Among other things, the ongoing trial of Major Hasan is serving as an ongoing rejoinder to the favored claim that limiting magazine size is good public policy — especially when that proposal is presented as a means by which mass shootings might be prevented or limited.
We know the following: Hasan purchased an FN Five-seven semi-automatic pistol because, per the store clerk at “Guns Galore,” that was the weapon “with the highest standard magazine capacity”; over the following weeks, Hasan visited the same store to buy extra magazines and he stockpiled ammo; as his testimony has revealed, Hasan did these things very deliberately in order to commit premeditated mass-murder, and he only stopped when he had prepared fully; and while Hasan went to the same gun store to make all of these purchases, he didn’t need to because, as an active-duty soldier in Texas, he was hardly without options.
As at Sandy Hook, and pretty much every other scene of mass-murder in American history, Hasan chose to do his killing in a “gun free zone.” However, unlike at Sandy Hook or Virginia Tech or Columbine, his “gun free zone” was also an army base, and it was filled with an almost endless supply of strong (and brave) military personnel who were both willing and able to charge the shooter. And still, contra the claims that limiting magazine size helps buy victims some time to charge and disarm the shooter, charging the shooter did no good at all. In the ten minutes before he was shot and paralyzed, Hasan fired approximately 150 shots. When a man with a gun finally showed up and put him down, Hasan had another 177 rounds of unfired ammunition in his pockets. These were contained in both 20- and 30-round magazines of the sort that critics would like to see banned. (And which are banned in some states.)
The New York Times confirmed that Hasan was “dropping his magazines and reloading in a matter of seconds,” and the Statesman that “several witnesses have said the gunman wielded his weapon with grim efficiency, reloading in clean, quick motions” — quickly enough, that is, to prevent soldiers running at him with tables and chairs from doing any harm.
Evidently, Hasan had practiced until he became proficient at swiftly replacing the magazines. But pretty much anyone can replace a magazine in a couple of seconds if one practices, and mass-murders rarely shoot up schools or army bases on a whim. A Slate piece from 2009 shows that:
. . . an experienced gunman can fire off a 20-round magazine—the likely capacity of Hasan’s gun—in 3.3 seconds. Reloading takes under two. You just press the magazine release button with your shooting hand and insert the new magazine into the grip with your offhand
So each 20-round magazine would take no more than 5.3 seconds, including time to reload. That means you could fire off 1,575 shots in seven minutes—provided you were carrying 79 magazines on your person.
Put simply, the chances of anyone unarmed rushing Hasan effectively were extremely slim.
Now, it is true that limiting magazine size to, say, ten rounds would have changed the dynamic here a little. Suppose for the sake of argument that Hasan had 15 magazines on him, each with 30 rounds in them, and that he could carry no more. That’s 450 rounds. If each of those magazines had contained ten rounds, on the other hand, he would have had just — “just” — 150. Undoubtedly, he’d have run out faster and he would have had to reload more often. But when we take into account that he fired around 150 shots in ten minutes, and that sometimes, a witness recalled, “the rate of gunfire was as fast as someone can pull a trigger,” it doesn’t seem as if this would have made much difference. I suppose that it would have made his 11th and all subsequent minutes more difficult. Still, while it is true that Hasan may not have been so profligate if he had fewer rounds, he’d still have been the only one in the room with a gun. This is evidently a vast advantage on an active army base, let alone in a school.
Given how quicky one can reload a handgun with a new magazine, it strikes me that the more important variable here is not how many rounds a magazine holds but rather how fast it can be replaced. (Watch this video for a good summary of this.) I’m slightly surprised that the gun-control movement hasn’t cottoned on to this and proposed that weapons carry some sort of magazine-delaying mechanism. This wouldn’t work, of course. But then nor would limiting magazine size.