Nobody Wanted to Give Up the M-1 Carbine
Classic weapon endured through three big American wars
Medium.com - War is Boring
A grim-faced U.S. Army major led a group of armed men away from a tropical village he decided not to attack. Wearing jungle boots and olive-drab battle dress, Edwin Brooks grasped a lightweight, reliable, .30-caliber weapon in his right hand as he walked.
It was an M-1 carbine.
The scene could have been anywhere in the South Pacific during World War II or somewhere near the Pusan Perimeter during the Korean War. But Brooks also wore a green beret with a Special Forces flash and he was leaving the then-South Vietnamese village of Ban Me Thuot in 1964, leading the indigenous forces he commanded back to base in an effort to defuse a rebellion.
It’s all on the cover of the January 1965 National Geographic magazine in a photo by writer and photographer Howard Sochurek. Not a single M-16 is anywhere to be seen. The Pentagon had shipped thousands of the new M-16s to U.S. troops including the Special Forces, but in 1964 many Green Berets still preferred the M-1 carbine, the weapon of their fathers’ wars.
What’s more, Brooks’ Viet Cong enemy was almost certainly wielding the more modern Kalashnikov assault rifle. As for the Montagnard tribesman Brooks trained and led, they also were carrying some of the 800,000 M-1 carbines the U.S. sent to South Vietnam during the war.
More: https://medium.com/war-is-boring/nobody-wanted-to-give-up-the-m-1-a5d21f713201
@Elderberry Naw,that's not what was happening.
In 64 the SVN Army and the VN indigenous were being issued surplus WW-2 firearms and ammo. The SF advisors that went out on patrols with them had access to pretty much anything they wanted short of nukes,but carried the surplus WW-2/Korean War carbines too because they would be able to shoot the same ammo as the people they were advising if things got hot. You want to see something that looks out of place,find a photo of a 14 year old 'yard soldier carrying a BAR. It looks like it weighs more than he does.
Some carried the old M3 grease gun chambered for 45 ACP,but not around areas like Ban Me Thuot. The jungle wasn't thick in that area and they needed something with more range than the old 45 ACP. Granted,the 30 caliber round fired by the M1/M2 carbine was also a pistol round,but it was the equivalent of a magnum pistol round,and shot flatter and further. Didn't have much killing power,though. I knew a Major that was shot 4 times in the back with a carbine by a camp striker as he stood shaving in the latrine,and he strangled the shooter to death and walked to the dispensary to get patched up. Granted,he was a sick puppy for a long time,but he did survive. The charm of the carbine was 30 round magazines. You could usually afford to shoot somebody 3 or 4 times to kill them.
Back then lots of SF advisors also carried 9mm sub guns like Swedish K's or British Stens,too. They were popular for "special mission" operations because you could get them with silencers on them,but the problem then was you had to shoot a downloaded subsonic round to keep from burning out the silencer,and it was quicker to choke somebody to death than shoot them to death with a silenced 9mm. I had a friend shoot a NVA point man 14 times in the chest from about 20 feet away with a silenced Swedish K,and the SOB still managed to unsling his AK and return fire before he died.
My "special missions weapon" was the old grease gun with a silencer. The full-power military 230 grain ball round was subsonic anyhow,so you lost nothing,and I guarantee you that you never have to shoot anybody 14 times in the chest with military 45ACP Ball ammo.
This reminds me. A couple of recon teams were at our launch site at Dak To,waiting for the rain to stop so we could get inserted into our targets,and the platoon tent at the launch site was leaking right over the door way. You walk inside and hit that slick wet plywood floor,and would go skidding down the aisle. A friend of mine named Squirrel Sprouse decided to use his silenced/suppressed Swedish K to shoot a couple of holes in the floor so the water would drain,and the silenced K was so quiet the shooting wouldn't cause anyone to panic. The freaking bullets bounced off the wet plywood and made more holes in the tent. It was only due to luck they didn't make any holes in any people.
Back to the M-1/M-2 carbines. We loved to issue them to the yards and the yards loving being issued them because they were light,and so was the ammo. They were also super reliable and easy to dissemble and clean. They were a good "fit" for the small natives in every respect.
By 68-69,all the M1/M-2 carbines had been pulled,and the yards were all carrying M-16's.
