Sgt. Nick Fury

Fair nuff......
M21 is nothing but a match grade m-14.........same goes for m25 cept more modified.
allllllllright.....but I had about 10,000 words to say.....=)
Most astronomers can't say they have been to the Moon but I imagine a few know a thing or two more about it then Neil Armstrong....Are you saying that unless I have used a m-16 and a m-14 rifle in combat I can not study the reports, use my own firearms knowledge or have any opinion whatsoever on these weapons? In that case how often have you used an m-14 in combat?
While...problematic.......? That's my point.....it is has been always will be problematic. The m-14 was superior in every way cept the weight of the ammo, and if it were my life on the line I'd carry that extra weight....the only problem with the m-14 is it wasn't lining teh right wallets in the pentagon in the 60's.....

Granted....today's M-16 is a far far far cry improvement over it's early "widowmaker" reputation. That said, you still have several major flaws for a battlefield weapon. One it requires a LOT of maintenance, this especially is true in any area with alot of grime and dirt......aka any combat area outside of the freshly cleaned test labs.... The only good thing abotu this is it takes some amount of discipline and undisciplined enemy won't have much use for it for long. Men died because of it's problems with jamming on anything but IMR powder loads....I think that justifies me calling it a failure......if only for during the period of the Vietnam war.

Two...the "light" ammo doesn't always let you know you got the guy on impact, meaning you may continue firing when you should be siting your next target. The feedback from an m-14 direct hit alone is worth more to me then the idea of conserved weight. Using less ammo conserves weight too! The 7.62 round has better knockdown power then the 5.56

The objective is to kill the enemy right? not just to wound them? I understand that only one per squad was issued among the 101st but why? Certainly a lot more then sniper teams got them, who are using the m21s and m-25's if they're going to use a non bolt action. It is never ridiculous to compare weapons and ballistics.......

Look as far as I am concerned (and I realise my opinions mean nil to the powers that be) the m-16 is only in the military for political reasons based on greed in the 60's the difference then was between night and day and they washed right over the reliability problems despite the fact it was killing our soldiers. Once you convince peopel to invest in a new weapon system people will not admit it is not an improvement let alone more dangerous.........they're careers depend on it being better. Gee no brass ever backed a weapon because of their personal careers or massaged test data did they? nooooo of course not.

Is today's m-16 better? By leaps and bounds......but only because of constant revisions that have cost vast sums of money......I have no illusions about the m-14 being a viable main field rifle it has seen it's time, and surely in these number of years we can make something better.....that said if they're gonna spend billions on a new weapon system I think they should really reconsider the 5.56 round....or else once again we'll have to issue m-14's to some squad so one guy can actually reach out and touch someone.

(sorry for the lengthy post, but this is very important to me)

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\"Watch what people are cynical about, and one can often discover what they lack.\" -- George S. Patton