For those who remember the era, movies and television e.g. “Miami Vice” pictured an America where every street gang, let alone drug traffickers, had easy access to full-auto submachine guns such as the MAC-10, Uzi, and H&K MP5 among others. This perception, right or wrong, probably was an influence behind the closing of the BATFE’s register by the Hughes amendment to the 1986 FOPA, and the follow-on Assault Weapons Ban in 1994. I have a couple of questions:
First, how exaggerated was Hollywood’s version of the situation? I take it as a given it was exaggerated, but by how much?
Second, where did those miscreants who did possess such weapons get them? Possible sources (although I don’t know if such a breakdown is available) would be legally registered, stolen from legitimate owners, diverted from manufacturers or wholesalers, smuggled from abroad, or illegal conversion of semi-autos. IOW, to what degree did limiting submachine guns legal possession restrict the black market supply?
In short, did the Hughes amendment and the AWB save us from a Somalia- level gun holocaust, or was it a moral panic similar to the crusade against “gangsters” in the 1930s that gave us the NFA in 1934?
Machine guns that were legally made? Almost non-existent. All the evidence that I’ve seen is for 2-3 murders using legally owned machine guns in the period 1934 to present. Obviously the typical sources have an interest in that number being low, but I’ve never seen any contradiction.
Illegally modified ones were available, often because they were easy to modify due to simplicity or open-bolt design (e.g. Tec-9). The North Hollywood shootout involved illegal modifications. Very few/possibly none on the civilian market have open bolt designs nowadays.
The MAC-10 and Uzi, among others, had open bolt designs that were easily convertible to full automatic fire. (MP5s use a closed bolt system and were not easily convertible.) It was as simple as just buying the semi-automatic version that was legal and the relatively trivial conversion. In 1982 the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms mostly closed that loophole by designating specific open bolt firearms as machine guns because of their ease of conversion. (It wasn’t all but in general open bolt designs are easy to convert so most that had been for sale made the list.) ISTR some specific related provisions making the 1986 law but the issue was largely dealt with by rule making under existent law.
Hollywood using a lot of MAC-10s and Uzis during the 80s was at least accurate in that sense. The kinds of weapons that would likely have been used by criminals who were using automatic weapons tended to be the ones that showed up in movies and TV. That doesn’t mean that the rate of those weapons being used by criminals was accurate. It also doesn’t mean effectiveness of using automatic weapons was accurately displayed either. It’s Hollywood. Accuracy tends to take a backseat to story telling even today.
Well, I think in the last 40 years (the time period since the 80’s) we are talking about maybe 2-3 million…er, thousand…er…hundred? Nope, it’s 2-3, murders with an automatic weapon. So…that’s probably the body count in one 80’s era movie. A low budget one that was probably a love story. The average testosterone fueled 80’s action film probably had 2-3 people being killed in the opening scenes with automatic weapons.
So…I’d say that should give you a good gauge on the level of exaggeration wrt Hollywood verse reality and automatic weapons. Simply, they weren’t used very often (read: it was vanishingly rare) in crimes committed in the US, including murder. The most famous use I can think of was the North Hollywood (ironically) shootout.
As other posters mentioned, you can modify semi-automatic weapons to fire fully automatic, and in fact I believe that several of the weapons in the North Hollywood shootout WERE illegally modified. Yet, despite what Hollywood says, it’s still not something that people actually use to commit crime in the US very often.
Regulations. Most (maybe all, I’m not sure) open bolt semi-automatics were banned in the 80’s because they could have been converted relatively easily, so no guns made after something like 1983 are allowed to be made or sold on the general civilian market (it’s basically an extension of the automatic weapons ban, with similar grandfathering of older weapons but new one’s being almost impossible to legally get). This is part of those gun laws we don’t have in the US and one of the regulations we don’t have.
Much lower accuracy compared to closed-bolt firearms. Not a problem in the machine gun’s intended role, which is more akin to a shotgun than anything else, but a problem for accurately hitting a target with only one shot. An advantage of open-bolt, fully automatic firearms is that they can be fairly uncomplicated designs—have a look at how simple an open-bolt blowback submachine gun like the M3 is some time----and they also allow for greater airflow through the chamber of the firearm. The increased airflow is supposed to help with cooling the firearm, though I don’t know how effective that is in practice.
While I don’t think the ATF broke down what percentage of crimes were committed with illegally modified fully automatic firearms, they did look at which percentage was committed with pistols vs rifles vs shotguns. Absent things like a fully automatic handgun like a Tec-9, or Glock 18, which are a rounding error in the population of all handguns, most fully automatic firearms are rifles. Rifles are, until fairly recently, implicated in a very small percentage of crimes compared to handguns. IIRC, it’s like 2 percent or so.
So, by deduction, I don’t think that fully automatic firearms were a significant problem in American crime, either in the 80s or now. They sure gather attention when they do show up though. Like the N. Hollywood robbery mentioned above.
Thank you for all that information. But I wasn’t interested in how many crimes were committed with fully automatic firearms. I was interested in why “Very few/possibly none on the civilian market have open bolt designs nowadays”
Well, then look at my first sentence. Accuracy is usually much less, with no tradeoff on the good side for a civilian application. Cartridge headspacing can also be an issue.
That’s why you don’t see open-bolt designs in a firearm that isn’t intended for automatic fire use.
As stated, they are for all practical purposes banned today. Just like fully automatic machine guns are. The only ones you can get are those grandfathered in, and they are very expensive now since there won’t be any new ones coming along.
To my knowledge there were machine guns used in Miami Florida in the drug wars, and in the LA gang wars of that period. I’m not sure how commonly though or how they got them.
Having said that, I’m not sure why the MAC 10 is associated with Miami while the AK47 is associated with LA gang wars.
Because there’s been a de facto moratorium on new fully automatic weapons in the United States since the 1986 machine gun registry. Cops can get them, SOTs can buy them, the military obviously, but not John Q. Public. There’s a large demand, but not much liquidity.
Even if s/he owns a fully automatic firearm currently. It’s a reason why full auto firearms have the ridiculous prices they do. Remove that gun control law, and I’m sure you’d see legal, fully-automatic, open-bolt firearms for sale again. As range toys, if nothing else.
Moreover, open-bolt designs are really suited for firearms with a really large rate of fire. I’m meaning belt-fed firearms, things like the M240 or M2 machine guns: where the amount of ammunition supplied is measured in terms of boxes, not magazines.
Though the US Marine Corps is going the opposite direction, with using a box-fed M27 in roles that were previously the domain of belt-fed weapons like the M249.
Obviously. But even before 1986 I doubt many people planning to commit crimes wanted to register their NFA firearm, get fingerprinted and have the FBI run a background check on them. So the question is whether it ever made a difference whether full-autos could be purchased legally, or whether criminals favored illegal conversion of semi-autos or stolen-from-the-warehouse guns for their lack of traceability.
P.S. were open-bolt designs actually banned or were they redefined as NFA guns whether they’d been converted or not?
A low budget one that was probably a love story. The average testosterone fueled 80’s action film probably had 2-3 people being killed in the opening scenes with automatic weapons.