Army, Marines rate weapon success (M16A2/A4; M4; M9)

Stars and Stripes, European Edition ^ | Sunday, July 13, 2003 | Mark Oliva

[archy]

'Course, the 60 was good against light armored targets.. when it wasn't jamming.
Or misfiring.
Or having the feedtray go bizzak and jam up.
Or the advance crudding up and jamming.....

Shame on you!....to speak ill of the M60..

It's clear you've never had your position covered by M60s set up with interlocking fields of fire -- keeping the bad guy at bay all night.....with it's beautiful tracer rounds announcing and describing an unavoidable tight killing pattern...

Even the finest women in the world, require care, love and forgiveness from time to time.....but they're worth it..

The M60 was the same, in my book..

The only guys permitted to curse the M60, was the poor bastard that had to carry it!

Carping about the M60, more happily known as *the pig* among my bunch, is nothing new under the sun. And nothing new for troopies in general; nothing new at all:

Now all you recruities what's drafted to-day,
You shut up your rag-box an' 'ark to my lay,
An' I'll sing you a soldier as far as I may:
A soldier what's fit for a soldier.
Fit, fit, fit for a soldier . . .

...

But the worst o' your foes is the sun over'ead:
You must wear your 'elmet for all that is said:
If 'e finds you uncovered 'e'll knock you down dead,
An' you'll die like a fool of a soldier.
Fool, fool, fool of a soldier . . .

...

When first under fire an' you're wishful to duck,
Don't look nor take 'eed at the man that is struck,
Be thankful you're livin', and trust to your luck
And march to your front like a soldier.
Front, front, front like a soldier . . .

...

When 'arf of your bullets fly wide in the ditch,
Don't call your Martini a cross-eyed old bitch;
She's human as you are -- you treat her as sich,
An' she'll fight for the young British soldier.
Fight, fight, fight for the soldier . . .

-Rudyard Kipling

-archy-/-

[archy]

That AR-15 'Boom-Schwing!' drives me crazy.

An Australian young ladyfriend of mine describes it as akin tio the sound that an aluminum screen door makes when pulled shut by the door spring. I wish she hadn't told me that; her description remains with me every time I fire an M16 or AR15 and I hear that noise of the spring and buffer inside the buttstock.

Though the FAL, BAR and Browning Auto-Five shotguns similarly house their recoil mechanisms inside their buttstocks, they at least all project a feeling of bobustness in their innards, no more fragile than a steam locomotive's. That can't quite be said for Eugine Stoner's aluminum and plastic brainchild, but wooden buttstocks and steel lower receivers are available for the Armalite rifle. I doubt if it'd change the perception, though.

There is, however, another alternative....

-archy-/-

[archy]

Bullet trap rifle grenades are just the ticket. Flat trajectory...lots of KA-RUMP on the other end. Everyone becomes a grenadier.

I agree that bullet trap grenades are desirable, but not for the reason you suggest.

Yep, particularly at night, and especially against light armoured vehicles, *Wheelies* and mech infantry fighting vehicles, giving every rifleman 4 to 6 light rifle-launched grenades, using a derivitive warhead from a 40mm HEDP round or Rockeye bomblet is a useful addition to the 3 or 4 LAWs a rifleman might carry, especially now that we're going back to the SMAW bazooka/RPG launcher equivalent, carried by a dedicated gunner with advanced optics. Having enemy AFV crews know that in addition to that gunner who can kill them through their frontal armor, they have just as serios concerns with their side and rear flanks, as well as the possibility of longer-ranged platoon or company AT weapons to ruin their day.

But at the fire team level those *baby grenades* can have another use, with the development of a light electrically-fired launch cartridge that can be popped with a Claymore clacker. Place the so-loaded AT grenade, nose up, in a foot-deep hole, run the legwire to the command det position, and wait for the hostile vehicle to cross the chokepoint chosen: a bridge approach, intersection, or pass where it has to pass its thinnest belly armor directly over the surprise waiting below. Think of it as a Claymore, but for tracks or tanks, and serve while hot.

If the drivers don't cooperate, no problem; the grenades can still be used as grenades, along with the LAWS or SMAWS, M203s with HEDP, and any other antiarmor weapons handy. The more weapons infantry has to kill armor, especially light armor in close, the better off they are, and the less likely that an effective countermeasure that might defeat one such AT system or reduce its effectiveness will be able to work against all of them.

[The KG9 Kid]

"... You know about the Canadian NAACO *Brigadeer*? Or the Australian Owen [no relation to the top-fed WWII SMG of the same name]..."

That hideous thing looks like the 'Planet Of The Apes' version of a TEC-9.

Here's the Planet Of The Apes version of the 'Detective Special':

[PatrioticAmerican]

" with a ten foot container per each 4 man squad, loaded with everything from .22 hushpuppies to .50 calibers!"

Talk about something that can make a man feel inadequate! Jeez.

[archy]

That hideous thing looks like the 'Planet Of The Apes' version of a TEC-9.

Not hardly; more akin to a Browning Hi-Power combined with a S&W M59, but in a hotter .45 caliber number [think of a 1950s cross between the .45 ACP and the .44 AutoMag cartridge] with a single action trigger, and aluminum slide with steel breech insert [like the Sig 226]. There was even a shoulder-stocked selective fire version available.

Yeah, the prototypes were kind of clunky. So was the prototype Browning GP.

[archy]

" with a ten foot container per each 4 man squad, loaded with everything from .22 hushpuppies to .50 calibers!"

Talk about something that can make a man feel inadequate! Jeez.

We had something like that, though ours was mobile.

Three beltfed machineguns, a 90mm cannon, a couple of .45 greaseguns and a salvaged Thompson, an M79 and AK, sometimes an M14 and shotgun as well, plus a .50 M2 for the boss, and a lot of the time, there were three of us instead of four. M1911A1 .45 pistols for all, plus my Browning GP and my driver's .38 sixgun, plus ammo, 10,000 rounds just for the .30 caliber MG, and around 50 for that 90mm- High Explosive, HEAT, Canister and WP, among other possibilities. Called an M48A3, it was.

Well, sometimes we were mobile....

<img src="http://www.rjsmith.com/images/sunken-tank.jpg

[PatrioticAmerican]

I guess that would do it, too. The SEALS have nice "tool chests". Comparing the SEAL budget to the SF budget, I know some SF guys who say they just follow the SEALs around and gather what falls off them.

[PatrioticAmerican]

A friend of mine calls the AR the "bunny gun", because it makes a "boing" sound like a cartoon bunny hopping along.

[Travis McGee]

Were they shooting Martinis in the Zulu wars?

[Travis McGee]

Is that a young Jane Fonda fondling that phallic symbol?

[Travis McGee]

I guess a tank could have its advantages!

An advantage of the SEALs is that in the budget, they are being compared to aircraft carriers, nuke subs, F-18s etc.

"Only" a few 100 million for specwar sounds cheap!

[archy]

Is that a young Jane Fonda fondling that phallic symbol?

Yep. That's a Rockeye shaped charge *bomblet* or sub-munition, as used against tanks, or in this case, North Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun positions.

The NVA didn't like them one bit, and had their mouthpieces protest against their use, hence the pic of Hanoi Jane fondling that one.

Rather a pity that particular one didn't cut loose and hoist her with her own petard.

-archy-/-

[archy]

Were they shooting Martinis in the Zulu wars?

Oh yes; very much so, as at the fights at Rorke's Drift and Islandwana. First fielded in June of 1871 as the Martini-Henry Mark I in .450 caliber, then in three following Marks and several *pattern* variants including cavalry and artillerists' carbines and a smaller caliber cadets' training rifle. With the adoption of the .303 Service Rifle cartridge in a black powder loading in 1888, many were rebarrelled for the new load...and a few new ones produced with that chambering, as were some *C pattern versions in a .402 caliber, most of which were rebarrelled to the .450 caliber in hopes of standardidizing the hodgepodge; Service Gatling guns were chambered for the .450 and other cartridges as well.

"I am inclined to think, that the first experience of the Martini-Henrys will be such a surprise to the Zulus, that they will not be formidable after the first effort."

Lord Chelmsford, 23 November, 1878

[PatrioticAmerican]

Maybe this is sensitive info, but what is a round number for the SEALs annual budget? Do you know?

[dcwusmc]

I am rather fond of the old 106 Recoilless with the .50 cal spotting rifle, the one which said to the target, "If you think THIS is bad, you SURE ain't gonna like what's coming next!"

Mounted singly on the old mechanical Mule or the 6-pack on an ONTOS, it was a real winner of a weapon!

[ConservativeLawyer]

Bump for later reference.