Corporal Chad Wade

Tomorrow we are burying another Marine Corporal Chad Wade. I did not know Cpl Wade but he is a Marine and therefore my brother. Rest in Peace and may God bless him and his family.

This will be all of my writing tonight.

Hezbollah

I know I keep coming back to these clowns even though we have a full on shooting war going on if Afghanistan and it has been over 25 years since Hezbollah has challenged the U.S. directly.

For those that may not know it I had a paper on Hezbollah published a couple of months ago. The paper was criticized as such things are with a lot of passion for and against my theory that Hezbollah was as dangerous as al-Qaeda if not more so.

Today it is read that Hezbollah has been supplied with 50,000 missiles including Scud - D and Fatah-110. If anyone thinks that Hezbollah is anything but a terrorist organization study the 2006 war with Israel. Yes I will concede that there was conventional ground combat and the Israelis got more than they bargained for attacking the strength of Hezbollah's defenses. However lobbing unguided missiles at population centers is just as much an act of terrorism as a suicide bomber. I could even understand if Hezbollah aimed these unguided missiles at military formations or bases they did not do this either. Therefore by all defenitions of terrorism Hezbollah was guilty.

It is going to come down to a matter of Hezbollah having to be dealt with one way or another.

Reading for the weekend

I just got done reading the final report on the Battle of Wanat in Afghanistan's Korengal valley. The first thing I took away from this report was a great deal of pride in the 101st, Marine, and ANA troopers and Marines defended their position in the face of an overwhelming amount of firepower. To have as one 101st member describe "RPG's landing like machine gunfire" in addition to a huge amount of small arms that were being used and to be able to fight back for an how before air support arrived is a credit to all of these men.

The Army Has a new toy

The XM-25 a weapon system that is supposed to change the rules of warfare. The Army is sending this to Afghanistan as we speak. This weapon is supposed to make the use of trenches, foxhole, etc useless. Every squad and Spec Ops team in the army is supposed to get one of these weapons. Here is the video from the manufacturer ATK. I would imagine this replacing one M203 per squad but it is also taking away one M4 unless the Army plans on either increasing the size of their squads or wants some poor grunt to carry the XM-25 and a rifle. I pity that poor guy. Currently this weapon is useless in house clearing and while it can take care of guy hiding in buildings what about when you have to go in?

I am sure the army has thought about all this but I am just saying. Also this weapon still does not outrange the RPG-7. Which the terrorists in Iraq and Afghanistan seem to use like a rifle.

Will have to wait and see on this one.

Something Interesting I missed

Way back on February of of this year Mohammed Haqqani brother of Siraj Haqqani was killed in a drone strike in North Waziristan.

The Rifle v Carbine Argument is back

This also includes the Marine Corps statement by Gen Conway “We are never going to be a carbine Marine Corps, OK. We’re never going to go completely to the M4. We’re a rifle Marine Corps. We believe in long-range shooting skills, and those skills are just not as resident in a carbine as they are in a service rifle.” Meanwhile the Army is going full tilt with the smaller M4 and are investing a lot of money in upgrading it.

While a new 5.56 round the Special Operations Science and Technology (SOST) that is more lethal is beginning to see use in the Army's M4s and the Marines M16A4 it still comes down to a matter of ballistics. The 5.56 round in its current form is its most lethal when used from a 20" barrel rifle. While the M4 is handier in urban fighting and when having to get in and out of vehicles accuracy begins to suffer much beyond 200 meters. While not an issue in a highly urbanized country like Iraq in Afghanistan long distance shooting is a norm. The Army predicts that most modern combat will be against urban insurgents however we are in one shooting war where long range shooting capabilities is a plus.

While on the topic reliability needs to be discussed while the M16A4 seems to work well enough however the M4 has had issues. During the Battle of Wanat One staff sergeant described how his M4 failed him early in the battle. “My M4 quit firing and would no longer charge when I tried to correct the malfunction,” said the soldier, identified as Staff Sgt. Phillips in a draft analysis paper on the battle written by the Army Combat Studies Institute at Fort Leavenworth.

If I were the Sec Def I would gather my Joint Chiefs and tell them that all the services were adapting the AK model in 5.56. The 18" barrel and side folding stock will make the Army happy for compactness and the Marines still are using rifle. The Galil would work but is rather heavy AKs are being produced here in the states and production is not hard which is why the Soviets/Russians still use them. Are they a precision weapon, no, but they will run all day YES.
I personally would have a weapon that is practically accurate and not a precision tack driver.

Thoughts?

Next couple of days

Captain's Journal has done me the honor of posting a paper I wrote. I did not put it here because I really have few readers. I will link when it is up.