Thursday, May 21, 2009

Guns and Ammo: Where There's a Will, There's a Way

One tactic sometime proposed by gun banners is to attack the ammunition supply rather than the gun supply.  After all, a gun with no ammo is just an awkward club.  And as many people are  discovering with the current run on ammunition, it's best to keep a good supply on hand as a hedge against shortages.

That said, even if the gun banners were able to enact a ban on ammo sales, or impose a prohibitively high tax, American shooters possess a huge amount of ammo already, along with components for reloading (though there is also a run on components of late).  Further, the machines necessary for reloading ammunition are in good supply and widespread.  Handloading machines run from simple table-top devices like the Lee Loader, to very sophisticated progressive presses like the Dillon Super 1050, capable of churning out hundreds of rounds per hour.

Even in a worst-case scenario people who need ammunition will make it.  For example, check out this formerly-secret Haganah factory for 9mm ammunition at Ayalon in Israel.  During the British occupation of Palestine the Haganah (precursor to the IDF) needed 9mm ammo for pistols and submachineguns.  So, they obtained the machinery to make it from raw materials, running it right under the noses of the British.

Where there's a will, there's a way.  Prohibition -- whether it's of alcohol, drugs, or guns and ammo -- does not work.

1 comment:

Bill James said...

I wouldn't put much faith in a large number american sheep stampede to be honest. And in total candor the author lost me with his closing paragraphs painting liberals as the organized destroyers of this republic, when the assault has clearly come from the right. As far as peaceable resolution, we had that in the election of recent past when the republican revolution was convincingly repulsed. Unfortunately, the damage was done and the rehabilitating policies of a south side chicago politician for president -- universal coverage of nationalized welfare being the only solution he is remotely familiar with - and predictably so -- offers little hope that any status quo recovery is even possible at this point. Indeed, democrats in their obama and his mania stepped dead in the bear trap laid out for them and all within the first hundred days. I suppose the thinking has republicans picking up the pieces in four years if anything worthwhile remains, and if the republican party survives to do the plucking. As rushbo says; "I hope he fails" and goose steps to the fore as the new face of institutionalized cultist conservatism. Never mind that little to nothing conservative has been represented by republicans since the days of eisenhower save perhaps reissued rockwells on orwellian canvas that was the reagan illusion; gingrich engineering the takeover of washington in the name of the party behind the distraction. So after bush/cheney runs america straight into the ground subsequent we are supposed to be concerned that obama is coming for teh gunz and teh ammo needed to fend off the coming apocalypse and/or restore the sanctity of this republic? Who is driving this bus?