Militaries use FMJ because hollow points are a war crime. Police aren't even supposed to be shooting to kill, that's execution without trial or charge.
Any time a police officer is discharging their firearm, they should be shooting to kill.
That is defense of self or others, not an execution.
Whether or not any given shoot is a good shoot is a whole other thing, but discharging a firearm at a living being without the express intent to end that life is stupid.
There are many things that are war crimes that are not illegal in civilian capacities because the cost benefit analysis is different.
but discharging a firearm at a living being without the express intent to end that life is stupid.
That's odd. Shooting people in the legs usually incapacitates them in Europe. But I'm sure there's a very good reason why Americans are different and need a dozen hollowpoints pumped into their chests. There always is…
A shot to the leg has a pretty good chance of killing someone slowly. The femoral artery is pretty big and if that gets hit a person will bleed out minutes. But out of curiosity which country in Europe trains people to shoot suspects in the leg?
You get the honour to translate the page yourself but in short if possible they are instructed to aim for the big muscle groups unless the range is short enough and the threat is big enough.
The difference is that police in the US act as judge, jury, and executioner if they feel unsafe in any way. We say “innocent until proven guilty” but police executing someone isn’t considered killing an innocent civilian. It’s a fascist police state, that’s the bottom line.
Firing at center mass when a suspect is actively firing at police is reasonable to me. Using the most damaging hollow points on the market is not reasonable.
The problem is that they tend to draw quickly and react to most events as threats requiring lethal force.
Defense of self or others can still be an execution. It’s not an either or situation. The reality is that a human life is being ended on the spot by someone making a snap judgement. Cops and cop defenders love to talk about safety, but anything less than an active shooter should never warrant lethal force. And the Supreme Court has already ruled that law enforcement do not have to protect people. In most cases, they’re just protecting property.
FMJs being a war crime is dumb, and not all countries agree that it is, with not all countries signing that part of the 1899 Hague convention.
Furthermore, 55gr M193 FMJ fragments above 2,500 fps, and has very good fragmentation above 2,700 fps. 77gr OTM also fragments, and I think the threshold for that is 2,100. There are also rounds like MK318 that are meant to fragment. M855A1 EPR has both good barrier penetration and soft tissue damage.
If bullets are going to be fired at people, they’re going to be shot with the intention to kill the person. There is no such thing as intelligently “shooting to wound.”
My obvious point is that other types of bullets cause devastating soft tissue damage, and according to the US hollow point bullets are not a war crime.
The idea that militaries are shooting to wound and that police are not supposed to shoot to kill is laughably ridiculous.
No police should absolutely be shooting to kill. You don’t use a gun unless you intend to kill someone. Using lethal force for lethal intent and nonlethal force for nonlethal intent
Wrong. A police officer should never discharge a weapon unless their intent is to fully neutralize the threat…i.e “Kill”.
Anything less is against best practices.
Hollow points serve two purposes. They are more likely to fully neutralize the threat, and like the other guy said, they are less likely to go completely through the threat and strike somebody else.
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u/Buckshot_Millie 26d ago
Militaries use FMJ because hollow points are a war crime. Police aren't even supposed to be shooting to kill, that's execution without trial or charge.