[central_va]

My father had all three during the Korean War. He a had a Thompson, a M-1 carbine and a grease gun. He said the grease gun was the best weapon he carried.

He said the Thompson was great but need cleaning all the time, the carbine was a beautiful weapon that needed constant cleaning and had terrible stopping power past 50 yards. The grease gun was durable, NEVER needed cleaning and had good stopping power. He said he nailed a ChiCom radio operator behind a thick wooden door at 75 yards. The operator was wounded but the radio did not survive.....

[Chainmail]

That's funny! I carried a grease gun for a couple of weeks while in Vietnam because it looked and felt cool - but it was very heavy with a loaded magazine, slow firing, and the massive bolt that slid forward when you pulled the trigger made accurate aiming very difficult. Worse, the enemy always showed up and 10 meters and 300 meters - so the grease gun was OK for 10 meters but useless at 300 meters. The magazines were a B-tch to load and once you fired all your magazines up, you were in a lousy position to try to load more while the shooting continued.

I finally realized that a loaded M-14 weighed the same as a grease gun and was much more effective at all ranges, so I traded the grease gun to the SeaBees for beer.

Carried an M2 Carbine for a short while too - an excellent, controllable full-auto weapon but all I used it for was killing a crocodile we spotted in a river. As before, when your life depended on it, the M-14 was the only choice.