M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle hits Hawaii Marines’ hands, fleet Marine force

NO ONE that has studied it says there were thousands that died because of M-16 failures.

I'm not a gun expert, though I'm trying to learn a little and I'm no expert on Vietnam, being only a child when the war ended. Many, many FReepers have much more personal experience in both areas, so I have to rely on their opinions in this regard. I've seen many stories and discussions about the failures of the early M-16s but I'm more than willing to be skeptical if there is a dispute. Thank you for the input. I'll research it further.

In 1966, soldiers arriving overseas found their rifles “hard to clean, fussy and prone to untimely stoppages.” Inspectors from Colt later reported that the weapons were in such bad shape that they were “literally rotting in troops hands.”

By the summer of 1967, the Viet Cong were killing 800 US servicemen per month, with the majority of deaths coming from small-arms fire: the VC’s far-more-reliable AK-47s.

Chivers lays out numerous scenes in which trapped American soldiers faced enemy fire while trying to revive jammed weapons.

In one, a gunner with no counter fire to cover him is shot in the head. As the assistant gunner moves to take his place, he’s hit as well. Another company sees 40 rifles jam during one battle, leaving a quarter of them unable to return fire.

Increasingly, as Marines faced enemy bullets, they needed to “thread together several sections of narrow metal pipe . . . and plunge the rod down the barrel” to dislodge trapped shell cases — the same movement, Chivers notes, that “Revolutionary War soldiers had to do to reload muskets nearly 200 years before.”

Marines began to develop cuts on their hands from using their M-16s as clubs.

The situation got so bad that healthy Marines would walk among the wounded, asking if their guns still worked so they could trade. Others bought black market M-14s from rear echelon and aviation units. One platoon commander, conceding to the M-16’s ineffectiveness, ordered his company to “fix bayonets” before advancing on the enemy.

Chivers quotes a soldier, in an interview with the Asbury Park Evening Press, saying, “You know what killed most of us? Our own rifle. Practically every one of our dead was found with his rifle tore down next to him where he had been trying to fix it.”

The gun that changed the world

It is true the Communists (BTW one telling thing is the story is that they refer to them a “VC”.) By 1967 there were a lot more NVA troops in the picture and doing the lion's share of the damage.

Here is the M-16 story:

1. The Military did not want the gun, with the exception of the Air Force. McNamara and his whiz kids basically shoved it down their throat.

2. Brass stupidity or arrogance released the gun into the field with no cleaning kits of even instructions on how to clean it except for a comic book style operations manual.

3. Due to a ammo shortage the Pentagon - again switched powder to a dirtier powder against Stoner’s recommendations.

4. In the climate of VN chambers rusted quickly. When the first weapons had the chamber chrome plated that stopped immediately.

http://duncanlong.com/science-fiction-fantasy-short-stories/ar15.htm

Now, that said it was a crime how the not ready for prime time weapon was thrust on the troops. I quit counting how many rounds I have fired through the AR/M platform at 500,000. I have had exactly two jams or malfunctions going back to 1972. One of those was a bent round from the factory which was easily cycled out and dropped. The other seems to have been a primer failure on some Winchester ammo that I got surplus.

I have always heard from what I consider reliable sources that the number of troops that died as a results of malfunctions was 500-700. Keep in mind that that is about 1.5x the estimated percentages in WW2 due to weapons failures.

Most of the info you read about the M class weapons in VN is written by the poor guys that had it thrust upon them. Objective reports are hard to find but they are out there.

Every weapon has it teething problems as will this new one. FReep on!

I think this is a step backward. The Mk 46 Mod 1 [product improved M249] has eliminated the problems the M249 had in service. Also, it has the quick change barrel the M27 lacks and has a 200-round box of linked ammunition compared to 30 rounds in the M27 magazine.

The M27 actually decreases the firepower of the rifle squad, because the M27 is really a modified M4A1 carbine with a heavy barrel and some cosmetic changes.

Automatic rifles are a compromise between the assault rifle and light machine gun. Compromises are just that — compromises — and cannot by their design do the job. So, to make the concept work, we change the design parameters to fit what the compromise can do.

My answer to the issue…

The answer as to why the u.S. government does anything is stupefying in it's repetition.

No one knows.

The MG3 is licensed, built and USED around the world for an amazingly good reason.

It works.

But the whiners start puking up the same vomit, "it's from the Nazis."

My response is "it's from the GERMANS." You know, like the damn cars the whiners like to drive. And the MG3, the modern version of the MG 42, is designed by those very same Germans.

"The MG 42 has a proven record of reliability, durability, simplicity, and ease of operation, but is most notable for being able to produce a stunning volume of suppressive fire. The MG 42 has one of the highest average rates of fire of any single-barreled man-portable machine gun, between 1,200 and 1,500 rpm, resulting in a distinctive muzzle report. There were other automatic weapon designs with similar firepower, such as the French Darne, the Hungarian-Gebauer single-barreled tank MGs, the Russian 7.62mm ShKAS aircraft gun and the British Vickers K machine gun. However, the MG 42's belt-feed and quick-change barrel system allowed for more prolonged firing in comparison to these weapons.

The MG 42's lineage continued past Nazi Germany's defeat, forming the basis for the nearly identical MG1 (MG 42/59), and subsequently evolved into the MG1A3, which was in turn followed by the MG 3. It also spawned the Swiss MG 51, SIG MG 710-3, Austrian MG 74, and the Spanish 5.56mm Ameli light machine gun, and lent many design elements to the American M60 and Belgian MAG. The MG 42 was adopted by a number of armed organizations after the war, and was copied or license-built as well. The MG 3 served with many armies during the Cold War and remains in use to this day. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MG_42

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9f/BundeswehrMG3.jpg/800px-BundeswehrMG3.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BundeswehrMG3.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinmetall_MG_3

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