Smith & Wesson touts new .45 to military

UPI ^ | 5/15/07 | n/a

[dblshot]

my SOF so in law carries a Sig Sauer anyway.

[Gorzaloon]

I’d prefer being able to scarf ammo from the enemy dead or their stores and continuing the fight with a lighter hitting 9mm than having to beat a still firing enemy over the head with the butt of my EMPTY .45.

But if you can harvest their ammo, you can harvest their sidearm, their boots, or anything else.

[AngryJawa]

IMO, there's a very good reason a gun that size only carries a 10 round mag:

Any more than that many .45 rounds in a double stack and you end up with a magazine that protrudes far beyond the bottom of the grip. Extending the grip is a study in diminishing returns as the weapon becomes heavier and less ergonomic. I think you'll see that the optional 15 rounders for the M&P and the standard 13 rounder for the XD are a good example of this.

I think most all of the polymer .45 ACP offerings being considered would be a great improvement over the current M9's. Mag capacity is of lesser concern than the round's stopping power when it comes to a last-ditch defensive pistol that may only legally be stoked with FMJ ammo.

[Non-Sequitur]

The Marine in this photo is armed with a .45 sidearm and a .45 main battle weapon, the Thompson sub-machine gun

The Marine in the background looks like he's carrying a .30 BAR. Does he have a .30 sidearm to?

[Al Gator]

This reminds me of when some cops from Brazil came to our gun club back in the ‘80s.

They had just switched to .45s. We asked Why?

In their rough english, they said.

“With 9mm, bad guy shoot, shoot, shoot. Cops shoot, shoot, shoot. Every body reload, and we go shoot, shoot shoot again.”

“With .45, bad guy shoot, shoot, shoot. Cops shoot. Fight over.”

Never worry about not enough ammo for your slab iron. Do your job, hit the target, no need for wasting rounds.

[Spktyr]

That is a submachine gun, not a rifle. The SMG was always considered to be a kind of overgrown sidearm anyway.

[Southack]

The point is that we *have* equipped soldiers with common main and secondary weapons (e.g. Colt 1911 .45 and Thompson .45 sub machinegun), and have done so quite effectively for the soldier in the field.

The point is not to claim that we have always done so (e.g. .30 BAR + sidearm).

[Spktyr]

The XD has a very compact grip, and the balance of the weapon is superb. It’s not an issue for that weapon.

[AngryJawa]

I like polymer weapons, but for military application, too many drawbacks. A lack of external safety and the chance to fire with an ejected magazine is a bit much for me.

Go back to the 1911 frame .45 Universal parts, easy to use and knockdown power.

Granted the polymer guns are easier to clean, but I want knockdown power, not ease of cleaning.

I'm a 1911 guy myself and would be just fine with its return, but it just ain't gonna happen. The 1911's round, however, should be a no-brainer for the military.

IIRC, the bid requirements stated that all entrants have an option for a thumb safety. Even Glock had one (odd to see). The mag disconnect is a lawyer mod. You can expect to NOT see that on any .mil or LE weapon. Those are for us proles, dontcha know.

All this may be moot, however, as I think the military just bought a metric buttload of new Beretta mags to replace the worn ones. Changing weapons may take several more years for the Pentagon on which to even make a decision. Typical.

[ZULU]

“..is part of a line of polymer pistols ..”

Real men use Iron and wood (and lead).

[SJSAMPLE]

For the vast majority of soldiers, it’s an “either - or” proposition”. They either carry a sidearm or they carry a rifle. Very few carry both and I doubt that ANY would want their primary weapon down-powered or their handgun upped to rifle caliber. It just isn’t practical either way. The only 5.56mm handgun is a short-barreled rifle/AR15 without a stock and that’s a poor substitute for a true handgun.

A sidearm in a different cartridge isn’t a big deal and, IMHO, neither is the 9mm vs 45ACP debate. Both cartridges perform remarkably similar in terminal ballistics and 9mm FMH DOES offer superior penetration on hard targets. I’ve seen this tested and proven on a variety of materials. The .45 gives you a marginally larger hole with almost the same penetration on human tissue. It simply doesn’t knock people off their feet.

Personally, RELIABILITY should be the #1 concern and most of the M9/Beretta 92FS issues come from cheap aftermarket mags contracted by the DOD. But, if I were in charge in 1985, I would have picked the SIG P226. The open M9 slide isn’t good for debris and the two-piece barrel assembly is a known point of failure.

[Spktyr]

The original agreement, saved by web.archive.org:

http://web.archive.org/web/20001109154400/www.smith-wesson.com/misc/agreement1.html

A similar agreement they signed with Boston, again thanks to w.a.o:

http://web.archive.org/web/20010124054000/www.smith-wesson.com/misc/agreement1.html

A decent discussion of what that actually meant:

http://www.txchia.org/artarno5.htm

And a discussion of the current state of affairs:

http://www.thegunzone.com/rkba/sw-hud+3.html

I don’t necessarily agree with the writer’s conclusion, since per the filings I saw, Saf-T-Hammer bought S&W lock, stock, and barrel, not just some of the assets thereof.

[Non-Sequitur]

Then you should be aware that it's always been the tiny minority so equipped. The standard weapons that armed the overwhelming majority of the troops during WWII and Korea were the M1, the M1 carbine, and the BAR. All .30 caliber. During the 50's and into the 60's it was the 7.62mm M14 that was the standard rifle and the .45 as the standard pistol. Since then it's been the M16 and either the .45 or the 9mm. I cannot recall a time when the standard issue Army sidearm and rifle were the same caliber.

Heck, even in the Navy we carried .45 pistols but our primary weapon was a 5 inch 54.

[Spktyr]

And spend half their downtime cleaning the bloody things so they don’t rust.

Polymer frames are superior.

[NVDave]

In a FMJ round, the would ballistics for the 9mm Parabellum/Luger are pathetic. It is little wonder than a guy has to put a half-dozen rounds into a target to get some results. The only thing more pathetic than the 9mm Luger is the .380 (aka 9mm Kurtz) that the Europeans use for their police sidearms.

Size of the wound channel is everything. The only acceptable handgun calibers begin with a “4” - as in “.40”, “.41”, “.44” and “.45”.

[Redcloak]

That problem is mitigated when primary and sidearm weapons both share the same ammo.

That would stick them with something like the FN's P90 carbine paired with their Five-seveN pistol. But the 5.7X28 mm cartridge has even less energy (~1/5) than the 5.56X45 mm; and there are complaints that the 5.56 is too little cartridge to get the job done. The effective range is also much less than what a proper rifle cartridge offers. The "Rifle ammo for the rifle and pistol ammo for the pistol" paradigm isn't going to go away anytime soon.

[PAR35]

Such combinations *already* exist in many desired calibers

So give every soldier a .45 Colt and a Tommy Gun with a 50 round drum. Problem solved.

[SamuraiScot]

S&W never repudiated the deal

You are correct in essence, but it's a complicated story. (You got me curious.) The new owners criticized the deal, and were making noise about getting out of it, as noted here on National Public Radio's "Marketplace" for May 14, 2001:

http://marketplace.publicradio.org/shows/2001/05/14_mpp.html

"(G)un buyers were furious at the deal and organized a boycott - decimating Smith & Wesson's sales."

Jorgenson: "There were a lot of gun owners who weren't happy with what Smith & Wesson had done that was their way of telling us."

Henn: "So the new owners of Smith & Wesson—which include long time gun-industry insiders—are already talking about talking another look at that deal - despite having recently won a $1.7 million dollar federal grant to help make guns safer.

But apparently, they didn't follow on ditching the deal. in Wikipedia, more recently:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_&_Wesson

All Smith & Wesson firearms have been equipped with an internal locking mechanism since the acquisition by Saf-T-Hammer. The mechanism itself is a relatively unobtrusive lock which, when activated with a special key, renders the firearm inoperable. While the lock could simply not be used at all, some gun owners refuse to buy "post-lock" guns, fearing the extra part might fail when they need it most. Smith & Wesson have repeatedly stated that the locking mechanism does not affect reliability.

So, up to now, S&W appears to be implementing some version of its deal with the devil.

I guess I'll stick with pre-2000 Smiths.

[ansel12]

“For the vast majority of soldiers, it’s an “either - or” proposition”. They either carry a sidearm or they carry a rifle. Very few carry both “

Thanks for mentioning that, I was starting to think that this new urban warfare had changed things.

My take on the question was that the pistol almost always lost out to the desire to carry more ammunition for the battle rifle.

[Pistolshot]

You really should keep up with this. S&W was purchased from Tomkins at least 6 years ago by gun people. At that time they said they would NOT adhere to any agreement reached before the purchase. So much so that a seller for gunparts called me back to re-establish a new deal for parts and service.