This article is a national treasure…. nay… an earthly treasure…
Why the Glock 18 Might Be the Most Deadly Gun on Planet Earth
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“In December 2003, soldiers of the U.S. Special Operations Command captured the Ace of Spades himself, Saddam Hussein. The former Iraqi president, on the run since the capture of Baghdad, had appeared in a deck of playing cards with the profiles of other fugitive war criminals and naturally was the top card. Hussein, bedraggled and bereft, was armed with one of the rarest of handguns: the Glock 18, the full auto Glock.”
Not even remotely true. But this is a good place to put a picture of the prettiest and rarest pair of pistols on the planet. The Big Bang Pistol Set. Made out of a freaking meteor! (Anyone wanna loan me $4.5 million?)
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“Turning the selector switch counterclockwise down, on the other hand, turns the Glock 18 into a fully automatic weapon with a rate of fire nearing Germany’s fearsome MG42 machine gun. In fully automatic mode the Glock 18 has a rate of fire of 1,200 rounds per minute.”
MG42:
Glock 18 (actual picture from the article):
Yup – Good comparison. -eyeroll-
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“Early Glock 18s had ported barrels that vented gunpowder gases in a direction to counteract barrel climb. However, this increased overall pistol length and created a situation where the gas ports could catch on clothing while being drawn—not a great feature for undercover work.”
If your more concerned about your recessed barrel’s gas ports catching on clothing, but not your front sight – you’re doing something weird. And you should try using a holster or not shoving it into a coat pocket.
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“The fully automatic pistol is available for police and government purchase in the United States but without the benefit of frequent, expensive training it’s difficult for even the largest police departments to justify the cost. This specialized weapon may be fun to shoot, but it has little practical value outside of units such as EKO Cobra. For the foreseeable future, the Glock 18 will remain a rarity that roars at 1,200 rounds a minute.”
Well… then there’s this:
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“Kyle Mizokami is a defense and national-security writer based in San Francisco who has appeared in the Diplomat, Foreign Policy, War is Boring and the Daily Beast. In 2009, he cofounded the defense and security blog Japan Security Watch.”
Annnnnddddd….. That explains why this article is so full of wrong.
Gunpowder and Ink! 
I didn’t see anything that was factually wrong. I mean, what makes something “one of the rarest”? And what truly makes a comp port a snag hazard?
I mean, police agencies don’t have the kind of time & money to spend making their officers competent with full auto Glocks, especially when they barely have the budgets to adequately train their officers with long arms and duty pistols. It’s not that the G18 is uncontrollable, it just takes a lot of time and effort and money.
If the MG42 and the G18 have the same or similar rates of fire (ie: too freaking fast), then comparing that specific aspect isn’t entirely dishonest. I feel that 1200 RPM is too fast to be useful, but I have no experience with full auto, so I’m out of my depth here.
I’m not sure what the original author is trying to accomplish, but I have no doubt that he’s even further out of his depth than I am, which itself is dishonest.
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Factually incorrect, not particularly.
Although I’d love to hear how someone snags on their recessed barrel ports. And using the word ‘rarest’ is a joke. Hard to own, yes. Rare, no. Bren Ten’s are more rare. 🙂
But the article is certainly misleading. It really reminds me of that ‘whispery’ guy on Future Weapons. Where every single weapon he shows is ‘the most dangerous, the most awesome, the most powerful rifle/shotgun/pistol/slingshot EVAHHHH!’ Then he intentionally edits the film, or shoots poorly, to make it appear true.
Anywho – you can’t compare an MG42 using 8mm Mauser rounds to a Glock 18 using 9mm. Firing rate is a nice number and all. But that’s really just cycle time. Does it really matter if the Glock cycles at 1,200 rpms or 700 rpms when it has a 33rd box mag? The guy is still comparing a belt fed rifle with bipod to a magazine fed pistol. (As an aside, famed trick shooter Ed McGivern who holds the record for ‘greatest rapid fire feat’ wouldn’t use a 1911 because he could cycle a double-action revolver faster.)
The Glock 18 doesn’t require a lot of time or money to master – no more than any other weapon. It just requires a decent shooter behind the trigger who knows the basics and won’t ‘spray and pray’.
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