Gunnie News
Interesting stuff from The Trainer. Notably:
The military needs 7.62 M14s so bad that it is buying them from Springfield Armory and buying back lots that were sold to other NATO countries.
I thought they had a ton of these mothballed somewhere.
April 19th, 2006 at 10:50 am
Clinton had them destroyed in ’96 so that he didnt have to, as required by law, send them an/or auction them to the CMP and other civilian organizations.
April 19th, 2006 at 11:08 am
I thought that was just an urban legend. Mainly for the reasons of, “he wouldn’t actually do anything that dumb!?!” I mean, for all the things Clinton is and isn’t, a smart politician is towards the top of the list of things he is.
April 19th, 2006 at 12:43 pm
Why would that surprise you, ’06?
Destroying those eeeeevil assault weapons before they could fall into the hands of the NRA-lovin’ gun nuts? That fits right into Bill “Bastard” Clinton’s anti-gun M.O.
Right along with the AWB and the Brady Bill {spit}
April 19th, 2006 at 2:21 pm
Add in the fact that the .gov never did buy a really large number of M-14s in the first place. To my understanding, even the whole of the active Army didn’t have M-14s before they were phased out in favor of the M-16. And remember that semi-famous photo of peace activists sticking flowers down the barrels of NG troops rifles? Those rifles were M1s, and that was the late 60s.
April 19th, 2006 at 2:28 pm
They probably do have a lot mothballed somewhere. But why use what you already own when you can waste taxpayer dollars buying more?
April 19th, 2006 at 4:37 pm
But why use what you already own when you can waste taxpayer dollars buying more?
x2
April 19th, 2006 at 6:08 pm
I guess I’m just not cyincal enough… Silly me assumes that selling things for millions of dollars is a better move than destroying them at a cost of approaching millions of dollars. (Ray Nagin, call your office, re: cars.)
April 19th, 2006 at 6:35 pm
AughtSix – I think you need to get more cynical. When it comes to most Democrat politicians and anything related to guns, it’s almost guaranteed that the rational thing will NOT be done.
That said, I ain’t sellin’ MY Springfield match rifle to the gov., even if they ask real nice.
April 19th, 2006 at 6:43 pm
The Trainer doesn’t give a source for this news. I’m sceptical. It’s certainly true that many of the special OP/seal/delta groups have individual budgets to buy whatever they want. That MIGHT be what his source is referencing.
The Military didn’t have millions of M14s, but they had enough. I helped teach a class that had them issued from the Anniston depot. They came in every kind of shape and variant, but they seemed to have plenty last year.
IMPO, the USG needs to get the AR10 platform going. That’s an up-to-date 30 cal platform, much preferable to the M14 design.
April 20th, 2006 at 12:59 am
They have selected an AR10-type (not sure who makes it). They call it the SASS-Semi-Auto Sniper System. As the name implies, it’s intended for snipers. Battlefied data, at least from Iraq, has shown that rapid follow up shot capability to be more important than absolute accuracy.
April 20th, 2006 at 8:58 am
“All interesting stuff coming from the latest issue of Combat Arms”
A source only slightly less unimpeachable than the National Enquirer. Why doesn’t “The Trainer” glean his weapons news from Wikipedia, or the general discussion forum at THR or Arfcom? It’d be about as accurate.