OK, educate me here regarding pistols and the US military.

[funkychinaman]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

So, what would it take to make the first steps towards replacing the M9 with something like the Glock 20? Same magazine capacity of 15 rounds, much better stopping power in FMJ, flatter bullet trajectories and better range, along with more compact options (such as the Glock 20SF, the Glock 29, or even a Glock 29SF) should the need arise for those with hands too small.

It would probably take a time where the economy wasn't down and we weren't in the middle of a war. The military spent a lot of time and money less than thirty years ago to adopt the M9. Given the limited military applications of a pistol anyway, I doubt it's going to happen anytime soon. Plus, any group that seems to really care about pistols, SOCOM, Force Recon, Deltas, etc, already replaced the M9 anyway.

[funkychinaman]

I would also think the military would run into the same problems that the FBI did with the 10mm round. If you're going to go with a non-NATO round, you might as well just skip ahead to .40 S&W.

[Mazryonh]

Originally Posted by funkychinaman

I would also think the military would run into the same problems that the FBI did with the 10mm round. If you're going to go with a non-NATO round, you might as well just skip ahead to .40 S&W.

Well, you could argue that the FBI values physical fitness (and has less strict physical requirements) less than the Army does for frontline troops, because it values investigation and administration more than strength of the body. Besides, aren't many of those same troops used to handling higher recoil cartridges than the 10x25mm, like the 7.62x51mm NATO?

[funkychinaman]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

Well, you could argue that the FBI values physical fitness (and has less strict physical requirements) less than the Army does for frontline troops, because it values investigation and administration more than strength of the body. Besides, aren't many of those same troops used to handling higher recoil cartridges than the 10x25mm, like the 7.62x51mm NATO?

Yeah, in a machine gun. Most of which are either mounted or fired from a supported position, unlike a pistol. I would also think there are a lot more women in the military than as field agents. Not only does .40 S&W exist to address this shortcoming with 10mm, it has come to overwhelm 10mm in the LE market.

[AdAstra2009]

Originally Posted by funkychinaman

Yeah, in a machine gun. Most of which are either mounted or fired from a supported position, unlike a pistol.

pretty much

[Mazryonh]

Originally Posted by funkychinaman

Yeah, in a machine gun. Most of which are either mounted or fired from a supported position, unlike a pistol. I would also think there are a lot more women in the military than as field agents. Not only does .40 S&W exist to address this shortcoming with 10mm, it has come to overwhelm 10mm in the LE market.

Ah yes, but I think it has to be admitted that FBI agents don't go through the same physical training that grunts do. They don't wear the same heavy kit as often, they don't get a lot of practice moving heavy objects while running as fast as possible, they don't routinely load heavy supplies by hand to keep fit or for punishment duty. A lot of military training is to get one accustomed to the discomforts which would normally cause an unaccustomed civilian to quit quickly. I've been hearing wildly varying accounts of the 10x25mm round's recoil when properly loaded (i.e., beyond the .40 S&W's capabilities), from everything to "mildly worse than a .45 ACP's" to "just too much." We're not talking about .454 Casull or .50 Action Express though--just how much is "too much", even with service members who are used to most discomforts and pain?

I'll admit that the programs the US has undertaken to replace its service weapons (the M4/16 replacement, the Joint Combat Pistol programs) have been all over the place. Nothing ever seems good enough (seriously, improve on the M16 by 100%?!), or else the makers just don't bid low enough. Sniper Wolf's line from the original Metal Gear Solid that "You men are so weak. You can never finish what you start . . . " is starting to take on less nice connotations the more news I hear about . . .

[funkychinaman]

Originally Posted by Mazryonh

Ah yes, but I think it has to be admitted that FBI agents don't go through the same physical training that grunts do. They don't wear the same heavy kit as often, they don't get a lot of practice moving heavy objects while running as fast as possible, they don't routinely load heavy supplies by hand to keep fit or for punishment duty. A lot of military training is to get one accustomed to the discomforts which would normally cause an unaccustomed civilian to quit quickly. I've been hearing wildly varying accounts of the 10x25mm round's recoil when properly loaded (i.e., beyond the .40 S&W's capabilities), from everything to "mildly worse than a .45 ACP's" to "just too much." We're not talking about .454 Casull or .50 Action Express though--just how much is "too much", even with service members who are used to most discomforts and pain?

You can't TRAIN away the fact that someone's a smaller person. Not being able to handle the recoil is not a conditioning issue. If it were that simple, our professional, volunteer military would still be using full auto M14s. Again, I point out the dominance of .40 S&W in the LE market over 10mm. Cops, who's lives can hinge on being able to hit their targets, still would rather go with .40 S&W, despite probably having as much range time as they want. (Cops shoot for free at my range.)

A friend of mine from HS did two tours in Iraq as an MP. She's an officer, and an MP, so I would think at least one of those facts would mean she was issued a sidearm. She's also tiny, probably no more than 5'2", 110 lbs. How much conditioning would it take for her to handle a full sized 10mm sidearm? And giving her a smaller 10mm pistol would only exacerbate the issue.

[funkychinaman]

And why spend all that time training to use a weapon with such limited capability anyway? The British went from the .455 to the .38/200 for exactly the same reason. Any unit which actually cares about that much about stopping power already went back to using .45 ACP pistols anyway.

[Mazryonh]

Originally Posted by funkychinaman

Cops, who's lives can hinge on being able to hit their targets, still would rather go with .40 S&W, despite probably having as much range time as they want. (Cops shoot for free at my range.)

You mean they get range time for free, right? It's not like you hand them ammunition for free, too? Last I read not many pistol-users know where to get 10mm Auto ammunition at a reasonable price. Good to know that some cops are looking to not be part of the statistic that says "Cops only hit their targets 20% of the time," if not necessarily in an environment that simulates the randomness and rapid change from friend-to-foe of on-the-beat situations (i.e., someone pulls out what you think is a gun, you plug two rounds in his chest and one in his head, only to find that he was holding an aluminum-wrapped sandwich, or someone claims that he's needs help and pulls out his drivers license, only to pull a small revolver to fill your face full of lead).

Originally Posted by funkychinaman

You can't TRAIN away the fact that someone's a smaller person. Not being able to handle the recoil is not a conditioning issue.

Gary Coleman, at all of his 4' 11'', is too small to handle the recoil, until he isn't.

(Interested viewers can see the full vid here. Watch your step around the missile launcher, the machine guns, and . . . the magazine models?)

Originally Posted by funkychinaman

A friend of mine from HS did two tours in Iraq as an MP. She's an officer, and an MP, so I would think at least one of those facts would mean she was issued a sidearm. She's also tiny, probably no more than 5'2", 110 lbs. How much conditioning would it take for her to handle a full sized 10mm sidearm? And giving her a smaller 10mm pistol would only exacerbate the issue.

To misquote a popular saying, the sources I've seen seem to corroborate this: "A gun that's good for the gander is good for the goose" (double entendre totally intended).

From this website:

To further counter this myth we report our observations in watching women shoot some very big guns repeatedly, without flinching. We're talking about very petite 100-110 pound women shooting .357 magnum pocket pistols, full powered 10mm Glock 20s and 4 inch .44 magnums. Not only can they shoot these guns -- they can shoot them darn well! We have seen these same women shooting 458 Lott rifles, loaded to the max. The 458 Lott is a rifle designed for the largest animals on earth, a true elephant gun generating nearly 6000 foot pounds of energy. Women hunt all over the country using high power rifles and are very effective. When asking these women how it was that they were able to shoot such high caliber firearms, they told us that it is simply a mind-over-matter situation. They continued by saying that if you think the gun is in control of you, then you will be afraid. But if you realize that it is you in charge of the gun -- it's a piece of cake.

So what caliber and type of gun is best for a woman? Clearly, the answer is: "The same one that is best for a man." Any woman can easily learn to shoot any handgun effectively. Of course, practice is the key for both men and women.

Are these women exceptional in some way that I am unaware of?

There's also the assistance that can be rendered by technology. Aside from the aforementioned slim frames that Glock 20s/29s come in, there's always the compensated models (which can be changed back to uncompensated simply by replacing the barrel with a non-ported version). How about the pseudo-foregrip used by the Beretta M93R? Is that covered by a patent somewhere that disallows its use on other pistols without paying a hefty licensing fee?

To get back closer to topic, why hasn't the M9 been replaced already by the "winning candidate" of the Joint Combat Pistol program? It's not a good way to address a problem by cancelling the program that was supposed to appoint a replacement twice. And here I was thinking that because pistols are easier and less costly to make than rifles, the Joint Combat Pistol would have a better chance of reaching completion and meeting its objectives than the M4/M16 replacement program did.