bulldogg
Milforum's Bouncer
Whispering Death said:Well, to get back to your origional thesis bulldogg, I disagree with you.
The army itself (not congress) has actually tried a number of times to get rid of the M-16 and the army (not congress again) has decided to stick with the M-16. In the 1970s there was the Special Purpose Individual Weapon program which was terminated. And again in the late 1980s you had the Advanced Combat Rifle contest. The ACR program tested a Colt highly modified M-16, a falachet rifel, the H&K G11, and the Steyr Aug: the result was that none of the rifles met the 100% improvement over the M-16 demanded by the army.
The end of the ACR program began OICW program which continues today, still with not a millitary-industry-congress spending spree in 50 years.
So you see bulldogg, replacing the M-16 family is nothing new. If it was motivated out of some kind of corporate greed conspiracy we would have gone through 2 or maybe even 3 rifles already! You seem to forget when calling this "constant replacement" that the M-16 is older than you are, bulldogg! When the M-16 was invented that box you're using to type to me would take up a whole building and the TV came in two colors, black and white.
My first memories of TV areblack and white on 13" screen, I was 10 before we had a colour TV. I remember going on a elementary school field trip to see the computer at UC Berkley that filled an entire floor of the science and tech building. The M-16A1 came into service a scant 4 years before I was born. Perhaps in a marajuana induced haze you have mistaken me with one of our younger cadet members.
My argument is that there was nothing wrong with the M-14 and that replacing it with the M-16 was a mistake that is being repeated again. This constant search to replace a good weapon with a lesser weapon (in my opinion) is what I see happening. I would much rather be sent into the field with an M-14 than an M-16 or an XM-29 or XM-8 ad nauseum et al. I would rather have a bigger round with more kinetic energy at target with a longer range and greater accuracy than some small ass plastic tumbling round with half the range and the annoying habit of being deflected off something as assinine as a blade of grass.
People have argued that the weight of the M-14 is too much. I say that is bull:cen: if they wouldn't keep lowering the bloody PT standards and actually put studs in the field there would be no complaint about weight. I have used the M-14 for hunting mountain goats in the high country above 9000 feet in Colorado near Leadville and had no trouble with hauling that bad boy around tracking with an additional 20kgs of gear for two weeks. Just because some flyweight can't hang doesn't mean I should have to suffer by being issued an inferior weapon in my opinion.
