It's hard not to be a conspiritorial thinker, when this sort of story happens.

[JDogger]

The JOINT SERVICES TRAINING COMBAT ARMS SURVEY was part of a master theisis to judge if the troops had a suffecient understanding of the role of the military in the United States.

Hi Henlee, welcome to RTF PP.

Usually, a good first post includes a little bit about who you are, and what you do with retrievers. It helps....JD

[Pete]

You must have not watched the clip I posted of the military going house to house in Katrina,,kicking down doors without out waiting for people to respond to the knocking and confiscating their guns, You must have missed the old lady getting bruitilized on camera as she questioned why she needs to give up that little gun she was holding..
Natural disaters are a prooving ground.
Pete

[mjh345]

Check out the link I provided. They do A LOT more than you seem to think they do.

But then again, it's a lot more fun to think the Gummints out to get you. - Paul

I believe I'll pass on checking out your link. Im sure they have a number of employees on their payroll, as do most govt buereacracies, who are good at writing flowery descriptions of the wonderful things they do in order to justify their existence.
IMHO we have too many govt agencies. The fact that they feel the need to spend our $ scaring usmaking self serving propaganda about our need for them is rather telling.

If you don't think the "Gummints" out to get us and take away our Constitutionally guaranteed freedomsthen you have not been paying attention.
The 4th Am. has become a joke to them. Remember the Patriot Act? How about the Bush administration telling us they had not tapped any phones; it turned out they tapped EVERY phone. Now they are supposedly using drones to go after the rogue cop out in LA. I guess we all know that drones are 100% safe and dont ever miss their target and do collateral damage. They want to allow the military to kill US citizens: all they have to do is use a couple of magic words in describing their target. I could go on, but if you don't get it by now its useless.

If they make a video recomending that we defend ourselves with plastic scissors against an armed gunmen, then why do they not arm their agents with plastic scissors? Think of the money they'd save. Whats good for the goose is good for the gander. Right???

Homeland Security has scarecly been in existence for a decade and look at how huge and powerful they have become. IMHO we got along just fine without them. Its one of the biggest power grabs by the govt since the days of FDRs New Deal. Besides that if you haven't noticed we are leaking red ink all over the place. We cant afford more govt BS programs, especially ones that are designed to scare us so they can take away more of our freedoms.

There is a famous quote from one of our founders to the effect of...Those who would sacrifice freedoms for safety deserve and will get neither

[Marvin S]

I believe I'll pass on checking out your link. Im sure they have a number of employees on their payroll, as do most govt buereacracies, who are good at writing flowery descriptions of the wonderful things they do in order to justify their existence.
IMHO we have too many govt agencies. The fact that they feel the need to spend our $ scaring usmaking self serving propaganda about our need for them is rather telling.

If you don't think the "Gummints" out to get us and take away our Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms then you have not been paying attention.
The 4th Am. has become a joke to them. Remember the Patriot Act? How about the Bush administration telling us they had not tapped any phones; it turned out they tapped EVERY phone. Now they are supposedly using drones to go after the rogue cop out in LA. I guess we all know that drones are 100% safe and dont ever miss their target and do collateral damage. They want to allow the military to kill US citizens: all they have to do is use a couple of magic words in describing their target. I could go on, but if you don't get it by now its useless.

If they make a video recomending that we defend ourselves with plastic scissors against an armed gunmen, then why do they not arm their agents with plastic scissors? Think of the money they'd save. Whats good for the goose is good for the gander. Right???

Homeland Security has scarecly been in existence for a decade and look at how huge and powerful they have become. IMHO we got along just fine without them. Its one of the biggest power grabs by the govt since the days of FDRs New Deal. Besides that if you haven't noticed we are leaking red ink all over the place. We cant afford more govt BS programs, especially ones that are designed to scare us so they can take away more of our freedoms.

There is a famous quote from one of our founders to the effect of...Those who would sacrifice freedoms for safety deserve and will get neither

Paul - as you have not responded I will - you need to read this very carefully - I believe Marc has the background to pass a thing or two along legal-wise.

[paul young]

Paul - as you have not responded I will - you need to read this very carefully - I believe Marc has the background to pass a thing or two along legal-wise.

OK, then. They are all out to git us!

We'll just get rid of the Coast Guard, Border Patrol, Customs, TSA, FEMA, Citizenship & Immigration Services. Much safer now! All better!-Paul

[Gerry Clinchy]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphben...-conversation/
This further discussion of the ammo purchase by DHS appeared on the Forbes.com site just a few days ago.

As reported elsewhere, some of this purchase order is for hollow-point rounds, forbidden by international law for use in war, along with a frightening amount specialized for snipers. Also reported elsewhere, at the height of the Iraq War the Army was expending less than 6 million rounds a month. Therefore 1.6 billion rounds would be enough to sustain a hot war for 20+ years. In America.

Another author is quoted in the article

[T]he Department of Homeland Security is apparently taking delivery (apparently through the Marine Corps Systems Command, Quantico VA, via the manufacturer – Navistar Defense LLC) of an undetermined number of the recently retrofitted 2,717 ‘Mine Resistant Protected’ MaxxPro MRAP vehicles for service on the streets of theUnited States.”These MRAP’s ARE BEING SEEN ON U.S. STREETS all across America by verified observers with photos, videos, and descriptions.”
Regardless of the exact number of MRAP’s being delivered to DHS (and evidently some to POLICE via DHS, as has been observed), why would they need such over-the-top vehicles on U.S. streets to withstand IEDs, mine blasts, and 50 caliber hits to bullet-proof glass? In a war zone… yes, definitely. Let’s protect our men and women. On the streets of America… ?”
…“They all have gun ports… Gun Ports? In the theater of war, yes. On the streets of America…?
Seriously, why would DHS need such a vehicle on our streets?”

At 15 million rounds (which, in itself, is pretty extraordinary and sounds more like fun target-shooting-at-taxpayer-expense than a sensible training exercise) … that’s a stockpile that would last DHS over a century. To claim that it’s to “get a low price” for a ridiculously wasteful amount is an argument that could only fool a career civil servant.

From Townhall.com today

Government spokesmen, when they're not trying to make 1.6 billion bullets sound like a frugal, Costco-style bulk purchase, will tell you it's all about target practice. Really? I hear that U.S. Army newbies soon to deploy to Afghanistan are training with blank cartridges. Why the priority for arming domestic forces, not military ones?

Even the liberal-minded "debunking" site Snopes.com confirms that the Social Security Administration has procured 174,000 hollow-point bullets for 300 special agents. Meanwhile, the National Marine Fisheries Service, which is tasked with "protecting fish stocks from depletion," has procured 46,000 hollow-point bullets. Spokesman Scott Smullen explained, straight-faced, I am guessing, that 63 fisheries service "enforcement agents" will be using the so-called cop-killer bullets for "target qualifications."(That's 730 bullets for each agent. No mention of the history of how many bullets they have needed, per year, in the past, much less hollow-points.),

Also from Townhall:

Back in 2008, candidate Barack Obama went off his teleprompter and added a couple of sentences to the text of a speech about expanding the Peace Corps and AmeriCorps. Over rolling applause, the soon-to-be president of the United States said: "We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."

Nearly five years later, it hardly matters that candidate Obama's promise to double the Peace Corps and the rest has come to naught. But the president's unscripted determination to empower a civilian national security force is a different story. As far as you're concerned, though, it's also a nonstory.

This complacency or complicity has to stop. During the last 10 months, the Department of Homeland Security has purchased 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition, including millions of hollow-point bullets. The department also has purchased 7,000 fully automatic assault rifles, and it has overseen the retrofitting of more than 2,000 light tanks, which, of course, were originally designed to resist the mines and ambushes of the battlefield. Why does DHS need such offensive and defensive firepower

It just seems to me that if Obama, the Fed ... whatever you want to call it ... were truly interested in having a mobile, domestic force, they would be following Switzerland's formula of training citizens to defend their country if there were an "invasion" of a foreign force. Unless one is really dumb, they have to notice that foreign invaders, when they outnumber the defenders, have been most effectively damaged by guerilla-type, hit-and-run, resistance than they are by highly visible military units. Iraq and A'stan would be the most recent examples.

And do we really believe there is likely to be an invasion of a foreign force that would require the armaments of the DHS? wouldn't it be more likely that Iran or N Korea would drop a bomb on us; or set off a dirty bomb, v. a land invasion?

1.6 billion rounds is 5 rounds for every US citizen ... do we imagine that if there were a land invasion it would total even 1 million combatants on US soil? That would then be 1600 rounds per "invader". Guess that would mean that all that target practice isn't expected to result in much accuracy?

Either this govt is very dumb or very sinister. They have certainly already shown that they can be very dumb. Even if it is a matter of them just being this dumb, are such dummies the ones who should have all the guns and ammo?

[Jason Glavich]

Not all DHS employees or agents use a pistol or have to qualify, very small amount of the total 200k which includes a lot of regular gov employees. The other thing is the infowars article and the links incorrectly explain the amount of ammo they are buying in that request. They have bought a lot of ammo but info wars is pretty sloppy at reading the request for bids. Also hollow points are not used in qualification shooting. But then again neither are armored vehicles.

[HPL]

Not all DHS employees or agents use a pistol or have to qualify, very small amount of the total 200k which includes a lot of regular gov employees. The other thing is the infowars article and the links incorrectly explain the amount of ammo they are buying in that request. They have bought a lot of ammo but info wars is pretty sloppy at reading the request for bids. Also hollow points are not used in qualification shooting. But then again neither are armored vehicles.

Instead of just making that statement, could you give the correction (clean up their sloppiness).

[Jason Glavich]

When reading requests for proposals there is a lot of I will call it "odd" wording.
Commercial Leaded Training Ammo (CLTA) Pistol Cartridge .40 caliber 165 Grain, jacketed Hollow point(Jhp) p/n P40HSTS3G OR EQUAL. BRASS CASING 100,000 ROUNDS PRICE PER 1000 ROUNDS WILL INCLUDE DELIVERY QTY 100
That is 100,000 rounds 1,000x100 not 100,000x100 which is what they state in the articles. When you add it all the way they did it is 21.6million. Or the right way it is 240,000.

But even saying that, they have bought a lot of ammo and once again hollow points are not used in target practice.

[Gerry Clinchy]

When DHS defended why they needed a lot of ammo ... why didn't they refute the amounts that were cited?