"The AR-15 is... one of the greatest failures in weaponry by the US military..."

[arslin]

Don't ZOMBIES require headshots? How many of those will you get with an AK?

It is a fallacy that the AK is inaccurate. It is not as precise as as an AR, but it would be more than capable to brainpan a zombie at 100 yards.

The reason the AK is reputed as inaccurate is because of the uneducated, and untrained forces that have been facing. We have not faced a military that has adequately trained their fighters to use the tools they are given.

I know every time I pull the trigger, the AK goes bang.

Back to what I said... the AR is a great weapon. Just picked up a new lower during my lunch break matter of fact.

[arslin]

Look you can argue all you want about how badly the 5.56 round inflicts damage on soft targets, and "stopping power", and whatever other FUD you want to spout, but the simple fact is that the 5.56 was designed to specifically to fragment and wound soldiers in the hopes that we could slow down the highly mobile guerilla tactics of the Viet Cong.

OK there are two perspectives on this. One is the general command perspective, and the other is the infantryman's perspective.

The general likes to have a enemy wounded because that puts a strain on supply. I wounded man screams, he needs to be carried out of the fight. He needs a hospital. A dead enemy gets a body bag, and the guy he owed money going thru his pockets.

From the infantryman's perspective, he wants to kill the enemy as quickly as he can. A wounded enemy can still fight.

The 5.56 has a reputation for zipping thru the enemy, and not causing enough damage to render him inactive. That target might very well one day require medical aid, and two friends to take care of him, but until then he is still a problem to the american infantryman fighting him.

A lot of this is due to the Hague convention preventing "bullets which expand or flatten easily in the human body." I am not a signatory to that convention. So I do not have to follow that limitation. That is also who I would not buy military spec ammo.

[The War Wagon]

The rifle('s) GUMMINT CONTRACT SUB-PAR AMMO had initial problems in Vietnam...

Fixed it for ya'.

[bernieb90]

Hey all you combat vets who've actually shot people with your M4s, shut up and listen to this guy! He has a History degree!

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

I recall very recently some guy with a fancy Ivy League degree told that I can keep my health plan and my doctor too.

Large scale changes overseen by the government usually result in cluster copulation of some sort. Unfortunately the common folks often suffer the consequences. Sometimes if we are lucky things get sorted out like with M16.

[Vaktathi]

It's not unique to government by any means, try watching a large corporation change a common piece of equipment or a computer program and it's just as bad if not worse

To be fair though, the M-16 was a special kind of cluster****, with the army ordnance group going out of its way to poo-poo the entire concept, Kennedy's "whiz kids" pushing the concept hard along with Air Force General Curtis LeMay, Colt's management putting their hands over their ears and yelling "lalala can't hear you" while their engineers tell them the guns are corroding to **** in weeks, and a massive logistical cockup with one ammunition type used for trials and another used for deployment, and relatively little training given to the actual users of the rifle.

Eventually, most of these issues got sorted out, the M-16 today is a decent rifle, but it's introduction was a special sort of cockup that involved not just civilian government, but also private industry, warring factions within the military, and more.

[JohnBrian]

My Noveske is a POS! SSA trigger, Aimpoint T1/Larue QD, nice rail, DD lower kit. Anyone want it? Kinda sick of it, it's boring.

I'll trade you a 10/22 International for it.

[jwkincal]

5.56 was not designed to kill. it was designed to fragment and wound. it was the US military's way of getting around the hollow-point restriction in warfare.

Incorrect. You may find the information from the horse's mouth here. See page number 26, which is actually the 33rd page in the pdf.

If you read the whole study, you will see that it was this research which was the origin of what became the M16. And "killing" is specifically called out as the design purpose for the rifle and is explicitly stated as preferable to "wounding".

Don't believe everything the armchair warrior (or even the Drill Sergeant) tells you...

[Son of BAR7]

The AR platform must be garbage, I own 5.

[MotoriousRacing]

Lt Michael Chervenak would support JMP's claim about the M16 when it was first fielded in Vietnam as it resulted in the deaths of his men and his numerous letters to his COs of failures in the field were completely ignored. He is a hero that the history books will never write about.

But a lot has changed since then and the platform has evolved into a more-than effective battlefield weapon.

My next door neighbor is of the correct age to have served in Vietnam, and although I haven't grilled him about his involvement, he mentioned the same thing as above, saying magazine changes were getting americans killed. He claimed the forward assist basically solved most of the problems, along with proper cleaning.

This is something I have not researched, but he is a no BS guy.

[Vaktathi]

IIRC all US army M-16's were issued with a forward assist from the get-go in 1963, the Air Force version (built on the original AR-15 specs) did not have it initially, but was built in far fewer numbers.

Was he thinking of the chrome lined chamber?

[RobGR]

My next door neighbor is of the correct age to have served in Vietnam, and although I haven't grilled him about his involvement, he mentioned the same thing as above, saying magazine changes were getting americans killed. He claimed the forward assist basically solved most of the problems, along with proper cleaning.

This is something I have not researched, but he is a no BS guy.

My father-in-law was in Vietnam, good guy, has many interesting stories. He has never openly disliked the M16 he was issue when in country, but he definitely preferred the M14 he trained with.

Here is an excellent article on the subject: http://www.esquire.com/features/ak-47-history-1110 The article explains the issues and politics of the introduction of the M16. Corrosion was a big issue in the Vietnam theater and the solution, according to the article, was chrome lining the bores and chambers, as well as, introducing stainless steel barrels.

The writer's blog is also good to check on from time to time: http://cjchivers.com/ His coverage of the wars and uprisings in the middle east, Afghanistan, etc is was intriguing, especially because he likes to examine the weapons being fielded and their origin.

[strongpoint]

My father-in-law was in Vietnam, good guy, has many interesting stories. He has never openly disliked the M16 he was issue when in country, but he definitely preferred the M14 he trained with.

Here is an excellent article on the subject: http://www.esquire.com/features/ak-47-history-1110 The article explains the issues and politics of the introduction of the M16. Corrosion was a big issue in the Vietnam theater and the solution, according to the article, was chrome lining the bores and chambers, as well as, introducing stainless steel barrels.

The writer's blog is also good to check on from time to time: http://cjchivers.com/ His coverage of the wars and uprisings in the middle east, Afghanistan, etc is was intriguing, especially because he likes to examine the weapons being fielded and their origin.

are you aware that chivers wrote an entire book on the subject? it's really good stuff, mostly a history of automatic weapons in warfare. i believe the esquire article is an adapted excerpt.

http://amzn.com/0743271734

[Vaktathi]

Chivers' book is excellent, I picked it up a couple months ago and really highlights the problems with the M16's development along with the problems of the Kalashnikov's unintended proliferation.

[arslin]

the M4 is Windows 7... the original M16 is Windows Vista. They had 3 major things in common: Bad deployment, did not work out the bugs before release, and bad reputation.

Microsoft just made a few changed to vista and sold it as an entirely new OS. Colt sorta did the same thing... it just took longer.

[RobGR]

the M4 is Windows 7... the original M16 is Windows Vista. They had 3 major things in common: Bad deployment, did not work out the bugs before release, and bad reputation.

Microsoft just made a few changed to vista and sold it as an entirely new OS. Colt sorta did the same thing... it just took longer.

Microsoft ME! The absolute worst.

strongpoint, I have not read the book yet, but am aware of it. I'm in the middle of rereading The Hobbit and WAR (Junger), in the middle of The Road and Jarhead, as well as, An Unpopular War (on South African conscripts). But I should get it. Admittedly, I should have finished all those books listed ages ago.