Could the FBI save money by converting their handguns to 9mm?

[Mazryonh]

Originally Posted by funkychinaman

R&D on a brand new product is one thing, like the Zumwalts and the F-35, but there are plenty of existing handguns that meet requirements for the FBI to choose from. I don't know if the FBI is legally bound to solicit bids, but they'd get a better price and product if they did, and they'd avoid congressional scrutiny. A congressman from Virginia or Massachusetts can, understandably, make a stink as to why $80 million worth of government contracts weren't going to a SIG-Sauer or S&W factory in his or her district without a competition.

Why would that hypothetical congressman make a stink? If it's a contract from the FBI, it's government/tax money (since the FBI is a government agency) that can end up in the congressman's state any number of ways.

Sole-source contracts are not necessarily bad either. Here's a link I could find on short notice that shows how they can go well:

http://bestfighter4canada.blogspot.c...searching.html

Originally Posted by Excalibur

You would think the FBI being a domestic agency will have more leeway in how they choice their guns. It sorta went out of control back when deciding on the 10mm and then bitched out and went to .40

And now the FBI is going back to 9x19mm.

Originally Posted by StanTheMan

^ Keep in mind much of that was a knee-jerk reaction to a bad shootout where afterward they felt every suited agent needed a bad-ass handgun to fight off potential assault-rifle toting suspects when that doesn't really happen much today, and certainly was nonexistent 30 years ago. That said, they are essentially an agency that has to think about having a standard gun for a wide array of agents with varying physiques and sizes, and have to do so under a budget, same as any police department (especially bigger ones).

I'll agree that one size never fit all, but how much would it hurt if agents could use a Glock in 9mm or 10mm, their preference? I don't think agents are swapping magazines to each other in extended firefights 5 times a week, or some other circumstance that would make magazine commonality between agents a major asset.

Originally Posted by Jcordell

FBI Special Agents do go out into the field, conduct investigations in the field and interact with some pretty unpleasant people. They were unarmed until the Kansas City Massacre in 1933 and I really don't see the FBI disarming their agents anytime in the near future. Also up until the 1970's (I believe after Hoover died) applicants had to have either a law degree, accounting degree or a technical/science degree to even apply so that hasn't changed. The writer makes some good points, but having just a small select group of agents carry really isn't that realistic. There are numerous sub-offices that fall under a main field office (Boise is under Salt Lake City and there is one agent in Twin Falls and a couple in Idaho Falls). For those small offices how would one determine the ratio of armed to unarmed? Yes the writer makes some good points, but not all of them. As far as the old 40 caliber Glocks. I imagine they'll be cut up and melted down and crushed.

Why destroy the old Glocks? Is it kind of like the scene from Lord of War where Nicolas Cage's character says "It was cheaper and easier to buy new weapons than move the old ones back home"?

Would arming only half the agents in a building work, so as long as most of those who are armed are well-qualified, such as HRT-trained personnel?

Instead of disarming their agents, the FBI might want to give them something simpler to use. A pistol-caliber PDW might work well because it would have more points of contact and be easier to aim under stress than a handgun.

Speaking of FBI guns, I remember how in the first X-Files movie, Mulder goes to infiltrate a hostile facility while apparently being unarmed and ill-prepared. I thought that, since the TV series had been filmed in Vancouver for a long time, the production team might have just contacted the same film armourer as the Stargate TV series and given Mulder a touch more firepower for his mission. Something like a suppressed FN P90 (made famous in the Stargate TV series) might have worked well for someone in Mulder's situation. A P90 certainly would have been better than nothing while escaping from the rampaging Alien Colonists in the facility (and he didn't seem to have a backpack to get Scully the necessary clothing needed to survive in the hostile environment outside the facility either).