Cite as: 520 U. S. 1 (1997)
Opinion of the Court
§ 924(c) sentence before any prison term that the prisoner is already serving, whether imposed by a state or federal court, limiting the phrase "any other term of imprisonment" to state sentences does not get rid of the problem. Thus, we think that the Court of Appeals both invented the problem and devised the wrong solution.
Justice Breyer questions, in dissent, whether Congress wanted to impose a § 924(c) sentence on a defendant who is already serving a prison term pursuant to a virtually identical state sentencing enhancement statute. Post, at 15. A federal court could not (for double jeopardy reasons) sentence a person to two consecutive federal prison terms for a single violation of a federal criminal statute, such as § 924(c). If Congress cannot impose two consecutive federal § 924(c) sentences, the dissent argues, it is unlikely that Congress would have wanted to stack a § 924(c) sentence onto a prison term under a virtually identical state firearms enhancement. Ibid.
As we have already observed, however, the straightforward language of § 924(c) leaves no room to speculate about congressional intent. See supra, at 4-5. The statute speaks of "any term of imprisonment" without limitation, and there is no intimation that Congress meant § 924(c) sentences to run consecutively only to certain types of prison terms. District courts have some discretion under the Sentencing Guidelines, of course, in cases where related offenses are prosecuted in multiple proceedings, to establish sentences "with an eye toward having such punishments approximate the total penalty that would have been imposed had the sentences for the different offenses been imposed at the same time . . . ." Witte v. United States, 515 U. S. 389, 404 (1995) (discussing USSG § 5G1.3). See post, at 14-15 (Breyer, J., dissenting). When Congress enacted § 924(c)'s consecutive-sentencing provision, however, it cabined the sentencing discretion of district courts in a single circumstance: When a defendant violates § 924(c), his sentencing en-
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