This gun can pierce inch-thick steel a mile away
Dallas Morning News ^ | June 20 2004 | Jim Morris
Benign for target shooters or malevolent for terrorists?
http://www.dallasnews.com/s/dws/dn/opinion/sundayreader/stories/062004dnsun50caliber.83be0.html
12:00 PM CDT on Saturday, June 19, 2004
By JIM MORRIS / The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON – During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, U.S. troops used the .50-caliber sniper rifle to take out Iraqi armored personnel carriers from a mile away. Its most powerful cartridge can penetrate inch-thick steel from that distance.
Could the same weapon, in a terrorist's hands, be used to bring down a commercial airliner or unleash toxic chemicals from a railroad tank car?
Originally designed for the military, the .50-caliber rifle is legally available to anyone 18 or older who can pass a background check.
Most civilians use it for target shooting. Some people fear it could be wielded for darker purposes.
"They're obvious weapons of choice for terrorists," said Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va. "They have no function in hunting, unless you're hunting humans."
Mr. Moran introduced a bill in May that would prohibit sales of the gun, except to the military and law enforcement agencies. He is the latest in a succession of federal and state legislators who have sought to ban or more tightly regulate the .50-caliber, drawing spirited opposition from gun-rights activists.
These efforts have failed for good reason, say defenders of the rifle.
"There's no scientific basis for any of this," said Michael Marks, president of The Fifty Caliber Institute, an advocacy group. "There's no historical basis. My concern is that this is drawing attention and resources away from some very real threats."
A commercial photographer, Ronnie G. Barrett, introduced the Model 82 sniper rifle in 1982. After modifications in 1986, it was renamed the 82A1. The gun weighs 28.5 pounds, is 57 inches long and has a retail price of $7,300. Its fat, 5 ½-inch-long cartridge dwarfs the .223-caliber round used in the military-issue M-16.
Quickly embraced by the armed forces, the 82A1 also caught on with the public.
"My customers are usually men and women with money," Mr. Barrett, president of Barrett Firearms Manufacturing Inc. of Murfreesboro, Tenn., said in a recent telephone interview. "I've got movie stars. I've got bankers. I've got attorneys."
Taking issue with Mr. Moran's statement about hunting, Mr. Barrett said the rifle can be used to fell water buffalo, elephant and moose among other large animals.
Any sort of ban or restriction on civilian sales "puts us out of business," said Mr. Barrett, whose company is the largest but not the only .50-caliber manufacturer. "I cannot stay alive on just what the military buys."
The debate over the .50-caliber has been driven largely by the Washington-based Violence Policy Center, accused by critics of playing on the public's anxiety about terrorism to promote a gun-control agenda.
"This is not a gun-control issue so much as it is a national-security issue," said Tom Diaz, a senior policy analyst with the center. "It's not reasonable to think that somebody's going to be lugging this thing around, knocking off 7-Elevens. You have to think of this gun as a delivery system for an extremely powerful payload over a very long range."
Mr. Diaz, a former congressional aide and journalist, has produced a number of alarming reports on the .50-caliber in recent years. The reports, with titles like "Sitting Ducks," describe in great detail the potential risks to chemical plants, commercial aircraft and other components of the American infrastructure.
Weapons that use .223-caliber cartridges "are for shooting people," Mr. Diaz said. "The fifty is for blowing things up."
The military and its consultants have done studies of their own. The RAND Corp. warned the Air Force in 1995 that .50-caliber rifles could be used in attacks on air bases. "These rifles are effective against man-sized targets up to 1,600 meters (1,744 yards) away and could hit aircraft-sized targets at even greater ranges; one expert marksman has reported consistently hitting 8-x-10-foot targets over 2 kilometers (1.24 miles) distant," RAND said.
The Marine Corps has observed that a multipurpose .50-caliber round – incendiary, explosive and armor-piercing – can pass through an inch of steel at 2,000 yards. Some rail cars and stationary tanks containing toxic chemicals are only half that thick, according to the National Transportation Safety Board and the Environmental Protection Agency.
Mr. Barrett said the .50-caliber's capabilities have been exaggerated. Its ammunition is only marginally more potent than other high-powered cartridges, he said, and the gun is being unfairly demonized by Mr. Diaz and some politicians.
"The truth is, there's not been any crimes committed with a .50, and it's got a real nice record," Mr. Barrett said.
Sheree Mixell, a spokeswoman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said that .50-caliber rifles "are not the most commonly recovered firearms associated with street crime."
They do turn up, however. On June 4, for example, authorities found a .50-caliber rifle and other weapons in an armor-plated bulldozer used by an enraged business owner to damage or destroy nine buildings in Granby, Colo. The driver, apparently upset about a zoning matter, killed himself after the rampage.
In 1999, the U.S. General Accounting Office reported that .50-caliber semiautomatic rifles had been "linked to domestic and international criminal activity. We have established a nexus to terrorist groups, outlaw motorcycle gangs, international drug cartels, domestic drug dealers, religious cults, militia groups, potential assassins and violent criminals."
Undercover investigators with the GAO found gun dealers who were eager to sell armor-piercing, .50-caliber ammunition, even when the would-be buyer's intentions were suspect. The following, for example, is from a transcript of a secretly recorded conversation between an Oregon dealer and an agent:
Agent: "And I don't like people asking me questions why I want this ammunition."
Dealer: "Well, see, they use them out here for hunting."
Agent: "Uh-huh. Well, you could say I'm going to be using this for hunting also, but just hunting of a different kind."
Dealer (laughing): "As long as it's ... nothing illegal."
Agent: "Well, I wouldn't consider it illegal."
Dealer: "OK. All right."
In a letter last year to Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., The ACT Group, a counterterrorism consulting firm in Forest Hills, N.Y., complained that the Transportation Security Administration seemed to underestimate the threat the .50-caliber rifle posed to commercial aviation. A team of snipers, firing incendiary rounds at aircraft on a tarmac from beyond an airport perimeter, could inflict massive damage, the letter says.
Katy Mynster, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the TSA, said, "We remain concerned about any weapon of choice that could potentially be used by a terrorist, including a .50-caliber rifle." However, Ms. Mynster said, the department has put no special emphasis on the gun.
Absent a federal ban, Mr. Diaz and others say the .50-caliber should be reclassified and brought under the National Firearms Act of 1934, meant to limit sales of machine guns, sawed-off shotguns and other weapons favored by criminals.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., introduced legislation along these lines last year, saying reclassification would subject buyers to more extensive background checks, prohibit second-hand sales and otherwise slow circulation of the rifles. The bill went nowhere, as did a statewide ban proposed in the California Assembly.
In April, the Board of Supervisors in Contra Costa County, Calif., voted to ban sales of the .50-caliber rifle in unincorporated areas of the county. That action has been challenged in a lawsuit filed by a coalition of gun enthusiasts, manufacturers (including Mr. Barrett) and retailers.
Mr. Marks, of the Fifty Caliber Institute, argued that further restrictions on the .50-caliber are unnecessary. The concept is erroneously based on the theory that the rifle is "more powerful than it has to be," he said.
"We don't have additional licensing for more powerful cars," Mr. Marks said. "We don't have additional licensing for more powerful boats."
Critics of the gun, he speculated, have been deluded by action movies that suggest a plane could be shot from the sky with a single .50-caliber round. "Things don't act like they do in Hollywood," Mr. Marks said.
E-mail jmorris -at- dallasnews.com
Dallas Morning News ^ | June 20 2004 | Jim Morris
Benign for target shooters or malevolent for terrorists?
http://www.dallasnews.com/s/dws/dn/opinion/sundayreader/stories/062004dnsun50caliber.83be0.html
12:00 PM CDT on Saturday, June 19, 2004
By JIM MORRIS / The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON – During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, U.S. troops used the .50-caliber sniper rifle to take out Iraqi armored personnel carriers from a mile away. Its most powerful cartridge can penetrate inch-thick steel from that distance.
Could the same weapon, in a terrorist's hands, be used to bring down a commercial airliner or unleash toxic chemicals from a railroad tank car?
Originally designed for the military, the .50-caliber rifle is legally available to anyone 18 or older who can pass a background check.
Most civilians use it for target shooting. Some people fear it could be wielded for darker purposes.
"They're obvious weapons of choice for terrorists," said Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va. "They have no function in hunting, unless you're hunting humans."
Mr. Moran introduced a bill in May that would prohibit sales of the gun, except to the military and law enforcement agencies. He is the latest in a succession of federal and state legislators who have sought to ban or more tightly regulate the .50-caliber, drawing spirited opposition from gun-rights activists.
These efforts have failed for good reason, say defenders of the rifle.
"There's no scientific basis for any of this," said Michael Marks, president of The Fifty Caliber Institute, an advocacy group. "There's no historical basis. My concern is that this is drawing attention and resources away from some very real threats."
A commercial photographer, Ronnie G. Barrett, introduced the Model 82 sniper rifle in 1982. After modifications in 1986, it was renamed the 82A1. The gun weighs 28.5 pounds, is 57 inches long and has a retail price of $7,300. Its fat, 5 ½-inch-long cartridge dwarfs the .223-caliber round used in the military-issue M-16.
Quickly embraced by the armed forces, the 82A1 also caught on with the public.
"My customers are usually men and women with money," Mr. Barrett, president of Barrett Firearms Manufacturing Inc. of Murfreesboro, Tenn., said in a recent telephone interview. "I've got movie stars. I've got bankers. I've got attorneys."
Taking issue with Mr. Moran's statement about hunting, Mr. Barrett said the rifle can be used to fell water buffalo, elephant and moose among other large animals.
Any sort of ban or restriction on civilian sales "puts us out of business," said Mr. Barrett, whose company is the largest but not the only .50-caliber manufacturer. "I cannot stay alive on just what the military buys."
The debate over the .50-caliber has been driven largely by the Washington-based Violence Policy Center, accused by critics of playing on the public's anxiety about terrorism to promote a gun-control agenda.
"This is not a gun-control issue so much as it is a national-security issue," said Tom Diaz, a senior policy analyst with the center. "It's not reasonable to think that somebody's going to be lugging this thing around, knocking off 7-Elevens. You have to think of this gun as a delivery system for an extremely powerful payload over a very long range."
Mr. Diaz, a former congressional aide and journalist, has produced a number of alarming reports on the .50-caliber in recent years. The reports, with titles like "Sitting Ducks," describe in great detail the potential risks to chemical plants, commercial aircraft and other components of the American infrastructure.
Weapons that use .223-caliber cartridges "are for shooting people," Mr. Diaz said. "The fifty is for blowing things up."
The military and its consultants have done studies of their own. The RAND Corp. warned the Air Force in 1995 that .50-caliber rifles could be used in attacks on air bases. "These rifles are effective against man-sized targets up to 1,600 meters (1,744 yards) away and could hit aircraft-sized targets at even greater ranges; one expert marksman has reported consistently hitting 8-x-10-foot targets over 2 kilometers (1.24 miles) distant," RAND said.
The Marine Corps has observed that a multipurpose .50-caliber round – incendiary, explosive and armor-piercing – can pass through an inch of steel at 2,000 yards. Some rail cars and stationary tanks containing toxic chemicals are only half that thick, according to the National Transportation Safety Board and the Environmental Protection Agency.
Mr. Barrett said the .50-caliber's capabilities have been exaggerated. Its ammunition is only marginally more potent than other high-powered cartridges, he said, and the gun is being unfairly demonized by Mr. Diaz and some politicians.
"The truth is, there's not been any crimes committed with a .50, and it's got a real nice record," Mr. Barrett said.
Sheree Mixell, a spokeswoman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said that .50-caliber rifles "are not the most commonly recovered firearms associated with street crime."
They do turn up, however. On June 4, for example, authorities found a .50-caliber rifle and other weapons in an armor-plated bulldozer used by an enraged business owner to damage or destroy nine buildings in Granby, Colo. The driver, apparently upset about a zoning matter, killed himself after the rampage.
In 1999, the U.S. General Accounting Office reported that .50-caliber semiautomatic rifles had been "linked to domestic and international criminal activity. We have established a nexus to terrorist groups, outlaw motorcycle gangs, international drug cartels, domestic drug dealers, religious cults, militia groups, potential assassins and violent criminals."
Undercover investigators with the GAO found gun dealers who were eager to sell armor-piercing, .50-caliber ammunition, even when the would-be buyer's intentions were suspect. The following, for example, is from a transcript of a secretly recorded conversation between an Oregon dealer and an agent:
Agent: "And I don't like people asking me questions why I want this ammunition."
Dealer: "Well, see, they use them out here for hunting."
Agent: "Uh-huh. Well, you could say I'm going to be using this for hunting also, but just hunting of a different kind."
Dealer (laughing): "As long as it's ... nothing illegal."
Agent: "Well, I wouldn't consider it illegal."
Dealer: "OK. All right."
In a letter last year to Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., The ACT Group, a counterterrorism consulting firm in Forest Hills, N.Y., complained that the Transportation Security Administration seemed to underestimate the threat the .50-caliber rifle posed to commercial aviation. A team of snipers, firing incendiary rounds at aircraft on a tarmac from beyond an airport perimeter, could inflict massive damage, the letter says.
Katy Mynster, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the TSA, said, "We remain concerned about any weapon of choice that could potentially be used by a terrorist, including a .50-caliber rifle." However, Ms. Mynster said, the department has put no special emphasis on the gun.
Absent a federal ban, Mr. Diaz and others say the .50-caliber should be reclassified and brought under the National Firearms Act of 1934, meant to limit sales of machine guns, sawed-off shotguns and other weapons favored by criminals.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., introduced legislation along these lines last year, saying reclassification would subject buyers to more extensive background checks, prohibit second-hand sales and otherwise slow circulation of the rifles. The bill went nowhere, as did a statewide ban proposed in the California Assembly.
In April, the Board of Supervisors in Contra Costa County, Calif., voted to ban sales of the .50-caliber rifle in unincorporated areas of the county. That action has been challenged in a lawsuit filed by a coalition of gun enthusiasts, manufacturers (including Mr. Barrett) and retailers.
Mr. Marks, of the Fifty Caliber Institute, argued that further restrictions on the .50-caliber are unnecessary. The concept is erroneously based on the theory that the rifle is "more powerful than it has to be," he said.
"We don't have additional licensing for more powerful cars," Mr. Marks said. "We don't have additional licensing for more powerful boats."
Critics of the gun, he speculated, have been deluded by action movies that suggest a plane could be shot from the sky with a single .50-caliber round. "Things don't act like they do in Hollywood," Mr. Marks said.
E-mail jmorris -at- dallasnews.com
