Editing Machine pistol (section)

== Criticisms ==
{{csection|date=December 2023}}
[[File:MAC10.jpg|thumb|left|[[MAC-10]] with a sound suppressor (shown unloaded)]]
[[File:Shooting demonstration of sound suppressed Ingram MAC-10 machine pistol by US marshal.jpg|thumb|upright|A [[United States Marshals Service|US Marshal]] firing a MAC-10 machine pistol on full auto]]

Machine pistols are considered a special purpose weapon with limited utility. Due to their small size and high rate of fire, machine pistols are difficult to control accurately. As a result, most machine pistols are fitted with a detachable shoulder [[stock (firearm)|stock]]. Some, such as the [[Heckler & Koch VP70]], will fire only in semi-automatic when the stock is removed because the select-fire mechanism is incorporated into the stock. The VP70 introduced a three-round-burst limiter in the same way to improve controllability. The [[Beretta 93R]] not only uses a detachable shoulder stock and a three-round-burst limiter, but also a folding forward hand-grip to improve controllability in full auto. The [[MAC-10]] and [[MAC-11]] use suppressors to reduce [[muzzle rise]], while other designs use a combination of burst limiters, forward hand-grips, ported barrels and muzzle brakes.{{Citation needed|date=December 2022}}

[[Gunsite]], a US firearms training facility, decided against teaching machine pistol firing when it was founded in 1976. Facility experts believed that it is "a slob's weapon, useful only by half-trained or poorly motivated troops"; they claimed that the machine pistol "hits no harder than a pistol and is no more portable than a rifle."{{cn|date=August 2023}} Nevertheless, even the critics from Gunsite concede that the machine pistol is useful for a few situations, such as boarding an enemy boat in low light or when repelling boarders in a naval situation.{{cn|date=August 2023}} In the 1970s, [[International Association of Chiefs of Police]] weapons researcher David Steele criticized the MAC-10's accuracy when he hyperbolically described the MAC series as "fit only for combat in a phone booth".<ref name="Lewis2011">{{cite book|author=Jack Lewis|title=Assault Weapons|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=s2AbzqChZBYC&pg=PA79|date=28 February 2011|publisher=Gun Digest Books|isbn=978-1-4402-2400-3|pages=79–}}</ref>

Walt Rauch notes that "...&nbsp;despite the 50 to 70 years of bad press that has accrued to the concept of shooting a hand-held machine pistol", in which critics contend that the weapon will "spray bullets indiscriminately all over the area", he believes that the 2000s-era models such as the Glock 18 are controllable and accurate in full-auto shooting.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://remtek.com/arms/glock/model/9/18/ |title=GLOCK 18 |publisher=Remtek.com |access-date=2009-11-05|author =Rauch, Walt}}</ref> Leroy Thompson states that "...machine pistols were reasonably good for use from within a vehicle or for issue to VIP [bodyguard] drivers to give them a marginally more effective weapon during an evacuation under fire".<ref>{{cite journal |author=Thompson, Leroy |date=October 2010 |url=https://www.swatmag.com/articles/the_machine_pistol|title=The Machine Pistol – Why Does It Even Exist? |journal=S.W.A.T. Magazine}}</ref> However, he also stated that machine pistols are "...(h)ard to control in full-auto fire", which means that there is nothing that a machine pistol "...can do that other weapons available today can't do more efficiently."<ref>{{cite journal |author=Thompson, Leroy |date=October 2010 |url=https://www.swatmag.com/articles/the_machine_pistol|title=The Machine Pistol – Why Does It Even Exist? |journal=S.W.A.T. Magazine}}</ref>