Robert Pogson

Since I was little, I’ve always enjoyed a good rifle. I suppose it’s for the same reason boys throw stones. A good rifle throws a tiny stone with great range and accuracy. Some men spend great time, money, energy and care doing that. Recently I had the opportunity to fire a rifle older than I am. It’s a Mauser 98k virtually in mint condition after all these years because it was not used in WWII and was in storage for many decades. It’s not the best, most accurate or most powerful of rifles but it is an excellent deer rifle, delivering great stopping power to 350 yards without adjusting sights.

A man carries the rifle, loads it, aims at the target and squeezes the trigger. The rifle then leaps to life accelerating the bullet and recoiling. No man can truly tame that. The rifle does its own thing. A great rifle like this does it very well.

Commercial ammunition in North America is whimpy for this cartridge because there are 8X57J barrels around which are smaller in diameter… Handloaded ammunition is necessary to get the best performance from this rifle. This rifle loves IMR4064 powder and shoots most accurately with 170 to 220 grain bullets. My favourite bullet for hunting in bush is Hornady 170 RN. In open country the 150SP gives much better range. 220 grain bullets give best accuracy for target-shooting but they are scarce.

Beautiful, isn’t it?
It was made in a time when German craftsmanship was still prevalent and factories were not being bombed back to the Stone Age. It was shipped to Spain in the hope that Spain would be an ally of Germany but the Spaniards were tired of war so they kept it in storage. I was privileged to touch such a fine work of art. I fired a couple of rounds of hunting ammunition of calibre 8X57JS and 170 grain round nosed bullets. I have seen deer just drop where they stood in the bush with that combination. I think it is superior to the much more popular .308 Winchester and the more usual 150 grain pointed bullets. You can’t beat the original sometimes.

One of my shots hit the target right where I aimed. The other was a bit further away… Either would have killed a deer promptly. I will work on my consistency over the summer. My increased hiking distances are a start towards a successful hunt this fall.

“The Syrian rebels say weapons and ammunition are what they need most”see BBC News – Syria conflict: John Kerry extends US aid to rebels.

Come on Kerry! The time for sending food and medicing was two years ago when Assad began to slaughter civilians wholesale. That was the time to send small arms, ammunition and light artillery, too. The war might be over by now if the USA had done that. Instead, the USA wrung its hands worrying about who was fighting Assad as if some fighters for liberty are OK and others are not.

• Clear the sky of Assad’s planes.
• Supply the refugee camps with food, shelter, clothing and medical assistance.
• Air-drop all the radios, rifles, ammunition and light artillery the rebels can manage.
• Supply all kinds of weapons, not just assault weapons. They need snipers’ rifles, laser designators for air-support, laser rangefinders and night-vision.
• Open up a seaport for the rebels.

The sooner the rebels are properly equipped and trained the more lives will be saved. As long as Assad and his partners think Assad can hang on they will keep fighting and killing. Eliminate the doubt.

Added to the wave of consumers’ interest in firearms in USA recently, the government’s solicitation of suppliers for immense quantities of ammunition lead one to speculate that USA is bent on uncivil war.
“An approximation of how many rounds of ammunition the DHS has now secured over the last 10 months stands at around 1.625 billion. In March 2012, ATK announced that they had agreed to provide the DHS with a maximum of 450 million bullets over four years, a story that prompted questions about why the feds were buying ammunition in such large quantities. In September last year, the federal agency purchased a further 200 million bullets.

To put that in perspective, during the height of active battle operations in Iraq, US soldiers used 5.5 million rounds of ammunition a month. Extrapolating the figures, the DHS has purchased enough bullets over the last 10 months to wage a full scale war for almost 30 years.”
see » DHS Purchases 21.6 Million More Rounds of Ammunition Alex Jones' Infowars: There's a war on for your mind!

It’s either war or severe cuts coming at the end of the month (slide over to 4:50). What else could prompt the government to stockpile that much ammunition?

A friend obtained a batch of ammunition built to 7.62×51 NATO specs. Differences from commercial .308 Winchester include

• full metal jacket bullets (not full actually, but open to the core at the base of the bullet hidden in the case, complying with the Geneva Convention against expanding bullets),
• gunk sealing the bullet in the neck to prevent ingress of moisture and to grip the bullet more tightly under handling and recoil,
• crimped primer preventing a loose primer jamming or exploding prematurely in machine-guns, and
• gunk around the primer sealing it against the ingress of water or oil.

Some of these features may reduce accuracy but the increase in reliability makes them worth it. A shooter with a bolt-action rifle may fire 10K rounds in a lifetime while a military shooter with a machine-gun may fire that many rounds in an afternoon. When it comes to life and death, increased reliability matters.

From the Geneva Conventions:
“Art. 16. In addition to the prohibitions which shall be established by special conventions, it is forbidden:
(1) To employ poison or poisoned weapons, or projectiles the sole object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases;
(2) To employ arms, projectiles, or materials calculated to cause unnecessary suffering.
Entering especially into this category are explosive projectiles or those charged with fulminating or inflammable materials, less than 400 grammes in weight, and bullets which expand or flatten easily in the human body, such as bullets with a hard envelope which does not cover the core entirely or is pierced with incisions.”

This kind of ammunition is useful for casual target-shooting but is not legal/desirable for hunting big-game because of the non-expanding bullets. Better bullets and accuracy can be obtained by choosing individual components of ammunition and reloading. Some 7.62×51 brass have Berdan primers not easily reloaded. Buyer beware…