Speed Kills

I was listening to some friends debate the “effectiveness” of various handgun calibers last night.  One of them wanted to buy a Walther PPK and the other thought it was a bad idea because a .380 ACP caliber is “ineffective.”  Then a third friend interjected that a really “effective” caliber was a .44 Magnum.  Then they asked my opinion.

What I told them was that no pistol caliber is “effective.”  Then I asked what they meant by “effective.”  Some said one-shot stops, some said lethality.  This is mythology, a lot of it is Hollywood brainwashing about the effects of guns.  I explained to them a startling statistic: about 80% of gunshot victims in America survive, regardless of caliber.  I also explained that there is no statistical difference in lethality or “effectiveness” of any standard carry pistol caliber with modern ammunition: this includes pistols from .380 ACP up to .44 Magnum.  To my friend that encouraged carrying the .44 Magnum, I explained that people survive being shot with those as well.  Dirty Harry is a myth, a .44 Magnum will not “blow your head clean off.”  The fact is pistols are not as good at killing people as rifles.  So then, what is an “effective” pistol?

I had two answers.  The first answer: “High calibers don’t make pistols more ‘effective;’ high capacities do.”  My example was this: is it worse to be shot with five .38 Specials from a snub nose revolver or to be shot with ten .22 LRs from a target pistol with a ten round magazine?  My argument is that the ten .22 caliber bullets into a torso cause more trauma than five .38 caliber bullets do.  More bullets is better than less bullets.

The second answer is an extension of the first: Speed Kills, not accuracy.  In his book On Combat, LTC David Grossman tells the story of an LAPD officer who got shot through the heart with a .357 Magnum but still managed to kill her attackers, crawl to her porch, call 911 and survive by force of will until the ambulance came and saved her life.  One perfectly placed shot in the heart does not create the same trauma as five randomly placed, fast-paced shots to the rib cage.  Two perfectly placed shots that are touching and go in the same hole fired in two seconds do far less Damage than six to ten shots fired in the same two seconds all over a person’s chest.  Putting lots of holes into a Bad Guy’s body is what eliminates him as a threat because it creates massive trauma (what I call Damage).

I define “effective” like that.  Some people call it Incapacitating, but it’s a lot more than that.  Incapacitating someone can be done with a stun-gun.  But that effect wears off, and they are then a threat again.  So, is that really “effective?”  I don’t think so; I think “effective” means a specific outcome on the Bad Guy’s body caused by rapidly inflicting trauma to it.  Recognizing 80% of gunshot victims in America survive, then the specific outcome I want on a Bad Guy’s body is Shock—in the medical sense of the word—which is overwhelming trauma to one or more systems of the human body.  That to me is “effective” self-protection shooting; it has nothing to do with the caliber of the gun, very little to do with the accuracy of the shooter, a lot to do with the capacity of the gun, and mostly to do with the speed at which the shooter can empty that capacity into a Bad Guy’s rib cage.  Remember, the goal is to cause Damage (trauma), not pain; shooting a guy in the leg will hurt but it will not cause significant Damage.  Inflicting shots to multiple organs in the rib cage (heart, lungs, spleen, liver, kidneys), or the spine, or the primary blood vessels coming into and out of the heart and lungs, or the diaphragm muscle controlling breathing, or the trachea feeding the lungs oxygen, or…(the list goes on) will put a Bad Guy into shock, quickly!  Trauma to multiple such targets shuts down systems of the body, and that is what prevents a Bad Guy from functioning effectively to hurt you.  So, what’s an “effective” handgun?  The most effective handgun is the one with a high capacity, which you can fire rapidly without losing control, placing every round into a Bad Guy’s rib cage.  It’s not the caliber of a pistol that kills.  SPEED KILLS!

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Soule

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