Barrett Firearms Company
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The Barrett Firearms Company was founded in 1980 by Ronnie Barrett. The company's main product is the Barrett M82A1 sniper rifle.
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[edit] History
Barrett introduced the M82 in 1982 but did not make any significant sales until 1989. These first large sales were to Sweden. Soon afterwards, the enormously powerful rifle attracted the attention of the US military, and it was deployed in the Gulf War. Today the company has contracts with dozens of countries to supply sniper rifles.
The success of the M82A1 has led the company to develop several other models of .50 caliber rifles, including the M95, M99, and M99-1. These are lighter bolt-action rifles, which are somewhat less advanced but more affordable to civilians and law enforcement agencies.
In current military use, the M82A1 is designated as the M107, and is labeled as an anti-material rifle. While the M107 is highly effective against soft targets, and is also used by explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) teams with special military high explosive incinderary bullets, its large recoil and heavy weight make it somewhat less efficient in use against individuals.
The M82A1 has been purchased by over 40 militaries worldwide. It became legendary in the first Gulf War for disabling Iraqi armored personnel carriers from a mile away. Fighters in the Bosnian Army used just one .50 caliber rifle to great effect in fending off Serb forces in Srebrenica during the Bosnian War of the early 1990s. Florin Krasniqi and his associates acquired dozens of the rifles in the late '90s for use in the Kosovo War. They found that they afforded a psychological advantage, once the Serbs and the international press discovered that the Kosovo Liberation Army forces were armed with Barretts.
Barrett Firearms currently working on two projects for the military. One is the M468 upper receiver for the AR-15/M16/M4 platform, chambered in the 6.8 mm Remington SPC. This provides more punch than the 5.56 mm NATO standard round used in most current U.S. issue assault rifles. Early testing among special forces units has met with approval. The second new product is the XM109. This is essentially a conversion of the M107/M82A1 designed to fire a 25 mm payload.
[edit] Barrett Responds to Criticism
Gun control organizations such as the Violence Policy Center have decried the availability of Barrett's rifles to civilians in the United States and have been pushing for states to ban the civilian ownership of .50 BMG rifles.
There has only been one crime committed in the United States with a .50 caliber rifle. Marvin Heemeyer, a man from Granby, Colorado, used a Barrett rifle as part of his "Killdozer" rampage. Although he fired several rounds from the weapon, they were intended as warning shots, and no one was injured. A recent road-rage incident in which police seized a .50 caliber weapon turned out to be an antique pistol with a half-inch bore diameter. A pistol round, even one in "fifty caliber" is not nearly as potent as .50 BMG.
They justify banning this calibre of high-powered rifles by claiming that they have no civilian use and are readily available to terrorist groups- especially for the purpose of penetrating armoured vehicles and aircraft. However, the original fully-automatic Browning M2 Machine Gun was abandoned as impractical for this purpose following the Second World War. Rifles in the .50BMG calibre are often used by civilians for very long range target shooting and hunting.
In response to the California ban on the civilian ownership of .50 BMG rifles, Barrett Firearms instituted a policy of refusing to sell to or service rifles for any California Law Enforcement Agency. It is known that the LAPD has several of these rifles in its arsenal, but they were purchased pre-ban.
Recent programs on 'Dateline' for NBC and 60 Minutes on CBS suggested that the Barrett .50 cal rifle could be used to down an airliner in flight. While designed to disable planes on the ground, military studies have shown it is extremely unlikely that even with a 10 round magazine the rifle can hit an airborne plane. Also, with the advent of the autocannon, .50 BMG ammunition is no longer used in anti-aircraft weapons. In addition, the inability to conceal such firearms, along with their extreme expense (upwards of $8,000) would make their criminal use unlikely.
