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Sorry, that article was written 20 years later by someone who probably wasn't even born when the riot happened. It has a LOT of misinformation. I was there, right in the middle from about 11 pm on night one until the second night when I went home for a few hours. I was AT the California Market on night two. If you google "California Market LA Riot" and click "images" you can see pictures.
There were NO "automatic" firearms other than semi-auto pistols and semi-auto hunting rifles. Most of the Koreans had pump sporting shotguns, not the current tacticool street sweeper types. As I recall one guy had like a Remington 1100 semi-auto skeet gun.
There were several guys with 1911's or Browning pistols, but most were revolvers. Also a number of the armed men were licensed security officers in plainclothes hired by the market and other stores.
"I" was wearing body armor, carrying a .38 snubbie, a 1911 and had a Mossy 500 pump 12 ga close by in my truck - and I was a journalist!
But yes - the guns were a deterrent. In a few cases the BULLETS were a more effective deterrent. Interesting enough "warning shots" fired into the air were successful in driving groups of looters away. We are trained today to never use warning shots - however had the Koreans fired directly into the crowds it probably would have been a bloodbath. It probably would have stopped any further rioting butt cold too! But regardless of what the police or trainers say, warning shots DO have a place. They can work and avoid the need to kill people, maybe many people.
The riot didn't last 6 days either. Yes, OK, technically. But the reality was most of the violence occurred on night one, all night long. That was mostly black violence, burning and looting. By the morning of day two the mexicans joined in and predominately looted retail stores. By afternoon the police started regrouping and leading fire task forces in to fight fires and retake major looting.
About 4-5pm I ended up in Koreatown. Most of the s--t had already hit the fan there earlier. I hung out at a few stores until about 9 pm and then headed home for some sleep. By then most of the rioting was done. By day three people were too tired to loot and the police started getting a hand on things. Day four the National Guard arrived, sort of, though I personally never saw very many deployed, just in their camp, and volunteers started cleaning up the mess with groups of highly publicized community leaders predominately displayed and outnumbered by media.
The article failed to mention (I can't recall) but three or maybe all four looters killed by the Koreans were in one gun battle. I wasn't there so I can't give first hand knowledge but some of it was caught in photos and I saw the blood pools of the losers.
As I recall off the top of my head, 5,000 buildings burned, mostly to the ground. 55 people were killed and 22 cases were never solved. Pretty much anybody who got whacked on night one got off scott free because there were NO cops.
This is a microcosm of what will happen in a serious breakdown of social order, either locally, regionally or nationally.
The MINUTE the seething unwashed masses feel the police are not there to repress their criminal actions they will go nuts! Ferguson was a good small example. The social order will break down within minutes to hours.
The ONLY thing that will stop marauding idiots and barbarian thugs is a gun.
It seems like everywhere I look and see, I'm being pressured to buy a gun...not just one gun, multiple ones. Gun shows all over the place, advertisements in newspapers and magazines, and non-stop talk about guns on TV and the radio.
It's like American culture expects me to be carrying around a gun 24/7, and that if I don't own multiple firearms, I'm somehow a second class citizen. Anyone else tired of this?
Nobody is pressuring you to do anything, whether or not you want a gun is up to you. Just because you see all kinds of materials that promote guns, cars, foods, and millions of other products, that doesn't mean you have to run to a store and buy them.
You're still clueless. The only people who ever talk about worshiping guns are ignorant anti gun nuts who have no idea what they're talking about, as you prove with every post. You obviously have no idea what ranchers today commonly use to deal with coyotes and other varmints. The scary "designed for human on human combat" rifle you're so afraid of has been used by civilians for over 50 years, it's hardly a new development.
Are these rifle blessed by you? They were "designed for human on human combat"
This one is evil though, right?
This is a pair of nice hunting guns
And these are "scary" designed-to-kill-people guns
And here's the kicker...
the hunting guns above are more deadly compared to the civilian versions of the "scary" guns !
That's right.
Remember... it's illegal to own a fully automatic weapon in most US states. And in the states where it's legal getting one is so difficult, so expensive, and requires going through so many background checks, they are mainly rare, rich people toys. There were very few instances of fully automatic weapons used in crimes, and the last one was in 1997 AFAIK.
So all these "scary" black rifles are semi-auto, just like the two hunting guns above.
Except they were not designed to be semi-auto, they were designed for military use as full auto weapons. And this means, compromises and sacrifices were made to make them controllable when fired, not overly heavy, and reliable. They had to make the round less powerful, since the powerful rifle ammo used in a fully automatic gun resulted in excessive recoil making it impossible to keep the rifle on target, and tearing up the internal mechanisms. They had to make the barrels shorter so that they could be operated by a member of mechanized unit and wouldn't snag on things inside the APC, and that resulted in even more reduced power, accuracy and range. All for the sake of full auto mode... which doesn't exist in the civilian versions.
So the civilian versions of these scary military rifles are less powerful, have shorter range, less penetration and the same rate of fire as the hunting guns above them (both semi-automatic).
But... but.. they are scary !
Personally, I think that the most terrifying gun for close-quarter urban fight is a 12 ga pump shotgun, a single blast will tear you apart. And when loaded with slugs, they are deadly at decent range. But oh my god, let's confiscate people's scary military rifles ! They can just start killing people all by themselves !
Simply stating you're entitled and don't shive-a-git what others think would have sufficed. All that other bumph is utter bullcrap.
Lets look at England. The year after they outlawed firearms gun violence surged 30%. Its not like your above quoted articles on skewed facts. On average 12k people die every year from firearm violence. Every year over 100k people die from alcohol. Thats almost 10 times the amount.
And these are "scary" designed-to-kill-people guns
And here's the kicker...
the hunting guns above are more deadly compared to the civilian versions of the "scary" guns !
That's right.
Remember... it's illegal to own a fully automatic weapon in most US states. And in the states where it's legal getting one is so difficult, so expensive, and requires going through so many background checks, they are mainly rare, rich people toys. There were very few instances of fully automatic weapons used in crimes, and the last one was in 1997 AFAIK.
So all these "scary" black rifles are semi-auto, just like the two hunting guns above.
Except they were not designed to be semi-auto, they were designed for military use as full auto weapons. And this means, compromises and sacrifices were made to make them controllable when fired, not overly heavy, and reliable. They had to make the round less powerful, since the powerful rifle ammo used in a fully automatic gun resulted in excessive recoil making it impossible to keep the rifle on target, and tearing up the internal mechanisms. They had to make the barrels shorter so that they could be operated by a member of mechanized unit and wouldn't snag on things inside the APC, and that resulted in even more reduced power, accuracy and range. All for the sake of full auto mode... which doesn't exist in the civilian versions.
So the civilian versions of these scary military rifles are less powerful, have shorter range, less penetration and the same rate of fire as the hunting guns above them (both semi-automatic).
But... but.. they are scary !
Personally, I think that the most terrifying gun for close-quarter urban fight is a 12 ga pump shotgun, a single blast will tear you apart. And when loaded with slugs, they are deadly at decent range. But oh my god, let's confiscate people's scary military rifles ! They can just start killing people all by themselves !
From the standpoint of a serious and knowledgeable shooter, this is the Gospel truth. ^^^…Quite frankly, its the absolute, scientific , truth, as well. The 5.56 NATO was developed as the .223 Remington, with its use, intended as a varmint round. Its adoption, by the US military, in the AR platform, was/is, as an area fire combination, more intended to wound than kill. The logic being, as we (or some of us, anyway) know, that it takes three men out of a fight, to deal with one wounded man. Whilst a dead one, can be ignored by his comrades.
Of the military wanted a , truly lethal, smaller caliber, high velocity cartridge, designed for one shot, one kill, aimed fire, the .243 Winchester would have been a better choice. This is my personal opinion, and there is a counter argument about the thinking behind small caliber/high velocity, that , at the time of the 5.56/M16 adoption, the powers that be felt it would, actually be MORE lethal, at the ranges the typical engagements in Viet Nam were fought at, a d that that , since a sdker could carry twice the amount of ammo as with the M14, those coveted body counts would rise. Either way, the M16 was intended as an area fire weapon.
A crack shot, in a birds nest, with an M14 and a box of ammo, or even a Garand, same conditions, would be "scarier", to anyone with half a brain, that that same shooter with and AR and a 30 round mag. At least if a shooters intent is to cause actual damage, and not just tear holes in the air and splash dust. There is a reason that the 223/5.56 is illegal to hunt deer with. At least it is here, and other locations where deer are fair sized.Its 6mm, (243 Win) and up, for Mule Deer here. If I were to have to face a human enemy, bent on killing me, such as in a true combat environment, my AR is not my "go to". My M1A is. My ARs niche is in varmints and competitive events. Since "scary" looks, don't win fights.
From the standpoint of a serious and knowledgeable shooter, this is the Gospel truth. ^^^…Quite frankly, its the absolute, scientific , truth, as well. The 5.56 NATO was developed as the .223 Remington, with its use, intended as a varmint round. Its adoption, by the US military, in the AR platform, was/is, as an area fire combination, more intended to wound than kill. The logic being, as we (or some of us, anyway) know, that it takes three men out of a fight, to deal with one wounded man. Whilst a dead one, can be ignored by his comrades.
Of the military wanted a , truly lethal, smaller caliber, high velocity cartridge, designed for one shot, one kill, aimed fire, the .243 Winchester would have been a better choice. This is my personal opinion, and there is a counter argument about the thinking behind small caliber/high velocity, that , at the time of the 5.56/M16 adoption, the powers that be felt it would, actually be MORE lethal, at the ranges the typical engagements in Viet Nam were fought at, a d that that , since a sdker could carry twice the amount of ammo as with the M14, those coveted body counts would rise. Either way, the M16 was intended as an area fire weapon.
A crack shot, in a birds nest, with an M14 and a box of ammo, or even a Garand, same conditions, would be "scarier", to anyone with half a brain, that that same shooter with and AR and a 30 round mag. At least if a shooters intent is to cause actual damage, and not just tear holes in the air and splash dust. There is a reason that the 223/5.56 is illegal to hunt deer with. At least it is here, and other locations where deer are fair sized.Its 6mm, (243 Win) and up, for Mule Deer here. If I were to have to face a human enemy, bent on killing me, such as in a true combat environment, my AR is not my "go to". My M1A is. My ARs niche is in varmints and competitive events. Since "scary" looks, don't win fights.
The 243 is an excellent round, but it is substantially larger than the 223 reducing the amount of ammo able to be carried by half plus it would up the weight of the gun by at least 50%.
From the standpoint of a serious and knowledgeable shooter, this is the Gospel truth. ^^^…Quite frankly, its the absolute, scientific , truth, as well. The 5.56 NATO was developed as the .223 Remington, with its use, intended as a varmint round. Its adoption, by the US military, in the AR platform, was/is, as an area fire combination, more intended to wound than kill. The logic being, as we (or some of us, anyway) know, that it takes three men out of a fight, to deal with one wounded man. Whilst a dead one, can be ignored by his comrades.
Of the military wanted a , truly lethal, smaller caliber, high velocity cartridge, designed for one shot, one kill, aimed fire, the .243 Winchester would have been a better choice. This is my personal opinion, and there is a counter argument about the thinking behind small caliber/high velocity, that , at the time of the 5.56/M16 adoption, the powers that be felt it would, actually be MORE lethal, at the ranges the typical engagements in Viet Nam were fought at, a d that that , since a sdker could carry twice the amount of ammo as with the M14, those coveted body counts would rise. Either way, the M16 was intended as an area fire weapon.
A crack shot, in a birds nest, with an M14 and a box of ammo, or even a Garand, same conditions, would be "scarier", to anyone with half a brain, that that same shooter with and AR and a 30 round mag. At least if a shooters intent is to cause actual damage, and not just tear holes in the air and splash dust. There is a reason that the 223/5.56 is illegal to hunt deer with. At least it is here, and other locations where deer are fair sized.Its 6mm, (243 Win) and up, for Mule Deer here. If I were to have to face a human enemy, bent on killing me, such as in a true combat environment, my AR is not my "go to". My M1A is. My ARs niche is in varmints and competitive events. Since "scary" looks, don't win fights.
there have been times when the police using the AR15, have not been able to bring down an armed suspect, but had they been using something larger, like say the 30-30 winchester, those failures would not have happened. personally i would rather have a nice lever action marlin or winchester rifles chambered in the 30-30. it is a nice all around round, and since it is a lever action, you dont get the evil looks that the AR gets.
there have been times when the police using the AR15, have not been able to bring down an armed suspect, but had they been using something larger, like say the 30-30 winchester, those failures would not have happened. personally i would rather have a nice lever action marlin or winchester rifles chambered in the 30-30. it is a nice all around round, and since it is a lever action, you dont get the evil looks that the AR gets.
5.56, especially with more modern heavier loadings in the 69gr+ weights are not having any problems taking people down.
Switching from an ar15 to a lever action has so many disadvantages.
I dream of the day when guys are banned in America. Screw right to bear arms. I'm only 28 and I'm confident I'll see that day.
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