Another Run on Ammo: DHS's New 900 Million Round Purchase

DHS has a metric fuck ton of agencies under its control, as well as funding a metric fuck ton of local LEA’s that are under equipped, under supplied, etc. Do I think this is something to “worry” about? Nope, not at all. Stupid admin fucks buy duty ammo for practice ammo, they over order due to ammo crunches that have been in recent years. I know of several LEA’s that only shot 50 rounds for the past 2 years, all because they could not get an ammo order filled. They had the coin, just could not get the order filled.

Also keep in mind that DHS did not have the same type of ammunition acquisition capability as DOD, where the orders are guaranteed, etc. This very well may be DHS’s attempt to develop an acquisition capability similar to DOD.

So I guess I would say this is hardly a “WTF” purchase, as I am sure there are many explanations as to why they made that type of an order.


Just my $0.02
 
An old thread that needs reviving.

It turns out, according to an article circulated today by AP, the number of rounds being purchased by the DHS over the next few years was not 65 million, or even 900 million rounds, but a whopping 1.6 Billion rounds.

The forms we discussed in this thread - and the math we worked- were only tranches of the overall purchases.

http://news.yahoo.com/homeland-security-cache-bullets-190840538.html


WASHINGTON (AP) — Online rumors about a big government munitions purchase are true, sort of.
The Homeland Security Department wants to buy more than 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition in the next four or five years. It says it needs them — roughly the equivalent of five bullets for every person in the United States — for law enforcement agents in training and on duty.

Published federal notices about the ammo buy have agitated conspiracy theorists since the fall. That's when conservative radio host Alex Jones spoke of an "arms race against the American people" and said the government was "gearing up for total collapse, they're gearing up for huge wars."

The government's explanation is much less sinister...
 
Threads like this one make me want to comment and back it up with honest to God references unlike most posters who strap on their tin foil hats and spew ridiculous bullshit (not counting what comes from news articles). However, I realize that no matter what I say, the tin foil hat crowd will just spew more ridiculous horseshit about revolution, the evil gov, etc. Most of you who fall into this category constantly attempt to back your position with random, unsubstantiated bullshit, like the OP who said something about the initial article and the amount of ammo order exceeding the navy and mc wartime budget. The same OP has also stated dumb, unsubstantiated shit in the past. In other words I you are going to attempt to back your position up with "facts," reference your source.

Why don't you idiots inquire as to how many gun carrying agents are employed by DHS and do a little math? That's right, that would take effort.

If any of you morons PM me, you're gonna get a vacation from the site. Have a nice day.
 
Ouch.

The same OP has also stated dumb, unsubstantiated shit in the past
Unsubstantiated? My posts frequently focus on what I view as the militarization of our society. You might think that view is "dumb", and I'm fine with that. I'm not trying to convert you or anyone to my point of view. There are many others who largely agree with that point of view, and cite such concrete things as
But unsubstantiated? I do not post unsubstantiated data as a general rule. If it ever happens, it's either because I failed to properly embed/post a link, or simply didn't have time at time of posting and intended to go back and post later. I usually take a great deal of effort documenting what I post, perhaps more rigorously than most.

like the OP who said something about the initial article and the amount of ammo order exceeding the navy and mc wartime budget.
This is not what I said. I said, in the context of the OP- and in those first few posts- that nearly a billion rounds of small arms would have been more than double the entire small arms (5.56 and 9mm) consumption of the USMC and Dept. of Navy combined. And that's largely accurate. 900 million rounds of small arms (as quoted in the OP, based on a Market Watch article, which I also cited) exceeds (or would have exceeded) the annual consumption of the entire USMC and US Navy in small arms expenditure. Just to draw a simple comparison, the USMC has used an average of about 70 million rounds of 5.56MM in training annually- worldwide- for the period being discussed (circa 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005).

(One) source (of many) of this information is Jerry Mazza, Program Manager for Marine Corps Systems Command Publication "Ammunition Quarterly".

https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:vgG1snX03JcJ:www.marcorsyscom.usmc.mil/am/ammunition/Corporate_Center/Ammunition_Quarterly/Vol10No3.pdf vol10no3.pdf, ammunition&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESi_54lDi0HE-YUXKkl7L8KftWAvUElZYGCzWLu9Wmas3SQZeCa5d376mvQwhZ5sc5w4iN3DvhAROBXTtwAXyPc3OgVJ9T4hrebyMZrdwq_7rnWVCf7WSpr3qfZPgmWsl9hPYH4H&sig=AHIEtbT6QuGng-Mzoq1r2s8S_4zCGDKXWg

Saying my post is "dumb", or you don't agree, or whatever, that's one thing, but if you're going to call me out and say I have posted unsubstantiated things in the past, I don't think I have a record of that. I could have done a better job of sourcing the numbers in the OP, and I will come back later when I have time and post to the documents I sourced that from. I don't take responsibility at all for the original ATK Press Release, for which it was later withdrawn and re-released to show the contract was for an extended period.
 
Threads like this one make me want to comment and back it up with honest to God references unlike most posters who strap on their tin foil hats and spew ridiculous bullshit (not counting what comes from news articles). However, I realize that no matter what I say, the tin foil hat crowd will just spew more ridiculous horseshit about revolution, the evil gov, etc. Most of you who fall into this category constantly attempt to back your position with random, unsubstantiated bullshit, like the OP who said something about the initial article and the amount of ammo order exceeding the navy and mc wartime budget. The same OP has also stated dumb, unsubstantiated shit in the past. In other words I you are going to attempt to back your position up with "facts," reference your source.

Why don't you idiots inquire as to how many gun carrying agents are employed by DHS and do a little math? That's right, that would take effort.

If any of you morons PM me, you're gonna get a vacation from the site. Have a nice day.

Then comment and back it up. I trust what you've got to say more than I trust "Official disclosure" by any means.

I sorta chuckle about the "can shoot everyone in the country 4 times" round count.... since the round count I've shot through my .45 equates to eliminating either Carson City (the capital of Nevada) twice or half of the population of Reno, NV
 
Most of the militarization of society you speak of started under President Bush, not Obama. Next to no one cried foul then (hmmmm....patriot act, Iraq, etc). Everyone cries about drone strikes, assassinating our citizens, detentions and whatnot. No one would have said shit about offing John Lindh 11 years ago. What about Adam whats his name? Its kind of funny I guess. Under Bush we wouldn't have a problem killing our enemies, citizen or not, but since we have this black, muslim, non-citizen as our twice elected by the masses president (note my sarcasm), the so called religious right doesnt have the stomach for it anymore.

Since I work for this terrible regime that so many of you are apparently planning to overthrow (that will be a fun day or two at work) I can tell you that what the media tells you may give the appearance that my coworkers and I have donned our gestapo uniforms, let me be the first to say that things have became more restrictive, not less for LE. As for DHS and their ammo order, I would venture to say for one year of ammo for my small agency to qual and barely train, we would probably need around 3 million or so rounds. That is one small agency, not the many agencies which comprise DHS. As for the USMC and their ammo usage, I feel sorry for them as the 75th probably shot more rounds in a year than the entire Corps.
 
And I don't consider news articles worth any merit as a source. But then again, most everything is opinion which is forced down our throats anyway.

So, who wants to discuss how the USG is going to manipulate the citizens of this country after being trained by Yale psychologists?
 
And I don't consider news articles worth any merit as a source. But then again, most everything is opinion which is forced down our throats anyway.

So, who wants to discuss how the USG is going to manipulate the citizens of this country after being trained by Yale psychologists?

3/4 of the population of my school ;-)
 
Most of the militarization of society you speak of started under President Bush, not Obama.
Agreed. I have posted the same types of comments on this forum. Of course, predictably, the powers claimed by Bush have been expanded upon by Obama. Actually your statement is highlighting exactly how powers like this lead to even more gross violations by subsequent Presidents. You're touching on the very thing I'm describing. How far will the next President move the ball? Whoever he or she is, s/he won't be starting from where Bush left us, but from wherever Obama is going to leave us.

Next to no one cried foul then (hmmmm....patriot act, Iraq, etc). Everyone cries about drone strikes, assassinating our citizens, detentions and whatnot. No one would have said shit about offing John Lindh 11 years ago. What about Adam whats his name? Its kind of funny I guess.
Again, you must not have seen my posts, but you're mistaken about "no one" on this forum being critical about the small steps Bush took that laid the groundwork for undermining the Constitution. But again, whatever Bush did, Obama has done more profoundly. For instance (not that this belongs in this thread), take debt; Obama created more debt in 4 years than all of Bush's 8 years combined. That's after he promised to cut Bush's debt in half. In the State of the Union the other day, he promised everyone in the world free pre-school for all their kids, or something crazy like that. Or maybe it was just all 350 million Americans, something equally silly.

Under Bush we wouldn't have a problem killing our enemies, citizen or not, but since we have this black, muslim, non-citizen as our twice elected by the masses president (note my sarcasm), the so called religious right doesnt have the stomach for it anymore.
The matter of killing citizens without due process is something I find abhorrent. Race or religion has nothing to do with it.

Since I work for this terrible regime that so many of you are apparently planning to overthrow (that will be a fun day or two at work) I can tell you that what the media tells you may give the appearance that my coworkers and I have donned our gestapo uniforms, let me be the first to say that things have became more restrictive, not less for LE.
I don't think you can find a post where I criticize LEOs, except individual cases of stupidity like the LAPD shooting up random trucks, exhibiting horrific fire discipline. Besides that, I don't think any of the 2nd Amendment crowd is known for criticizing LEOs, Federal law enforcement entities, or anyone who serves. The issue is the creation of these giant bureaucratic pseudo-policing organizations that are infiltrating every facet of our lives. And, at the top of the food chain, the guys (in government) who are implementing this are/were >>on the payroll of the companies that build the machines and sell the equipment.<< Where I come from, that's called a racket.
 
Yeah chop, but no one will ever know as I'm the guy who forgets to shave and gets a haircut once or twice a year. A far cry from the knuckleheads who maintain a high and tight and the tell tale goatee.

Let me back this thread up to my first inflammatory post where I threatened to start banning people for messaging me regarding my post. The intent here was not to shut down conversation or to exercise some sort of authoritarian position, but to keep the postings in this thread. It may have not come off that way and I acknowledge that the post in its entirety was a knee jerk response (albeit the way I feel) to JBS.

JBS, as to your last post, the link you posted addresses shit hat has been going on forever. Congressman pull that shit, Generals pull that shit, etc. not justifying it, but I think many of us have seen or heard about that stuff going on for years. Only recently have we seen GOs finally getting hammered for their indiscretions. I just wish they would hammer our elected officials more often.

We have seen an erosion of rights under this admin and spending has gone through the roof, bu much of that was a continuation of Bush policies. The expansion of fed employment really started under Bush with the SW border initiative. All fed LE agencies that has a presence down there were expanded bigtime. As for the LE bashing, bash away! I'd dare say that there aren't many in LE who are as critical of their own profession as I am. My point was to say that shit has become pretty restrictive for us.

We've gone astray, bigtime, but I'll hit on your nanny state point too, only to say that its not the government's job to pay for head start, as you addressed. What's next? The man will be requiring home inspections? Hell, they want to provide access to pre-school but not regulate food stamp EBT cards to cut down on fraud. I could go on and on, but most of us could.

My overall point is that while hundreds of millions for DHS may seem in excess, a quick search reveals that DHS employs 240000 folks. While not all are LE, figure 1k rounds per year (not a lot), per gun carrying employee, per year and go from there.
 
There's 200 K DHS Employees, per the website, as of 2011. http://www.dhs.gov/eeo-complaints-and-adjudication. That's 8,000 rounds for every employee, if you gave an allocation to every janitor, every clerk, every single employee.

Number of DHS employees: 199,492

The orgs that roll up under DHS are as follows:
The 1.6 Billion order was covered on CNN, FOX, ABC and other major news outlet (not Alex Jones).
Divide this up over 4 years, here's what you get:

1.6 Billion rounds ÷ 4 years = 400 million rounds per year (still nearly 6 times the amount of all combined forces ammunition expenditure in Iraq, citation above, and again here: http://www.businessinsider.com/dhs-...-million-200-million-40-caliber-rounds-2013-1).

Since we know that FLETC uses 20 million rounds per year by themselves (as they posted on their website as well as the DHS website which states it's only 15 million rounds per year) , we can use an adjusted number of 380 million rounds left over, after FLETC uses their allocation, to be distributed among all the other employees of all the other agencies. That's 380 million rounds per year distributed to agencies, 90% of which have extremely limited force projection capabilities. Except for the Coast Guard, the other organizations have not traditionally been known for excessive consumption of ammunition. These kinds of ammo purchases by the DHS are not usual, not common, haven't been done before. It's totally understandable why people would look at these kinds of ammunition acquisitions with major "WTF" in their mind, especially when coupled with the subsequent attempted "black out"/ redaction: http://www.examiner.com/article/dhs-ammo-specifics-now-redacted-as-n-west-activists-react
 
After reading, re-reading, and reading the original article once again, Im having trouble understanding why DHS would be ordering ammo for every agency under there umbrella. My agency does not purchase ammo for us. It is purchased by the district. Maybe DHS does things differently and if I get the chance I'll ask tomorrow.

On the other hand, maybe they foresaw the run on ammo and are doing nothing more than what all the idiots who have been mobbing local and Internet gun/ammo suppliers. Maybe it's a big conspiracy against the unassuming citizens of this fine country! Run for the hills...
 
I'll find more info, but I'm fairly sure our ammo from small arms up to the deck guns comes from the Navy. I know we had a hell of a time just trying to get enough for proficiency, much less extras. We had a better chance of ordering a me helicopter than getting a case of AA11...
 
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