Gun Industry Militarization Drives Mexico Gun Trafficking

[jpak]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/josh-sugarmann/gun-industry-militarizati_b_876927.html

As the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform prepares to focus Wednesday on alleged failures of the U.S. Justice Department's program to stop gun trafficking to Mexico, a new study by my organization, the Violence Policy Center (VPC)--The Militarization of the U.S. Civilian Firearms Market--explores the major force driving criminal cross-border gun trafficking from the U.S. to Mexico: the gun industry's cynical militarization of the U.S. civilian gun market.

The study finds that today militarized weapons--semiautomatic assault rifles, 50 caliber anti-armor sniper rifles, and high-capacity pistols including armor-piercing handguns--define the U.S. civilian gun market and are far and away the 'weapons of choice' of the traffickers supplying violent drug organizations in Mexico. The study also finds that the gun industry has become so dependent on militarized product lines that 11 of the top 15 gun manufacturers now market assault weapons.

In describing the industry's marketing daisy chain, the study states that "...the gun industry designs, manufactures, imports, and sells firearms in the civilian market that are to all intents and purposes the same as military arms. It then bombards its target market with the message that civilian consumers--just like real soldiers--can easily and legally own the firepower of militarized weapons."

Most Americans--the majority of whom don't own guns--would be shocked at what the gun industry has become. Forget Grandpa's shotgun and dad's hunting rifle, or, for that matter, the proverbial six-shot revolver kept in the bedroom dresser drawer. Today's gun market is military-derived weapons with virtually unlimited ammunition capacity resulting in heightened lethality. The common bloodline is a military pedigree.

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[Vinnie From Indy]

1. Never met a gun manufacturer, but I would guess in our modern world of

hyper-capitalism that murder, death, crime and war are all positive things to the executives needing to make their bonuses to afford the second home on the coast etc. There are in fact many industries that are philosophically against peace and tranquility.

[gejohnston]

10. Modern world? Sorry, there never was a "good old days" and

hyper capitalism is the same now as it was then.

[TheWraith]

12. Hell, it's better now. Back in the day, quasi-slavery was still acceptable...

It used to be that being a labor organizer was likely to get you murdered by the owner's thugs. Striking workers would be hanged. In fact one of the few things that made it possible for labor to resist was the widespread availability of firearms. The thugs would always be armed, whether you could buy a gun or not, but the workers weren't so lucky.

[gejohnston]

14. I agree

That is how most of these laws that are being repealed now were passed. It was more Jim Crow in the south. That is why Vermont is Vermont. It had no labor or racial issues that I know of.

[TheWraith]

17. Yep. It was designed so the powerful, white, well connected sheriff made the rules.

Hell, it's not even that long ago. Reagan banned open carry in California in order to shut down the Black Panthers.

[gejohnston]

20. The Mulford act. Point that to freepers and their heads expode. n/t

[TheWraith]

23. Or the Sullivan Act. Explicitly passed on a wave of virulent anti-Italian racism/xenophobia. nt

[Vinnie From Indy]

16. No need to be sorry!

I would argue still that the phrase "modern world" is completely appropriate as used. Technology has magnified the effects of capitalism on a global scale in a multitude of ways that fully justifies the word "hyper" as well. The only thing that is comparable between our modern era and periods in the past is desire of some to acquire wealth at others expense using whatever means necessary to achieve their goals. In our modern world, these people have the "means" like at no other time in human history.

I am curious about your view on the central point of my initial post instead of something relatively minor like the phrase "modern world". Do you disagree that gun manufacturers want to sell as many guns as possible and that drug wars and wars of all flavors are good for business? And, would that not mean that these manufacturers do not view peace and tranquility as good for business?

Cheers!

[TheWraith]

18. Certainly companies want to sell product. But weapons manufacturers are small potatoes.

Despite what people think, the firearms industry in the US is a very small industry as things go. The total sales of the entire firearms industry here is just $1.2 billion a year. That's three quarters of the total revenue of Netflix.

[gejohnston]

19. Gun manufacturers specifically?

Drug cartels seem to be buying used. You are talking about a diverse and complex industry, but I do think they are less sleazy than the auto industry.

[benEzra]

28. I've read Barbara Tuchman's _A Distant Mirror_, about the 14th century.

Oppression was much, much worse then than now.

http://www.amazon.com/Distant-Mirror-Calamitous-14th-Century/dp/0345349571

The agrarian South of the 1830s to the 1850s was likewise much worse than now in terms of oppression. So was pre-Industrial-Revolution England, 1800's Ireland, and the Middle Ages. We haven't fixed everything yet, but we're making progress.

And, point of fact, our well-armed society is less violent today than it was a hundred years ago (and far less violent than pre-industrial Europe), and our homicide rate has been declining for years.

Do you disagree that gun manufacturers want to sell as many guns as possible and that drug wars and wars of all flavors are good for business? And, would that not mean that these manufacturers do not view peace and tranquility as good for business?

IMO, peace and tranquility are good for the civilian gun market, less so for the military and governmental market. Buying guns on the civilian commercial market requires financial security, disposable income, and an economic climate that allows gun aficionados to buy guns like golfers buy golf clubs. In hard times, people tend to pare down to smaller, more focused collections, buy less often, and conserve expensive ammunition.

What does vastly accelerate civilian sales is "ban talk"; every time someone proposes another ban on "assault weapons", or magazine/ammo restrictions, sales go through the roof. I doubt there has ever been a more profitable time for the U.S. gun industry than 1994-2004, when sales of modern-looking rifles and handguns skyrocketed due to the 1994 faux bans.

The military/government market, on the other hand, thrives on "security sales", and U.S. military weapons manufacturers are making quite a bit of money selling to the Mexican government. Those sales don't go through civilian channels, though. But the real money is in heavy weapons, comms, surveillance equipment, and vehicles; small arms are small potatoes.

[TheWraith]

2. More lies and nonsense from Sugarmann, who's repeatedly proved...

That he has no idea what he's talking about.

"today militarized weapons--semiautomatic assault rifles"

"Assault rifles" are not semi-automatic, are not sold on the civilian market, and no military uses semi-automatic rifles as a standard weapon.

"50 caliber anti-armor sniper rifles"

.50 caliber rifles haven't been anti-armor weapons since World War I.

"armor-piercing handguns"

Armor piercing handgun ammunition is illegal in the United States.

"far and away the 'weapons of choice' of the traffickers supplying violent drug organizations in Mexico"

Except that they're not. They use military-grade fully automatic weapons bought from China, South America, or stolen from the Mexican military.

"The study also finds that the gun industry has become so dependent on militarized product lines that 11 of the top 15 gun manufacturers now market assault weapons."

Because "assault weapons" is defined as "anything that people campaigning against US gun sales say they are." Which includes most of the most popular civilian rifles in the country.

"the gun industry designs, manufactures, imports, and sells firearms in the civilian market that are to all intents and purposes the same as military arms"

Patently false. Military weapons are fully automatic. Of the "assault weapons" he complains about, NONE are automatic, nor can they be made so.

"The common bloodline is a military pedigree."

As was the case with those old fashioned "acceptable" guns that he talks about: almost all bolt-action rifles in the US are derived from the Mauser design, which was a military weapon. Same goes for revolvers. Every gun design was military before it was civilian.

[friendly_iconoclast]

3. I noticed the first "faith-promoting rumor" in the second paragraph:

...armor-piercing handguns--define the U.S. civilian gun market and are far and away the 'weapons of choice' of the traffickers supplying violent drug organizations in Mexico.

I wonder how many Mr. Sugarmann has sold- after all, he is a FFL dealer...

[GreenStormCloud]

4. In the comments section of the article Sugarmann is getting his ass kicked. N/T

[TheWraith]

11. Good to see that the HP crowd has wised up.

Maybe, HuffPost will finally stop giving a public forum to these relics, and they can go sit and have a few drinks with the Women's Christian Temperance Union and the other discredited causes.

[gejohnston]

15. Could Josh be Carrie Nation reincarnated? Just asking. n/t

[gejohnston]

13. given that I don't know any conservative that read

Huff post, the only people I know that read it are liberals. That makes it even more funny.

[PavePusher]

25. A lot of folks don't consider me a liberal...

but I'm sure as hell not a conservative.

[Tejas]

5. "armor-piercing handguns" - how hard do you have to throw one of those?

LOL at Sugarmann and his sheep.

[ileus]

7. I assume he's trying to mention FNs 5.7 but come out like a dumbass...

[Tejas]

9. Imagine that!

Reading the article, Sugarmann almost sounded excited as if his aged spiel was breaking news.


:rofl:

[ileus]

6. Walnut for everyone...bad! quadrail bad!

[gejohnston]

8. What is next, an article on carbon 14 dating from the Creationist Museum? or

International relations by Sarah Palin? Wine buying tips by Carrie Nation?

[aikoaiko]

21. "militarized weapons" what a nunbnut. Are our GPSs militarized navigation systems?

:shrug:

They are not militarized, if anything they modified for civilian use.

[damntexdem]

22. The NRA Project: turn the U.S. into what Mexico has become.

By first doing it to Mexico.

[TheWraith]

24. You mean Mexico which has the most restrictive gun laws in North America?

Yes, clearly that proves that gun control works. :eyes:

[PavePusher]

26. Please see a doc.... you seem to be incoherent. n/t

[benEzra]

27. "Dad's hunting rifle" was military-style. So was granddad's.

So was his granddad's.


Does this style of gun look familiar to you?




How about this one:




Or this one?




The bottom two (Winchester Model 70 and Remington Model 700) trace their lineage to the top one, the Mauser bolt-action military rifle, designed to kill human beings at extreme ranges. All three served as front-line military weapons, and the Model 700 still does.



Going a little further back, does this style of rifle look familiar to you?



Yup, military weapon, with a 15+ round magazine. That's an early 1860's Henry, predecessor of the 15+ round Winchester Model 1873 and the 30+ round Evans repeating rifle of the 1870's.


Or how about this one?



Yup, military rifle.



And then you have this one:

An exclusively civilian gun, a .22 centerfire that shares some military heritage but functions like a civilian Remington Model 1908 or Ruger Mini-14:



That's my competition rifle, a Rock River Arms 16" midlength carbine, never used by any military on this planet.

Today's gun market is military-derived weapons with virtually unlimited ammunition capacity resulting in heightened lethality.

Heightened lethality, huh? Funny, then, that rifles are now the least misused class of weapons in the United States, and that rifle homicide is now at or near an all-time low.

http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2009/data/table_20.html

Total murders...........................13,636.....100.00%
Handguns.................................6,452......47.32%
Firearms (type unknown)..................1,928......14.14%
Other weapons (non-firearm, non-edged)...1,864......13.67%
Edged weapons............................1,825......13.38%
Hands, feet, etc...........................801.......5.87%
Shotguns...................................418.......3.07%
Rifles.....................................348.......2.55%

[Dr_Scholl]

29. Yet violent crime rates continue to plummet.

Funny they don't mention that.

[ileus]

30. and here we were thinking it was DRUGS.....

[krispos42]

31. Yeah, because why would we want guns to take on military traits?

Accuracy, reliability, ergonomics, light weight, accessories... fuck, who needs that?


I want a gun designed by people that hate guns and don't know what the hell they're doing!



:eyes:




The people that made the technology that is in the six-shot revolver? Yeah, they were trying to make the most lethal, reliable, and ergonomic military weapon possible.

[rl6214]

32. "Mexico's Military Drives Mexico Gun Trafficking

Fixed it for you.

Come on seriously? Citing sugarbaby?

[RSillsbee]

33. Ywo full pages of comments and only 2 in favor of Josh

There's hope for the Democrat party yet!

[Taitertots]

34. Your dishonestly knows no bounds

Your attempts to conflate highly restricted and/or banned military hardware with available civilian weaponry is nothing by intellectual dishonesty. Stop being intentionally misleading. I know from previous discussions with you that you know/should know most of what you post is totally untrue.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

35. I must comment on...

...the basic idea of a firearm.

"Today's gun market is military-derived weapons with virtually unlimited ammunition capacity resulting in heightened lethality."

- According to the USMC rules for gunfighting: "Anything worth shooting is worth shooting twice. Ammo is cheap. Life is expensive." Why is this a bad idea?



"The common bloodline is a military pedigree."

- The basics of shooting include the fundamentals of:
-- only aim at what you intend to shoot
-- observe your target and anything behind it

* Aside from any moronic, pants wetting sound bites made to inspire panic among the hopolophes, the very core of shooting is to hit the target. Firearms that "hit the target" better are obviously to be preferred. Also, if one is shooting in a personal defense situation, "hitting the target" becomes an imperative and the ability to hit all of the targets enough times is a very good idea.

The idea that you appear to advocate less accurate guns and, therefore, less useful guns, highlight your irrelevance to the discussion.

[spin]

36. It appears that it wasn't the NRA or gun stores that allowed 1700 or more weapons ...

to "walk" across the Mexican border. It was the ATF.

All Americans should be pushing for an accurate accounting of who was responsible for this poorly conceived policy.