Scoop - Lileks refers us

Scoop - Lileks refers us to "Iraq Now", a blog by Jason van Steenwyk, a US Army officer currently in country.

Van Steenwyk touches on a topic that ties him to his anscestors 35 years ago in the jungles of Vietnam; hatred of the M16 rifle:

"Well, the secret's out. After months of combat, after Kosovo, after Bosnia, after Haiti, after Mogadishu, the Associated Press and the Army finally realized what we figured out after about 90 minutes on the ground: the M16 is too beaucoups for vehicle-intensive, urban peacekeeping operations. Story here.

The truth is, we seem to be the only suckers out here trying to fight with them. Most of the Cav guys carry carbines. The special ops guys around here all arm themselves with some variant of a carbine, or machine pistols such as the TEC 9 and HK. Ditto the Brits.

I just talked to a British paratrooper the other day. (See, Josh Marshall--we're not "all alone" as you say!). American troops gripe when their rotation goes beyond 6 months. He just spent five years patrolling the mean streets of Belfast. The British have been there for decades. You'd think they'd have learned a thing or two about urban counterinsurgencies.

We talked to some of his troops about their armaments. All of them carried a variant of the submachine gun design, with folding stocks or no stocks at all.

Even the insurgents are cutting the stocks off their AK-47s! "

No, this doesn't much pertain to politics in Minnesota. It's just fun to scoop Kim Du Toit on a gun-related story for once...

Posted by Mitch at November 24, 2003 05:59 AM