Firing Squads

The firing squad is the most commonly used method of execution throughout the world. The exact origins of firing squad protocol are unknown, but as the rifle replaced the sword on the battlefield of history, it also replaced the sword in military executions.

The firing squad is not a fail-proof method of execution. The marksmen are the weak links, leading to many botched executions. In the firing squad, one man is secretly issued a blank, the theory being nobody will know who fired the killing shot. However, a rifle firing a blank produces less recoil than a rifle with a live round, so the experienced shooter always knows. Firers are often accused of deliberately missing or shooting to maim other than to kill.

In the United States, a machine was invented to take out the human element, but firing squads were routinely being attacked for their inhumane violence. They were replaced by lethal gas (liquid cyanide) and the electric chair, and as technology progressed, lethal injection. Only two states, Idaho and Utah, still have a firing squad as an option for inmates on death row. The most recent execution by firing squad in America was in Utah in 1996, by John Taylor, who requested it over lethal injection.

The firing squad is one of the few methods of execution that allows for organ donation (other methods destroy the organs beyond use).

The United States is currently the only major Western nation that still employs the death penalty. The firing squad and other methods of execution may soon become obsolete and pass into our history.

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