The Firing Line Forums - View Single Post - ATF Looking to Impose Multiple Sales Reports on Long Guns

tet4 · December 21, 2010, 02:05 PM

Uh, it could also be that the top five FFLs sell a lot of guns in this country and may be located in markets where gun runners are found. I know some of the FFLs run a shady business but ATF would be closing them down faster then ever before. So, I highly doubt anything is going on at the FFL level for those five FFLs.

Now, as to how they are getting the guns, it's by private transfer. But, let's for a minute assume that we passed a law to ban private, unregistered transfers. So, now, the cartels will just find the same unscrupulous people as before. They buy the guns and register them in their names and sell them off to the cartels. Do they worry about having the gun in their name? Maybe, but if the cartels are paying 5k per AK, one could run a fairly large number of guns at that price and move out of country fast enough to have made it worthwhile for them, so I don't really see it solving a problem. Even better, just file off the serials and now they are untraceable.

But, this is assuming that the bulk of the cartels' weapons come from the US anyway, which I have a hard time believing (and the data aren't there to support it anyway). Why would cartels pay black market prices for guns through straw purchase from FFLs in the US, take the risk of smuggling it across the border, and have to live with semi-auto weapons, (and then not take the time to file off the serials?) when they could smuggle full auto weapons from any number of other countries for much cheaper and by the crate - probably with just a chartered airplane? It's not like they don't have the means to smuggle illicit contraband. And, where does all their ammo come from?

To me the risk/reward ratio doesn't make sense. These are large, powerful, international groups that sell a product with such a high profit margin to make the illegal trade worth it. They have the means to smuggle tons of contraband all over the world every day, yet they somehow think it's easier to piece-meal acquire sub-optimal weapons off the american black market than it would be to smuggle a few containers of weapons from venezuela?

December 21, 2010, 02:05 PM	#15
tet4 Senior Member Join Date: November 13, 2009 Posts: 232	Uh, it could also be that the top five FFLs sell a lot of guns in this country and may be located in markets where gun runners are found. I know some of the FFLs run a shady business but ATF would be closing them down faster then ever before. So, I highly doubt anything is going on at the FFL level for those five FFLs. Now, as to how they are getting the guns, it's by private transfer. But, let's for a minute assume that we passed a law to ban private, unregistered transfers. So, now, the cartels will just find the same unscrupulous people as before. They buy the guns and register them in their names and sell them off to the cartels. Do they worry about having the gun in their name? Maybe, but if the cartels are paying 5k per AK, one could run a fairly large number of guns at that price and move out of country fast enough to have made it worthwhile for them, so I don't really see it solving a problem. Even better, just file off the serials and now they are untraceable. But, this is assuming that the bulk of the cartels' weapons come from the US anyway, which I have a hard time believing (and the data aren't there to support it anyway). Why would cartels pay black market prices for guns through straw purchase from FFLs in the US, take the risk of smuggling it across the border, and have to live with semi-auto weapons, (and then not take the time to file off the serials?) when they could smuggle full auto weapons from any number of other countries for much cheaper and by the crate - probably with just a chartered airplane? It's not like they don't have the means to smuggle illicit contraband. And, where does all their ammo come from? To me the risk/reward ratio doesn't make sense. These are large, powerful, international groups that sell a product with such a high profit margin to make the illegal trade worth it. They have the means to smuggle tons of contraband all over the world every day, yet they somehow think it's easier to piece-meal acquire sub-optimal weapons off the american black market than it would be to smuggle a few containers of weapons from venezuela?