Army Plans on Pursuing Alternatives to 9mm Pistols

[Suicidesoldier#1]

God Emperor Baldur

Suicidesoldier#1

God Emperor Baldur

Keltoi Samurai

How about the Para-Ordinance double-stack variant of the 1911?

Seriously, the .45ACP has the stopping power they're looking for, and the Para doublestack has a 14 round mag, compared to the M9's 15 rounds of 9mm.

But, anyways . . . They're saying that the M9 is outdated . . . But that's a weapon from the damn 1980's. The AR-15 platform entered service in Vietnam.

Vietnam.

Further, it was based on the faulty premise that a larger round like the M14 it replaced uses will kill a man, thus taking one man out of the fight, whereas a smaller, lighter round like the AR-15 uses will wound a man, thus taking him out of the fight as well as all the people needed to drag their injured comrade back to safety . . . And then we've fought nothing but conflicts against those who consider soldiers expendable ever since, where not only will a wounded man not be rescued, but oftentimes, won't stop shooting until they're either dead or unconscious.

We chose the AR-15 because of an experiment that those responsible for are too proud to admit was a failure, and we chose the M9 because it was thought it'd be easier for female officers to handle the reduced recoil of the 9mm round. We found out that, in both cases, the weapons might achieve the stated objectives ( wounding rather than killing and reduced recoil, respectively ), but the stated objectives turned out to be less than ideal in practice ( wounding only works if the wounded party stops fighting and has allies nearby willing to do the same to rescue him, which it turns out isn't how combat works, and a lower recoil round is obviously gonna be less lethal, by the very nature of ballistics and physics ). Let's actually go with what works, rather than what we so desperately want to work but doesn't.

I said this before and I'll say it again. What matters in a fight is shot placement, not the round. Hit the mark with a 5.56 and kill. Miss the vitals with a 7.62 and you wound. If the 5.56 is not an effective round, then why is our kill to death ratio higher in Afghanistan, Iraq and Vietnam?

The 5.56mm being adequate =/= the 5.56m is good.

The virtue of our soldiers makes us do well, it isn't the virtue of the weapon itself.


The difference between a spleen with a hole in it and a spleen that's completely ruptured is pretty important to take into account.

Both wounds will kill regardless. The thing about weapons is that are of them are crafted with the intention of quality. Every gun, musket, sword that was designed for the military has a vested interest in staying customers.

The M16 never went through official military testing, it was put into service by Robert McNamera despite notable problems it still possessed.

Killing really isn't the objective, but incapacitation how well you stop the enemy, or neutralize them. A knife will kill; I do not think issuing our soldiers all knives and calling it "good enough" is sufficient. If anything, a knock out gun would be superior to capture the enemy's alive to be able to interrogate them, so just taking them out of the fight is the goal, and would be just as if not more effective.


Furthermore while the M16 was designed by Eugine stoner, it was produced by colt, who proclaimed it to be a self cleaning rifle among other fallacious statements, meaning the sellers didn't know about the design really at all, so their desire to keep selling it had little to do with it's design.

[Keltoi Samurai]

God Emperor Baldur

Suicidesoldier#1

God Emperor Baldur

Keltoi Samurai

How about the Para-Ordinance double-stack variant of the 1911?

Seriously, the .45ACP has the stopping power they're looking for, and the Para doublestack has a 14 round mag, compared to the M9's 15 rounds of 9mm.

But, anyways . . . They're saying that the M9 is outdated . . . But that's a weapon from the damn 1980's. The AR-15 platform entered service in Vietnam.

Vietnam.

Further, it was based on the faulty premise that a larger round like the M14 it replaced uses will kill a man, thus taking one man out of the fight, whereas a smaller, lighter round like the AR-15 uses will wound a man, thus taking him out of the fight as well as all the people needed to drag their injured comrade back to safety . . . And then we've fought nothing but conflicts against those who consider soldiers expendable ever since, where not only will a wounded man not be rescued, but oftentimes, won't stop shooting until they're either dead or unconscious.

We chose the AR-15 because of an experiment that those responsible for are too proud to admit was a failure, and we chose the M9 because it was thought it'd be easier for female officers to handle the reduced recoil of the 9mm round. We found out that, in both cases, the weapons might achieve the stated objectives ( wounding rather than killing and reduced recoil, respectively ), but the stated objectives turned out to be less than ideal in practice ( wounding only works if the wounded party stops fighting and has allies nearby willing to do the same to rescue him, which it turns out isn't how combat works, and a lower recoil round is obviously gonna be less lethal, by the very nature of ballistics and physics ). Let's actually go with what works, rather than what we so desperately want to work but doesn't.

I said this before and I'll say it again. What matters in a fight is shot placement, not the round. Hit the mark with a 5.56 and kill. Miss the vitals with a 7.62 and you wound. If the 5.56 is not an effective round, then why is our kill to death ratio higher in Afghanistan, Iraq and Vietnam?

The 5.56mm being adequate =/= the 5.56m is good.

The virtue of our soldiers makes us do well, it isn't the virtue of the weapon itself.


The difference between a spleen with a hole in it and a spleen that's completely ruptured is pretty important to take into account.

Both wounds will kill regardless. The thing about weapons is that are of them are crafted with the intention of quality. Every gun, musket, sword that was designed for the military has a vested interest in staying customers.

You think the military buys with quality in mind?

The group who awards the contract to either A ) the lowest bidder, or B ) the guy with the most connections to the people who write the cheques?

Wow. Yeah. You really don't get it. Like, at all.

[God Emperor Baldur]

Keltoi Samurai

God Emperor Baldur

Suicidesoldier#1

God Emperor Baldur

Keltoi Samurai

How about the Para-Ordinance double-stack variant of the 1911?

Seriously, the .45ACP has the stopping power they're looking for, and the Para doublestack has a 14 round mag, compared to the M9's 15 rounds of 9mm.

But, anyways . . . They're saying that the M9 is outdated . . . But that's a weapon from the damn 1980's. The AR-15 platform entered service in Vietnam.

Vietnam.

Further, it was based on the faulty premise that a larger round like the M14 it replaced uses will kill a man, thus taking one man out of the fight, whereas a smaller, lighter round like the AR-15 uses will wound a man, thus taking him out of the fight as well as all the people needed to drag their injured comrade back to safety . . . And then we've fought nothing but conflicts against those who consider soldiers expendable ever since, where not only will a wounded man not be rescued, but oftentimes, won't stop shooting until they're either dead or unconscious.

We chose the AR-15 because of an experiment that those responsible for are too proud to admit was a failure, and we chose the M9 because it was thought it'd be easier for female officers to handle the reduced recoil of the 9mm round. We found out that, in both cases, the weapons might achieve the stated objectives ( wounding rather than killing and reduced recoil, respectively ), but the stated objectives turned out to be less than ideal in practice ( wounding only works if the wounded party stops fighting and has allies nearby willing to do the same to rescue him, which it turns out isn't how combat works, and a lower recoil round is obviously gonna be less lethal, by the very nature of ballistics and physics ). Let's actually go with what works, rather than what we so desperately want to work but doesn't.

I said this before and I'll say it again. What matters in a fight is shot placement, not the round. Hit the mark with a 5.56 and kill. Miss the vitals with a 7.62 and you wound. If the 5.56 is not an effective round, then why is our kill to death ratio higher in Afghanistan, Iraq and Vietnam?

The 5.56mm being adequate =/= the 5.56m is good.

The virtue of our soldiers makes us do well, it isn't the virtue of the weapon itself.


The difference between a spleen with a hole in it and a spleen that's completely ruptured is pretty important to take into account.

Both wounds will kill regardless. The thing about weapons is that are of them are crafted with the intention of quality. Every gun, musket, sword that was designed for the military has a vested interest in staying customers.

You think the military buys with quality in mind?

The group who awards the contract to either A ) the lowest bidder, or B ) the guy with the most connections to the people who write the cheques?

Wow. Yeah. You really don't get it. Like, at all.

Yes they do. All weapons are built for quality in the field they are in and there are no exceptions to that rule.

[Keltoi Samurai]

God Emperor Baldur

Keltoi Samurai

God Emperor Baldur

Suicidesoldier#1

God Emperor Baldur

Keltoi Samurai

How about the Para-Ordinance double-stack variant of the 1911?

Seriously, the .45ACP has the stopping power they're looking for, and the Para doublestack has a 14 round mag, compared to the M9's 15 rounds of 9mm.

But, anyways . . . They're saying that the M9 is outdated . . . But that's a weapon from the damn 1980's. The AR-15 platform entered service in Vietnam.

Vietnam.

Further, it was based on the faulty premise that a larger round like the M14 it replaced uses will kill a man, thus taking one man out of the fight, whereas a smaller, lighter round like the AR-15 uses will wound a man, thus taking him out of the fight as well as all the people needed to drag their injured comrade back to safety . . . And then we've fought nothing but conflicts against those who consider soldiers expendable ever since, where not only will a wounded man not be rescued, but oftentimes, won't stop shooting until they're either dead or unconscious.

We chose the AR-15 because of an experiment that those responsible for are too proud to admit was a failure, and we chose the M9 because it was thought it'd be easier for female officers to handle the reduced recoil of the 9mm round. We found out that, in both cases, the weapons might achieve the stated objectives ( wounding rather than killing and reduced recoil, respectively ), but the stated objectives turned out to be less than ideal in practice ( wounding only works if the wounded party stops fighting and has allies nearby willing to do the same to rescue him, which it turns out isn't how combat works, and a lower recoil round is obviously gonna be less lethal, by the very nature of ballistics and physics ). Let's actually go with what works, rather than what we so desperately want to work but doesn't.

I said this before and I'll say it again. What matters in a fight is shot placement, not the round. Hit the mark with a 5.56 and kill. Miss the vitals with a 7.62 and you wound. If the 5.56 is not an effective round, then why is our kill to death ratio higher in Afghanistan, Iraq and Vietnam?

The 5.56mm being adequate =/= the 5.56m is good.

The virtue of our soldiers makes us do well, it isn't the virtue of the weapon itself.


The difference between a spleen with a hole in it and a spleen that's completely ruptured is pretty important to take into account.

Both wounds will kill regardless. The thing about weapons is that are of them are crafted with the intention of quality. Every gun, musket, sword that was designed for the military has a vested interest in staying customers.

You think the military buys with quality in mind?

The group who awards the contract to either A ) the lowest bidder, or B ) the guy with the most connections to the people who write the cheques?

Wow. Yeah. You really don't get it. Like, at all.

Yes they do. All weapons are built for quality in the field they are in and there are no exceptions to that rule.

Hoo, boy . . . All too soon, we forget the M-16 roll-out fiasco.

There was no "quality in the field," there . . . In fact, those who were against the rifle somehow got it labelled as "self-cleaning," issued it without cleaning kits, and then watched as it jammed up, getting kids that had no choice in the matter killed.

[Ask Jappleack]

God Emperor Baldur

yung goku

God Emperor Baldur

How about we stop putting money into the US military?

yall prolly shouldnt bcuz

Yeah. Only 3,000 people died on 9/11 when annually, cancer kills way more people.

mcdonalds kills even more than cancer probably lol

[Corrupting Clay]

Suicidesoldier#1

The M16 never went through official military testing, it was put into service by Robert McNamera despite notable problems it still possessed.

Killing really isn't the objective, but incapacitation how well you stop the enemy, or neutralize them. A knife will kill; I do not think issuing our soldiers all knives and calling it "good enough" is sufficient. If anything, a knock out gun would be superior to capture the enemy's alive to be able to interrogate them, so just taking them out of the fight is the goal, and would be just as if not more effective.


Furthermore while the M16 was designed by Eugine stoner, it was produced by colt, who proclaimed it to be a self cleaning rifle among other fallacious statements, meaning the sellers didn't know about the design really at all, so their desire to keep selling it had little to do with it's design.

Indeed, and not just that but killing in our most recent wars just makes the problem worse.

The more a US occupation looks like murderous genocide, the more maligned we are in the world community and the more resistance to our occupations there will be locally.

It's almost like we shouldn't invade poor countries at all or something because it's a stupid idea that just leads to more people hating us.

[Michael Noire]

Keltoi Samurai

How about the Para-Ordinance double-stack variant of the 1911?

Seriously, the .45ACP has the stopping power they're looking for, and the Para doublestack has a 14 round mag, compared to the M9's 15 rounds of 9mm.

But, anyways . . . They're saying that the M9 is outdated . . . But that's a weapon from the damn 1980's. The AR-15 platform entered service in Vietnam.

Vietnam.

Further, it was based on the faulty premise that a larger round like the M14 it replaced uses will kill a man, thus taking one man out of the fight, whereas a smaller, lighter round like the AR-15 uses will wound a man, thus taking him out of the fight as well as all the people needed to drag their injured comrade back to safety . . . And then we've fought nothing but conflicts against those who consider soldiers expendable ever since, where not only will a wounded man not be rescued, but oftentimes, won't stop shooting until they're either dead or unconscious.

We chose the AR-15 because of an experiment that those responsible for are too proud to admit was a failure, and we chose the M9 because it was thought it'd be easier for female officers to handle the reduced recoil of the 9mm round. We found out that, in both cases, the weapons might achieve the stated objectives ( wounding rather than killing and reduced recoil, respectively ), but the stated objectives turned out to be less than ideal in practice ( wounding only works if the wounded party stops fighting and has allies nearby willing to do the same to rescue him, which it turns out isn't how combat works, and a lower recoil round is obviously gonna be less lethal, by the very nature of ballistics and physics ). Let's actually go with what works, rather than what we so desperately want to work but doesn't.

The AR15 platform is a mess of branding and trademarks. The AR15 today is not the AR15 of the 1950s, both legally and mechanically. Armalite Rifle 15 became the basis for the M16 after Colt gained patent controls. Now this is where that Vietnam rifle originated, but the AR15 you buy from Rainer, Stag, Rock River, etc. is not the same rifle.
here's an example:
http://www.ar15.com/content/legal/AR15-M16Parts/


here's another example:
http://www.fieldandstream.com/answers/guns/rifles/rifle-reviews/what-difference-between-m4-m16-or-ar-15

now the key difference of an AR15 today is the concept of the M4 period of rifles. Back in the days of Ruby Ridge and Militias, and way back before the Assault weapons ban, rifles of this caliber all pretty much looked the same. Today, an AR15 can be this:



With the A2 in the 1970s, barrel twist changed from 1:12 to 1:7. Obviously, 12 and 7 are completely different numbers. The M4 came out in 1994. The assault weapons ban came out in September of 1994 and ended 2004.

So somewhere between the 1970s and 1994, someone got the bright idea to make Upper receivers in alternative calibers. That's hugely important for defining what a modern AR15 is today, because the AR15 of today is literally just a kit gun - a mister potato head. Once you get to that modular rifle, you have what is meant today in the vernacular.
http://sskindustries.com/cartridges/
The whisper was a 1990s development as well

obviously flash lights and lasers and picatinny rails also matter.

Quote:

The rail is named after the Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey. The Picatinny Arsenal's role with the rail was to test/evaluate it and to create a military standard for it. This was Mil-STD-1913, dated 3 February 1995.[

There was also a lot of competition to try to make the better M16 round, and that led to things like Alexander Arms 6.5 Grendel and.50 Beowulf. 2003 and 2001 respectively.

So I understand it can be legally said the AR15 platform has been around for half a century and more, but realistically, when people think of AR15, they are thinking not about some proto-M16 Vietnam weapon, they are thinking about a weapon that really developed between 1994 and 2003, and became commercially available in 2004. (about the same time period Smith & Wesson started releasing its .500 and .460 lines).

The 9x19 parabellum M9 could be argued in the reverse: John Moses Browning invented a 9mm called the Hi Power in 1926 or so, then dropped dead, then in 1935 the design was picked up. fring 13 rounds. The Walther P38 was used 3 years later but only fired 8 rounds. The M9 itself is just a variant of the beretta 92, which came out in 1975, preceded by a 10 shot Beretta from the 1950s.

The question is whether the M9 is as different from the 1950s-1970s models as the AR15 today is from its colt/vietnam ancestors. I would argue the M9 represents almost no change by way of comparison.

[Keltoi Samurai]

Michael Noire

Keltoi Samurai

How about the Para-Ordinance double-stack variant of the 1911?

Seriously, the .45ACP has the stopping power they're looking for, and the Para doublestack has a 14 round mag, compared to the M9's 15 rounds of 9mm.

But, anyways . . . They're saying that the M9 is outdated . . . But that's a weapon from the damn 1980's. The AR-15 platform entered service in Vietnam.

Vietnam.

Further, it was based on the faulty premise that a larger round like the M14 it replaced uses will kill a man, thus taking one man out of the fight, whereas a smaller, lighter round like the AR-15 uses will wound a man, thus taking him out of the fight as well as all the people needed to drag their injured comrade back to safety . . . And then we've fought nothing but conflicts against those who consider soldiers expendable ever since, where not only will a wounded man not be rescued, but oftentimes, won't stop shooting until they're either dead or unconscious.

We chose the AR-15 because of an experiment that those responsible for are too proud to admit was a failure, and we chose the M9 because it was thought it'd be easier for female officers to handle the reduced recoil of the 9mm round. We found out that, in both cases, the weapons might achieve the stated objectives ( wounding rather than killing and reduced recoil, respectively ), but the stated objectives turned out to be less than ideal in practice ( wounding only works if the wounded party stops fighting and has allies nearby willing to do the same to rescue him, which it turns out isn't how combat works, and a lower recoil round is obviously gonna be less lethal, by the very nature of ballistics and physics ). Let's actually go with what works, rather than what we so desperately want to work but doesn't.

The AR15 platform is a mess of branding and trademarks. The AR15 today is not the AR15 of the 1950s, both legally and mechanically. Armalite Rifle 15 became the basis for the M16 after Colt gained patent controls. Now this is where that Vietnam rifle originated, but the AR15 you buy from Rainer, Stag, Rock River, etc. is not the same rifle.
here's an example:
http://www.ar15.com/content/legal/AR15-M16Parts/


here's another example:
http://www.fieldandstream.com/answers/guns/rifles/rifle-reviews/what-difference-between-m4-m16-or-ar-15

now the key difference of an AR15 today is the concept of the M4 period of rifles. Back in the days of Ruby Ridge and Militias, and way back before the Assault weapons ban, rifles of this caliber all pretty much looked the same. Today, an AR15 can be this:



With the A2 in the 1970s, barrel twist changed from 1:12 to 1:7. Obviously, 12 and 7 are completely different numbers. The M4 came out in 1994. The assault weapons ban came out in September of 1994 and ended 2004.

So somewhere between the 1970s and 1994, someone got the bright idea to make Upper receivers in alternative calibers. That's hugely important for defining what a modern AR15 is today, because the AR15 of today is literally just a kit gun - a mister potato head. Once you get to that modular rifle, you have what is meant today in the vernacular.
http://sskindustries.com/cartridges/
The whisper was a 1990s development as well

obviously flash lights and lasers and picatinny rails also matter.

Quote:

The rail is named after the Picatinny Arsenal in New Jersey. The Picatinny Arsenal's role with the rail was to test/evaluate it and to create a military standard for it. This was Mil-STD-1913, dated 3 February 1995.[

There was also a lot of competition to try to make the better M16 round, and that led to things like Alexander Arms 6.5 Grendel and.50 Beowulf. 2003 and 2001 respectively.

So I understand it can be legally said the AR15 platform has been around for half a century and more, but realistically, when people think of AR15, they are thinking not about some proto-M16 Vietnam weapon, they are thinking about a weapon that really developed between 1994 and 2003, and became commercially available in 2004. (about the same time period Smith & Wesson started releasing its .500 and .460 lines).

The 9x19 parabellum M9 could be argued in the reverse: John Moses Browning invented a 9mm called the Hi Power in 1926 or so, then dropped dead, then in 1935 the design was picked up. fring 13 rounds. The Walther P38 was used 3 years later but only fired 8 rounds. The M9 itself is just a variant of the beretta 92, which came out in 1975, preceded by a 10 shot Beretta from the 1950s.

The question is whether the M9 is as different from the 1950s-1970s models as the AR15 today is from its colt/vietnam ancestors. I would argue the M9 represents almost no change by way of comparison.

Good point. The AR-15 platform started out old, then was developed and over-engineered to make it new again, whereas the M9 was just a carbon-copy of a gun from ten years before, which itself was largely unchanged from weapons made 20, 30 and 50 years before even that.

Still, I'd say that the "modern" AR-15 is still outdated, and you can't argue that the philosophy of "shoot to kill, you take one man out of combat, but shoot to wound and you take out the wounded man and his two buddies who have to carry him to safety" never quite panned out the way McNamara insisted it would.

[Michael Noire]

the problem in vietnam was messy. It was our first war in which the long winded chants of a MacArthur didn't echo through the chamber, and it became what we know today. The Vietnamese and allies lost around 1.1 to 3 million people using AK 47s and Americans and allies lost around 58000+ using crappy M16s.

The M16s were mainly crappy because they were way ahead of their time and not enough time existed in the window to refine and train for these differences. I think the M1 garand and the BAR would have been better rifles, as obviously even the M14 was better, but the M16 is what soldiers got, and they were issued comic books for instruction manuals once it was understood there were so many problems.

Still, I think what the AR15 has evolved into is fricken awesome, even if the base cartridge is shitty. I've heard piston systems for this platform like Sig popularized are more reliable but I've also heard those are actually harder to clean. I don't know because I haven't bought a piston system yet.

I would say the M4 is a train wreck and the old M16 while better than the M4 is definitely outdated. But I do believe the modern AR15 can be rigged to become a fricken awesome rifle, and if soldiers were issued a medium sized kit, they could do a wide variety of things with it that would make it worthy of the 21st century.


The real question is how close to this modularity and options does the US Army want their next pistol to be? Do they want barrel swap options?

I think If I was worried about stanag or overseas supplies, I might like to issue soldiers viable barrel options for the local ammunition. That would allow me to not have to compromise what I believed was a superior caliber weapon, but also know in the extremely rare case that my soldiers would run out of their issued supply chain of ammunition, they could switch to a functional, although inferior round.

[my pet monster]

Gardening_with_Rave_Music

God Emperor Baldur

yung goku

God Emperor Baldur

How about we stop putting money into the US military?

yall prolly shouldnt bcuz

Yeah. Only 3,000 people died on 9/11 when annually, cancer kills way more people.

mcdonalds kills even more than cancer probably lol

How about the approximate 500-1000 innocent American citizens killed by American police and these guns each year, totaling over 5000 since 9/11 specifically? Something important to keep in mind.

[Ask Jappleack]

my pet monster

Gardening_with_Rave_Music

God Emperor Baldur

yung goku

God Emperor Baldur

How about we stop putting money into the US military?

yall prolly shouldnt bcuz

Yeah. Only 3,000 people died on 9/11 when annually, cancer kills way more people.

mcdonalds kills even more than cancer probably lol

How about the approximate 500-1000 innocent American citizens killed by American police and these guns each year, totaling over 5000 since 9/11 specifically? Something important to keep in mind.

hello, heart disease kills 380,000 a year in america. I am sure mcdonalds kills more than that(>5k). But good point.

[Lord of the Vine]

Gardening_with_Rave_Music

my pet monster

Gardening_with_Rave_Music

God Emperor Baldur

yung goku

God Emperor Baldur

How about we stop putting money into the US military?

yall prolly shouldnt bcuz

Yeah. Only 3,000 people died on 9/11 when annually, cancer kills way more people.

mcdonalds kills even more than cancer probably lol

How about the approximate 500-1000 innocent American citizens killed by American police and these guns each year, totaling over 5000 since 9/11 specifically? Something important to keep in mind.

hello, heart disease kills 380,000 a year in america. I am sure mcdonalds kills more than that(>5k). But good point.

Death is involved in 100% of people dying each year. Spooky.

[Ask Jappleack]

Dion Necurat

Gardening_with_Rave_Music

my pet monster

Gardening_with_Rave_Music

God Emperor Baldur

Yeah. Only 3,000 people died on 9/11 when annually, cancer kills way more people.

mcdonalds kills even more than cancer probably lol

How about the approximate 500-1000 innocent American citizens killed by American police and these guns each year, totaling over 5000 since 9/11 specifically? Something important to keep in mind.

hello, heart disease kills 380,000 a year in america. I am sure mcdonalds kills more than that(>5k). But good point.

Death is involved in 100% of people dying each year. Spooky.

Personally i want to see the statistics on percent of people who died choking on pastel colored night-time footwear

[Michael Noire]

my pet monster

Gardening_with_Rave_Music

God Emperor Baldur

yung goku

God Emperor Baldur

How about we stop putting money into the US military?

yall prolly shouldnt bcuz

Yeah. Only 3,000 people died on 9/11 when annually, cancer kills way more people.

mcdonalds kills even more than cancer probably lol

How about the approximate 500-1000 innocent American citizens killed by American police and these guns each year, totaling over 5000 since 9/11 specifically? Something important to keep in mind.

i keep those numbers in mind all the time when i see reports about things like IKEA kicking out an armed police officer/chief and then double backing on their position when they found out it was a police chief. I noticed all the people who were interviewed said they were totally against guns in the IKEA and then when asked if an officer should have a gun in the IKEA they all did a 180.

You know who else had double standards? England.
That was, after all, the main theme of Braveheart: English Peace Officers were given the rights the other citizens were not: the right to rape a man's wife.

[Keltoi Samurai]

Michael Noire

the problem in vietnam was messy. It was our first war in which the long winded chants of a MacArthur didn't echo through the chamber, and it became what we know today. The Vietnamese and allies lost around 1.1 to 3 million people using AK 47s and Americans and allies lost around 58000+ using crappy M16s.

The M16s were mainly crappy because they were way ahead of their time and not enough time existed in the window to refine and train for these differences. I think the M1 garand and the BAR would have been better rifles, as obviously even the M14 was better, but the M16 is what soldiers got, and they were issued comic books for instruction manuals once it was understood there were so many problems.

Still, I think what the AR15 has evolved into is fricken awesome, even if the base cartridge is shitty. I've heard piston systems for this platform like Sig popularized are more reliable but I've also heard those are actually harder to clean. I don't know because I haven't bought a piston system yet.

I would say the M4 is a train wreck and the old M16 while better than the M4 is definitely outdated. But I do believe the modern AR15 can be rigged to become a fricken awesome rifle, and if soldiers were issued a medium sized kit, they could do a wide variety of things with it that would make it worthy of the 21st century.


The real question is how close to this modularity and options does the US Army want their next pistol to be? Do they want barrel swap options?

I think If I was worried about stanag or overseas supplies, I might like to issue soldiers viable barrel options for the local ammunition. That would allow me to not have to compromise what I believed was a superior caliber weapon, but also know in the extremely rare case that my soldiers would run out of their issued supply chain of ammunition, they could switch to a functional, although inferior round.

Has that supply chain breakdown really been an issue, though, in modern combat scenarios?

EDIT: Nevermind, I realised almost as soon as I typed that that I was engaging in that same "fighting the last war" behaviour that's screwed us over so many times before, where we base our policies on how to fight the next war on the mistaken assumption that the last war we fought will be what combat looks like from now on, and as such, are never prepared for what we're facing now, even if we've done it before, simpl because there was a war in-between how we handled this situation once and it cropping up again, and because of that, we fought that last war prepped for this one and the one before it, and will face this one prepped for the last one.