Here’s what everybody is missing. Arming cops with any rifle is a bad idea. Why? Politicians will go cheap, and that means that the rifles will be part of the gear that goes with the car, which means that it’s gonna get swapped between shifts. And what that means is that it’s not going to have the sights adjusted for the user. And that means that not only will the cops shoot a lot, they’ll miss a lot. And if they’re not hitting their targets, they’ll be hitting something or somebody else.
For the most part, they’re lousy shots anyway because they won’t practice until the day before qualification and if you want to see something scary, see Joe Beat Cop trying to make up for not practicing for the previous six months to a year. It’s a wonder when they hit their own targets, let alone anything else.
And this shows up in police shootings all the time. They fire a huge number of rounds and they’re lucky if they get one or two actual hits. And if they hit the wrong guy and kill him, while the negligent cop did the shooting, the perp will get charged with capital murder because whatever he was doing is considered to be the proximate cause of the shooting.
Part of that is lack of practice and part of that is that they tend to fire at longer ranges than they can hit at, and stationary target practice doesn’t prepare you for a firefight. Range shoots are neat, but real gunfights are sloppy, especically when it’s the cops doing the shooting. One of the reasons that private citizens tend to hit more, is that they shoot from closer range, and they practice, and most important of all, they tend to shoot inside their homes where the building and the junk in it canalizes the movement of the target they’re trying to hit.
Overall, I think that the move to arm cops with assault rifles is a tragic mistake because they’re not set up to use them correctly or to maintain the proficiency to do so. And the end result will be more property damage and more collateral casualties that the cops will blame on anything else except themselves.
If the cops need a long arm, they’re better off sticking to shotguns. Much safer for everybody concerned, especially if they’re taught to restrict their shooting to ranges that they can actually hit at.
In the meantime, I’m gonna offer some well intended advice to everybody. Whenever you see a cop with either his sidearm drawn or carrying an assault rifle, your best move is to find some cover and get behind it because they’re more likely to cap you than they are the badguy.
