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http://www.sftt.org"06-08-2004
We Need A Bigger Stick
By: Maj. Anthony F. Milavic, USMC (Ret.)
With the mounting U.S. casualties in Iraq, an issue that's going untold is the fact that Americans are being killed because they are outgunned by their Iraqi enemy. And on top of that, the deficiency in U.S. service members' knockdown power has been known for almost 40 years.
On Sept. 12 in Ramadi, Iraq, for example, elements of the Army's 3rd Battalion, 5th Special Forces Group, engaged enemy forces in a firefight.
An insurgent was struck in the torso by several rounds of 5.56mm ammunition from the soldiers' M-4 carbines.
The insurgent continued to fire his Kalashnikov and mortally wounded Master Sgt. Kevin N. Morehead.
Then, from a hiding place, the same insurgent surprised Sgt. 1st Class William M. Bennett, killing him instantly with a three-round burst to the head and neck.
Staff Sgt. Robert E. Springer, having lost confidence in his M-4, drew a World War II-vintage .45-caliber pistol and killed the insurgent with one shot.
A close inspection of the enemy's corpse revealed he was hit by seven 5.56mm rounds in the torso before the pistol took him down.
For almost 40 years, American warriors have reported enemy soldiers continuing to fire their weapons after being hit by multiple 5.56mm bullets.
Army Lt. Col. Harold G. Moore recorded such an event in his "After Action Report of the Ia Drang Valley Battle," from 1965. He also recalled the battle in his 1992 book, "We Were Soldiers Once ... And Young."
Moore writes of enemy soldiers being hit by 5.56mm rounds: "Even after being hit several times in the chest, many continued firing and moving for several more steps before dropping dead."
Later in that war, a similar experience was recalled by Army Col. John Hayworth: "In one firefight, I saw [a soldier] place three rounds [of 5.56mm] in the chest of a charging NVA [North Vietnamese Army] regular at 50
yards. He kept firing his AK and never slowed down. At 30 yards, I hit him with a blast of double-ought buck. It picked him up off his feet, and he didn't get up again."
During Operation Desert Storm in 1991, Marine Maj. Howard Feldmeier reported an Iraqi officer leaving a burning vehicle and charging his Marines firing an AK-47. The Iraqi was hit repeatedly by 5.56mm rounds, only to stop firing when he ran out of ammunition and Feldmeier's Marines tackled him.
"He was quickly carried back to the battalion aid station," Feldmeier reported. "The surgeons told me he certainly died of burns, but not necessarily from the six 5.56mm wounds."
In his book "Black Hawk Down," Mark Bowden recalled that Sgt. 1st Class Paul Howe, a soldier involved in the 1993 Somalia imbroglio, was angered by the round's obvious ineffectiveness: "The [5.56mm] bullet made a small, clean hole, and unless it happened to hit the heart or spine, it wasn't enough to stop a man in his tracks. Howe felt he had to hit a guy five or six times just to get his attention."
In their briefing "Lessons Learned in Afghanistan" from April 2002, Army Lt. Col. C. Dean and Sgt. 1st Class S. Newland, both of the U.S. Army Natick Soldier Center in Massachusetts, reported: "Soldiers asked for a weapon with a larger round. So it will drop a man with one shot."
On March 3, 2003, Navy Lt. Cmdr. Gary K. Roberts opened his written briefing to Rear Adm. Albert M. Calland, commander of Naval Special Warfare Command, on modifying the command's 5.56mm rifles and carbines to fire a 6.8mm cartridge by saying:
"Recent combat operations have highlighted terminal performance problems, generally manifested as failures to rapidly incapacitate opponents during combat operations when M855 62gr. 'green tip' [full metal jacket] is fired from 5.56mm rifles and carbines. Failure to rapidly incapacitate armed opponents increases the risk of U.S. forces being injured or killed and jeopardizes mission success."
Roberts' words proved to be prophetic in the deaths, six months later, of Morehead and Bennett in Iraq.
The only question now is: Who will be the next American killed because he was sent to war armed with a bullet that did not have the necessary knockdown power?
The writer is a retired Marine major living in Reston, Va., and moderator of MILINET, an Internet forum on international military and political affairs."
