Sam Gabbert of SGAmmo on the status of Russian ammo

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brunowbe said:
Lol! You cannot be serious. This was totally nothing more than back door gun control. This does not hurt Russia one bit. Squeezing Russia would have been going after their energy sector with sanctions, not ammo.

Wow, I cannot believe I read this on a gun forum of all places.
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I'm sorry, did ammunition suddenly become illegal or controlled in some new way? Or can you buy the exact same ammo you could before? The only difference is the place it comes from, and you can still buy Russian ammo that is already in the USA. This doesn't prevent you from importing ammo from almost any other country on earth.
and given the pro-US proclivities of most people on this board, I'm surprised to see people so upset about this. Russia is a state sponsor of terrorism who has no qualms about meddling in US elections, pumping out propaganda, funding genocidal dictators, etc. Yes, ammo is going to remain expensive, boo freaking hoo. If that impacts your hobby, maybe its time to cut back other places or get a part time job to fund your ammo habits.
 
brunowbe said:
Lol! You cannot be serious. This was totally nothing more than back door gun control. This does not hurt Russia one bit. Squeezing Russia would have been going after their energy sector with sanctions, not ammo.
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I think it does both. It hurts the shooters in America and hurts Russia manufacturers. I imagine the US market is a large customer, if not largest customer, for the Russian producers.
 
Ivy Mike said:
I'm surprised to see people so upset about this. Russia is a state sponsor of terrorism who has no qualms about meddling in US elections, pumping out propaganda, funding genocidal dictators, etc.
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I'm not surprised at all. One of the regional forums I'm on, I'd almost be willing to bet that a lot of the AK, AR and Glock guys who shoot crap-tons of ammo every week, would buy ammunition from the Taliban if it were cheaper than they could get it from Sportsman's Warehouse, Bi-Mart, Academy or on-line...
 
This is not hard to understand.
Multiple things can be true at once, and it can also be complicated.
Quit thinking it’s this or that, it can be both/and

:1 The administration in power wants to put new sanctions on Russia, for multiple reasons.

:2 They also want to Negatively impact legal gun owners any way possible.

These sanctions do both, the later likely being a bonus, to them. I say this mainly because i don’t think they really understand the effects of Russian ammo in the US market, I don’t believe they’re that educated or competent.

Furthermore
:3 Russia is no friend of the US, to put it nicely. Therefore us giving them money probably isn’t the best policy. Sure other things would have hurt them worse, maybe that’s why they didn’t do that. Maybe they didn’t want to escalate things to much, just a mild show of force that leaves other options open for the future.

:4 We seem, as a country and as individuals, to overlook massive issues simply to get a good price, and that’s not always unreasonable.




Like I’ve said before, I’ve bought multiple thousands of rounds of Russian ammo. A Russian ammo ban will likely negatively impact me, I’ll probably spend more money on ammo while shooting/stocking less, that sucks.

I can also understand the US Government taking actions that have a negative financial impact on Russian, that is not something I can complain about.


At the end of the day if this is your biggest problem, or anywhere near your biggest problems, you should thank the Lord you have such a blessed life.
 
DeepSouth: excellent "big picture" scenarios you described.

A buddy (retired A-330 captain: DTW base) with whom I've shot guns several times over a few years Refused to get any vaccination; I have no idea what his "reason(s)" were, but he chose a popular variation of Russian Roulette, so to speak..

He was a life - long shooter, healthy, age 68. Superb shot, and loved milsurps as much as modern guns.
>>>> After 3 weeks in a hospital (ventilator), he Died Yesterday :(<<<< from the Wuhan/Covid.

He would have loved to have had these "problems".
 
Ignition Override said:
Even when there were no panics, people never should have Assumed that Ammo Panics were all in the past.
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Even now the same is true, I don’t know of any reason the powers that be couldn’t stop import of all ammo, such a reason could exist but I don’t know about it.

The point is while things could get better, they’re much more likely to get worse, long term anyway.

That said I don’t know of any other “hostile” countries we get ammo from, a “tax” of some form is probably more likely.
 
I think of all the things we don't do here because we like things cheap- ammo, electronics, aluminum, steel, REE, batteries, clothing...the list is probably a lot longer than that.
 
I agree with Matt's take on this:

This is political posturing at best.
And, 5.45x39 is probably the most "at risk" ammo in all this.

There are plenty of other sources that are "not Russia" for the rest of the rounds, as ther eare other users of that ammo. So, even the 9x18 probably will not dry up, not entirely.

Now, how quickly this will actually affect buyers in the US is up for grabs. The way Import Licensing works is "per import" not a "you get to import for this duration" deal. Some of those licensed imports are huge, some are tiny (by comparison).

Now, a person could make an argument that this move is a "protectionist" one to preserve the people buying brass for cases. Which gets complicated as copper and tin are imported products (we happen to have huge deposits of copper in Alaska, but are not allowed to mine it). Which turns into a tangle to rival the xmas lights in the box in the attic.

So, for THR, we must needs focus on the ammo.
7.62x54R is used in many places, and we may see increased imports from Scandinavia and Eastern Europe.
9x18 is used all over, too; as is 7.62x25--if to a lesser extent.

Only real round not much used will likely be 5.45x39--unless the Pole, Slovak, and/or Czech run up some production. Those places all once used the 5.45, but switched over to 5.56 for their own use. Whehter they kept the old machine tools & fixtures will be the critical part.

Now, places other than Russia are probably more likely to use brass and similar gilding metals for the ammo than steel. So, maybe, that means the ammo will be "better." That's a hard call. And, only time will tell.
 
Ivy Mike said:
I'm sorry, did ammunition suddenly become illegal or controlled in some new way? Or can you buy the exact same ammo you could before? The only difference is the place it comes from, and you can still buy Russian ammo that is already in the USA. This doesn't prevent you from importing ammo from almost any other country on earth.
and given the pro-US proclivities of most people on this board, I'm surprised to see people so upset about this. Russia is a state sponsor of terrorism who has no qualms about meddling in US elections, pumping out propaganda, funding genocidal dictators, etc. Yes, ammo is going to remain expensive, boo freaking hoo. If that impacts your hobby, maybe its time to cut back other places or get a part time job to fund your ammo habits.
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It is more about the hypocrisy by politicians who ban Chinese guns and ammo yet expand the market with China for all other goods as well as the current administration banning Russian ammo yet the top imports from Russia are gas. oil and iron and that has increased since last year so it is easy to see it is all about punishing gun owners that's all.
 
7.62x39mm is slated to make a more or less full recovery thought it could take a few years.

5.45x39mm though... that cartridge is just about doomed, unfortunately.
 
JCooperfan1911:

Had a short break for lunch in Tampa Airport several years ago.

I was Ready, that same Day, to click on AK-74 “Buy Now.”

But immed. news on AKfiles stated that King Obama had suddenly banned imports of the really cheap 7n- ammo, linked to various factors.
 
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I bet Prvi steps up their game and corners the market. They’re not Russian or Serbian. They’re also one of the only manufactures of a lot of these calibers in hunting ammo.


With that said… I may have to move to a more conventional American caliber or just get back into shooting shotguns more than rifles.
 
Privi has always made a lot of less common calibers, when I had a 6.5 Belgian Mauser Privi was the only source for ammo, and wasn’t any more expensive than 30-30. But Privi doesn’t make any steel case that I know of, and their 7.62x39 was 50 cents a round when steel case was half that, so Privi brass case 5.45x39 for a buck a round might not sell.
I know if I was tooling up a new ammo factory I’d stamp out 9mm & 5.56, it’s still pricey and people are paying.
Been some discussion of Russia building a factory in another country to import here but if I was Russia, not sure I’d make the investment to skirt an import ban that might go away in a year. I’m not betting on any ban being lifted,
 
Those Russian factories will start selling more ammo at lower prices to other countries. Those countries will buy less Sellier & Bellot, Prvi, Aguila, and IMI and those non-Russian brands will start selling more in the US. It will just take some time for the import paperwork to be processed and the supply chains to adjust.
 
Small Arms Analytics claims that in 2020, 22.5% of ammo all imports was imported from Russia in a report published March 15, 2021.
http://smallarmsanalytics.com/v1/pr/2021-03-15.pdf

The National Shooting Sports Foundation (citing the ATF) said that the US consumed 8.7 billion rounds of ammo in 2018. The Russians imported 0.765 billion rounds in 2020 or 8.8% of what we bought in 2018 (assuming that 8.7 Billion figure is the the total of all rounds purchased for Americans including imports. If it wasn't then the portion of ammo coming from Russia is even less than 8.8% of what we bought in 2018). https://www.nssf.org/articles/nssf-releases-firearms-production-figures/

If you are illiterate like me, you can watch this video with additional details about the ammo ban:



"Imports of ammunition from Russia, South Korea, the European Union and others were up 225% over the past two years, according to an analysis by Panjiva Inc., which independently tracks global trade."--AP
https://apnews.com/article/sports-b...gun-politics-86e61939eb4ae1230e110ed6d7576b70
So we got a little spoiled before the pandemic and now some of that increase in imports is being taken away.
 
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Victor252 said:
Small Arms Analytics claims that in 2020, 22.5% of ammo all imports was imported from Russia in a report published March 15, 2021.
http://smallarmsanalytics.com/v1/pr/2021-03-15.pdf

The National Shooting Sports Foundation (citing the ATF) said that the US consumed 8.7 billion rounds of ammo in 2018. The Russians imported 0.765 billion rounds in 2020 or 8.8% of what we bought in 2018 (assuming that 8.7 Billion figure is the the total of all rounds purchased for Americans including imports. If it wasn't then the portion of ammo coming from Russia is even less than 8.8% of what we bought in 2018). https://www.nssf.org/articles/nssf-releases-firearms-production-figures/

If you are illiterate like me, you can watch this video with additional details about the ammo ban:



"Imports of ammunition from Russia, South Korea, the European Union and others were up 225% over the past two years, according to an analysis by Panjiva Inc., which independently tracks global trade."--AP
https://apnews.com/article/sports-b...gun-politics-86e61939eb4ae1230e110ed6d7576b70
So we got a little spoiled before the pandemic and now some of that increase in imports is being taken away.
Click to expand...


Good find Victor. ☝ молодец спасибо
 
I suppose if I was smart I would be selling the old eastern bloc iron and ammo while demand was hot, but I never was the sharpest tool in the shed.
 
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