Archive for the 'Army' Category

Military.com:

Preliminary results of an Army test to see how the service’s M855A1 5.56mm round performs in Marine Corps weapons show that the enhanced performance round causes reliability and durability problems in the Marine M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle, service officials say.

The Marine Corps in March added the M27 and the M16A4 rifles to the Army’s ongoing testing of M855A1 Enhanced Performance Round at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland after lawmakers questioned why the Army and the Marines use two different types of 5.56mm ammunition.

“One of the reasons we were doing that test was because of congressional language from last year that said ‘you two services need to look at getting to a common round,’ so we heard Congress loud and clear last year,” Col. Michael Manning, program manager for the Marine Corps Infantry Weapon Systems, told Military.com in a Dec. 15 Interview.

Lawmakers again expressed concern this year in the final joint version of the Fiscal 2017 National Defense Appropriations Act, which includes a provision requiring the secretary of defense to submit a report to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees explaining why the two services are using different types of 5.56 mm ammunition.

[ … ]

The Army replaced the Cold War-era M855 5.56mm round in 2010 with its new M855A1 EPR, the result of more than a decade of work to develop a lead-free round.

The M855A1 features a steel penetrator on top of a solid copper slug, making it is more dependable than the current M855, Army officials have said. It delivers consistent performance at all distances and penetrates 3/8s-inch-thick steel at ranges approaching 400 meters, tripling the performance of the M855, Army officials maintain.

First of all, my former Marine Daniel laments the transition from the SAW to the IAR.  It’s all part of the softening of the USMC.  They should still be deploying the SAW.  But let’s assume that whatever problems they’re having with the IAR, they would have with the SAW too.

About this being a better round, I think the Army is lying.  That isn’t what I hear.

The Army M855A1 had a LOT of problems in development. Wearing down barrels, damaging the chambers, requiring new magazines because of the feed angle

Folks, they threw ballistics to the wind, didn’t consider what’s best for killing, and decided to go all green with their ammunition (this isn’t the only area they did this, witness the push for solar panels on military bases with the use of defense dollars).

And about this, commenter Fred tells it like it is.  “It’s green, why won’t you understand that? It’s green for everyone’s benefit especially the children. What is wrong with you people who can’t understanding destroying whole countries in a friendly, environmentally sound, and loving way is green?

Lets wreck this whole motherfuckin’ city and blow it up and kill millions of people but, let’s do it in an environmentally responsible way.”

Military.com:

So it doesn’t seem that the Army or the Marine Corps are in any hurry to explain to Congress why they don’t use a common 5.56mm round.

The final joint version of the Fiscal 2017 National Defense Appropriations Act includes a provision requiring the secretary of defense to submit a report to the House and Senate Armed Services Committees explaining why the two services are using different types of 5.56 mm ammunition for their M16A4 rifles and M4 carbines.

The bill has already passed the House and is expected to be voted on and approved by the Senate this week before going to President Obama’s desk for his signature.

This is not the first time Congress has gotten its dander up over this subject. Lawmakers asked both services to explain the same thing last year, but Marine Corps leaders said they need to do more testing of the Army’s M855A1 enhanced 5.56mm round.

I reached out to the Marine Corps yesterday and the Army today to ask about how they planned to deal with the request. I could almost hear the head-scratching as if neither service had heard anything about it.

According to the provision, the report must be submitted within 180 days after the bill, which includes the entire defense budget for the coming year, is enacted.

If the secretary of defense does not determine that an “emergency” requires the Army and Marine Corps to use the two different types of rifle ammo, they must begin using a common 5.56mm round within a year after the bill is passed, it states.

OK so here is the back story for those you out there who don’t know it.

The Army replaced the Cold-War era M855 5.56mm round in 2010 with its new M855A1 enhanced performance round, the end result of more than a decade of work to develop a lead-free round.

The M855A1 features a steel penetrator on top of a solid copper slug, making it is more dependable than the current M855, Army officials have maintained. It delivers consistent performance at all distances and performed better than the current-issue 7.62mm round against hardened steel targets in testing, Army officials maintain. It penetrates 3/8s-inch-thick steel at ranges approaching 400 meters, tripling the performance of the M855.

The Marine Corps had planned to field an earlier version of the Army’s M855A1 until the program suffered a major setback in August 2009, when testing revealed that the bismuth-tin slug proved to be sensitive to heat which affected the trajectory or intended flight path.

The setback prompted Marine officials to stay with the current M855 round as well as start using the MK 318 Special Operations Science and Technology round developed by U.S. Special Operations Command instead. Commonly known as SOST ammo, the bullet isn’t environmentally friendly, but it offered the Corps a better bullet after the Army’s M855A1 round failed.

Since then the Marine Corps has purchased millions of MK 318 rounds.

The MK 318 bullet weighs 62 grains and has a lead core with a solid copper shank. It uses an open-tip match round design common with sniper ammunition. It stays on target through windshields and car doors better than conventional M855 ammo.

The Army quickly replaced the bismuth-tin slug in its new round with a copper one, solving the bullet’s problems in 2010, Army officials said.

The new Army round also weighs 62 grains and has a 19-grain steel penetrator tip, 9 grains heavier than the tip on old M855 ammo. Seated behind the penetrator is a solid copper slug. The M855A1 consistently penetrates battlefield barriers such as windshields more effectively than the M855, Army officials contend.

The accuracy of the MK 318 may not be what it’s cracked up to be.  However, for any of these heavier than 55 grain rounds, there is a detriment in muzzle velocity (these rounds lose up to 200 FPS), and that can actually make a difference in penetrating capability.

Suffice it to say that creation of an environmentally friendly round for the armed forces is laughable, and the main thing to be concerned about is ballistics.  It would be interesting if someone still in the service would weigh in on this debate.

But as for Congress being briefed on the details of the ammunition being chosen by the armed forces, I agree with one of the comments.  You may as well try to teach physics to a pig.

ABC News:

As gun ownership drops among young Americans and the Army trains a generation more accustomed to blasting out emojis on cellphones than taking aim at targets, drill sergeants are confronting a new challenge: More than half of raw recruits have never held, let alone fired, a weapon. Young people who form the bulk of the Army’s rookie soldiers don’t have nearly the exposure to guns as past generations. And the drill sergeants tasked with transforming these men and women into competent marksmen are going back into training to adjust their approach. Many are dropping the tendency to bark out orders and are adopting a more mentor-like coaching attitude. “You don’t hear any drill sergeants yelling, unless it’s a huge safety issue,” said Staff Sgt. Randy Fisher, one of about 600 drill sergeants working daily with recruits at South Carolina’s Fort Jackson, the Army’s largest basic combat training post. “We don’t want the soldiers to get all freaked out.” Amid deafening blasts of semi-automatic rifle fire at one of Fort Jackson’s 30 ranges, Army drill sergeants paced behind four dozen soldiers aiming M-4s at distant targets during a recent practice session. The hard-nosed, barked commands from the first days of basic training were absent. And though real bullets were being used, not one of the young recruits nor any sergeants wore heavy body armor or helmets. And, during a lull in the shooting, drill sergeants leaned over to offer guidance in measured tones to soldiers learning to fire.

My former Marine, Daniel, is thrilled he is no longer associated with a military like this.  His text reply to me concerning this article was this.

Oh …

My …

God …

Granted, he was a Marine, but even the Marine Corps is being pressed to send women through the Marine Corps infantry officer course at Quantico. We will lose the next legitimate war we fight.  But perhaps we’re already there.  A saddening question comes to mind.  The kill ratio of the U.S. military has been around 6:1 – 10:1 in both Afghanistan and Iraq.  What would it have been with no CAS, no AC-130 gunships, so helicopters, no A-10s?

It will get worse, as the U.S. government continues to fill the ranks of the military with weaklings, homosexuals, women and nonconformists (here you can safely assume what I would have to say about people like the Sikh Army Captain wearing nonconventional cover).  It’s a sad day for the U.S. military

Time:

As General Stanley McChrystal noted in the New York Times: “In 2014, 33,599 Americans died from a gunshot wound. From 2001 to 2010, 119,246 Americans were murdered with guns, 18 times all American combat deaths in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

Nightclubs have become battlefields.

Schools have become combat zones.

Movie theaters have become theaters of war.

This should anger us. It should make us want to do better. And we can.

While our gun-violence crisis is complex, there is no doubt that our weak, gap-ridden gun laws help fuel the violence by making it too easy for dangerous people to access firearms.

Right now under federal law, felons, domestic abusers and the dangerously mentally ill have the option of buying a gun without a background check and with no questions asked. Even people who are considered by the the Federal Bureau of Investigation to be a known or suspected terrorist can pass a background check and legally buy a gun.

Extremist groups like al-Qaeda and ISIS have long urged their followers to use our country’s weak gun laws to acquire deadly weapons and commit active shooter terrorism here in America.

So why has Congress refused to act to address these loopholes and to keep guns from falling into the wrong hands?

Congress in the grips of the Washington gun lobby.

There is a better way forward.

Earlier this year, I joined the Advisory Committee of the Veterans Coalition for Common Sense, a national initiative of distinguished veterans from all branches and ranks of the military who are committed to advancing commonsense solutions to gun violence here at home.

Some of us are combat veterans. Some of us are gun owners. All of us were trained in the responsible use of firearms and to have respect for their incredible power. All of us swore an oath to defend our Constitution and to defend the homeland. And we all agree on this: our country is in the grips of a gun-violence crisis.

We know there is no single policy that will prevent every gun tragedy here on our home soil, but we cannot afford to let perfect to be the enemy of good—not when innocent lives are at stake.

The policies we support—closing the loopholes in our background check system and prohibiting known and suspected terrorists from legally buying guns—are not controversial.

So apparently Chiarelli has joined the ranks of the gun controllers, or more probably he was always in their ranks and is of that particular ilk.  He invokes the emotional “terrorist watch list” card, but he knows that there shouldn’t even be any such thing as a terrorist watch list since it is concocted out of whole cloth by the unaccountable federal executive based on suppositions and conjecture.  He knows.  He just doesn’t care.

He has clearly aligned himself with the murderer Stanley McChrystal and adulterer David Petraeus.  Of these two I have made my own position clear.

… the irony is that McChrystal, who issued the most restrictive rules of engagement ever promulgated on American troops, waxes know-it-all on what it takes to keep our people safe.  He can micromanage the campaign, release a bunch of inept, bureaucratic, PowerPoint jockeys into highly protected mega-bases to command the troops under fire in the field, turn so-called general purpose troops into constabulary patrolmen, and become a laughingstock when his juvenile staff turned party-animal with Rolling Stone.  But he didn’t manage the campaign in such a manner as to keep our children in uniform safe in Afghanistan.  If he didn’t do that, why should I care what he has to say about anything else regarding my safety?

This is what happens when media stars think they know something about policy.  So here is a suggestion for Mr. McChrystal.  You go read the lamentations at this article from the families and widows of SFC Kenneth Westbrook, Gunnery Sgt Aaron M Kenefick, Corpsman James Ray “Doc” Layton, and others in the Ganjgal engagement.  You know the one I’m talking about, even if others have forgotten.  You and I will never forget.  The one where they left our men to perish without fire support because of your rules of engagement.  You sleep with this reality, if you can, you ponder on those men and their lives morning and night, and you lament with the widows and families.  And then you tell me why I should give a shit what you have to say about anything, much less what it takes to keep my children or loved ones safe?

… McChrystal, with his ROE, is a murderer.  I don’t give a shit what he says about anything.  As for Petraeus, he is an adulterer and that during deployment when men under his charge were suffering and dying.

I’m glad those are the best two men this ungodly bunch could come up with.  Those two men should be embarrassments to the gun controller crowd.  It gives me amusement and pleasure to have them as enemies.

Chiarelli is now part of the cool kids gang along with all of the other statists.  I’m glad to have him as an enemy.  But if he rationalizes his own adultery towards his oath to the constitution right after reminding us that he did in fact take such an oath, he makes matters worse by telling us that he has no respect whatsoever for those who served and suffered.  He invites veterans to break their oath as well.

My suspicion is that the ranks of veterans isn’t fertile ground for Chiarelli and his gang of cool kids.  But it should be enough that he thinks no more of you [veterans] than to surmise that you might be an oath-breaker just like him, and he would sooner see you sent to hell than lose his political fight to control other people and take their liberties.

What contemptible trash.  How sad that men such as him were in charge of any campaign at all.  They are all as bad as the corrupt politicians they serve, and dear veteran, if you side with them, you’re no better than they are.

Gazette Review has a very interesting article on what someone believes to be the world’s top ten special operations units (the article is titled special forces, but they got that part wrong).

I think that inclusion of Quds Force is insulting and laughable, and they are more of a gang or group of thugs.  Not surprisingly, SEALs top the list and the world’s best, with SAS coming in at number two and Delta Force at third place.  This is a little surprising, and I’ve always thought of Delta as being the world’s best, and I’ve also always been under the impression that Delta is entirely a tier 1 group whereas SEALs is made up of tier 1 plus others who aren’t relied upon as much as, say, SEAL Team Six.  I also may be somewhat jaded in my evaluation given the horrible arrogance, inappropriate tactics, lack of control and lack of proper planning that attended Operation Red Wings.

Then there is this paragraph.

First officially denied to have ever existed, and then the subject of countless books, movies and video games, Delta Force is now among the most recognized special forces units in the world. Despite having few officially recognized missions available for mention, Delta’s training regimen alone is enough to warrant their high placement on this list. First, nearly 70% of the recruits for Delta are experienced Rangers of the famed 75th regiment, whose training is equivalent to many of the premier special forces units in the world. Then once selected, recruits are put through a 6 month training and testing period which includes schooling from the FBI, FAA, CIA, and Secret Service. Much like their Israeli counter parts who were previously mentioned in this list, both on and off duty, Delta members lack any insignia and often do not even wear standard issue military uniforms; Likewise military style hair and facial grooming is not required. With their high level of training and low profile, operators from this unit have been seen in Afghanistan hunting Taliban members, helping Peshmerga forces in Syria fight off ISIS forces and assisting in evacuation, and even in 2016, aiding in the tracking and capture of the Mexican Cartel lord, El Chapo.

True enough, Delta has been known to send its members into countries almost in spying assignments to scout out enemies, evaluate tactics, plan operations and conduct a whole host of activities (sometimes in concert with the CIA and sometimes even with females in order to aid concealment and role playing).

But I find it odd that they are trained by the Secret Service unless it applies to protection of dignitaries (what can the secret service teach them except to party, shirk their duties and bed down with whores?).  I would think the list would have focused more on training in CQB, covert insertion and extraction, combat diver training, weapons training, communications and medical training, and dark operations.

But what do I know?

Popular Mechanics:

A recent competition hosted in part by the U.S. Army and designed to test core tank crew skills saw European crews take the top honors, while crews from the U.S. Army failed to place. The results raise the question of whether the Army—after more than a decade of focusing on guerrilla warfare—has devoted adequate training to address “big war” skills.

Held from May 10 to 12 and jointly hosted by the U.S. Army and the German Bundeswehr at the Grafenwoehr Training Area in Germany, the the Strong Europe Tank Challenge included challengers from six NATO countries: Denmark, Germany, Italy, Poland, and Slovenia—which sent tank platoons of four tanks each to compete— and the United States, which sent two platoons.

The competition involved tank crews conducting both offensive and defensive operations, and both mounted and dismounted activities. Crews fired ten main gun rounds from various positions. In one event, crews had to correctly identify 25 friendly and unfriendly (read: Russian) vehicles while traveling a course. Other events involved operating in the aftermath of a chemical weapons attack, dealing with improvised explosive devices, and medical emergencies.

A German tank crew from Mountain Panzer Battalion 7, Panzer Brigade 12 took top honors, followed by a Danish crew from their country’s 1st Tank Battalion in second. Third place went to a Polish crew from the 34th Armored Cavalry brigade. It’s unknown where the American crews placed, only that they weren’t in the top three.

But hey.  The upshot is that black females at West Point believe in black power, we now have gay pride events at the Pentagon, Navy Secretary Ray Mabus knows that green energy saves Marine lives, and they’re trying to push women through the Marine Corps officer school at Quantico despite the fact that every candidate so far has had pelvic fractures.

We may suck, but at least we’re culturally sensitive, green and color coordinated.

Army Times:

The Army just bought a new sniper rifle.

The service on Friday announced that it awarded a contract to Heckler & Koch to supply a precision rifle to replace the M110 made by Knight’s Armament.

The Army wanted to acquire a shorter, lighter, more accurate, more ergonomic and more reliable gun for marksmen, according to Program Executive Office Soldier’s product portfolio. The new Compact Semi-Automatic Sniper System should be easier to carry and use in close quarters than the M110 without sacrificing performance or accuracy, PEO said.

The FedBizOpps.gov award notice said H&K will produce a maximum of 3,643 rifles over 24 months, as well as spare parts and depot support, at a max contract value of $44.5 million. There’s a minimum purchase of 30 rifles for quality assurance testing.

The Army did not immediately respond to requests for comment, nor did Heckler & Koch. It is unclear from the FedBizOpps posting which model rifle won the contract, and whether it’s a commercially available gun, modification of one, or a new weapon.

The gunmaker’s website lists two precision rifles, one of which fits the Army’s desire for a rifle smaller than the M110: the G28. The gas-operated rifle fires the same 7.62mm ammunition (NATO standard) as the M110. Heckler & Koch lists a minimum length of 96.5 cm (about 38 inches) and weight of 5.8 kg (12.7 lbs). That makes it nearly 6 cm (2.5 inches) shorter and 1.3 kg (3 lbs) lighter than the M110 (unloaded and without a suppressor).

A Knight’s Armament spokesman said the company had no comment at this time.

It’s shorter but it doesn’t sacrifice accuracy.  Hmmm … or so says the Army.  What model?  Who knows, except the Army.  Available to whom?  Probably no one, except the Army.  Test results to be made public?  Eh, probably not, nothing said about that.  No comments from the Army, no comments from H&K, no comments from Knight’s Armament.  Except this from the always ubiquitous H&K marketing department.

At HK, we stuck a piston on an AR15, just like a bunch of other companies have done, dating back to about 1969. However ours is better, because we refuse to sell it to civilians. Because you suck, and we hate you.

Our XM8 is the greatest rifle ever developed. It may melt, and it doesn’t fit any accessories known to man, but that is your fault. If you were a real operator, you would love it. Once again, look at Rainbow Six, that G36 sure is cool isn’t it? Yeah, you know you want one.And by the way, check out our new HK45. We decided that humans don’t need to release the magazine with their thumbs. If you were a really manly teutonic operator, you would be able to reach the controls. Plus we’ve fired 100,000,000 rounds through one with zero malfunctions, and that was while it was buried in a lake of molten lava, on the moon. If you don’t believe us, it is because you aren’t a real operator.

By the way, our cheap, mass-produced, stamped sheet metal guns like the G3 and MP5 are the bestest things ever, and totally worth asinine scalpers prices, but note that cheap, mass-produced, stamped sheet metal guns from other countries are commie garbage. Not that it matters, because you’re civilians, so we won’t sell them to you anyway. Because you suck, and we hate you, but we know you’ll be back. We can beat you down like a trailer park wife, but you’ll come back, you always do.

Buy our stuff.

Sincerely

HK Marketing Department.  Because you suck.  And we hate you.

So there.

Military News:

Since 2002, military police, like many specialties across the Army, had to adapt to serve the mission on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Investigations and community relations took a backseat to foot patrols and base security. The wide-range of abilities military police are capable of narrowed so they could face the challenges at hand.

Soldiers and Airmen from Joint Base Lewis-McChord had an opportunity to get back to basics during civil disturbance training on the installation Jan. 25 to Feb. 4 to face those shifting challenges.

“Our MPs could be called out on a variety of situations,” said Sgt. 1st Class Steven Ketchum, an instructor with the 14th Military Police Brigade, Fort Leonard Wood, Mo. “National Guard MPs got called out in Ferguson (Missouri) and during other civil disturbances. Units don’t train civil-stability operations as much as they could.”

The Missouri National Guard mobilized 2,200 Guardsmen to keep the peace during rioting in Ferguson in the fall of 2014. Likewise, 3,000 Guardsmen were mobilized to assist Baltimore police last spring.

[ … ]

For a long time, Soldiers were trained to see the battlefield in stark terms — friendlies and enemies. Recent civil disturbances have exposed the limitations of that philosophy.

While preparing for Ferguson, National Guard briefings referred to citizens on the ground as “enemy forces” and “adversaries.” The Missouri National Guard corrected course, but they struggled to overcome the perception of being hostile occupiers as opposed to peacekeepers.

“We are helping to keep everyone safe, whether they’re rioting or not,” Loxsom said.

MPs learned many lessons from deployments around the world. Staying strong in the face of adversity, operating in difficult environments, and remaining flexible to meet the mission are hard-won traits that have become part of their DNA.

As the Army’s focus adapts to a changing security environment, MPs are changing with it. They are finding their future by getting back to basics.

Be sure to hear the nuance in the article.  “Enemy forces.”  Not good.  Need better PR.  Call them “everyone,” and tell them you want what’s good for them.  Call us “peacekeepers.”  The “future” of Army MPs is getting back to the “basics,” by which they mean stability operations.  Not breaking up fights between drunken Soldiers, but stability on the streets of America.

The times they are a changin’.

Stars and Stripes:

The Army granted a West Point-educated officer a rare religious accommodation that will allow him to wear a beard and turban, requirements of his Sikh faith.

Capt. Simratpal Singh, 27, was granted the appearance waiver last week that will allow him to grow his beard and hair and wear a turban through at least Jan. 8, Debra S. Wada, the assistant secretary of the Army for manpower and reserve affairs, wrote in a Dec. 9 letter. Singh is the fourth Sikh soldier in recent years to be granted such uniform exemptions.

Not to be outdone, the Marine Corps caved on females in combat after the pathetic Ashton Carter made it clear that the conclusion was done before the studies and bitching was ever started, and Commandant Robert Neller joined the chorus.

The top officer of the Marine Corps sent an unequivocal message to troops: It’s time to get behind the mandate to integrate women into combat units.

Gen. Robert Neller released a sternly worded video late Friday, a day after Defense Secretary Ashton Carter announced that all military jobs — including infantry and special forces positions — would be open to female troops by the start of next year.

The commandant tried to feign toughness when he said they are in danger of becoming Gucci gear people.

Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Robert Neller is proving to be quite the quotable general.

His way with words was on display last week at the I/ITSEC (Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference) in Orlando, Florida, when he reportedly said, “We’ve allowed ourselves to become Gucci gear people.”

That was his way of saying that military gear has become overly complicated, according to Jen Judson, a reporter for Defense News who attended the show.

Blah, blah, blah, yawn, blah, blah blah.  Yea, that’s the problem and that’s the answer.  Gear.  And take it away and make them use second rate gear.  Good grief.  I’m unimpressed.

This ain’t your grandfather’s or father’s army or marines.  They’re a shell of what they once were, and destined to become worse.  And the Air Force is focused on how to stop their football team from praying before games.  If you had as your intent to destroy the armed forces of the U.S., what would you have done any differently?

The drill Sergeant and his discipline has no place any more.

Stars and Stripes:

Surveys find that men in U.S. special operations forces do not believe women can meet the physical and mental demands of their commando jobs, and they fear the Pentagon will lower standards to integrate women into their elite units, according to interviews and documents.

Studies that surveyed personnel found “major misconceptions” within special operations about whether women should be brought into the male-only jobs. They also revealed concerns that department leaders would “capitulate to political pressure, allowing erosion of training standards,” according to one document.

Some of those concerns were not limited to men, researchers found, but were found among women in special operations jobs.

Dan Bland, force management director for U.S. Special Operations Command, said the survey results have “already driven us to do some different things in terms of educating the force.”

Well, there you go.  If the force believes that women can’t do the job, the only recourse is to educate them differently, because surely, surely, surely they must be wrong.  Otherwise the advocates of gender homogeneity would be wrong, and that couldn’t be the case because command says so because the administration and God-hating, elitist, Marxist liberal arts colleges around the nation say so.

Dan Bland responded the way he did because he has lost his soul and joined the dark side.

See category Women in Combat.