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

The plans seemed flawless, and the courage of the soldiers and Marines unflappable.

But with the dust settling — and the adrenaline rush of battle now subsiding — military officials are finding some weapons performed as advertised. Others, however, let troops down when they needed them most.

Army and Marine officials recently released after-action reports compiling what was right and what was wrong about the small arms with which troops squared off against Iraqi forces. Soldiers and Marines rated the rifles and pistols they carried into battle, and not all got perfect scores.

Soldiers and Marines relied on variants of the M-16 rifle. The M-16, in service since the early days of the Vietnam War, was highly criticized then as unreliable, often jamming during firefights. Soldiers who participated in Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan also complained the M-4 variant, a shorter version of the M-16, lacked what they needed in combat.

Most soldiers carried the M-4 into battle in Iraq and “were very satisfied with this weapon,” according a report from the Army’s Special Operations Battle Lab. “It performed well in a demanding environment, especially given the rail system and accompanying sensors and optics.”

Marines carried the older and larger M-16A2 rifles, but a report from the Marine Corps Systems Command Liaison Team stated: “Many Marines commented on desire for the shorter weapon vice the longer M-16s.”

One Marine told the team that the shorter rifle would have been better in confined urban battle. Some also said the smaller rifle would have been easier to handle when climbing in and out of trucks and armored vehicles.

“Several Marines even opted to use the AK-47s that had been captured from Iraqi weapons caches,” the Marine report stated. “Others were trading rifles for pistols to go into buildings to allow for mobility in confined spaces.”

Marine Corps officials announced late last year that infantry forces would soon switch from the M-16A2 to the M-16A4, a heavier-barreled version of the long rifle with a rail system like the M-4. Stocks of the weapons, however, arrived in Kuwait too late to be fielded and sighted for battle. Most stayed in storage, but some weapons were delivered to Marines under a plan to initially field one per squad.

A number of M-16A4 rifles, fitted with a 4X scope, were given to Marine rifleman. The combination, Marines said, allowed them to “identify targets at a distance, under poor conditions, and maintained ability to quickly acquire the target in close-in environment[s].”

But not all soldiers and Marines were enamored with the performance of their rifles. Complaints centered on lack of range and reliability problems.

“The most significant negative comment was reference [to] the M-4’s range,” the Army report stated. “In the desert, there were times where soldiers needed to assault a building that may be 500+ meters distant across open terrain. They did not feel the M-4 provided effective fire at that range.”

Safety was another concern. The M-4’s bolt can ride forward when the selector switch is on safe, allowing the firing pin to strike a bullet’s primer.

“Numerous soldiers showed us bullets in their magazines that had small dents in the primer,” the Army report said.

Reliability complaints also found fault with the oil soldiers and Marines used to clean their weapons. In the dusty, sandstorm-plagued battlefields of Iraq, weapons became clogged with sand, trapped by the heavy oil, called CLP.

Several Washington Post articles recalling the night the 507th Maintenance Company was ambushed recounted moments when soldiers in the convoy, including Pfc. Jessica Lynch, battled their weapons to continue fighting Iraqi irregular forces.

“In the swirling dust, soldiers’ rifles jammed,” one article reported. “Pfc. Patrick Miller, 23, from suburban Wichita, began shoving rounds into his rifle one at a time, firing single shots at enemies swarming all around.”

“We had no working weapons,” Sgt. James Riley told The Washington Post. “We couldn’t even make a bayonet charge — we would have been mowed down.”

“The sand is as fine as talcum powder,” the report stated. “The CLP attracted the sand to the weapon.”

Unlike the soldiers’ reports after Afghanistan, Marines in Iraq said the 5.56 mm round fired from the M-16 “definitely answered the mail” and “as long as shots were in the head or chest, they went down.” The Marine reports said many were initially skeptical of the small rounds’ performance against the heavier 7.62 mm round fired from AK-47s. There were reports of enemy being shot and not going down, but most were referencing non-lethal shots on extremities.

Still, “there were reports of targets receiving shots in the vitals and not going down. These stories could not be described, but are of the rare superhuman occurrences that defy logic and caliber of round.”

The M-16 series of rifles fires a 55-grain bullet, a projectile that weighs slightly more than three-and-a-half grams. Some servicemembers believe a heavier-grained bullet would carry more energy downrange, creating greater knockdown power.

“There was general dissatisfaction with this weapon,” the Army report said. “First and foremost, soldiers do not feel it possesses sufficient stopping power.”

But soldiers and Marines alike railed against the poor performance of the M-9 ammunition magazines.

“The springs are extremely weak and the follower does not move forward when rounds are moved,” the Marine report stated. “If the magazine is in the weapon, malfunctions result.”

Soldiers complained that even after they were told to “stretch” the springs and load only 10 rounds instead of the maximum 15, the weapons still performed poorly. Lack of maintenance was determined not to be the cause.

“Multiple cleanings of the magazine each day does not alleviate the problem,” the Marine report stated. “The main problem is the weak/worn springs.”

Still, Marines wanted more pistols to back up their rifles, especially in urban environments, according to the report.

I thought I'd read somewhere before the war that they'd argued about reducing grains to slow the round. Some thought it such a fast, small round that it wasn't doing any knockdown at all....just passing on through. I think my memory's correct on that, but I have no idea where I read it.

I regularly compete in IPSC matches with a 1911 chambered for 38 super. It is basically a 9MM on steroids. Light kick provides great recovery time.

As for the lube problem,
I don't understand why the Military hasn't taken advantage of some of the excellent metal finishes out now. A few are so slick that you can dryfire the weapon for 1000s of rounds without problem. My 38 super gun above, and all 10 mags for it, is finished in NP3 by Robar. It cost me about $400 to do but it has about 2500 rounds through it since and I can detect no wear. The slide moves like it's on ball bearings.

According to a report I read, the M1911 has become the sidearm of choice once again for those who can get their hands on it. The M-9 just doesn't have the same stopping power as the M1911. Tommy Franks himself carried an M1911. When you are to the point where you are using a sidearm, you are not worrying about accuracy or kick so much as you are worried about stopping the jihadi who is fifteen feet away from you and closing fast. Several SF guys complained that they would have to tap a jihadi 3 times with the M-9, while a .45 would do the job with only one tap.

The most popular, iirc, has become everyone's favorite 1911, the Kimber .45. My friend the gunsmith, who is also a range safety officer for a PD down here, swears by the Kimber, as do plenty of others. My prediction? The M9 is quietly shelved as officers and NCO's start carrying the Kimber, NATO standard or no NATO standard.

The complaints about the composition of the gun oil have been confirmed to me by this friend of mine.

Be Seeing You,

Chris

Primer indents are not necessarily a problem. Military priners are 'hard' relative to civilian components for this very reason. M1 Garand ROUTINELY and normally indents the primer of a chambered round. Not a big deal, provided the round is fed from the mag or clip. Spring tension from mag or clip slows the bolt enough that the firing pin strike is light. Without mag/clip some rifles, including M1, can slam-fire. But that is not how they were designed to be used.

And can we PLEASE get news people to learn the difference between bullet and cartridge?

I regularly compete in IPSC matches with a 1911 chambered for 38 super.

Yeah, I really should have said IDPA rather than IPSC. My bad. The various exotic .38s are definitely big in IPSC for the reason you mentioned. My real point was just that you can shoot a .45 ACP accurately and fast. I've seen plenty of people do it. And I've seen plenty of people miss slowly with 9mm. It's all just training, after all.

When I was in field artillery, our advanced party wish list had this weapon on it: MP5Sd2 or 3. Advanced party was usually the first group from our unit to make contact with the opfor, and the M-16A2 was just to big, and to loud to use in close quarters.
My unit was a light towed unit, and year after year during annual training advanced party would literally run over the opfor and end up in a close range gun battle, usually less than 25 meters in range.

We also wanted the M249 with pistol front grip, at least two, for advance party sweeps. Again, the 16 was too big and too loud, and it didn't have sufficient suppressive fire volume for the real tough times. (The old spray and pray.)
I've been out of the service for about three years now, and am now seeing some of our recommendations coming to life in other units.
We also were dissatisfied with the Beretta M-9.
We preferred a good Sig Sauer, Glock, or H&K USP over the M-9 anyday.
Not that we'd ever get to see anything like that anyday within my lifetime. *chuckle*
That's why we called it our wish list.

I prefer the M-1 Garand (.30-O6) or the M-1A - also known as M-14 (.308/7.62mm) with a match grade barrel. Ammunition is heavy to carry in the field, but I think they did the job better. General Patton called the Garand the greatest weapon of war ever invented for a reason.

I agree. I've never had much faith in the 5.56, despite what the critics said. I don't think that the ammo weight is as big a factor as it was in previous conflicts because the soldiers did most of their travelling in vehicles and didn't have to worry about packing 10 lbs of ammo in a 40 mile a day hike.

The 5.56 may have adequate stopping power at ranges inside 100 meters, but beyond that it isn't nearly as capable as the 30-06 or 308. Many of the engagements in the desert were well beyond the effective range of the 5.56 and the bad guys with the AK-47's had a clear advantage.

Yes, it is.
My unit went to Fort Dix for weapons qualification one year.
While we were there, not everyone got to even fire their weapon, let alone qualify. And to make matters worse, not everyone was allowed to attempt to zero their weapon before qualifying.
And some people were told to let other use their weapon to qualify.
Which brings to mind a combat safety issue.
If someone else has rezeroed my weapon to suit them, and then hands it back to me, how can I sanely expect to be able to hit anything when I really have to without rezeroing the weapon to my settings?

They don’t even need anything as fancy as the metal finishes. Many of the combat companies bought the “dry lube” that is commercially available and used electronics cleaner to blow the sand out. The support units used what they were trained with and had predictable results.

The marine units were doing this during the first gulf war. It is old news but should have been corrected.

It always amazes me how much money the military dumps down the toilet, and then they turn around and get totally anal retentive about spending a few bucks on rounds for their soldiers to practice with. It's sheer idiocy.

I was in one unit where they spent nearly a hundred grand on a designer tent that would house all the division support staff under one roof while in the field. That way they could talk to each other.

In itself, not a bad idea (or a necessary one), but at the same time they'd moan about the expense of rounds down range.

At the time the M16 was being considered for the primary issue weapon there was the consideration of the .25 calibers for the ammo. Something derived from the .243. I believe history has proved the military made the wrong choice.

A good bullpup design based on the delayed roller blow back action of the H&K’s and CETMES chambered for .243 would be the way to go.

My unit was supposed to know the procedures for firing a RAP round.
Needless to say, we'd never seen one let alone actually fired one.
They were too expensive apparently.
We were told we could have 500 HE rounds, or one RAP round.
Yet we were supposed to be up on it.

Amazes me too how much money gets spent on little minor crap that is unneeded, and when something that is needed needs funding they whine about it.
My unit also suffered from 'bedgetitis'.
Our budget woudl shrink from year to year due to this stupidity: if we didn't spend it all this year, then they stated we didn't need it all the next year. I.E. if we didn't spend all 500 grand or so this year, they'd subtract whatever we had left from next year's budget so we'd have, say, 400 grand left over. But our budget fluctuated from year to year depending one whether or not we broke anything.

Marines, however, asked for something more like what enemy Iraqi forces carried: a rocket-propelled grenade, which had a range beyond what the M-203 could offer. The Marine report stated that the desire stemmed from the rocket-propelled grenades having been the most effective weapon used against them.

It's pretty sad when our individual soldiers lack the firepower of the individual enemy soldiers. Why don't we have a cheap, reusable high impact device like the RPG??? Out on globalsecurity.org, they list several RPG-like weapons in our inventory: look at the Anti-Tank/Assault column. Either we don't make them or we don't deploy them. Are they too expensive???

We need higher firepower, at the individual level, for our soldiers ASAP. It doesn't need to be a computer-controlled, GPS guided complex system - it needs to be cheap and plentiful. Let our guys train on them until they get a feel for the device and its capabilities. That way, when the s*** hits the fan in combat our guys will be able to use them without thinking.

This report also mentioned the soldier's satisfaction with the "battle axe" used as an entry tool. Do we have an honest-to-god issue battle axe, or is this just something that individual units picked up off the shelf? Anybody got a link or a picture of one?

This should be saved and refernced for any SCOTUS challenge which references Miller!

Shotguns

Both soldiers and Marines preferred shotguns for breaching doors. The Marine report said many doors in Iraq were heavy steel and reinforced with cross bars, making battering rams ineffective.

“Most agreed that, at a minimum, small units need to have a shotgun to breach the doors,” the Marine report said.

Soldiers felt the breaching shotgun could be shortened, according to the Army report. Some soldiers replaced the stocks with purchased pistol grips, and many said they would have preferred “sawed-off” versions.

Marines, in their report, said the six shotguns issued per battalion were not enough. They wanted one per squad and opted to use slugs over 00 buckshot, which they reported didn’t work well.

The Russians also wrote after-action reports like this for Grozny Chechnya, and they also concluded the weapon of choice was the launched grenade.

Nothing clears a room like a grenade through the window fired from 200 yards down the street.

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