On Feb. 7, the New York Times ran a major story on how Mexican drug cartels use .50 caliber ammunition to “overwhelm” the police and terrorize civilians. The kicker is that the ammunition is produced at the U.S. Army-owned Lake City Ammunition Plant located outside Kansas City, Missouri. The cartridge casings are identifiable by the letters “L.C.” stamped on them. The bullets are apparently purchased on the retail market in the U.S. and then smuggled across the border into Mexico.
“The U.S. domestic market for the ammunition is small: .50-caliber rifles, which have limited civilian application, typically retail for thousands of dollars, and heavy machine guns like the one used in Villa Unión (a town in Mexico that was assaulted by a cartel gang in 2019. Police found about 45 .50 shell casings on the scene afterward, all stamped “L.C."—ed.) cost considerably more,” the Times reports. “The guns’ standard cartridges average between $3 and $4 apiece and are rarely purchased by American gun owners.
