U.S. Gun Shops Supply Cartels With the Rifle Most Feared by the Military

Five out of every six .50 caliber sniper rifles seized from Mexican cartels come from U.S. armories.

Since its invention in 1985 in the United States, the .50 caliber sniper rifle has become the monarch of all wars. Its reputation for destroying the toughest armor, its murderous precision -even at 1.8 kilometers from its target- and the ease with which it can be trafficked to Mexico made it the most coveted weapon by cartels since 2008.

Its most popular version is the one created by Barrett Firearms, but given its sales success, more and more gun shops are producing their own 50 caliber rifles with innovations that make them more devastating than the originals.

They are capable of penetrating an armored car where a politician, judge or businessman is traveling, and even of piercing military tanks.

Barrett Rifles Increasingly Popular Among Criminals

The problem is that the necessary restrictions don’t exist to prevent these new monsters from falling into the hands of organized crime. And they’re arriving, increasingly: if 44 of these weapons were seized in Mexico in 2013, by 2022 this figure had reached 82 seizures.

“The .50 caliber is the largest ammunition cartridge available to American civilians today. It can shoot down airplanes on takeoff or landing, and yet acquiring it is as simple as buying a single-shot hunting rifle,” Kristen Rand, director of Government Affairs for the civil organization Violence Policy Center (VPC), an ally in the Mexican lawsuit against American gun shops, told MILENIO.

Dozens of destructive versions of the .50-caliber rifle from six different Barrett gunmakers—five American and one European—have already been found on Mexican soil. These rifles were acquired on the black market by cartels to give hitmen an advantage over the Armed Forces, according to the report.

For example, the discovery of the .50-caliber TAC-50C rifle, produced in Texas by McMillan Firearms.

Its creators describe their device as the proud result of years of work with elite units around the world and promise greater effectiveness than Barrett rifles in military tactics such as ambush.

“Our equipment is reliable. It ergonomically adapts to the shooter, not just for a few shots at the shooting range, but for hours or days crouching in a hiding place, waiting for a target to appear,” boasts the Texas gun shop. McMillan Firearms is located about 300 kilometers from Gulf Cartel strongholds such as Nuevo Laredo and Matamoros, Tamaulipas, where its armed groups, such as La Tropa del Infierno, are known for ambushing military personnel using .50-caliber ammunition.

“These are the weapons the military and police fear most. Now they are being used to inflict terrible damage in Mexico, which is why we are calling for U.S. manufacturers to be held accountable,” says Rand, co-author of the report “Long-Range Terror: How U.S. 50-Caliber Sniper Rifles Wreak Havoc in Mexico.” Even gun shops like Tampa, Florida-based Serbu Firearms sell their .50-caliber variant, the RN-50, as “inspired by social media,” knowing that in most of the United States, anyone 18 or older who passes a background check can purchase a .50-caliber rifle.

“Designed in collaboration with YouTube celebrity Royal Nonesuch (currently banned for his advocacy of violence), the RN-50 is durable, lightweight, accurate, easy to disassemble, and low-cost. It’s the most affordable way to get started shooting a .50-caliber rifle,” reads their advertisement for this weapon, which has also been found in Mexico.

With words like “power,” “toughness,” “precision,” and “destruction,” gun shops are targeting new buyers as well as Mexican cartels.

How much does a Barret rifle cost?

Between 2010 and February 2023, 831 .50 caliber sniper rifles have been seized by Mexican authorities; of these, 519 are the traditional Barret, but 238 come from other gunmakers offering increasingly catastrophic qualities, such as veiled promises that they can pierce military tanks, according to the VPC count.

This is the case of the Austrian armory Steyr Arms, whose version of the 50 caliber rifle -which they call Steyr HS .50- has also been found in Mexico more than 10 thousand kilometers away from its place of manufacture.

Capable of sending a .50-caliber round over 1,000 yards (914 meters) with surgical precision, this rifle will generate its own version of “shock and awe” on the range! The company’s information reads.

The power of these .50-caliber variants is of enormous concern to the VPC: armored vehicles for politicians, armored trucks for judges, aircraft, tanker cars, and even concrete bunkers are vulnerable to fire from the new .50-caliber rifles even at two kilometers away.

And the damage to infrastructure considered a source of national security could be much greater: airports and airplanes, train cars transporting hazardous materials, and toxic chemical storage facilities are even more vulnerable to attacks with these rifles.

“We are particularly concerned about semi-automatic and bolt-action .50-caliber rifles, as they pose serious threats depending on their use. For example, an attack with a Barrett semi-automatic rifle would allow 10 rounds to be fired in a burst,” says Kristen Rand.

Adding to this anxiety is the fact that gun shops are increasingly designing accessories that increase the lethality of their products: suppressors and long-range laser-equipped sights could increase the rate of police officers, soldiers, and even politicians killed.

Despite this cutting-edge technology, American gun shops have strived to make their creations as affordable as possible: an Armalite AR-50 rifle costs less than $4,000 (81,000 pesos), and Serbu Gunsmiths offers its variants with different barrel lengths for $2,600 (53,000 pesos).

And for those who don’t want to spend a lot, there are sites like Gun Broker, which sells used Barrett 50s—and their variants—but which promise to be as lethal as a brand-new one.

Osama Bin Laden’s Weapon

The first time the world began to talk about the destructive power of the .50 caliber rifle outside the hands of its original purchasers was in 2001.

This was when investigations following the September 11th terrorist attacks revealed that terrorist militant Osama Bin Laden had purchased 25 Barrett brand rifles for his Al Qaeda organization.

In Mexico, seizures of this weapon began to grow in 2008, following an operation in Reynosa, Tamaulipas, against Jaime González Durán, known as El Hummer, founder of Los Zetas.

The Mexican Army described seven Barrett .50 caliber rifles, along with AK-47 rifles, grenades, grenade launchers, dynamite, handguns, and cash, as “the largest arsenal captured in one day in Mexico.”

From then on, the .50 caliber appeared in the most terrible crimes in Mexico:

In the 2013 murder of Gustavo Gerardo Garza, the operational coordinator of the State Investigation Agency in Nuevo León.

In the 2023 homicide of the Michoacan self-defense group leader Hipólito Mora; in the 2015 shooting down of a military helicopter in Villa Purificación, Jalisco, which killed eight soldiers and one soldier.

In the leg amputation resulting from a gunshot wound of a soldier who participated in the 2019 Culiacanazo.

And it reached its peak of “popularity” on June 26, 2020, when hitmen from the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) attacked then local police chief Omar Garcia Harfuch in the heart of Mexico City, who survived the .50 caliber attack, but not two of his bodyguards and a woman caught in the shootout.

To prevent .50 caliber sniper rifles from making their way to Mexico, the VPC demands that future production and sale of .50 caliber and similarly powered sniper rifles be banned immediately, except for military and police use.

In addition, require by law that all 50 caliber rifles currently in possession be registered under the National Firearms Act, demand background checks and registration for the sale or transfer of all 50 caliber and similar power ammunition, as well as prohibit all unconventional ammunition, such as armor piercing, armor piercing incendiary and tracer ammunition.

Source: Milenio