glock was predicting they would way back in 1990. (I have some gun 'zine articles from that time to demonstrate this.)

Speaking of predicting the future...
Big Shrek said:
Dept's are leaving .40 & .45 for 9mm because they're less deadly when used by the average officer...meaning less "Demostrations" for dead hoodlums in a given year.

Frankly, brass don't want the heat, they can't stand the heat...even though the entire BLM movement is based on a lie...
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Did it occur to you that the move back to 9mm was well underway years before "BLM" meant anything other than the name of a federal agency that oversees U.S. public land? Color me incredulous. :rolleyes:
625TC said:
Hang around... and the current 9mm craze will die down again.
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Perhaps for LE, but I suspect that 9mm will be the go-to military cartridge for the foreseeable future, until it is replaced by something much higher-tech such as caseless ammo or ray guns. :)

9mm is mature technology. It works. The world's militaries have vast sums of money invested in it. They're not going to change without a really compelling reason, and we've already seen that incremental improvements like small-caliber high-velocity PDW cartridges evidently aren't compelling enough to convince the big players.
 
Carguychris I agree the 9mm is an accepted standard around the world for military forces. But my point is this just a repeat of history and it will continue. You may well be right there as been a lot of developmental work on caseless ammo and its real world application.
 
I think caliber discussions go awry because of context. This thread referenced military and police use, but most of the posts seem focus on what people think is the best cartridge for them -- two widely different things. Plus these discussions almost always seems to focus on "stopping power" to the exclusion of everything else, which exemplifies tunnel vision.

I don't much care what the next guy shoots or carries. If you want to pack .40 or .357 SIG or .45 ACP or 10 Auto, and you can afford to fire that regularly, then have at it. Doesn't affect me. But if you're responsible for making decisions for a large organization -- on the taxpayer dime, no less -- then the criteria broaden considerably, to wit:

• Effectiveness of the round. (Yes, a certain minimum level of effectiveness will always be important.)

• Shootability and accuracy across the force. (This doesn't simply mean ballistic accuracy, but real-world accuracy -- first shots and follow-ups -- among a diverse body of shooters, from 100-pound women to 250-pound he-men.)

• Cost of ammunition (which cascades across training time and personal range time, which translate back to real-world rounds on target)

• Capacity

• Availability of weapons in a particular caliber

• Cost of weapons in a particular caliber

• Long-term wear on weapons (cost again)

When you look at it organizationally -- and to do so any other way would be irresponsible -- it should be obvious that 9mm is going to be very competitive if not the clear winner. Maybe this wasn't true 25 years ago when the 9mm's effectiveness was judged to be lacking (which gave rise to the .40), but today's self-defense round ain't the old 9mm.
 
Take into account the fact that a wounded person takes more people out of the battle than killing a person
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Take into account that this only applies when the people you are fighting DO take people out of battle to care for their wounded. A lot of the people we have fought simply don't do this. Or do it enough to matter.

Many of our opponents don't give care, or even try to move their wounded, until after the battle, IF they are able to, then.

Is the .45ACP still "viable"? That's a political decision, as much as anything. IT will still work as well as it always has. But if those in charge of making the decision don't think its "viable" then its not.

The whole .45 vs 9mm debate has been going on since the 1911A1's wore out. It's nonsense.
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It is, but the debate has been going on since long before our GI .45s "wore out". Think P.08 Luger vs. 1911 as being about the start of the issue.

Do note that there is a lot of sarcasm in this thread that is not identified as sarcasm, and should be, because, without a smiley, or statement saying its sarcasm, some people just won't get it.

And, btw, that Tiger tank shot with the .45 in the movie, DID blow up! :rolleyes:
 
Honestly, I think 9mm and 45ACP are ballistically the same. The edge goes to 9mm in a few different categories.

One main category being capacity. Usually, when you compare two weapons in a similar size, the 9mm holds 50%+ more rounds than 45ACP.

Another is a milder recoiling cartridge. 9mm, in most loads, recoils much milder than 45ACP. When comparing standard pressure to above standard pressure in each load, of course.

With that milder recoil, you have faster follow up shots. Which is important in stopping your threat. You'll have more rounds to get that threat to stop doing whatever bad thing they're doing (capacity). While taking into consideration the fact that you could face multiple attackers, potentially missed shots (a lot), miss shots on the attacker that fail to incapacitate (upper CNS / upper spine and brain stem), and possible barriers.


So yes. 45ACP is great, but 9mm has more advantages. Since 9mm is equal to and sometimes even seen to outperform 45ACP, it seems like a no-brainer.

That said, I still carry a 45 from time to time.
 
It works just fine. If various organizations prefer 9mm, that's fine. But they could use 45acp instead and it would be quite functional.
 
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