Is Craig Tucker or the NSSF Right About AR-15s?
To some extent, the answer is "neither one."
Former Army Special Forces soldier, now tactical and competition firearm instructor Mike Green, of Green-Ops.com, handles an AR-15 that California Democrats, some federal judges and Supreme Court justices, and most Democrat politicians want to ban.
Mark Oliva, Managing Director of Public Affairs for the National Shooting Sports Foundation, recently accused retired Marine Corps Col. Craig Tucker of providing “false testimony” to the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California in Rupp v. Bonta, a case that challenges California’s “assault weapon” ban.
[Background: In 2021, in Miller v. Bonta, Judge Roger Benitez, of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California, ruled that the ban violated the Second Amendment. California appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which stayed Judge Benitez’ ruling. Meanwhile, in a separate challenge to the ban, Rupp v. Bonta, the District Court of the Central District of California denied a motion for summary judgment against the ban, and that decision was also appealed to the Ninth Circuit. Following the Supreme Court’s ruling in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen (2022), that firearm restrictions that are not consistent with the history and tradition of restrictions are unconstitutional, the Ninth Circuit remanded Rupp to the lower court for reconsideration.]
Tucker’s anti-police statement in another context (noted by Oliva), that Americans deserve “protection from the use of excessive lethal force by those sworn to protect and serve our communities,” tells you which side of the ideological divide he’s on, thus what to expect from his declaration to the court, which can be reviewed here.
Oliva’s primary argument is that Tucker’s claims are “verifiably false.” In the order in which Tucker’s claims appear in his declaration, they include:
Tucker: The only difference (between an AR-15 and a military M4) is the AR-15 cannot fire on full-auto. . . . Semi-auto function is used almost exclusively in combat. . . . . [T]he AR-15 and M4 . . . use the same magazines designed for combat and the same ammunition. . . . . [S]emiautomatic rifles (are) more lethal and most useful in combat settings.”
To understand from whence Tucker’s first flurry comes requires stepping into the Wayback Machine. Fake news didn’t begin when the Establishment and Deep State decided that, out of self-interest, it had to take down President Donald J. Trump. In 1989, after the first “assault weapon” legislation was introduced in Congress, the fake news media began lying through their teeth, trying to trick the American people into thinking that AR-15s and the like were machine guns.
This video (see screenshot below) shows CBS, in 1989, broadcasting footage of government personnel firing government machine guns while leftist reporter Dan Rather (later fired over his role in the Killian documents controversy) talked about legislation to ban semi-automatic rifles, followed by NBC and Matt Lauer (later fired over allegations of work-related sexual misconduct) doing the same thing in 1993, just before the Senate voted on “assault weapon” legislation introduced by Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), and NBC doing so again in 1994, before the House of Representatives voted on the same legislation.
In 2003, after more than a decade of complaints about the media’s machine gun lie, the Violence Policy Center sought to help then-Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-N.Y.) push her “assault weapon” legislation by introducing the claim (parroted by Tucker, above) that semi-automatic rifles are more useful than automatic rifles in combat. (The “Center,” funded by leftist outfits such as the Joyce Foundation, consists of maybe 2-3 employees, not counting the janitor; was founded by a former agitator with the National Coalition to Ban Handguns; and was previously known as the New Right Watch, to self-importantly suggest it was “watching” Reagan Revolution Americans.)
With that as background, Tucker is correct that an AR-15 cannot fire fully-automatically, and that soldiers armed with M4s almost always fire them semi-automatically, and that M4s and AR-15s use the same ammunition. But lots of bolt-action hunting rifles use the same ammunition, most bolt-action rifles use much higher-performing ammunition, and soldiers responsible for achieving and maintaining fire superiority against the enemy use automatic weapons, such as the M240, not M4s. The same was true in the early 20th century, when, for the same purpose, our troops used .30 cal. Browning air-cooled and water-cooled machine guns and the Browning Automatic Rifle, the latter discussed further, below.
(Left to right, M16/M4/AR-15 M193 with a 55-grain bullet and M855 with a 62-grain bullet, a M240 machine gun round with a 147-grain bullet, and a .30-cal. round with a 150-grain bullet, used in the Browning Machine Gun, Browning Automatic Rifle, and M1 semi-automatic rifle.)
In any case, by making the point that AR-15s are the semi-automatic-only variants of the M16/M4, thus well-suited to some aspects of combat, Tucker unintentionally explained why they are quintessentially a type of firearm that the Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear, thus why California may not ban them. That is because the amendment was adopted to guarantee the right to arms for defense against tyranny. (Those who disagree with that can argue with the Founding Fathers, starting with James Madison and Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist No’s 46 and 29, respectively.)
Also, the Supreme Court, in U.S. v. Miller (1939), recognized that the right to arms includes firearms that are “ordinary military equipment” and any others the use of which “could contribute to the common defense,” and in McDonald v. Chicago (2010) applied the Second Amendment against the states through the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment.
With Tucker having explained why AR-15s are within the scope of the right to arms, we could be done here—“case closed,” so to speak—and so could any federal court that considers itself bound to interpret the Constitution as the Framers intended it. And just as a parent must, at some point, stop explaining things to a misbehaving child and send the brat to his or her room, there should be a point at which normal people deal similarly with people who spew nonsense as part of their effort to destroy America from within and, in Tucker’s case, to prevent good Americans from being able to defeat a tyrannical government that would otherwise consolidate its power by murdering its ideological opponents, as has been the case with every one of the Left’s dictatorships around the world, beginning with its Reign of Terror during the French Revolution.
However, because some of Tucker’s remaining claims further illustrate the type of people with whom Second Amendment defenders must do battle in court, . . .
Tucker: AR-15 and M4 . . . . (ammunition) is capable of severing the upper body from the lower body, or decapitation. . . . [T]he AR-15 and M4 contain barrel rifling to make the (bullet) tumble upon impact and cause more severe injury.
The claim about decapitating or cutting an enemy in half is fiction. The claim about tumbling requires a more detailed response. The original M16’s rifling rotated the bullet once in every 12 inches of barrel length. With that barrel, the then-standard 55-grain fully-jacketed bullet was unstable in flight by intent and, upon impact with the enemy, frequently would break apart at the cannelure, sending two or more pieces of the bullet in different directions within the enemy’s body.
However, in the 1980s, the U.S. military adopted a 62-grain bullet and the A2 variant of the M16, the Army insisting on rifling that rotated the bullet once in every seven inches of barrel length. This was against the recommendation of the M16’s manufacturer, Colt’s, of one rotation in every nine inches.
Over-stabilization of the bullet by the Army-mandated rifling rate reduced the lethality of the rifle by increasing what is termed the “fleet yaw effect,” the gist of which is that sometimes the bullet will tumble upon impact with the enemy, but sometimes will only poke a small hole. Part of the reason the Army (as Oliva pointed out) is adopting a new rifle and new 6.8mm cartridge, is that there were numerous complaints in Afghanistan and Iraq, that bad guys shot with M16s and M4s sometimes kept on fighting.
Tucker: Changing magazines during intense combat is the most important individual skill taught to Marines.
Important? Yes. But more important than marksmanship and standard battle drills to be performed upon chance contact with the enemy? Ridiculous.
Tucker: [T]he pistol grip allows the rifleman to pull the rifle into her shoulder with each shot, an action which increases . . . the firmness of the contact between the rifle stock, the shooter’s cheek, and the shooter’s shoulder.
Aside from Tucker’s leftist virtue-signaling reference to “her” (women are a small percentage of personnel in the combat arms elements of the Army and Marine Corps), the following photograph shows world and national International Practical Shooting Confederation champion, and national U.S. Practical Shooting Association champion Ben Stoeger with an M1, a front-heavy rifle that weighs much more than an M16/M4/AR-15 and that does not have their type of “pistol grip,” holding it to his shoulder one-handed, even without the stock against his cheek.
Tucker: Absent any pistol grip, a semi-automatic rifle would be difficult to operate when fired rapidly, as the rifle barrel would seesaw up and down with each shot fired in succession.
It’s fortunate that Tucker wasn’t around to advise John Moses Browning on how to design the Browning Automatic Rifle (photo below), which American troops used in the two world wars and Korean War, or to advise John Garand on how to design the semi-automatic M1, used in WWII and Korea and which Lt. Gen. George Patton called “the greatest battle implement ever devised.” Both use the .30 Cal. U.S. Rifle cartridge (.30-06, seen in the ammunition photo, above), which has much more recoil than an M16/M4/AR-15, and neither has the latter’s “pistol grip.”
Also, as demonstrated in this video (see screenshot below), the upward movement of a rifle barrel due to recoil is controlled by the forward arm holding the handguard, not by the rearward hand on the grip, near the fulcrum of Tucker’s fantasy seesaw—the shoulder. Shown in the video are genuine experts: Former Army Special Forces soldier, now firearm instructor Mike Green, of Green-Ops Tactical Firearm Training, holding the rifle one-handed, and champion competitive shooter Ben Stoeger (shown with the M1, above) operating the trigger.
Tucker: “[T]he pistol grip functions as a hand rest to reduce hand/finger fatigue during long combat engagements.
I must have missed that part of military training before I was deployed to Iraq. Humor aside, this and Tucker’s previous claim contradict one another. If, as Tucker claims, the downward-shaped grip were necessary for the soldier to be able to pull the rifle to the shoulder, it would not be serving as a “hand rest,” because pulling with the hand and resting the hand are mutually exclusive activities.
Note: All pistols have a “pistol grip” and so do some rifles and shotguns that are not “assault weapons” as defined by any legislation or law. For the purposes of deception and hyperbole, anti-gun activists harp about the grips only when they are attached to AR-15s and the like.
Tucker: Both actions (pulling and resting the hand, see previous two claims) increase the killing efficiency of automatic rifles and are necessities in sustained combat operations of weeks or months when firing a rifle rapidly.
I laughed out loud when I read this whopper. Maybe Tucker hopes the judge in Rupp v. Bonta will imagine some poor soldier, unable to sleep or anything else for “weeks or months” on end, constantly firing a rifle—hundreds of thousands of rounds non-stop—able to do so only because he can rest his hand.
Tucker: A folding stock causes weapon instability. For that reason, folding stock automatic rifles are designed for military personnel, whose primary weapon is vehicle or air-mounted (tank, Bradly [sic], Apache), who may be required to escape from a mangled vehicle, or who may need to abandon a destroyed weapon system and need a substitute weapon for offensive combat. Outside of the military context, folding stocks that are not properly locked in place can cause significant safety risks to the shooter due to recoil.
Folding stocks are designed for military personnel because the stocks cause instability? Ridiculous. The military doesn’t use rifles designed to be unstable. For that matter, no one else does either.
Furthermore, an M4 or a comparably-configured AR-15 doesn’t have a “folding stock,” it has a telescoping, adjustable-length stock. Like many soldiers, I shot Expert on the Army’s rifle qualification course with an M4, which included hitting targets at 300 meters. The adjustable stock didn’t cause “instability.”
The primary benefit of the M4-type stock is that its length can be adjusted to the user’s physique, bulk of clothing (e.g., Summer vs. Winter), and the amount and type of equipment he’s carrying. That is why, for centuries, people with unlimited money to spend on custom-built guns have had them made with stocks tailored in length to their individual preference, and similarly expensive modern target rifles are made with stocks that can be adjusted not only for length, but also for cheek height, pitch, and rotational orientation to the bore.
Also, point of fact, the M4 is issued not only to tank, Bradley Fighting Vehicle, and Apache helicopter crews. It’s the standard-issue rifle for the entire U.S. Army.
Tucker’s claim about “significant safety risks” amounts to “making stuff up.” If the detent that locks the stock at a particular length were not engaged correctly, it would become locked as soon as the rifle were fired and perhaps as soon as the rifle were aimed.
Tucker: Grenade or flare launcher . . . . They have no legitimate use in self-defense.
Anti-gun politicians often refer to grenades in “assault weapon” legislation for the sake of hyperbole. AR-15s and comparable rifles do not come equipped with a grenade launcher or grenades, which are restricted by the National Firearms Act of 1934.
As for Tucker’s distinction between “self-defense” and combat, the right to keep and bear arms is a political right (like most of the Bill of Rights) aimed at preventing oppression, not merely facilitating defense against common criminals. As the late civil rights lawyer Don B. Kates (photo below) pointed out in The Second Amendment And The Ideology Of Self-Protection, “[T]he classical liberal worldview . . . . [H]eld that good citizens must always be prepared to defend themselves and their society against criminal usurpation—a characterization no less applicable to tyrannical ministers or pillaging foreign or domestic soldiery. . . than to apolitical outlaws. . . . John Locke adduced from the right of individual self-protection his justification of the right(s) of individuals to resist tyrannical officials and, if necessary, to band together with other good citizens in overthrowing tyranny.”
It’s worth noting that before 2008, civilian disarmament activists and politicians took the position that “the only reason for guns in civilian hands is for sporting purposes” (Handgun Control, Inc. chairwoman Sarah Brady, in “Keeping the battle alive,” Tampa Tribune, 10/21/93)), that self-defense is “not a federally guaranteed constitutional right” (Handgun Control, Inc. chief lawyer Dennis Henigan, in “2nd Amendment: A right to own arms?,” USA Today, 11/20/91)), and that you don’t “need” an AK-47 to hunt ducks (President Bill Clinton) or deer (2004 Democrat presidential candidate, now jet-setting global warming activist John Kerry). However, in 2008 the Supreme Court ruled in District of Columbia v. Heller (which, as I explained here and here, erred on other points) that “the inherent right of self-defense has been central to the Second Amendment right.”
That required disarmament activists to shift their argument, to recognize the right to self-defense against criminals, while continuing to disparage the right to the defensive purpose for which the Second Amendment was adopted. Also, comically, while nominal president Joe Biden and Chinese communist spy trick Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) say Americans couldn’t defeat tyranny without nuclear weapons, longtime Senate sponsor of legislation to ban AR-15s, Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), thinks nukes and the rifles are one and the same, saying “[W]e need to classify semiautomatic weapons as those of mass destruction.” (Congressional Record, 7/29/93.)
Tucker: The purpose of the (M16/M4/AR-15) flash suppressor is to reduce combat signature by cooling and dispersing burning gases. This makes it more difficult for the enemy to pinpoint a rifleman’s location, especially in low light conditions. . . .
A 30-round fixed magazine can fire more rounds in a given amount of time than three 10-round detachable magazines, which would need to be reloaded to fire the same number of rounds, slowing down the rate of fire.
Yes to both, and those are more of the reasons M16s, M4s, AR-15s, and their magazines are quintessentially within the scope of the right to keep and bear arms. It is also true that a flash suppressor can prevent the user from being blinded at night, and the purpose of a 30-round magazine is not only to allow you to fire 30 shots before reloading, but to give you a greater opportunity to reload before the rifle runs out of ammunition.
Tucker: The AR-15 is an offensive combat weapon no different in function or purpose than an M4.
The same is true of bolt-action deer hunting rifles as compared to the Mauser bolt-action warfighting rifle, introduced in 1898, from which they are descended.
Defensive combat is generally up close and very personal. At that range, it is very difficult to use a rifle as a defensive weapon, except as a blunt force instrument.
Again, Tucker is making stuff up. The military uses “shoot houses”—shooting ranges laid out like the interiors of residences and other buildings, with targets only a few yards away—to train personnel in “room-clearing” during urban warfare operations. Similarly, defensive/tactical rifle classes focus primarily on target engagements at 25 yards or less. And military and civilian instructors conduct “force on force” training in structures laid out like shoot houses, using guns that cannot fire real bullets, with trainees suited-up in masks and heavy clothing to prevent being stung by the little paint or powder dispensing bullets that the special-purpose guns use.
Oliva’s other argument is that AR-15s and comparable rifles are not the warfighting rifles that Tucker claims, but are instead “Modern Sporting Rifles,” a term NSSF made up some years ago, presumably in the hope of convincing suburban soccer moms and their demoralized husbands that AR-15s shouldn’t be banned. Here and here, I explained why the term is misleading and counterproductive in terms of the challenge we face in convincing courts to overturn “assault weapon” bans.