Posted on 03/10/2006 4:09:18 PM PST by SandRat
CAMP MERCURY, Iraq (March 9, 2006) -- Arnold Schwarzenegger is going to want one.
Marines with Regimental Combat Team 5, based in Camp Fallujah, test-fired the latest in the Corps’ arsenal of weapons’ improvement, the M-32 Multiple shot Grenade Launcher. It’s a six-barreled, 40 mm beast of weapon that has just about enough attitude for Marines.
“I thought it was pretty bad the first time I saw it,” said Cpl. Jason H. Flanery, a 23-year-old mortarman from St. Louis, Mo., assigned to RCT-5’s Personnel Security Detachment.
The M-32 MGL looks like something straight out of an action movie or a weapon ginned up by designers of futuristic video combat games. It’s a bare-bones, shoulder-fired weapon with a bulging six-barreled cylinder. There’s no bones about it. This thing’s all business when the trade is knocking out bad-guys at a distance.
“You can put six rounds on target in under three seconds,” Flanery said. “I thought this thing was sick.”
Sick might be right for the insurgent on the other end of the sight. The M-32 MGL is step up from the M-203 grenade launcher Marines have used since post-Vietnam days. It fires similar 40 mm grenades and at similar distances. It just puts more rounds on the bad guys faster.
“The ‘203 has been around since the ‘60s,” explained CWO4 Gene A. Bridgman, the regiment’s gunner, or weapons expert. “It keeps improving. This is a progression in the weapons system.”
Flanery put the comparison of the two similar weapons in more simple terms.
“It makes it obsolete,” he said. “It’s that much better.”
The idea to bring M-32 was the brainchild of Marine gunners across the Corps, explained Bridgman, a 43-year-old from Garden City, Kan. During an annual symposium, they decided an improvement was needed over the M-203. One option was to bring back a rifle-grenade. The M-32, won out, however, and now each Marine battalion will field them as an experimental weapon.
Bridgman added the M-32 isn’t a new idea altogether, though. Brazilian, Italian and South African military have carried them in the field for years. Marines, though, took it one step further.
A fore-grip was added and a scope was mounted to the top, eliminating the old leaf sights like that of the M-203. The scope allows a Marine to follow the grenade to the target and immediately adjust and follow up with a lethal volley of indirect fire.
“The ‘203 was on shot at time,” Bridgman said. “The ‘203 became a signal weapon. This is more of an offensive weapon. With this, you shoot, adjust and fire for effect.”
The average Marine said it’s just about that easy to shoot. Lance Cpl. Alexandro R. Raymundo, a 20-year-old from Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., isn’t an infantryman. He’s a network administrator by trade. He shot the M-203 before during initial training, but this was his first time picking up the M-32 MGL.
“I thought it might be like the ‘203,” Raymundo said. “But is shoots more rounds, faster. It’s really simple. I had ‘hands-on’ once. I picked it up really quickly.”
As far as how it felt shooting it, Raymundo said the weapon was about as beefy as it looks.
“I felt like there’s more recoil than the ‘203 and the trigger’s a lot heavier” he explained. “It’s heftier than the ‘203.”
His likes about the weapon included the small scope added to the rail-mount system on top of the weapon.
“The optic was nice,” he added. “It’s a lot easier to sight in.”
Of course, there’s the part about lots of things going “boom” downrange too.
“My favorite part was being able to fire out so many grenades and not have to reload between each shot.”
Sgt. David G. Redford, a 35-year-old from Kennebunkport, Me., has more practical experience when it comes to what grunts like in the field. He’s an infantryman by trade and has logged in his own hours carrying the M-203.
“I didn’t know what to think about it before we came out here, but it’s nice,” Redford said. “It’s easier to shoot. You don’t have to constantly load. If you run into something, you’re already loaded.”
Redford predicted that most infantry Marines will welcome the addition of the six-pack attack weapon.
That’s exactly the reaction Bridgman wants to see. Adding the M-32 MGL could realign the way Marines operate at the small-team level. Fire teams could become more lethal, more mobile and more independent. The idea of a dedicated grenadier might just be reborn.
“Now you have your own indirect fire support right in the fire team,” Bridgman explained. “You have someone who can lay down (high explosive rounds) against someone in a trench. It would be used against enemy in fighting holes or behind cars, because of the indirect nature of the weapon. It’s the only weapon aside from mortars,” at the small team’s disposal.
Still, Bridgman stressed the weapon is only experimental. Marines will be gathering data about its’ effectiveness and durability from experiences on the streets of Fallujah.
For Flanery, though, the M-32 is already welcome.
“I think it’s one of the most simple and effective weapons systems,” he said. “I just want buckshot rounds.”
Thanks for the ping
The Joker: Where does he get those wonderful toys ?
There is a 40m WP smoke/mark WP round. At least there was last time I shot an M79, about 1982.
The most common round these days is the HEDP (and the next most common is the training/practice round, with a blue plastic ogive and full of orange marking powder -- it doesn't have the steel weight in it any more), but there have been dozens of kinds of 40mm round.
The British called a 37mm AT gun they used in WWII a "two pounder." (The US used the same thing and called it 37mm). So we could reckon the thing that way, in weight of cannon ball rather than as gauge, which is size of cannonball.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
Anytime, BTTT.
A good friend of mine was fortunate enough to be engaged by ~150 Taliban/foreigners while in possession of a 60mm mortar and his USAF TACP was on the horn to the [way we control air assets]. European F-16s weren't sure about a border issue, but some A-10s came along and it became a race between my buddy and his commo man on the 60, and the A-10s, to see who could get the biggest score.
They wound up dividing it up, and the jets handled what was over the hill, and he got everybody on the front slope. Took a bit of nerve because that included two emplaced DSHKs he was dueling with.
Mortars are one reason that a lot of people's neo-Civil-War imaginations about taking on combat soldiers with a hunting rifle are off the mark. Counting its MGs and mortars, an infantry unit is extremely hazardous to everything within almost a half mile of its front. Throw in artillery and air, and you really don't want them to see you or guess where you are.... the poor Taliban who learned this lesson usually learned it immediately prior to their demise, and so were not able to report back to their HQ.
You could say we got well inside their feedback loop.
Needless to say, I quite envied my friend the fun (even if his team's awards never did get approved). Where I was, they were falling all over themselves to get on our good side, so I wound up drinking tea with a lot of folks who need hangin'. We got tons and tons of weapons (and a number of other interesting catches) but they generally surrendered after face-saving token resistance, or none at all. So maybe they were getting some of the word.
Ah well, sometimes duty comes before pleasure.
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
Christmas coming!
big boom poing
Check out my links in my post #35. (Or use the links on my profile page) I got 1.2ga from them, and if there are math errors it's my fault, but the mistakes were made by the sites.
He may be an Osprey apologist and takes it personal when you insult his bird.
The difference between 1.2 and 1.125 gauge is rather trivial. That new laucher is probably "backbored" a little to help keep the recoil and firing pressure in check, and I'm sure the maker actually gauged the barrel.
As to recoil, this thing is popping out a projectile that probably weighs significantly more than two pounds, so a little backboring would probably be desirable.
In our era, a full company of NVA could be hidden in tall grass, 30 meters to your front in broad daylight..
Now, a single sheethead can't even hide behind a wall in the dark of night!
The phrase "obsolete" comes to mind a lot, lately!
Stay safe brother....
Semper Fi
pppppp-ping
I want it!
I want it!
I want it!
I want it!
"Arnold Schwarzenegger is going to want one."
HE'LL want one? I want one.
Then bring on MECHA! ! !
Cool BFG!
I wish... I were that young. Thanks for the offer, though.
3 Ga. Punt Gun used for commercial duck hunk. bad news for the ducks and hell on the decoys too.
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