The Pros and Cons of 9mm – by Rob Taylor

Image courtesy Sportsman’s Warehouse

Not to get political but President Biden made some waves recently by attacking the 9mm caliber – for some reason. He then went on to spread what is essentially new Fudd lore about how if you shoot someone with a .22 they’ll survive but if you shoot them with a 9mm they won’t. This is nonsense but ironically I have a (liberal) relative who panic bought two 9mm pistols even though I advised against it.

The 9mm Luger (also known as the 9×19) cartridge was invented at the turn of the 20th century (1901 I think) and was immediately popular with militaries around the world. This wasn’t actually because it was super effective but because of the transition semi-automatic arms that all militaries were experiencing. The 9mm was relatively weaker than many revolver cartridges of the day. The original .45 Colt for example, fired a 225 grain bullet at around 800-900 fps (and did this with black powder) which creates muzzle energy of 405. By comparison a modern 9mm self defense loading like the Federal 115 grain JHP (Jacketed Hollow Point) propels it’s projectile at 1175 fps producing about 341 foot-pounds of muzzle energy at the barrel.

In other words today’s 9mm isn’t so scary and certainly isn’t something anti-gunners should care about if it was really about how deadly something is.

FPS? Muzzle energy? What’s that? I’ll let Alice Jones writing at Ammunitiontogo.com explain:

Muzzle energy is the amount of energy a bullet carries right out of the barrel. This number can be used to get a rough idea of a round’s destructive potential. The heavier the bullet and the faster it moves, the higher its muzzle energy.

The more complicated answer: Muzzle energy is the measure of kinetic energy a projectile carries when it exits a firearm. If you can stretch your memory back to high school science, you should remember that kinetic energy is the energy of motion. If an object is moving, it has kinetic energy. In fact, the faster an object is moving, the more kinetic energy it has.

[…]

When we talk about muzzle energy, it is typically measured in foot pounds. Foot pounds is a standard unit of energy used as part of the English Engineering Units, a set of measurements commonly used in the United States. One foot pound (sometimes written as ft-lb) translates to the amount of kinetic energy it takes to move a one-pound object one foot.

In old westerns, we often see kinetic energy exaggerated as the bad guy flies backward after being shot. While this seems logical when you look at the numbers, the reality is very different. Even if a cartridge generates 1000 foot pounds of energy, not all of that energy is used to push the target. Some radiates out from the projectile, sending ripples of energy through soft tissue, rather than using all of its force to knock the bad guy backwards into that watering tough or stack of conveniently placed barrels.

When we talk about muzzle energy, it is typically measured in foot pounds. Foot pounds is a standard unit of energy used as part of the English Engineering Units, a set of measurements commonly used in the United States. One foot pound (sometimes written as ft-lb) translates to the amount of kinetic energy it takes to move a one-pound object one foot.

In old westerns, we often see kinetic energy exaggerated as the bad guy flies backward after being shot. While this seems logical when you look at the numbers, the reality is very different. Even if a cartridge generates 1000 foot pounds of energy, not all of that energy is used to push the target. Some radiates out from the projectile, sending ripples of energy through soft tissue, rather than using all of its force to knock the bad guy backwards into that watering tough or stack of conveniently placed barrels.

So here you’ll see the seed of why people think the 9mm is, perhaps, a more effective round than it might actually be – it’s a zippy round for a handgun and people equate zippiness and the numbers that produces on paper with real world effectiveness.

That brings us to one of it’s main “pros” – that it’s a very low recoiling round compared to how much speed velocity you’re getting. if you like velocity 9mm is one of the lightest recoiling rounds you can shoot from a handgun to achieve those speeds.

So people like 9mm because it’s low recoil and still very effective. Of course “very effective” is relative – the vast majority of people shot with handguns survive. That might however be a function of living in the First World where medical attention is just a phone call away.

Anyway that digression was just to set up the list of pros and cons in my opinion. So here they are.

The Pros:

1. It’s low recoiling meaning it’s in theory easier to shoot and keep on target if you have to shoot multiple times.

2. In commonly available loadings it’s considered a fairly effective handgun round.

3. It’s one of the most popular rounds meaning you can always find some.

4. It’s cheap relative to other rounds even during shortages like now.

5. Modern guns in this caliber can accept 9mm +P rounds which are “hotter’ loadings giving faster velocities. +P rounds can push some 9mms up to near magnum revolver performance. Maybe.

6. It is chambered in a wide variety of pistols and carbines meaning you can find a gun in your price range and that you like.

7. Because it’s more than one hundred years old there are a lot of interesting collectors pieces on the market.

Now some cons. Some of these, again, are obviously just my opinion but that opinion comes from observation of new gun owners, writing about crime, having been shot at once, etc. Some of these cons will apply to either handguns in general or semi-auto handguns in general.

1. Handguns cartridges aren’t actually that good at stopping people. Handguns are trade off weapons – they’re designed to be easily or discreetly carried and originally were designed for use with one hand from horseback. They are not designed to “kill” effectively no matter what people with blue hair or people in 5.11 tactical pants tell you. If you don’t believe me watch Mike Brown or any other person shot by cops eat five or six .40 cal rounds before going down. Handguns are best used to fight your way to a rifle or shotgun.

2. 9mm rounds are also known for needing a good amount of follow up shots. Especially in the cheapest loadings which will be Full Metal Jacket (FMJ) loadings, which ironically is what militaries use.

3. Semiautos in general can be ammunition sensitive – that is to say your gun will “like” certain rounds more than other. On the used gun market you’ll run into guns that can only reliably run FMJ for example, or that can’t handle the high pressure (+p) rounds that are marketed for self defense.

4. The most reliable semiauto in 9mm (or any caliber) is the Glock. Glocks don’t have external safeties. You might not care but Glocks are returned by new gun owners because of this quite a bit.

5. There are additional expensive in buying magazines (which can be very expensive) and trying out many different rounds to see which works best for the gun.

6. The “manual of arms” for any semiauto pistol (the process by which you get the gun to work, how you clear malfunctions etc) takes time to learn and master. I survived an attempted murder in Newark NJ because the thug couldn’t operate his pistol. he kept fiddling with it and it wouldn’t fire so I ran off. Then he emptied a mag at me but missed.

So why did I advise my relative to not buy 9mm? In short 3, 5 and 6. Right now the gun is sitting around, unfired, with one magazine. I knew that’s what would happen. If you only have one magazine there’s no point to no semi-auto pistol. if you’re not going to train with it you won’t be able to use it when you need it, unlike a single shot shotgun which can be used by anyone who looks at it for a minute of so.

But the point here is that you have to put a lot of effort into this platform (and any platform) to get competent so you should think about how much effort you will put in, how much time you have etc. If you’re not going to master clearing malfunctions – which takes many hours of practice to truly be good at, you’re better off with a revolver. If you’re on a budget and won’t buy extra mags, same. If you want a gun in a decent caliber that carries 15-17 rounds per mag buy a 9mm.

Come look at memes I make about how sad 9mm is on my Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/oldtimeypistolero/