The M-16’s Troubled Debut

By Mark Carlson

Marine Private Jim McGarrah arrived at Phu Bai in South Vietnam in late 1967 and was sent to what was euphemistically called “The Rockpile,” a firebase that overlooked the Demilitarized Zone between South and North Vietnam. Before boarding a truck to the firebase, McGarrah was issued boots, helmet, flak jacket and other essentials by a grinning supply sergeant. The rifle he was given was a new Colt M-16A1, what the military brass were calling the “Miracle Rifle.” McGarrah and the other new “F—in’ New Guys,” (FNGs) were about to enter combat with the lightweight and fast-firing 5.56mm assault rifle. While he initially felt “invincible” with the M-16, McGarrah was soon to learn he had been given a weapon that was already proving to be unreliable in the jungles and highlands of Vietnam.

On his first day at the Rockpile he was on a makeshift firing range to get familiar with the M-16. Aiming at a destroyed jeep, he pulled the trigger. The sharp report of the high-powered round was satisfying, and the faint “twang” of the butt-mounted spring absorbed the recoil. Then he pulled the trigger again. Nothing. Another pull. Still nothing. He cycled the bolt and the spent round ejected and a fresh one was seated. But the gun refused to fire. This was a very disturbing sign for the new Marine rifleman. While McGarrah survived many firefights before being wounded in 1968 and sent home, he lived in constant fear of having his weapon fail him at the worst possible moment. He had good reason to think so and it was a common fear of the men who had been issued the M-16.

Scores, perhaps hundreds, of other soldiers, both Army and Marines, paid the ultimate price for being given a weapon they believed was virtually useless in combat.

In the June 1981 issue of Atlantic Monthly, James Fallows outlined what was largely unknown to the American public, “The machinations surrounding the Army’s adoption of the M-16 were a pure portrayal of the banality of evil. Between 1965 and 1969, more than a million American soldiers served in combat in Vietnam. One can argue that they should never have been sent there, but no one would argue that, once committed to battle, they should have been given inferior equipment. Yet that is what happened. During those years, in which more than 40,000 American soldiers were killed by hostile fire and more than 250,000 wounded, American troops in Vietnam were equipped with a rifle that their superiors knew would fail when put to the test.” According to Fallows, the “Ordnance Corps was an insular and overly traditional organization reluctant to accept new concepts or ideas that contrasted with their own blinkered concepts in weapon design.”

The story of the M-16 is one of destructive chicanery and prejudice in the highest levels of the U.S. Army’s bureaucracy bent on sabotaging the weapon. In fact, the development of the M-16 was the subject of later congressional hearings that criticized the Army’s management of the program and uncovered evidence of “near-criminal negligence,” but no prosecutions were initiated.

During World War II, the German arms designer Hugo Schmeisser developed a new concept in infantry weapons, the Sturmgewehr or Assault Rifle. The STG-44 was a revolution in weaponry—rapid fire like a submachine gun but with the high power and range of a shoulder rifle. The use of a redesigned .30 caliber bullet with a smaller powder charge made the new weapon deadly in the hands of German ground troops. Made largely of stamped metal fittings rather than machined parts, it was possible for the gun to be manufactured quickly and sent to the troops fighting on the Eastern Front by late 1943. By most accounts, the weapon was developed in secret, both from Allies and Adolf Hitler. The Führer did not want the infantry to carry anything but the standard bolt-action Mauser rifle, the mainstay of the Wehrmacht, or the short but deadly Schmeisser MP-40 Machine Pistol. But when the troops fighting in the East began raving about the effectiveness of the new weapon, Hitler soon thought it was the greatest thing ever invented. The story probably has some apocryphal elements, but is essentially true.

When the war ended, so the story goes, a Soviet Red Army enlisted man, Mikhail Kalashnikov, copied the concept of the STG-44 and used it as a model to create the most ubiquitous assault rifle in history. The gun used by armies, revolutionaries and terrorists across the globe, the distinctive Kalashnikov AK-47. More than a hundred million AK-47s have been manufactured since 1947.

There is no doubt the Soviet military embraced the new AK-47 assault rifle from the outset. But in the United States, there is a disturbing parallel between the Fuehrer’s initial resistance to the STG-44 Assault Rifle and that of the U. S. Army’s opinion of the ArmaLite AR-15, which would become the M-16. While Hitler’s original objection to assault rifles was based on a lack of understanding of its capabilities, the U.S. Army’s effort to keep the M-16 out of the nation’s arsenal is believed by some observers to have resulted in the needless deaths of scores of soldiers fighting in Southeast Asia in the mid-1960s.

The reason was the Army’s adamant belief that the fully automatic M-14, modified from the sturdy and beloved M-1 Garand semiautomatic rifle, was the best and only choice for the infantry of the future. And that belief was so strong that the Army not only refused to accept a superior weapon, but many observers felt it went out of its way to sabotage it.

The M-14 was initially born as the T-25, designed by Earl Harvey of Springfield Armory in 1945. After several refinements and improvements, the rifle, which used a powerful .30 caliber round, later adopted as the NATO 7.62mm bullet, the final T-44 was adopted by the Army as the M-14 in 1959. While it was a fully automatic rifle with a 20-round detachable magazine, the new weapon still had the hefty recoil of the earlier M-1 and at full auto, was difficult to keep on target. But it was a reliable weapon, and went into service by 1960.

What it really came down to was the size of the cartridge and bullet. The small caliber high velocity (SCHV) concept was first described in an American report by Robert Kent at Aberdeen Proving Ground in 1930. Kent showed that a smaller high-velocity round served as well as or better than the large 7.62mm round. At extremely high velocity a lighter bullet was inherently less stable and tumbled upon impact, inflicting larger wounds. But the OC remained faithful to the 7.62mm and the M-14 Rifle.

In other words the M-14 was largely adopted for logistics rather than actual combat—the Army had invested $500 million in its development and even though it was proven to be almost impossible to fire effectively at full auto, the die was cast.

Enter Eugene Stoner of ArmaLite, an arms manufacturer in Costa Mesa, California. Stoner recognized the superiority of smaller high-velocity rounds in both civilian and military use. Using lightweight stamped aerospace materials and plastic, Stoner created the AR-10, a semiautomatic rifle using the standard 7.62mm round. But it was apparent to Stoner a smaller round would work even better, and he went on to develop the AR-15, a rifle using a smaller .223 caliber bullet, used by NATO as the 5.56mm. This was almost the same caliber as the .22 LR known to all American hunters for plinking at rabbits and squirrels. With a larger cartridge and a thin jacket, the bullet was extremely fast at 3,200 feet per second, more than 400 FPS faster than the M-14’s 7.62mm round, and twice as fast as the .22 LR.

Moreover, the AR-15 was far easier to handle at full automatic than the heavier weapon. It weighed 2.5 pounds less than the M-14, and with the reduced weight of the ammunition, a soldier could carry three times as much ammunition. But ArmaLite, established in 1954 as a Division of Fairchild Engine and Airplane Corporation, was a small development company with no large-scale manufacturing capability. After the Army ruled in favor of the M-14 and directed cancellation of any project not in 7.62mm caliber, ArmaLite went to Cooper-MacDonald, Inc., the international arms sales and marketing firm in Baltimore that had handled the AR-10. Through Cooper-MacDonald, ArmaLite licensed the designs and trademarks of the AR-10 and AR-15 to Colt Firearms of Hartford, Connecticut, in January 1959 and manufacturing of the AR-15 began. Gen. Curtis E. LeMay, the Air Force Chief of Staff, had witnessed a demonstration of the AR-15 in Virginia. He was so impressed by its incredible hitting power, that he immediately ordered 80,000 of them for the Air Force.

Cooper-MacDonald, following its contract with Colt and Fairchild, sent its representatives with the rifle to the Far East to demonstrate it to military officers in the Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, Burma and India. The light weapon and ease of handling made it ideal for the smaller Asian races. It is interesting to note that they had all tested the M-14 and rejected it.

Meanwhile, The U.S. Army was testing the AR-15 under simulated combat conditions. In every way that mattered, the new weapon proved exceptional. It was light and easy to handle, reliable and accurate even when fired at full auto. Moreover, even when subjected to moisture, humidity, dirt, dust and other field conditions, it almost never misfired. Still, the Army brass, refusing to let go of their cherished M-14 and the larger round, was not about to admit the truth that the M-14 had been an expensive failure. They insisted the .223 caliber round was too puny for infantry use, regardless of the test results. In other words, they flatly rejected the AR-15 in its current form. This was the case as late as 1962, when the Air Force, having tested the weapon for its own use, and not being fettered to a larger gun, began issuing the new M-16 to its forces around the world for air base security. Another Government agency, the U.S. Secret Service adopted the M-16 for its own use. There was an M-16 in the Secret Service follow-up car in Dallas on November 22, 1963.

The Army’s final evaluation reported “the weapon was inferior in some respects to the M-14 and equal to it in others. Consequently, the gun in no way represented enough of an improvement in the state of the art to justify replacing the M-14.”

As the U.S. became more involved in the Civil War in Southeast Asia, a Ranger battalion, part of the Military Assistance Command Vietnam, or MAC-V, was shown the rifle by Cooper-MacDonald. Though unofficial, all who fired it were impressed. The DOD learned of the new weapon from outside the procurement process.

Enter Defense Secretary Robert MacNamara, famous for his “bean counter” approach to national defense. His“Whiz Kids,” a group of technocrats and mathematicians, were keen to save money by streamlining military procurements. MacNamara believed one plane, the General Dynamics F-111 fighter, could serve the Navy and the Air Force. As it turned out, the Navy version was scrapped in favor of the F-14 Tomcat. But his thinking on all the services using the same rifle was correct, but it would be a fight. After reading conflicting reports, Kennedy had MacNamara’s team evaluate it. They saw the M-16’s superiority to the M-14 right away. An Inspector General’s probe would later prove the Ordnance Corps (OC) had rigged the test in favor of the M-14.

A Cooper-MacDonald representative said, “We saw so much duplicity, chicanery, double-dealing, that (Cooper-MacDonald principle) Robert MacDonald was determined that if it took him to the grave he was going to get the Army to adopt this weapon because it was so superior.”

But the Army was not about to give in without a fight. In 1963 it was forced to begin purchasing the M-16 in large numbers. But what they bought was not the same rifle Stoner had designed. The OC decided to do what was essentially industrial sabotage. They insisted on three changes—an unnecessary “forward assist” was fitted to the right side of the receiver, the bore and chamber weren’t chromed, and an inferior Olin-Mathieson ball powder was used instead of the DuPont stick powder recommended.

Ostensibly, the forward assist, which added weight and complexity, was meant to “assure” soldiers that a push of the right thumb would more firmly seat the bolt into the firing chamber. No chrome-plating in the chamber meant powder fouling, rust, and corrosion. Since WWII the Army and Marines had known that humid Pacific environments needed the chrome plating. The Olin Ball powder, which left more residue in the bore, was the biggest mistake. It virtually guaranteed the modified rifle would experience stoppages and misfires outside of combat. The Olin-Mathieson powder was recycled and cheaper and the Army insisted it gave the weapon a slightly greater range. Stoner strenuously objected to the change in powder, but the Army insisted. Stoner warned that the ball powder burned more slowly and increased the rifle’s cyclic rate of fire, which virtually guaranteed it would suffer worn and broken parts, jams and stoppages, resulting in an unusable weapon. He was right.

When the Army began testing the modified M-16A1, it proved six times as likely to jam as the older version. With a contract to build 40,000 of the rifles per month, Colt was so concerned by the change in powder that they announced they could no longer guarantee the reliability of the M-16A1 in the field.

By 1965 the number of American troops in Vietnam had risen to more than 200,000, a number that would double by the end of the year. No longer considered advisors, the troops were now actively engaged in combat with North Vietnam soldiers, who were largely armed with the deadly and effective AK-47. Those men needed weapons.

The Army began shipping the new M-16A1 to its troops in 1966 and there were problems from the start. The rifles were issued without cleaning kits or manuals. Troops were told to load only 16 rounds into the 20-round ammo magazine in order not to wear out and weaken its spring. A live round left in the chamber overnight in Southeast Asia’s humidity was often frozen in place, causing the extractor to tear off the base, leaving the weapon useless.

Soldiers were told the weapon was easy to maintain and “self-cleaning.” They were encouraged to go to the perimeter and fire a few rounds to familiarize themselves with it. As with Jim McGarrah’s own experience at Phu Bai, this was a recipe for disaster. The OC’s modifications to the M-16A1 were meant to make it fail.

One of the first poor reports from the field came in 1967, according to Fallows, from a letter sent by a Marine officer to Senator Gaylord Nelson (D) Wisconsin, who already opposed the war.

“The weapon has failed us at crucial moments, when we needed firepower most,” wrote the Marine. “It left Marines naked to their enemies in each case, and this is no exaggeration, as many as sixty percent of the rifles failed to operate. I know of at least two Marines who died within ten feet of the enemy with jammed rifles.”

Another letter to home said, “You know what killed most of us? Our own rifles, the M-16. Practically every one of our dead in a recent battle was found with his rifle torn down next to him where he’d been trying to fix it.”

The Army mulishly responded by stating the Soldiers were not cleaning the rifles properly.

It did not take long for such failures to infect the rest of the Army soldiers and Marines fighting in Vietnam and the M-16’s reputation plunged. More letters decrying the weapon’s unreliability reached the attention of the U.S. Legislature. Democratic Congressman Richard Ichord of Missouri, in his role as a member of the House Armed Services Committee launched an investigation into the matter. Among the witnesses were members of the insular OC who testified that the change to ball powder was justified. Stoner believed that the OC was trying to discredit the weapon that had so thoroughly outperformed the M-14. Ichord’s final 1967 report blamed the main problem on the Army’s insistence on using the Olin ball powder. Ichord stated that the continued use of the ball powder bordered on “Criminal negligence.” but this was only one of the reasons for the rifle’s disastrous performance. But in truth, it was the decision to not chrome-plate the chamber, and this was due to MacNamara’s original evaluation. Since the first AR-15 did not have a chromed chamber he said the production M-16A1 did not need them. It was a cost-saving measure. But MacNamara, being more of a numbers man, did not understand that the original DuPont stick powder didn’t foul the chamber and barrel, but the ball powder did.

MacNamara told the OC to make a military version of the AR-15. Instead, the OC altered the rifle to guarantee failure and make their M-14 the weapon of choice, regardless of the consequences.

The Ichord Committee did make the Army see something had to be done. Cleaning kits were issued and the next version of the M-16 had chromed bores. Soldiers were encouraged to clean their rifles as often as possible. Within a year the jams and failures virtually ceased. This was further proof that Stoner had been right all along.

The number of American soldiers killed by enemy fire as a direct result of the failure of their M-16s will never be known, since the Army did not keep records of such casualties and had no desire to do so. But there is no doubt they did happen in shocking numbers. It is a sad commentary to how a hidebound organization in the form of the OC could subvert logic and reason merely because they refused to admit they were wrong.

Back to the issue this appears in