LV Shooter Stephen Paddocks' 'Electronic Devices'; A Theory

One of the things I find fascinating about the way the discussion has gone, both in the media, and indeed here on ATS, is the sheer amount of nomenclature failure we have to deal with, in order to understand what is going on. As FauxMulder alerted me to earlier, I too have been caught up in it, despite my enjoyment and familiarity with the length and breadth of the language I speak.

One of the recurring themes that some people have bought up, is the idea that ANYTHING in the room with the shooter, was "Military grade". Well, what precisely do we mean by that? Are we saying that the rifles were purchased in a fully automatic format? Well, if we are, then we must stop, because they most certainly were not. If we are suggesting that scopes, mounts, laser sighting systems of practically any kind, detachable box magazines, or extended magazines are indicators of something being of the military persuasion, again, we must stop it, because it is not realistic.

I remember ten years back, when the discussion about "assault rifles" was being had at something of a pace, and other discussions about "ghost guns" were coming on, just beginning really. You had a chap, by the name of Rubio I think (although I could be mistaken, and would welcome correction on that point) coming out and doing a press conference on the matter, surrounded by guns on tables, and getting the difference between bullet caliber, and round count mixed up, at the same time as mixing up what constitutes a clip, and what constitutes a magazine, which, even for someone like me (with no actual firearms training to my name, relying instead on rigorous research of the historical and archival variety), would be utterly impossible.

Nomenclature is important, and calling something "military specification" or "military style" or "military grade" really is not accurate, and rather muddies the situation. A rifle issued to a person in the military, assuming it is not a precision rifle of the variety usually toted by those deployed in a sniper role, is fully automatic, normally speaking, from the factory, requiring no modifications in order to become so. It has a selector on the side which can be set to safe, semi, or fully automatic (although some variants, such as that which was used on the Bradley fighting vehicle, designed to be used from a mount, featured no stock, and a fire switch which only permitted automatic fire). Also there are burst fire weapons which are sometimes issued to military service persons, which are another matter entirely. In this case, the weapons we are dealing with were not such beasts.

Semi-automatic weapons, even when they LOOK for all the world like something you saw in a war movie, are not military grade just because they appear to be. A closer look needs having at every single facet of a piece of equipment, to establish whether it ever has, or ever would be deployed to a warzone, and accepting the word of alarmists in the media, or ill informed political figures, does not avail anyone of a proper understanding of matters.

originally posted by: intrptr

originally posted by: Woodcarver
There was nothing in that room that was military grade

He meant Military style. Tell that to the people on the receiving end. ETA: Both. 308 and .223 calibre are used by the US military and NATO.

Everyone there now knows what its like to be in warfare. We wage it so freely on other states, but before this event, only soldiers could tell you what its like to be on the receiving end of automatic (Style) weapons fire.

you are literally changing the definition of things. The military would not use any of the weapons used in this attack. These people do not know what it is like to be in war they know what it is like to be attacked by a psychopath. War is a much different situation than what these people went through. Your hyping up the language to support your position.

originally posted by: TrueBrit
a reply to: FauxMulder

It was just bump stocks then, no trigger group replacements, altered lowers, home milled receivers or anything like that?

Odd. You would have thought that more would have been made of the fact that nothing on any of his weapons was illegal, than there has been.

I was led to believe that some significant alteration had been made to the actual mechanical elements of the rifle. My sincerest apologies for the oversight there, FauxMulder.

The conspiracy part of me says that, in order to effect the existing gun laws, he would not break the law until he fired upon the people. This would go a long ways towards showing that you can legally acquire ridiculous amounts of weapons, ammo, and bump stocks. move them around and even stockpile them in a hotel room. Without ever breaking the law.

IF (big IF) this is some kind of false flag to be used to usher in more legislation towards firearms, then this is the perfect scenario.

Hi all, apologies for my slow reply.

Just to be clear, and fellow member Intrptr seems to understand this, when I said 'tactical' in the OP, I was referring to 'military style'. As a life-long civvy, I'm sure I can be forgiven for this slip.

I was thinking tactical/military style rangefinder when I first had the thought that he may have used one, and that was what I threw into my first internet search, which led me to the one mentioned and linked to in the OP.

As stated in the OP, the first rangefinder that I came across online seems to have the ability to not only give range to target, but to also give the operator an elevation at which to fire the weapon in order to have the projectile land at whatever distance is required (clarification on the veracity of this statement from someone knowledgeable would be great, I could be miles off but I'm sure this technology must exist by now, somewhere at least).

Again, although I'm as green as Kermit the Frog when it comes to this malarky, it seems to me that this technical ability would provide somewhat of a tactical advantage.

There has been some discussion in the thread about different types of weapons used; any weapons mentioned in the OP were only mentioned as they were named in the titles of the articles referenced.

To be clear, the OP was simply speculation based on the disclosed contents of the data written on the notepaper ('calculations of distance and trajectory from his window to the crowd below') and the fact that there was technology found on scene that still hasn't been fully disclosed to the public.

Thank you for the responses everyone, it's all made for interesting reading

originally posted by: intrptr

originally posted by: Woodcarver
There was nothing in that room that was military grade

He meant Military style. Tell that to the people on the receiving end. ETA: Both. 308 and .223 calibre are used by the US military and NATO.

Everyone there now knows what its like to be in warfare. We wage it so freely on other states, but before this event, only soldiers could tell you what its like to be on the receiving end of automatic (Style) weapons fire.

this is not warfare, Warfare requires two sides to be fighting this was an attack by a psychopath.

originally posted by: Woodcarver

originally posted by: intrptr

originally posted by: Woodcarver
There was nothing in that room that was military grade

He meant Military style. Tell that to the people on the receiving end. ETA: Both. 308 and .223 calibre are used by the US military and NATO.

Everyone there now knows what its like to be in warfare. We wage it so freely on other states, but before this event, only soldiers could tell you what its like to be on the receiving end of automatic (Style) weapons fire.

you are literally changing the definition of things. The military would not use any of the weapons used in this attack. These people do not know what it is like to be in war they know what it is like to be attacked by a psychopath. War is a much different situation than what these people went through. Your hyping up the language to support your position.

"Not like war?" Bite your keyboard...