Despite the fact that the possession of rifled short-barreled weapons is prohibited in Russia, citizens can still get acquainted with modern pistols and revolvers.
There are two ways.
The first is to become an athlete in the field of “practical pistol shooting”. In Russia, practical shooting was officially recognized as a sport in 2006. This makes it possible to go to classes with an instructor, shoot weapons belonging to a sports organization, attend Russian and international competitions in practical shooting. Also, a professional athlete can purchase a rifled short-barreled weapon as his property, but it can only be stored and used on the territory of a sports facility, or when leaving for a competition, with the registration of a package of documents.
Practical shooting lessons will allow you to learn at a high level to wield a rifled short-barreled weapon, will firmly hammer into your head the skills of safe handling of weapons, which are the cornerstone of this sport. Of the minuses - if you study seriously, then this is both time and money. Normal training for an athlete involves thousands of shots and at least a few sessions per week. If you are not applying for a competition, then two or four sessions per month of 100-150 cartridges are quite enough to develop basic skills and keep fit.
The second option to get acquainted with the "short-barreled" is to go to a shooting gallery that offers appropriate services. Usually the basic course is called "Introduction to Modern Pistols" or something like that. The choice is offered the opportunity to shoot from two or three barrels. Basic safety rules are explained before shooting.
The most accessible and widespread model of short-barreled small arms in Russia is the MP-446S Viking pistol manufactured by the Izhevsk Mechanical Plant. Most often, all beginners in practical shooting start with this pistol.
A relatively bulky pistol, not very convenient for shooters with a small hand. There is a classic drawback of domestic weapons - “file after purchase”. There were cases when magazines from one pistol did not fit another - a clear sign of the widespread use of manual labor in production. In general, the quality is gradually improving.
All the shortcomings pay off with the minimum price on the market for sporting short-barreled weapons - from twenty thousand rubles. It is simply impossible to find anything cheaper. Perhaps Makarov's sports pistol, but the meaning of its operation can only be with law enforcement officers, those where PM is still a standard weapon.
Another popular model is the Czech sports pistol CZ-75 "Shadow" in various designs. The price of this weapon immediately jumps up and exceeds one hundred thousand rubles.
The pistol is very well assembled, accurate in shooting and is used by many athletes as the main weapon. An interesting feature of this series of pistols is that the bolt guides are located inside the frame of the pistol, and not outside, like most samples of short-barreled weapons.
And finally, another outstanding representative of sporting short-barreled weapons in Russia is the Glock family of world-famous Austrian pistols.
With Glock pistols, the situation is usually like this - any person immediately falls in love with this brand, or categorically does not accept it (the author belongs to the first category), a neutral attitude, it seems to me, is less common.
Glock pistols are made according to the percussion scheme (no trigger), there are no non-automatic fuses, there is a fuse built into the trigger. Before each shot, pulling the trigger, the shooter cocks the striker, which is why the trigger travel in Glock is slightly longer than in pistols with a single or double trigger mechanism (USM).
In fact, due to the huge series, there is an equally huge selection of modifications for this weapon, which allows you to completely customize the pistol to your needs, including the trigger, sights, and more.
Also, pistols of this brand have the maximum number of models, different standard sizes, for almost all common pistol cartridges.
Glock pistols are of the highest reliability. The pistol's life under warranty is 40,000 shots (like the PM), but factory tests have shown that the Glock 17 can withstand more than 360,000 shots without mechanical damage to the main parts of the weapon. According to reviews on the forums, the numbers are more modest, problems begin to appear after 200,000 shots, but this is a huge figure. For comparison, according to an instructor of one of the Tula shooting clubs, the analogue of Glock, the GSh-18 pistol, must be sent for overhaul to the plant after 15,000 shots (this is when shooting sports cartridges that are not reinforced with armor-piercing).
Prices for Glock pistols start at about 130,000 rubles, i.e. about $ 2000. For comparison: in the US Glock 17 costs about $ 600. By the way, in Russia Glock pistols are "produced" by the Orsis company.
In addition to the weapons discussed above, a large number of different samples of foreign rifled short-barreled weapons are available in Russia, often at completely unimaginable prices. It will not be possible to cover them all due to the limited format of the article.
Honestly, there are doubts that a person who has given more than a million or two rubles for a pistol will simply put it in storage in a shooting club. Maybe for someone "short-barreled" is already de facto allowed?
Can sporting short-barreled weapons go beyond the boundaries of sport and become available to citizens for self-defense? In theory, yes, but the likelihood of this is extremely small. In the best case, it will be allowed to store pistols at home, and transport them to the shooting range without cartridges, with a lock on the bracket. All this can also be associated with a ban on wearing traumatics, as discussed in the previous article. And most likely, an athlete's certificate will still be required, which for ordinary citizens will result in significant troubles, and for wealthy people, in easy additional expenses. I am sure that if such amendments to the law are adopted, a large part of the population of some Russian republics, without exception, will become athletes in practical shooting.
In matters of legalization, it is necessary to note such an effect as “watchman's syndrome”. Often, many fans of weapons, having gone through the thorny path of an athlete or a moderator on a weapon forum, begin to mindlessly overestimate the requirements for the alleged owner. Such "supporters" of legalization can do more harm than opponents, because they can "reasonably" prove why it is impossible to give a weapon to a person who does not go to the shooting range three times a week and cannot disassemble / assemble the PM in ten seconds while blindfolded. In my opinion, it is necessary to make a short, capacious course on the preparation and safe handling of weapons from practical shooting, and make him teach as "Our Father". The modern weapon exam is more like an exercise in attentiveness, when, among half a dozen answers, one must choose the one that is formulated most competently.
We must clearly understand that no referendums or petitions can lead to the legalization of rifled short-barreled weapons. Most of the population of Russia does not need any weapon; in the event of a referendum, the votes of those who are "for" will drown in the voices of various grandmothers and aunts, and uncles who are mentally subordinate to them.
You should also not think that the government is very afraid to give weapons to the population, they say, it will be used against it. In fact, what is already in the hands of the population is more than enough for this purpose. The authorities most likely simply do not need the extra troubles associated with this. Somehow it happened, turned into a traumatic channel, well, okay. The manufacturers are also happy. It is much easier to produce rubber arrows, and they are sold even more expensive than combat ones, the power will either increase or decrease, and they break more often.
There is another speculative option - the coming to power of a national leader who, due to his inner convictions, will support the idea of legalizing short-barreled rifled weapons in Russia. In this case, everything will happen quickly, the protesters and the media will instantly change their position to the opposite. But for the avoidance of disappointment, I would not recommend relying heavily on this.
What actions now can affect the increase in the likelihood of allowing the circulation of rifled short-barreled weapons in Russia?
There are two main reasons that discredit short-barreled rifled weapons in the eyes of the population of modern Russia, these are the potential use of pistols in domestic conflicts, and their use in cases of mass executions.
In an everyday conflict, one way or another, there is always a guilty party. Someone should be the first to get out of the car, get out a bat, knife or pistol. The main question in such a situation is who is right and who is wrong. And this question in many respects arises from our muddy law enforcement practice. Despite the fairly clear explanations given by the Supreme Court (Armed Forces) of the Russian Federation on self-defense issues, the lower courts are still riveting bundles of indictments in self-defense situations. Suddenly it turns out that the previously three-time convicted bumpkin with a bat did not want to kill anyone, and just got out of the car to beat the snow off the wheels, and the girl who shot him in the course of self-defense inflicted grievous bodily harm on him, exceeded the level of necessary defense and should receive two or three year of the colony (conditional, but close to reality situation). And all this goes into statistics against weapons.
Thus, the main issue preceding the legalization of rifled short-barreled weapons is the maximum decriminalization of self-defense. It is necessary to achieve a complete abolition of the very concept of "excess" when establishing the fact of an attack as such. Not to mention such a basic concept as housing protection
A good help for resolving such situations could be some kind of Internet resource, where all cases of self-defense with a description of the situation, the possibility of attracting public opinion, etc. would be recorded. From a commercial point of view, such a resource could be of interest to defense lawyers.
For organizations like the Right to Arms, decriminalization of self-defense should be a top priority in their activities. Over time, the collected argumentation could become the basis at least for attempts to change something at the legislative level. When implementing the possibility of categorizing statistics on such a site, it would be possible to compile a list of judges who illiterately consider cases in self-defense, without taking into account the decisions of the RF Armed Forces, and send this list to the qualification collegium of judges of the Russian Federation and the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, for a possible revision of their status. I am sure that the above-mentioned judges will not like such attention and may indirectly influence the future decisions of their colleagues.
An important point is the complete audio and video recording of self-defense. The solution can be a grenade-barreled video recorder of the minimum size, like a GoPro camera. In the comments to the previous article, it was rightly noted that the grenade recorder will not record the beginning of the conflict, and this is so. At the same time, from the moment the weapon is removed, many legally important moments occur - the fact of a verbal warning "stop, I will shoot!" Regarding the fact that the videotape can harm the defender himself, you can first carefully review, or better, show the lawyer. And one more thing - in Russia, the scenario is still more realistic - self-defense with a pistol against a knife / bat or a physically / numerically dominant enemy. Legalization of the "short-barreled" is unlikely to change this situation, since criminals of a low "street" kind in most cases will not receive a license, or will not be able to, and they have neither money nor connections for illegal weapons.
Given the miniaturization of electronics, there may be a tendency to wear an always-on dash cam on your clothes. By the way, this can be implemented by an application in smart glasses such as "Google Glass", if they gain development and popularity.
As for the mass shootings, then again, the available weapons are more than enough. The damage dealt by a 12-gauge weapon is many times greater than the damage dealt by a pistol. The probability of a lethal outcome for wounds from a pistol is about 30%, from a 12 gauge - almost 100% mortality. Even if all weapons are removed from the population, this will not solve the problem. Psychopaths and terrorists use improvised items. In the east (China, Japan, South Korea), massacres were carried out with knives. It can be easily found in the search - "Japan, attacked schoolchildren with a knife, attacked train passengers with a knife, attacked a hospital with a knife", "China, attacked passers-by with a knife, attacked preschoolers with a knife" aid trucks, but there are also cases with a knife.
Personally, I am not worried about a neighbor who has a gun, but drunks who can bring down an entire staircase of an apartment building by turning the gas tap.
The next important factor is training people to handle weapons. During the Soviet era, at least something was taught in basic military training (CWP). Then, as far as I know, these classes were canceled altogether.
It is necessary to introduce on a compulsory basis in all schools a course of classes on basic military training and ensuring life safety. For training, involve employees of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Emergency Situations with mandatory combat experience, i.e. practitioners, not theorists, with a strict age limit. Teach general information on weapons, loading, alerting, aiming, safe handling (no disassembly / assembly), a short course on other weapons and self-defense skills, other real world skills will not interfere - handling household gas safely, how to light a fire, gas mask / respirator and so on. A condensed course for 8-12 lessons in the ninth grade, and for consolidation in the eleventh grade.
I believe that this direction can be claimed by the state and relatively easily promoted, since the RF Armed Forces, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of Emergency Situations will be interested in it - they will attach their retirees + they will popularize their profession. In addition, training in CWP will require a significant amount of empty weapons, for example, PM, and maybe AK, which can be made from the most worn out weapons, and this is a large market for manufacturers, i.e. there will be a weapon lobby interest.
Another area of activity for the arms lobby may be to promote the need to create an effective cartridge case for all civilian weapons, which will allow you to quickly find "wild" shooters, and reduce the latter's desire to shoot from the car window and at weddings. Reducing crime incidents will have a beneficial effect on the media background around weapons.
Of all the variety of rifled short-barreled weapons, which one is the most acceptable for society and the state in terms of possession of ordinary citizens?
Several factors can be distinguished.
1. Limited ammunition. The magazine / drum capacity of the weapon is currently limited to ten rounds. Temporarily, such a restriction was in effect even in the United States. The UK has a two-round limit. A large-capacity magazine is convenient for mass executions, so it is unlikely that in Russia this figure will change upwards, rather downwards. In other words, the weapon should not be able to go beyond the indicator - ten rounds.
2. Restriction on reloading speed. The second point follows from the first. The most effective way to arrange mass shootings will be a criminal armed with a rapid-fire, multiple-charge weapon with the ability to quickly reload. At the same time, for effective self-defense, a normal firearm (not traumatic) with up to ten rounds of ammunition will be quite enough. After all, we are not the United States, and modern multiple-charge weapons are not widespread among criminals, our criminal weapons are more often knives, PMs, alterations from gas or traumatic ones.
3. The weapon should be as easy to use and reliable as possible. This is necessary to minimize accidents when handling by inexperienced users and to minimize cases of failure during use, to simplify the requirements for operation - cleaning, lubrication.
Based on this, two options can be proposed
The first option is the legalization in Russia of revolvers chambered for.38 SPECIAL and 357 MAGNUM. Russia has experience in the production of revolvers - the traumatic weapon of the "Thunderstorm" series. I am sure that in the event of the legalization of combat variants of this type of weapon, their production will be launched as soon as possible. Cartridges of these calibers are already being produced, for example, by the Tula Cartridge Plant.
Weapons of this type are most convenient to use, there are no fuses that they forget to turn off in a stressful situation. It is not demanding to operate and is of little use for mass executions.
On the other hand, a sufficiently powerful cartridge and a drum capacity of 5-7 rounds will allow effective self-defense in most situations. Cartridges 357 MAGNUM allow self-defense, including against wild animals (wolf, wild boar), which is quite important for some regions of Russia.
Another positive point is recognition - nowadays traumatic revolvers are not very common. In the case of the legalization of revolvers, criminals will quickly learn that a revolver is most likely a combat weapon, not a traumatic weapon.
For some reason, it seems to me that this is a subjective opinion that the legalization of revolvers will also cause less rejection among opponents of the "short-barreled".
Russia also imported a traumatic revolver Taurus LOM-13 of the Brazilian company Forjas Taurus S. A., developed on the basis of the design of the Taurus Model 905 revolver. Brazilians may well certify the production of their combat revolvers in Russia.
Well, as an example - the classic models of the most famous manufacturer of revolvers, Smith & Wesson.
The second option is the legalization of the Makarov pistol and structurally similar samples chambered for 9x18
This pistol is familiar to most Russians. Its design has been worked out for decades, is reliable and unpretentious. At the same time, the idea of replacing this pistol with modern models has been ripening for a long time in the armed forces and the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
If a decision is made to authorize the sale of this particular weapon model, the sale of PM and cartridges for it can pay off the transition of the RF Armed Forces and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to modern weapons of 9x19 caliber. In this case, everyone will be happy. Citizens will receive quite effective and reliable weapons, the military, police and other law enforcement agencies will unload warehouses from weapons and cartridges that are outdated for them, and will receive money to order modern weapons, and the defense industry will receive money for its implementation. Taking into account the prices in the civilian market and the purchase prices for the military, for one sold PM they will acquire two modern pistols.
At the same time, the PM does not go beyond the limit of 10 rounds, and the lower magazine latch does not allow changing it at a super-fast pace (there are certainly methods, but most likely the psychopath will simply drop the magazines in a stressful situation).
Anticipating the objections of supporters of the legalization of full-size samples of multiple-charge pistols at once, I think this is unlikely, unless we consider the "miracle" in the form of the appearance of the president of a "short-barreled" supporter or for a long period - the prohibition of traumatics, the subsequent "cooling" of the public from incidents with it, and decades of expectations of promotion sporting weapons to the masses.
On the other hand, the successful experience of introducing short-barreled rifled weapons, in one of the two options described above, may eventually lead to further liberalization of the arms market. And if not, then it's still better than being left with trauma forever.
On moral and ethical issues of legalization …
I always misunderstand the position of opponents of the legalization of short-barreled weapons. It would seem, what's the difference? You do not need it personally, it doesn’t mean that others do not need it. Are you afraid of using violence against yourself? But this can be done with a gun, a knife, and an unregistered weapon, or just with a strong fist. In my opinion, there are too many emotions in relation to short-barreled weapons. But this is just a convenient tool for ensuring personal safety, as specialized as pliers, and much less dangerous than, for example, a gas cylinder. More precisely, a rifled short-barreled weapon is the best tool for legal self-defense against criminal encroachment.
Banning military weapons in favor of traumatism is an absolute stupidity, a completely ineffective, illogical decision. Imagine that you were forbidden to eat with stainless steel forks, they say they scratch the tooth enamel, and were obliged to eat only with plastic ones? And you can justify - you can calculate how much money the population spends on dentists, you can justify anything at all. In principle, you can eat plastic, but for what reason? So, the situation with rifled short-barreled weapons and traumatics reminds me of the situation with these forks.
A short-barreled weapon is a means of self-defense for a law-abiding citizen. Its acquisition requires obtaining a license, fulfilling certain requirements. The sound of a shot during self-defense attracts the attention of witnesses and the police, and the bullets make it possible to identify the shooter (as opposed to traumatics, where this is difficult). If we talk about the shortcomings of the licensing and permissive system (LRO), such as corruption or carelessness, then this is not a reason for denying citizens the right to security. On the facts of revealed violations, it is necessary to react, to take measures. Otherwise, the situation turns out - there are no weapons, there are no violations when issuing a license, which means that everything is fine in the LRO, nothing needs to be done.
Police-only security advocates want to ask the question, if the police are corrupt and incompetent to issue weapons licenses, then how can they be trusted with their safety? Also, how safe would they feel in prison, where the number of police officers in relation to the "population" is maximum?
It seems to me that those who live in large cities, communicate at work and in a company with decent people more often refuse weapons, and as a result rarely find themselves in bad situations. An illusion arises that if something bad happens, it will be somewhere far away. But this is just an illusion. It is enough to open the crime news section of your city once a month, and the illusion will dissipate.
Remember, there will always be those who wish to limit your civil rights, and they will find a million reasons for this. You shouldn't give them up voluntarily
On this topic of short-barreled weapons in Russia I consider exhausted. I plan to write articles on smooth-bore and rifled long-barreled weapons in modern Russia.
