Marine: A Guided Tour of a Marine Expeditionary Unit

by Tom Clancy

  The key to hitting targets with a semi-automatic pistol like the M9/92F is correctly holding, or gripping, the weapon. The subject of proper pistol grip provokes endless debate among shooters, and there is probably no best way to hold a pistol, but the grip currently favored and taught by the Corps works well. Sergeant Becket had me firmly grip the pistol in my right hand, and then grip over the holding hand with the fingers of the left hand, making sure that the palm of the grip hand is on the surface of the pistol grip. The idea is to create a rigid mount for the weapon, as well as to maximize the surface area of your hands in contact with the weapon. Once you have the proper grip, you thumb the safely to the Off position, and are ready to shoot.

  As with shooting combat and sniper rifles, the Marine Corps teaches pistol shooters to use the sights to get aimed fire. This is not just to save ammunition. In a pistol shootout, the first shooter to score a hit almost always wins. The USMC theory of pistol shooting requires that every shot be aimed from the sights, even if it takes a bit more time. Even with trained shooters like policemen, pistol shooting is, in a word, hideous. Forget what you see on television and in the movies. Accurate pistol fire from beyond about five yards/meters is almost unheard of. For example, in the last twenty years there are painfully few recorded instances of New York City policemen hitting anything beyond twenty-five feet/eight meters with a pistol. For this reason, the Marines teach pistol shooters to carefully get the proper grip, calmly line up the target through the sights, and then squeeze off one round. Repeat the procedure until the target drops. This procedure will almost guarantee victory and survival in a showdown at close quarters.

  With the target in the sights, you gently squeeze the trigger until the weapon fires. This can be a little disconcerting to new users of the M9/92F, because of the double action for safety on the first shot (you have to pull the trigger over a cam to fire). There is a feeling of pulling the trigger forever before the first round fires. But when the M9/92F fires, it is smooth and clean, with the round hitting a white "witness plate" target about 6 in./15.25 cm square placed about 16 feet/5 meters away. Once the M9/92F fires its first round, the trigger becomes single-action (short pull) and the shooting much easier. After each shot, Sergeant Becket coached me to line up and check my grip. And soon I was consistently hitting with round after round. After the fifteenth shot, he had me thumb the magazine release, and rapidly slide in a fresh one. At this point, the weapon is still cocked, so all you have to do is check that the safety is Off and fire the first round of the magazine as before. By the time we were done, the white paint of the target witness plate was scarred and worn, testament to the sergeant's coaching skill!

  Though there are equally good weapons from manufacturers like Glock, FN, and Colt, I like the Beretta. While 1 personally favor a single-action weapon like the 9mm Browning Hi-Power myself, the safety and reliability of the M9/92F make it an excellent weapon for military use. With minimal training, a shooter can expect to hit a target within killing range. And the 9mm NATO standard ammunition makes it fit well into the logistical chain of almost any nation.

  Colt.45-Caliber M1911 MEU (SOC) Pistol

  The USMC has almost a reverence for the old M 1911 Colt .45-caliber semi-automatic pistol. Its stopping power is legendary: It was designed to take down charging machete-wielding Filipino insurgents. The original M 1911 was replaced by the M 1911A1 in 1925, and nearly all existing weapons in Federal armories were upgraded to the new configuration. After that, the Colt became such a fixture that when the Department of Defense decided to issue the M9/92F in 1985, many Colt .45 users considered it just short of treason. Despite the .45's reputation for kicking like a mule and having the accuracy of a blunderbuss, it was loved by generations of American fighting men, particularly Marines. Thus, in 1986 there was general delight when the USMC decided to bring back a special version of the Colt, the MEU (SOC) pistol. The MEU (SOC) is a rebuilt and modified M 1911A 1 Colt .45, issued as a backup weapon to reconnaissance units equipped with the MP-5N. It was selected over other pistols for its inherent reliability and the greater lethality of the .45-caliber projectile, which weighs about twice as much as a 9mm bullet. Despite the limited inventory of five hundred units maintained by the Corps, the almost spiritual attachment of Marines to the M1911A1 guarantees support for this weapon.

  The specially built MEU (SOC) pistol, constructed from an M1911 Colt.45. These unique handgun are issued to Marines for close-quarters battle.

  JOHN D. GRESHAM

  The MEU (SOC) pistols are manufactured from existing Colt M1911A1 .45-caliber pistols (there are thousands in storage). They are rebuilt at Quantico by the armorers of Colonel Nance's Weapons Training Battalion. After each M1911A1 frame is stripped and checked for structural soundness, the following modifications are made:* A commercial competition-grade ambidextrous safety.

  * A precision barrel and trigger assembly.

  * Extra wide, rubber-coated safety grips.

  * Rounded hammer spur.

  * High-profile combat sights.

  * Stainless-steel seven-round competition-grade magazines with a rounded plastic follower and an extended floor plate.

  These improvements make the MEU (SOC) pistol more "user friendly." They also make the MEU (SOC) pistol one of the most comfortable and accurate hand-guns I have ever fired.

  I was given the chance to fire one of the MEU (SOC) pistols at the same distance and target as the Beretta. I've fired my share of .45-caliber pistols before, and the M1911A1 has always been a beast. Even with my size and weight, the M1911A1 always left me bruised and battered, with little damage to the targets. The MEU (SOC) pistol is different. Using the same grip and sighting technique as I used on the Beretta, I got a string of hits on my first magazine. A single-action trigger makes it smoother to fire than the Beretta, and the reduced recoil is easy on even small-handed shooters. Seeing the damage .45-caliber rounds were doing to the target witness plates, I could only imagine what they would do to a human target. This weapon is more than accurate and deadly; it is fun to fire, much like the MP-5N. I could have spent the whole day firing it under Sergeant Becket's coaching. Eventually I had to regretfully give it back. The MEU (SOC) is the finest large frame pistol you will never be able to buy. And I want one!

  An M249 Squad Automatic Weapon (SAW). The SAW is a 5.56mm fully automatic machine gun, and one is assigned to each four-man Marine fire team.

  JOHN D. GRESHAM

  M249 Squad Automatic Weapon (SAW)

  When the first machine guns appeared in the late 1800s, they revolutionized warfare. Until the introduction of the tank, machine guns ruled the battlefield. For many years infantry leaders longed for a machine gun that a man could carry, to set up a base of fire to support squad-level operations. As early as 1916 Marines used the French M1909 Benet-Mercie, license-built by Colt, in the Dominican Campaign; and by 1917 they had some British Lewis guns. During World War I, the U.S. Army resisted the idea of a light machine gun, fearing that it would lead to excessive ammunition waste. Instead it adopted the famous M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR), which entered service in the last two months of the war. This 22-1b/10 kg weapon fired standard .30-06 ammunition from a twenty-round clip. Even though the twenty-round clip limited the rate of sustained fire to about sixty rounds per minute--half the firepower of a typical belt-fed bipod-mounted light machine gun--and the effective range was also shorter, the BAR was robust and reliable. The Marines liked it so much they made it the centerpiece of the fire team. Unfortunately, the BAR stayed in service too long, a problem most often noted by those who had to lug the damned thing around the battlefield.

  In 1957 the BAR was replaced by the M60, a close copy of the World War II German MG42 light machine gun. The Army "improved" that design, which led to frequent stoppages and jams, poor durability, and barrels prone to overheating. It fired 7.62mm ammunition instead of the 5.56mm/.223-in. round used by the M16. Thus, a platoon with both weapons had to manage two separate ammunition supplies, co
mplicating logistics. Also, the M60 was still very heavy (at 18.75 lb/8.5 kg) to be lugging around with 10 to 20 1b/4.5 to 9 kg of ammunition. Thus, M60 gunners dreamed of a lighter weapon which would be easier to carry and operate, use the same 5.56mm/.223-in. ammunition as the M 16, and carry more rounds for the weight.

  By the late 1970s, the Army and Marines agreed to procure a non-developmental (i.e., "off-the-shelf") replacement for the M60 in rifle squads. After many models were evaluated, the winner was a weapon from Fabrique Nationale (FN) of Belgium. This became the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon (SAW), first issued to Army and Marine units in the mid-1980s. Since then a "Product Improvement Program" kit has modified the barrel, grips, stock, buffer, and sights. The M249 is an attractive little weapon, not much larger than an M16A2. With a folding bipod and tool kit, it weighs only 15.2 lb/6.9 kg and is some 40.9 in./103.8 cm long. A sling allows the gunner to fire it from over the shoulder when on the move. It can accept either the thirty-round 5.56mm/.223-in. magazines of the M 16A2, or a two-hundred-round belt (which is preferred). The belted ammunition comes in a plastic box, which weighs only 6.9 lb/3.1 kg. This is a vast improvement over the M60, in terms of the weight a fire team has to lug around the battlefield. Marines issue one M249 to each four-man fire team. The other three team members have M16A2s, and one of these comes with a M203 40mm grenade launcher, so that each fire team has a machine gun, three combat rifles, and a grenade launcher. Quite a lot of firepower for just four men.

  For my demonstration, Colonel Nance's instructors had flipped down the folding bipod legs at the front of the M249 so that I could fire from a prone position. This is the most comfortable and accurate way to fire the M249, because it tends to spread the recoil over three points (the two bipod legs and your shoulder), limiting the movement of the weapon. As I mentioned earlier, you can load the weapon either from the bottom with a 30-round M16 magazine or a 200-round belt which feeds across the top of the SAW. To load, you attach a plastic belt box to the left side of the SAW. This done, you raise the receiver cover and pull the belt over and across the receiver feed tray, align the first round over the feed tray, and close the cover. Then you pull back the cocking handle to load the first round, release the safety, and pull the trigger.

  The SAW fires at a satisfying 725 rounds a minute. While you are putting a lot of rounds onto the target, the weapon is not cycling so quickly that you cannot control it. You can fire single shots or short bursts easily, or empty a whole box of two hundred rounds in just over 16.5 seconds. Accuracy of the M249 is quite good. The sights are more complex than those on the M 16A2 (with adjustment knobs for elevation and windage), but when properly adjusted, they help you to consistently put rounds on target out to an effective range of about 1,000 meters/3,281 feet. I was able to put a stream of bullets right into the chest of a man-sized target at 200 yards/183 meters without difficulty. When you fire the M249, there is a solid feel with very little kick or travel. Firing the SAW is so nice that before long, you begin to feel invulnerable and omnipotent. As an SAW gunner, you have to deny yourself this feeling, because you are no better protected than any other infantryman, just better armed. If the SAW has a vice, it is the one common to all machine guns, a tendency to jam during long bursts. This is one reason why short bursts are encouraged (the obvious desire to conserve ammunition is another reason). The SAW is easily cleared in the event of a jam, simply by lifting the cover plate and pulling the jammed round clear. The M249 SAW is an excellent light machine gun. Its standard M988 5.56mm/.223-in. ammunition means that every Marine in a four-man fire team now fires the same ammunition, simplifying logistics and maximizing the utility of a team's load. I like it!

  M240G Light Machine Gun

  When the Army and Marines replaced the M60 at the squad/fire team level, they also had to replace it in other medium-machine-gun roles. In its final version, the M60E3, it had been used as a pintle-mounted weapon on vehicles and aircraft (M-1 tanks, trucks, helicopters, etc.), as well as in heavy weapons platoons. In these roles, the 5.56mm/.223-in. round really does not have the hitting power and range required, so the M60E3 with its 7.62mm round was retained well past its prime.

  The Army and Marine Corps finally found the ultimate replacement for the M60E3 in the M240G. Gunners like it for its reliability and reduced maintenance requirements. The M240G is basically a scaled-up M249 SAW, firing 7.62mm ammunition. Designed and built by FN of Belgium, the M240G is a lightened version of the original M240. The 240G is functionally identical to the M249 SAW, except for the following features:* It is longer (47.5 in./ 120.6 cm) and heavier (24.2 lb/ 11 kg) than the M249, or for that matter, than the M60E3. This is the main "down" side to the M240G.

  * The M240G fires the NATO-Standard 7.62mm ammunition instead of the 5.56mm/.223-in. rounds. This makes for better hitting power and greater effective range (out to 1.1 miles/ 1.8 km).

  * It has three selectable rates of fire, between 650 and 950 round per minute.

  Aside from these differences, the M240G is almost identical to the SAW. Now every medium machine gun in the U.S. military inventory will come from the same basic family. Like its little brother, the M249 SAW, the M240G is popular with the troops, though the Marine recruiters joke that they are looking for bigger recruits to lug it around the battlefield!

  Combat Shotguns

  In really close combat, there is nothing better than a shotgun (except maybe a flamethrower!) for hitting power. Marines use three different though similar commercial shotguns for CQB missions. The Remington 870, Winchester 1200, and Mossberg 590 have all been adapted for combat by adding a bayonet attachment, sling, and a phenolic buttplate to soften the recoil. Shotguns are not carried as a primary weapon (like the M 16A2 or MP-5N), but as special secondary weapons for use at close quarters. In addition to the obvious anti-personnel role, they can also be used to blow open a door (by blasting the lock or demolishing the hinges); and they make a fine "non-lethal" riot-control device. A new family of shotgun shells from MK Ballistic Systems, called Flexible Baton-12, fires projectiles that look like small rubber beanbags. These deliver enough force to knock down a human being, without the blunt trauma often associated with so-called "rubber" bullets.

  Colonel Nance and his staff are now preparing to evaluate a more capable combat shotgun. Though the actual weapon has yet to be selected, it will certainly have a large magazine (thirty rounds or more), and provide a semi-/fully automatic firing capability. When the Marine Corps puts its stamp of approval on this new shotgun, it is likely to be procured by law enforcement agencies all over the world.

  Foreign Weapons

  Quietly and discreetly, Colonel Nance's Weapons Training Battalion introduces new Marines to some of the weapons that they may face or capture on future battlefields. The first reason is obvious: Marines in the field should recognize the sound of an enemy weapon being fired, and know to get down out of the line of fire. Many weapons, like the ubiquitous AK-47 combat rifle, have a highly distinctive sound signature, and knowing this can help you locate its firing position. In addition, knowing an enemy weapon allows you to identify its weaknesses, possibly giving you an edge in combat. Finally, Marines have to be ready to fight with what they can get if they are lost, cut off, or even abandoned (remember Wake Island and Guadalcanal). To this end, new Marines are indoctrinated in the characteristics of weapons used by other nations. Many of the foreign weapons that Marines learn about at Quantico are of crude but effective design like the AK-47. Thus, knowing how to use them will continue to be an important battle skill for Marines.

  Grenades, Mines, Explosives,

  and Breaching Tools

  While firearms are the primary tools of an infantryman, there are times when a gun will not do. Ordnance engineers like to say that there is no condition in the human experience that cannot be solved by an appropriately shaped, sized, timed, and detonated charge of high explosive. Explosive weapons have had an important place in close combat since the invention of the grenade several hundred years a
go. Today's Marines can carry a variety of grenades, mines, and other devices in their rucksacks, and we're going to take a look at them here.

  Hand Grenades

  Shortly after gunpowder reached the West in the Middle Ages, some creative warrior took a handful of the new explosive, packed it into a container, lit a fuse, and threw it at his enemy. This was a good idea when it worked. The problem was that it didn't work all that often. Early grenades were frequently more dangerous to their users than their intended victims. Because of the unreliability of the explosive and fuses, you could never really be sure they were going to go off, or how big an explosion ("lethal blast radius") you would get.

  Modern grenades commonly used by Marines include: * M67 Fragmentation Grenade-Weighing 14 oz/.4 kg, it carries an explosive charge of 6.5 oz/ 184.6g of Composition B. When you pull the pin and release the safety handle (called a "spoon"), there is roughly a four-to-five-second delay prior to detonation. When it goes off, it spews fragments out to a lethal distance of around fifteen meters/forty-nine feet. The user must either be under cover when it explodes, or throw it far enough to be safe from the blast.