commander magazine 2 of 2

COMMANDER MAGAZINE 2

Yesterday we were talking about magazines for those infuriating semi-automatics you insist on owning.  I told you that the whole purpose of a semi is to dump rounds down range, which is why you DON’T want them post-apocalypse.  But I also know you hate me and refuse to listen to me and hence still live in the city and don’t have nice hair and own FLIR scopes and semi-automatic weapons.  Okay, whatever dude.  Since you DO own semi’s, you need to seriously consider if you have enough magazines.  Commander Zero, who is one of the few folks who passes as a cool dude in Yuppie Survival-dom, thinks you need forty mags per weapon.  Not per weapons system, per each individual gun ( or, that was my understanding anyway.  If you want details, read his damn blog.  I can‘t do ALL the work around here ). 

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Then I started talking about the M1 Carbine, because not only am I easily distracted by shiny objects, to me this seemed to be a direct inspiration to the M-16 and might shed some light on today’s tactical thinking.  Eugene Stoner was a Marine in the Pacific in WWII.  I don’t think it outside the realm of the probable that he either used a Carbine extensively or had buddies that did and he was stuck with a much heavier weapon that was so unwieldy that he felt it dangerous.  Either he enjoyed the Carbine or his buddies did, and this shaped his thinking.  Again, I am guessing.  I have read no material on the man previous to his engineering. 

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The Carbine wasn’t meant for front line infantrymen, but obviously when troops can get rid of turds and get better weapons, they do.  Evidently the Carbine was rather popular with the fighters.  Training doctrine was out of date and emphasized marksmenship, but it is my understanding that upon joining a unit the On The Job Training was orientated to suppressive fire.  Compared to all other fighting forces combined, the Americans alone had an insane surplus of everything.  It wouldn’t take combat vets long to learn to take advantage of the ammunition glut. 

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If you are fighting short ranges and you need overwhelming firepower, the Carbine has an advantage over the Garand.  There were Tommy Guns and ( I believe, at the time ) Grease Guns, but the Carbines proved the most popular.  Probably because it wasn’t REALLY a pistol round.  It was a step above in power and range.  Compared to a 30-06 of course it was a vile hunk of crap round.  But compared to a 45, it was impressive enough.  And they probably made and issued so many, there were plenty that found their way to infantrymen. 

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Now, here is what got my interest.  The two dudes are talking on You Tube “Forgotten Weapons”, and it was stated that the only two problems the Carbine had for the troops was that it could NOT be run dry and that the magazines were absolute crap.  So, you always over lubricated and you threw away your magazines every single time a new shipment of ammo came in, replacing them with brand new ones ( evidently the ammo always came packed with mags ).  The M-16 both needs to run wet and the magazines were designed to be disposable.

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What the M-16 did do was improve the round ( still light enough but packing much more punch at a further range  ) and the performance on full automatic ( the M2 Carbine broke bolts aplenty of full auto ).  It was still the Carbine tactically.  The premise was the same, by a combat vet.  Superior firepower for the infantryman who had a superior logistics situation backing him up.  Of course, as we know, Vietnam was the last Industrial Age Oil Age war.  All you preppers emulating an obsolete system. 

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But, looking at the M16 from its time of inception, perhaps not the worst idea the military ever had ( despite my hindsight insistence to the contrary ).  They don’t get a pass on replacing the Blooper with the horrid M203, nor substituting the Beretta for the 1911 ( the weapon was superior, but NOT the round ), nor the Hummer for the Jeep, but at least looking at it from Stoners perspective, I can give them a partial pass on the M16.  Good God!  I’m a superior human being, somewhat allowing stupidity to pass.  My magnanimousness is legendary.

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So, how many magazines do you think were used in combat in these systems?  I’m sure there is an Army study on new issue M16 magazines.  I remember being issued just one time a bandoleer of 223 ammo on stripper clips with the charger, but we never had any training ( unless it was a single offhand remark I forgot ) on saving or nor not saving magazines ( we were rear echelon combat troops, and loads consisted of two belts for the M60, never more than four M16 mags and the standard two clips for the 45 carried in the field or on base-if I’m recalling correctly.  Don’t place good money on that.  I do know it wasn’t enough ).  

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Now, obviously, the prepper doesn’t want to dump and forget a mag every 28 rounds.  But it would interest me to hear from veterans, or second hand from them, the realistic retention rate of magazines in combat.  I am of the mind that it probably isn’t very good.  Is forty magazines enough?  Not that I want to compare apples to oranges.  Preppers would have a concern from the beginning on proper savings of magazines in training.  And I don’t really like comparing the militaries combat to the more insurgent role preppers will most likely play.  But I have many questions here.

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We know that doctrine adapted on the battlefield was magazine disposal for the Carbine.  As has been mentioned oft times for Vietnam.  Is it still the same?  If not, are mags lost just the same?  At what rate?  If you practice ammo dumps with your AR-15, do you always assume you are able to police up your mags afterwards?  Is this realistic?  I’ll call this article, “fascinating but probably irrelevant”.  I hope you enjoyed anyway.

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