The Immortal 1911 Pistol, After 112 Years, Finally Retired From U.S. Military Service
BY Herschel Smith
6 months, 3 weeks ago
From a reader, Red State.
After 123 years, the immortal Colt-Browning 1911 pistol has finally left U.S. military service. This is after a long history without parallel in the annals of American arms, a history that began well before the Great War.
… after 123 years, the U.S. Marine Corps, the last service still using the 1911, has traded them in.
That’s a shame. I know that MARSOC was the last group to use the 1911.
I wouldn’t want to enter a gun fight with the Sig M18 or any other Sig, but that’s just me.
When choosing a handgun, I choose primarily for purposes of ergonomics, weight distribution and tactile feel of the trigger. If you can’t hit anything, nothing else matters.
On October 9, 2023 at 12:15 am, Georgiaboy61 said:
Re: “The Immortal 1911 Pistol, After 112 Years, Finally Retired From U.S. Military Service”
That tracks…. since the DOD/Pentagon and the services themselves seem determined to get rid of anything that works, whether mechanical or human. First, it was the Marine Corps re-establishing their world-famous scout-sniper program, then the attempts to kill off the A-10 Thunderbolt II or “Warthog,” the finest ground attack/CAS platform in aviation history, and now this.
There are a bunch of over-ranked morons running the armed forces, perfumed princes running around wrecking things. What would the late great Colonel Hackworth say about all of this mess if he was alive today? Nothing good, I’ll tell you that. Chesty Puller would positively melt down.
I second your views about Sig handguns. A brick feels better ergonomically…. but of course, that’s just the opinion of one old man. YMMV.
On October 9, 2023 at 10:05 am, xtphreak said:
superior trigger
and leaves a BIG hole in the target
superior ergonomics
and leaves a BIG hole in the target
it ain’t plastic
and leaves a BIG hole in the target
On October 9, 2023 at 5:00 pm, Dirk said:
A sad day indeed. It was the 1911 I trained with in 1975 at Navy boot camp. The M14 aswell. Seems every uncle and grandfather owned at least one 1911 after Korea.
Carried a 1911 for most of 27 years, AND I had the honor of being an A10 mech at MABPJC Air Force rework, M Clellan AFB in Sacramento Calif for roughly 4 years and a flight control hydronic flight controls roll.
Georgia boy you nailed it, I worked on a lot of military aircraft over the years. Non were as simple and logical as lethal as the A10
After I rebuilt the landing gear and flight controls on those A10s, I got to bore scope the gau 30 gun. I enjoyed it, nothing like firing it. 80 yards, dial the HUD into a fixed target and slowly cycle the Gatling gun. Was plus minus measurements, the final sighting in was done on the live range with a tank slayer driving the bird.
I’ve always thought the A10 should have been owned and operated by the US Army. Due to the AF chickenshits attempts to trash the A10. The army actually always valued what the warthog did for their folks
I recently read a report over on The Drive.com penned by a warthog driver suggesting the warthog needs to be replaced by the A/F18. The articles well done, but it’s just more lipstick on a pig bullshit.
If you’ve even been inside the structure of an A10, aft of the pilots station and under the pilots all ammo, the 30 mm drum is loaded thru the belly by ordinance. Right behind that port starboard is all the avionics. The guns obviously forward and beside the nose gear.
The A10 has a tool named “ the fence”, which is simply to divert gun gas away from the twin engines. Aft of that other than a few hyd pumps and hyd flight controls related equipment the birds essentially empty all the way to the tailbone. The A10 had a fantasist flight control systems flaps slats, on the wing front. Very important for the mission
A few hyd lines a secondary hyd system, obviously the radar in the nose, above the guns.
The A10 flyer sits in a titanium tub for bullet protection. Has additional flak blankets a fixed to the tube for extra bullet proof. I’ve been told they went to a different system after I left.
The A10 rework went to a base in Utah months after I went into law enforcement. The F15 was slated after in Sacramento after the A10s left. I don’t think that happen for some reason.
The A10 is simply one of the finest aircraft EVER made. To think the A/F18 could logically take over close ground support roll is truly amazing. Once again some dumb ass logic
Dirk
On October 10, 2023 at 12:35 am, Georgiaboy61 said:
@ Dirk
Re: “I’ve always thought the A10 should have been owned and operated by the US Army. Due to the AF chickenshits attempts to trash the A10. The army actually always valued what the warthog did for their folks”
That’s a very sensible and logical suggestion, which is why it will never, and I do mean “never,” be adopted. Well, at least not as long as the 1948 Key West Agreement is in effect.
I know the Army and Marine Corps sometimes clash, vis-a-vis tactics, doctrine, etc. – but I think the Corps is onto something having its own organic air assets. Marine aviation and ground elements train together and the grunts down in the mud often know the pilots overhead flying top-cover and CAS for them. That’s a smart system, and the army would be wise to emulate it. If the Air Force would agree to it, that is….
You’d think that the USAF would be all over pleasing the grunts on the ground, since none of our adversaries in the GWOT had air forces of which to speak. No one going to make “ace in a day” without enemy fighters in the air, right? But the Air Force seems still to regard CAS/ground attack as a poor stepchild. I don’t get, but then I’m just a dumb civilian, right?
Well, either grab the mission with both hands and do it right, or let go and let someone else in the armed forces take over the mission. Doesn’t seem to be too hard to figure out, but the Pentagon has its own internal logic to which folks like me aren’t privy. It usually boils down to m-o-n-e-y, and here all along I thought the mission at the DOD/Pentagon was to do the right thing for our guys and gals in uniform…. silly me!
Regarding the M1911, maybe the services have moved on from it, but I don’t see anyone volunteering to stand in front of one when it is going off! What the military-industrial complex considers “obsolete” is often a very different matter than reality.
The proof of that pudding was that the Afghans used a lot of “antique” Lee-Enfield bolt-action rifles in .303 to kill ~ 60,000 Red Army soldiers during the Soviet-Afghanistan conflict of the 1970s-1980s. Sure, there were plenty of modern AKMs and assault rifles, but plenty of the mujahadeen favored those old SLMEs, and they worked fine. And plenty of our guys and fellow ISAF personnel also faced those rifles during the GWOT.
In short, when it comes to small arms, old does not necessarily mean inferior or obsolete…
On October 10, 2023 at 12:42 am, Georgiaboy61 said:
@ Dirk
From what I hear, the F/A-18 is a great airframe, but how on God’s green earth is it going to prove to be as capable of CAS as the A-10?
Like the “SPAD” before, a.k.a. the Douglas Skyraider back in Vietnam, part of the effectiveness of the A-10 lies in its ability to be “low and slow” and loiter over the battlefield.
How does a fast-mover do that? Yeah I know that the miracles of modern avionics and electronic warfare can do a lot, but sometimes there is no replacement for being there.
And you don’t have to be an economist or efficiency expert to see that on a cost/shot basis, the A-10’s GAU cannon is cheaper than the missiles the F/A-18 would use.
The wild card in all of this is unmanned aircraft replacing manned assets entirely, but that’s not my bailiwick so I’ll leave that to others, except to say that if UAVs are going to rule the skies over ground battlefields soon, how does it make sense to transition to something like the F/A-18 instead of just keeping the Warthogs flying for a while longer? Again, follow the money…right??