Since somebody raised the "meant to wound" in another thread, I thought I give my two-cents.

The impetus to wounding the enemy as oppose to killing them outright because it took more men and logistics to take care of the wounded, thus sapping fighting strength of the enemy, in my opinion, has its root in the set-piece style of warfare, i.e. the Civil War, WW I, and to lesser extend, WW II (not the actual practice, mind you, but the source of the idea years later).  Back then armies, for most parts, march in large groups, had defined battle lines, and each soldier had other buddies around him, plus logistic support such as field hospital behind the soldiers.  If a soldier is wounded, his fellow soldiers would felt obligated to help him.  Failing to do so would be very detrimental to the morale and group cohesion (would you fight knowing the man next to you would let you bleed to death?)

Things changed when fighting style and soldiers' mentality changed.  In the Pacific Theater, the Japanese soldiers were fighting for their emperor, not mere survival, plus the jungle environment made taking care of their wounded impractical.  Thus if a Japanese soldier is seriously wounded, he's probably give a grenade and told to say "Banzai" before pulling the pin as American soldiers approach.  Dead Japanese soldier can't do that.

I do not know enough about the Vietnam War to make comments on it, but I'd imagine there were similar incidents of suicidal wounded.  The communist North and gurellas were quite motivated by their ideologies.

Fast forward to modern time.  There were several incidents in Afghanistan where wounded soldiers blew themselves up or kept on fighting (i.e. those buggers holed up in that hospital)  Another problem with these Talibans is that if you do wound and capture them, they may be unrepentent and cause further trouble in your rear end, witness uprising in Kandahar.  The Japanese, Vietnamese, and Afghans all have one thing in common: they were all motivated by, for lack of better words, "higher calling" for which they were willing to die.

Long gone are the days of clashes of great armies in open fields, and with it the strategy of "meant to wound" weapons.  For the forseeable future we will be dealing with localized religion/ideology motivated insurrections: Chechens in Russia, Maoist in Nepal, and assorted Muslim extremists in Philipine and Malaysia.  For these, wounding them will not stop them from coming back, killing them outright will.

A little piece of historical tidbit: .45 ACP was created because the issue revolver (.38Special?) would not stop the natives in Philipine.  Certainly the smaller revolver rounds would wound, but the .45ACP would put them away.  Then we came around back to the similarly calibered 9mm (I know they are not the same, but you get the idea).

These are my takes.  Feel free to expand on or dispute them.

You are right about one thing.
The idiots we are fighting now have no problem with death. They deal it on a daily basis and they have little value for human life. We can't deal with them like we would a normal enemy
For instance in Kuwait we had to fight according to the rules. If the enemy wanted to surrender we were obligated to take care of him after his capture.
I don't feel that way about terrorists. Kill them as soon as we get our hands on them and let it be a lesson to all who would imitate them and their acts of terror!!

Basically the exact opposite of what happened at mazar-e-sharif, where we just kind of helped the enemy regroup.[:D]

The aim is and should be is to stop, not to kill or wound.  This is true for both self defense and for war (bend them to your will).

I agree with this but how do you explain the flachete rounds designed to slip through the strands of kevlar in bullet resistent vests.
A little flachete dart is not going to do massive damage to a person.  Also when I was on tanks in the Army we had a round called BEEHIVE which had thousands of little flachetes in it and it was designed to WOUND, at least thats what I was told in the Army.  Also remember that this doctrine was developed to fight the Russian's who were our enemies then, and if you could tie up all the logistics of a major organized army this was a good thing.  If you are fighting fanatics the doctrine changes.


                             ROCK ON!

What, no one is going to touch this thread anymore?

You really thought that the beehive round was intended to wound? [thinking]

Read what I said DUDE, I said that is what I was told.  I don't know I never shot anybody with one!          




                           [whacko]

OK, I'll bite.

This debate is an off-shoot of the caliber question (5.56 vs. 7.62 and .45 [or .40] vs. 9mm).

I think I figured out what I would carry in a SHTF situation, as far as a rifle caliber is concerned. With the vast majority of gov't. agencies, police depts., and the military using 5.56mm, it makes sense to use the same thing b/c of all the common-sense reasons:

1. My AR15s are virtually the same as their M16s and M4s in fit, function, and design. If mine breaks or I need a part for mine, chances are I will run across something that will get my AR running again.

2. I might run out of ammo. Chances are I will run across someone who has some.

3. The lighter, "wounding" round is just that, LIGHTER. Meaning I can carry more.

4. Right now I can't think of a good #4.

5. Neither can I think of a good #5.

It is a military urban legend that rounds are designed to wound vice kill.  It is equally untrue that the military went to smaller calibers for this very same reason.  When the Army started the small caliber evaluations, to paraphrase the report, small calibers rounds moving at high velocity equaled the lethality of larger caliber standard issue [sic] out to around 400 yards.

BTW, I don't care how many good reasons there are for carrying a pistol in 9mm.

There will never be enough. Make mine a .40.

Yes, I bet it was an NCO that told you that and you being Joe Snuffy Private, believed it hook, line and sinker.  

When I was in BCT, the NCO in charge of the training for the Claymore told us the M57 firing device put out "three bolts of electricity to fire the ....".  FYI, he was reading the TM and never saw the word "volt" but knew lightning came in "bolts".

Also the drill sergents spent a whole bunch of ammo and effort on Pvt. Jeffery Creek who couldn't hit the broadside of a barn with the M16.  I was his foxhole buddy once during training and found the problem as cross-dominance.  He was right handed but left eye dominant.  Of course the DS didn't believe me and actually thought I was pulling it out of my ass, saying 3 position junior smallbore was not marksmanship training.  

So, believe what you read, not what you hear.  BCT isn't about book smarts, its about NCO smarts.  

It may be a cognitive dissonance created when changing over from the .30 to .22 caliber, that is, if a soldier has been shooting 7.61x51, then switch over to 5.56, he may have problem convincing himself that the smaller round has the equal killing power, no matter what the higher-up says (I wonder if they had this problem when switch over from .45-70 to 30 Krag)

Urban legend or not, this kind of thinking has permeated into modern weapon design.  The new types of hand grenade are now made with polymer materials embedded with small ball bearings or wires to create multiple small wounds and make treatments more difficult.  It is just not nice to keep all those virgins waiting!

The reason for prefragmenting or adding ball bearings is more to do with creating uniform frag throughout the ECR of the weapon.  Older explosive fragmented in random patterns and often made it possible to be right next the munitions functioning and not being stuck by frag.  What is given up is a little lethality (although the small frag can be quite lethal), with an increase chance of actually causing causalities.

[;D]  Carry a 9mm and shoot'em in the head...then it doesn't matter.  [KILL]

The whole "it takes 2 men to carry a wounded soldier off the battlefield" thing makes me laugh. Your platoon sergeant is NOT going to pull 2 men off the assault to carry you to the medics if you get hit. If you're wounded in the assault, you lie where you fall until the medics show up, or you try to crawl to the rear as best you can. If on the defense, you man your post until you're no longer able to fire a weapon, then you might just get put to work distributing ammo, operating the radio, etc. A wounded enemy may come back to shoot at you later and he'll be smarter the second time around - a dead enemy is replace by a green recruit who'll be easier to kill than his predecessor.

I have a "friend" that was in Vietnam....... he says,given the option,with no real BIG threat,shooting for the groin was common practice.

Expanding a little on the 9mm parabellum.  It was specifically developed for wounding and burdening the enemy, like you said.  Para bellum means "for war" in Latin.

Pretty flawed thinking if you ask me.

Pistols are used in Emergency Situations. In such situations Stopping Power (killing/imobilizing the perpetrator as fast as possible) takes precedence over any theory on the benefits of "wounding" the enemy.

The pre-metallic-cartridge rifles were pretty nasty killers.  The 1863 Springfield shot a .58 caliber lead bullet at around 900 fps, I believe, and it would smash anything in its path.  The .45ACP cartridge wasn't designed to wound, yet it doesn't do nearly as well as the .58 Minie ball.  Plus part of the discipline of line fighting is that you stay in formation no matter what - you're not supposed to stop your loading/firing sequence to help out a buddy.  The wounded, as stated previously, would lie there and hope to be picked up by their own side after the battle.

The Beehive comment reminds me of a scene in James Webb's [i]Fields of Fire[/i] where a 106mm recoilles rifle is accidentally fired at friendly troops.  The "Beehive" flechette instantly kills two men and rips open the lower half of a third, causing him to bleed to death before he can be rescued.  Webb was a platoon commander so even though the scene was fictional, his graphic description makes me think he knows what the flechette is capable of.

That leads again to the topic of NCOs telling their troops the same rumours that their NCOs told them.  That's how these rumours continue; who knows how they start.  My 0331 friend occasionally passes these kinds of things onto me, and sometimes I know for a fact that they aren't true.  But that's what his staff sergeant told him, so I'll be damned if I ever change his mind!

I think the Morros and the adoption of the 45 started with a grain of truth, but has also grown to the ranks of urban legend. The first problem with the story was that it is acknowledge that the Morros were high on a narcotic substance, something that would render the effects of hits with any weapon that didn't break bone or take out the CNS less than debiletating. The second was the Morrow uprising lasting a very short period of time, with the state of transport back than, I would doubt that the message to break out 45s, get them out of a depot and send them to the PI could have occurred in the length of time the conflict lasted.

Also I think possible their was a lot more missing going on than many would admit, remember that they still shot one handed bulls eye style and until the adoption of 38s were use to SA pistols. Combine these two things with the adrenaline of combat may contribute to misses, that were easier to explain as the round just didn't stop the guy. Than they really just missed.

The 9mm was devoloped because the original 7.62 (3?) luger round was considered under power.  The case was just turned from a bottle neck to a tapered case.  If the intent was to wound vice kill, why increase the power of the round?

I haven't really "been there," at least not in a fight with anything like the above! Hunkering down over the steering wheel, speeding up, and firing out the open door of my humvee is all I've done. I just think that some people don't understand that you "win wars by making the other bastard die for his county," not by merely giving him scars LOL