MARINE by PirateCat

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

MARINE

POSTED BY: PIRATECAT
UPDATED: Tuesday, May 27, 2008 15:42
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Sunday, May 25, 2008 5:24 AM

Misses death by fractions. Recovers and continues to kick ass.

for sequel pic go to http://www.repubblica.it/2006/05/gallerie/esteri/soldato-shock/1.html

"Battle of Serenity, Mal. Besides Zoe here, how many-" "I'm talkin at you! How many men in your platoon came out of their alive".

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Sunday, May 25, 2008 11:12 AM

AURAPTOR

America loves a winner!

Where's that soldiers helment???

It is not those who use the term "Islamo-Fascism" who are sullying the name of Islam; it is the Islamo-Fascists. - Dennis Prager

" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "

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Sunday, May 25, 2008 5:18 PM

FREMDFIRMA

Helmet hell, he's also not even wearing a flak vest, has no LBE, no spare mags* that I can see, and no grenades either.

He also does not appear to have a canteen.

That's what ya call a casualty waitin to happen.

(bear in mind we were trained for eastern europe, not the desert)
MINIMUM loadout for my unit in the field was six mags, four grenades and two canteens, reason for the latter is that you drink one empty, and when you have a chance fill it back up, dump your tab in and drink the other, cause they take a while to work.

And you never, EVER drink half a canteen, cause a half-empty canteen invites a full magazine.

I've always been a lil jealous of the marines, because they get substantially more marksmanship training, which translates directly into less casualties if you go look up the figures, whereas the army has repeatedly sacrificed rifle training for more physical training - which is idiotic since no matter how strong or tough you are, a bullet through the braincase kills ya just as dead.

Of course, that presumes your rifle actually fires when you pull the trigger, which is why I carried an M-60... course, that came with it's own problems, but in a pinch you could just snap off the belt when she decided she wasn't gonna STOP, and best do it quick unless you like changing out a hot barrel under fire.

Ok, yeah, imma rant a bit...

First you got the M16/M4/AR15 platform, a weapon which blasts it's own waste directly into a chamber that can be jammed by a mere three grains of sand, thus ensuring you WILL have a FTF by the second mag, if not on the first - it's unavoidable given the design, which is as stupid as venting a cars exhaust into the passenger compartment.

Then ya got the M60, mostly made of inferior fragile parts (how many OTHER 60-schleppers carried bailing wire ? show of hands ?) and given to runaway fire when the parts got any kind of worn, and the barrel burnout was far, FAR worse a problem with the E3 and other short barrel jobbies cause there just wasn't enough TO it for a proper heat sink.

Then ya had the M-203, which in my day had this wee little problem of hanging the firing pin in the extended position about 1-in-8 times it was fired, we had five, six guys come back with torn up hand and orange paint all over em, luckily that was mostly a slam-fire on load problem, but occasionally the cursed thing would detonate the round before it was fully closed, and THAT was pretty nasty.

And the puny little M67 rabbit killer, with a pathetic kill radius, ineffective fragmentation effect and less blastwave than a decent flashbang, which thanks to piss poor aerodynamics and light weight, has a terribly short throw range, tho they are handy with 3 second fuses for urban clearing.

Oh yes, and the Claymore mine, which is by itself effective, but the blasting caps were prone to go off at any time for no particular reason, thus the chance of it happening at an inopportune moment, and for crying out loud do NOT carry them in your pants pocket if you wanna have kids.

About the only decent equipment we had were some leftover officer .45's dumped upon us when other units went to that stinkin Baretta, one of which was carried in a cavalry flap holster between my canteens so I had at least one weapon that I could be SURE would work if it came to cases.

I think it's criminal that for all the money we sink into it, we're still sending our guys out into the field with such crappy equipment.

-Frem
*Was watching I am Legend with an also-served buddy of mine, and at one point uttered in absolute disgust "What kind of IMBECILE carries an assault rifle with ONLY ONE MAG??!!" to which my friend glances over to me and completely deadpans.. "An officer."

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Monday, May 26, 2008 3:47 AM

PIRATECAT

FF "Get her done" you belly aching bed wetter. Great Grand Dad Jameson didn't have all that crap at the Battle of Seine. Or Grand Dad looking at Romel. I didn't wear rubber gloves when I ran to get coffee for the admiral staff. I have a high IQ so naturally I was selected to United States Navy. We've been doing things the right way since John Paul Jones.

"Battle of Serenity, Mal. Besides Zoe here, how many-" "I'm talkin at you! How many men in your platoon came out of their alive".

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Monday, May 26, 2008 4:47 AM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up

Quote:
Originally posted by Fremdfirma:
First you got the M16/M4/AR15 platform, a weapon which blasts it's own waste directly into a chamber that can be jammed by a mere three grains of sand, thus ensuring you WILL have a FTF by the second mag, if not on the first - it's unavoidable given the design, which is as stupid as venting a cars exhaust into the passenger compartment.

No middle ground on the Stoner platform; either love it or hate it. I carried an XM-177E1 for most of my tour, and had no problems with it at all. Set up to sling under-arm it was light and easy to get into action. Didn't have the built-in brass deflectors back then so us lefties had to be careful of getting too far up on the sights, or we'd get pinged. I did have the advantage of not being in the field for extended periods and only needing it for road ambush response and compound defense, so I could keep it very clean.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Monday, May 26, 2008 7:22 AM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.

So what's up with the photos that Piratecat linked? Are they fakes or from a movie shoot or something?

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 2:49 AM

FREMDFIRMA

A soldier should not have to spend so much time "babysitting" a weapon that it limits their combat effectiveness, and when you're talking about supply units like the one I was in, most of them share limited and poor quality equipment across several units, so even if YOU maintain it properly, whoever is using it when you are not may not be so fastidious.

And poor quality equipment requiring ridiculous amounts of maintainence which you may not always have TIME for in a combat environment translates directly into additional casualties - as in our guys, dead because of equipment failure.

I submit to you the after-action report on the ambush of the 507th Maint Co.
An Nasiriyah, Iraq, 03-23-03.
http://www.metavr.com/casestudies/aar507ambush.pdf

Lemme share some highlights to make the point...

33 Soldiers involved, 20 casualties, 11 KIA or from wounds sustained.
60% Casualties, a rate clearly devastating and unacceptable.

The company had sufficient ammunition, having a basic combat load of seven magazines (210 rounds) but was for the most part unable to apply it to the enemy due to weapons failures and malfunction.

The vehicles in use by the company suffered repeated and extended mechanical failures and breakdowns, resulting in convoy separation and loss of tactical and time advantages, particularly speed of movement.
(And that's a big one folks, getting through BEFORE the bad guys can set up roadblocks is damned important.)

The company was using the notoriously poor and ineffective SINCGARS communication system, which by this account seems to have been inoperable in most vehicles thus requiring supplement from short range personal radios as is common practice of any unit cursed with it, and those units eventually failed due to running out of battery power.

And if you choose to doubt my opinion of SINCGARS, then consider the army's own evaluation of the system.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/1985/WGE.htm

"In examining the balance between the capabilities and
limitations of SINCGARS-V, it is evident that limitations
now overshadow capabilities with the radio system. The
existence of such crucial deficiencies so late in the
development and procurement cycle should prompt a reeval-
uation of the program. The Marine Corps should review the
requirement which spawned the system, and act to ward off
the disaster materializing."

Those are VERY strong words for an official report.

But the real thing that wiped the convoy was the weapons malfunctions.

Particularly of interest is the account of SGT Riley, who's own weapon malfunctioned, who then appropriated SPC Johnson and SPC Hernandez's weapons, BOTH of which then jammed, resulting in the surrender and subsequent capture of all three personnel.

PFC Miller by accounts other this report, continued to resist by manually loading single rounds into the action of his jammed rifle, more or less using it as a breach-loading musket rather than an automatic weapon, but was eventually surrounded and surrendered in the face of overwhelming odds.

The report attaches no blame to the personnel, who did their duty as best could be expected under the conditions, however, those conditions make for a substantial disadvantage in the field when facing an opponent who's equipment DOES actually work.

And in the end, that kills as many of our people as anything else, and I find this wholly unacceptable.

I found it even MORE so when my own ass was on the line depending on this crappy junk due to repeated first hand experience with it, particularly the fact that even a spotlessly clean M16 will eventually foul it's own chamber and jam at LEAST once within 25-40 rounds due to the very nature of it's design which spews the fouling from every single round directly into it's own chamber.

There's just no excuse for sending our people into a combat environment with equipment that cannot depend on to work when it's needed.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 2:57 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Oh yes, and as for Stoners little black toy, when it DOES fire, there's also THIS little problem.

"On 12 September 2003, in Ar Ramadi, Iraq elements of the 3rd Battalion, 5th Special Forces Group engaged enemy forces in a firefight. An insurgent was struck in the torso by several rounds of 5.56mm ammunition from their M—4 carbines (this is the current shortened version of the M—16 Service Rifle). He continued to fire his AK—47 and mortally wounded MSgt Kevin N. Morehead, age 33, from Little Rock, Arkansas. The engagement continued with the same insurgent surprising SFC William M. Bennett, age 35, from Seymour, Tennessee from a hiding place and killing him instantly with a three—round burst to the head and neck. SSgt Robert E Springer, threw away his M—4 carbine, drew an obsolete WWI/WWII vintage .45 caliber pistol and killed the insurgent with one shot. A close inspection of the enemy's corpse revealed that he had been hit by seven 5.56 mm rounds in his torso. Also, in this engagement, these soldiers were provided with a commercially produced 5.56mm round of 77—grain weight vice the 62—grain bullets in use by general—purpose forces. Obviously, the larger 5.56mm round was of little consequence."

You know, that whole not killing the enemy thing, which is kind of important - and the primary REASON most of us old codgerly bastards carried those fekkin .45's.

-F

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 5:08 AM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up

I dunno, Fremd.

Me and the folks I was with didn't have those problems with the M-16, and they seemed to knock the VC down pretty well. Granted that where I was wasn't a desert by a long stretch, but there was still mud and wet. Our platoon in Hue used to rotate down to our comm site on Tam Hai island every couple months and burn through our old ammo at stuff thrown in the water. Never a failure.

Did have an M-14 pull the rim off a case in basic, but it was a well worn range rifle and may have been ready to retire.

The report about the 507th suggests that weapons maintenance wasn't real good, as they even had an M2 fail on them. Your weapon's your life, so it should take first priority. Seems like these folk didn't do that.

We did have supply and equipment problems, but with our radio-teletypes. One of the typewriter units was built in 1954 (this in 1971) and we needed a full-time maint. guy for it. We never could get typewriter ribbons, and had to steal them from the main comm center in Da Nang.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 6:50 AM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)

Geezer: Totally off-topic, but while you were in Hue, you didn't ever come across an Army E-7 named Larry Mock, did you? He was a linguist - Mandarin Chinese & German, of all things.

I figure it's a definite longshot, but from what I remember (what little he ever said about 'Nam), my dad spent some time in Hue, should have been around 1970-71.

Mike

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 12:11 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up

Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Geezer: Totally off-topic, but while you were in Hue, you didn't ever come across an Army E-7 named Larry Mock, did you? He was a linguist - Mandarin Chinese & German, of all things.

I figure it's a definite longshot, but from what I remember (what little he ever said about 'Nam), my dad spent some time in Hue, should have been around 1970-71.

The name's not familiar. I spent most of my work time in the comm bunker at the Citadel, not with the MACV staff. But if he was there any time in '71 we were in Hue at the same time.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 3:06 PM

PIRATECAT

FF the military has always been like that. They get their use out of everthing. Barrels wear out. Ships breaking down, steam fires that melt men to the pipes, fighter pilots shooting defective missiles and so on. I won't bore ya with my toes hanging out of my boots and no food to eat as a squid. Watch "A Bridge Too Far" on that bs. Here in Tucson the sand gets everywhere so ya have to clean, clean, clean,. Now having said that to be a pro at anything a solider needs to supply himself. Tax dollar never gets to the right people. I stole everything for the job in the service. Pretended I was an officer on more than one occasion. Although I never messed with the seal team stuff even though they locked everything. I liked my face the way it is. Where the tax dollar really goes is to contractor pricing and black projects. But what you went through is nothing new.

"Battle of Serenity, Mal. Besides Zoe here, how many-" "I'm talkin at you! How many men in your platoon came out of their alive".

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 3:10 PM

PIRATECAT

Hey Vet its real. I first saw it in an english rag, then aussie, then s am rag. Got this off fox. Nice pic for memorial day just a salute to the brave young men and women. Thankyou PC

Sgt Bee

"Battle of Serenity, Mal. Besides Zoe here, how many-" "I'm talkin at you! How many men in your platoon came out of their alive".

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008 3:42 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.

Just checking. Was there an explanation for the lack of equipment?

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