The U.S. Army is moving forward to replace the Cold War-era M9 9mm pistol with a more powerful handgun that also meets the needs of the other services.
As the lead agent for small arms, the Army will hold an industry day July 29 to talk to gun makers about the joint, Modular Handgun System or MHS.
The MHS would replace the Army’s inventory of more than 200,000 outdated M9 pistols and several thousand M11 9mm pistols with one that has greater accuracy, lethality, reliability and durability, according to Daryl Easlick, a project officer with the Army’s Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning, Ga.
“It’s a total system replacement — new gun, new ammo, new holster, everything,” Easlick said.
The Army began working with the small arms industry on MHS in early 2013, but the effort has been in the works for more than five years. If successful, it would result in the Defense Department buying more than 400,000 new pistols during a period of significant defense-spending reductions. …
One of the major goals of the MHS effort is to adopt a pistol chambered for a more potent round than the current 9mm, weapons officials said. The U.S. military replaced the .45 caliber 1911 pistol with the M9 in 1985 and began using the 9mm NATO round at that time.
Soldiers who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan have complained that the 9mm round is not powerful enough to be effective in combat.
“The 9mm doesn’t score high with soldier feedback,” said Easlick, explaining that the Army, and the other services, want a round that will have better terminal effects — or cause more damage — when it hits enemy combatants. “We have to do better than our current 9mm.”
It shouldn’t take a long time to figure out that pretty much the ideal design already exists and dates back 103 years.
These three waggish hunters are posing with three enormous punt guns, the sort of arm that was used to hunt waterfowl en masse during the reign of Queen Victoria, in front of a duck-billed dinosaur.
Just purchased: British Martini-Henry Interchangeable Carbine Mark I, manufactured in Enfield in 1887, and later rebarreled in .303 British. Shipped home from Bagram, Afghanistan by an American in January, 2013.
Wikipedia reports that a small number of Martinis have been captured from the Taliban:
Early in 2010 and 2011, United States Marines recovered at least three from various Taliban weapons caches in Marjah. In April 2011, another Martini-Henry rifle was found near Orgun in Paktika Province by United States Army’s 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault).
The Martini-Henry was the result of trials held in the late 1860’s looking for a permanent solution to arming the British Army with a metallic cartridge breech-loading rifle. In 1866, the War Department adopted the Snider patent modification of the Pattern 1853 rifle musket, but it was always considered a stop-gap measure. The Martini Henry was officially adopted in 1871.
Work began on a carbine version of the Martini-Henry in 1871 as soon as the M-H was adopted, but initial experiments used the full power rifle cartridge and those involved in the trial found the recoil excessive, preferring to stick with the Snider. Little work happened on the Carbine until 1876, when trials with a carbine specific cartridge occurred, and finally, in 1877, a carbine pattern was approved. This was intended as carbine for use by both the cavalry and the artillery, and it was designated the Interchangeable Carbine Mk I (IC1) and first issues began in late 1878. In any event, the Artillery found the weapon not suitable since it did not have provisions for a sling, or the use of a bayonet, and in 1879, the Artillery Carbine Mk I was approved, and this gun became exclusively a cavalry carbine, though it was still marked IC1. In 1879, if was found that the rear sight sometimes caught on the saddle bucket and two woodscrews were added to the stock on either side, just below the rear sight. These acted as studs for a leather sight cover.
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The seller was at pains to distance himself from liability by describing the carbine as a Collectors-Item Only, Not for Shooting. But whoever re-barreled it obviously re-barreled it in order to shoot it.
Martinis were re-barreled in .303 and actually issued to Native Auxiliaries and to some reserve troops long ago.
I found a discussion about shooting .303 Martini-Henrys on a Maryland Shooters Board. One obviously knowledgeable member retorted to warnings against:
The Martin Enfield is more than up to the pressures of modern ammo, which by the way is quite a bit lower in pressure than the original loading. While the actions are indeed over 100 years old, that has little bearing on their ability to withstand use. Metal stress is cumulative, making use and condition much more important than simple age. As single shots, I suspect these fired a lot less ammo than many if not most bolt action military rifles. Further, these do not suffer from the brittle nature of many of the earlier bolt action rifles well past WWI. Further, since they were never frontline rifles in their ME form, they didn’t see the abuse either. A final consideration is the inherent strength of tilting block actions that have far greater bearing area in their knuckle than any common bolt action has in its locking lugs…and of course is complete immune to boltlug shear. While failures through receiver stretch and cracked blocks do occur, I’m unaware of any catastrophic failures….unlike many more “modern†arms half their age. There are sound reasons why many fine sporters using smokeless and BP rounds continue to be built on Martini actions, often approaching 140 years in age.
As to the disparaging remarks on not worrying about the troops, the Brits have had and continue to have some of the most stringent proofing laws in the world, while the US continues to have none. Whether military or civilian, every single firearm is proofed by an independent proving house as a matter of national law when new and whenever it receives major rework, such as a new barrel or being re-chambered. Simply put, they were and continue to be subjected to significantly greater quality control and assurance throughout their life than just about any other nation’s firearms.
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If a Zulu Impi suddenly appears over the hill, I’m going to be ready.
The scene had a problem, and the problem was the gun.
Dudley Nichol’s script was specific. “There is the sharp report of a rifle and Curly jerks up his gun as Buck saws wildly at the ribbons.
“The stagecoach comes to a lurching stop before a young man who stands in the road beside his unsaddled horse. He has a saddle over one arm and a rifle carelessly swung in the other hand… It is Ringo…
“RINGO? You might need me and this Winchester, I saw a couple ranches burnin’ last night.’
“CURLY? I guess you don’t understand, kid. You’re under arrest.
“RINGO?(with charm) I ain’t arguing about that, Curly. I just hate to part with a gun like this.
“Holding it by the lever, he gives it a jerk and it cocks with a click…”
John Ford loved the dialogue, which was in and of itself unusual, but the introduction of the Ringo Kid needed to be emphasized. Ford decided that the shot would begin with the actor doing something with the gun, then the camera would rapidly track in from a full-length shot to an extreme close-up — an unusually emphatic camera movement for Ford, who had grown to prefer a stable camera.
Since the actor was already coping with two large props, Ford decided to lose the horse. He told his young star what he was planning to do: “work out something with the rifle,” Ford sais. “Or maybe just a pistol.” He wasn’t sure.
And just like that the problem was dropped in the lap of his star, a young — but not all that young — actor named John Wayne., better known to Ford and everyone else as Duke.
Wayne ran through the possibilities. every actor in in westerns could twirl a pistol, so that was out. Besides, the script specified a rifle cocked quickly with one hand, but later in the scene than what Ford was planning. In addition, Ford wanted him to do something flashy, but it couldn’t happen too quickly for the audience to take it in. All the possibilities seemed to cancel each other out.
And then Yakima Canutt, Wayne’s friend and the stunt coordinator on the film offered an idea. When Canutt was a boy he had seen Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show. As the overland stage raced around the arena, a messenger trailing behind the stagecoach had carried a rifle with a large ring loop which allowed him to spin the rifle in the air, cocking it with one hand. The crowd went wild. Canutt said that it had been done thirty years ago and he still remembered the moment. More to the point, he had never seen anybody else do it.
Wayne sparked to the idea, as did Ford, so they had to make it work. Ford instructed the prop department to manufacture a ring loop and install it on a standard issue 1892 Winchester carbine. After the rifle was modified, Wayne began experimenting with the twirl move as Canutt remembered it, but there was a problem — the barrel of the rifle was too long — it wouldn’t pass cleanly beneath Wayne’s arm.
The Winchester went back to the prop department, where they sawed an inch or so off the end, then soldered the sight back on the shortened barrel.
With that minor adjustment, the move was suddenly effortless. Wayne began rehearsing the twirling movement that would mark his appearance in the movie he had been waiting more than ten years to make — a film for John Ford, his friend, his mentor, his idol, the man he called “Coach” or, alternately — and more tellingly — “Pappy.”
With any luck at all, he’d never have to go back to B westerns as long as he lived.
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Buffalo Bill’s Wild West and Congress of Rough Riders of the World.
Raywolf, at Return of Kings (a blog dispensing cynical un-PC advice to male millenials), offers an opinion I agree with.
At the end of the day if you’re not prepared to kill someone and you don’t have at least some basic skills in using firearms, there may come a time when someone might kill you or someone you care for. Owning a gun and being able to use one ought to be like owning a car.
The failure of gun control is laughably highlighted in both the UK and Australia. In the UK all handguns are illegal with hefty mandatory sentences, so now most criminals are not only armed, seeking the strategic advantage of weapons everyone else are forbidden to own, but are also happy to use their guns, when the sentences for killing are not much worse than the sentences for just having a gun. If I am about to get caught but I can kill you and get away with it, I might as well.
I do not personally agree with his choices of guns. Glocks are ugly and have no real safety. Raywolf contends that the Glock 34’s 17-round magazine makes it “more interesting.” But, speaking frankly, I expect that, if it ever comes down to it, you will only very rarely need to shoot anybody more than once. I like S&W revolvers and 1911-style automatics better than I like Glocks.
Myself, I don’t really see why anyone wants one of those ugly military-style semi-autos. They are expensive, stylistically inappropriate for hunting, and are really just toys useful only for blasting off huge quantities of ammo plinking. If the social order ever breaks down to the point that one needs a gun chambered for the standard military round with lots of firepower, I’d expect to get one off the ground for free after I shot the first few bad guys.
For the beginner, a pump shotgun is a good choice, I agree. But, I’d say go out there and buy an Ithaca Model 37, or some kind of Winchester or Remington, with a wooden stock. Then, if you go out in the field to shoot pheasants, you won’t look like a fantasist who thinks he is Rambo.
For a hunting rifle, you do not want a great big enormous muzzle-brake hanging on the end of your barrel. If you are too delicate & sensitive to accept a little recoil, buy a rifle chambered in low-recoil cartridges like .270, 7×57, .257 Roberts, or even .243. Most connoisseurs prefer Mauser-style controlled-feed bolt actions to the Remington 700 (which is a push feed action). Older rifles are commonly both less expensive and cooler than brand new ones. Possible choices are enormous. If you are young, have good eyes, and are likely to be hunting at Eastern sorts of ranges, I’d recommend getting a light rifle with iron sights.
Roughly 60 years ago, the humorist Corey Ford used to publish a monthly feature in Field & Stream magazine called The Lower Forty, a chronicle of the adventures of a fictional informal club of small-town New England sportsmen formally titled “The Lower Forty Hunting, Shooting and Inside Straight Club.” The club’s leader and role model was Judge Parker (a fictional version of a friend of Ford’s named Parker Merrow).
Around 1960 or 1961, Judge Parker received by telegram the news that his son, at the time serving as an Air Force officer in Japan, had fathered a baby boy. Judge Parker sat right down and wrote a “Letter to a Grandson,” which episode constituted one of the most memorable of the Lower Forty stories. The letter portion of the story is quoted here.
Judge Parker proceeds to identify and set aside for his infant grandson all the favorite items from his own battery of sporting equipment, including some guns. Note the final line.
I am leaving you a few things.First I leave you your Great Grandfather’s weapons. He taught me how to shoot a pistol with his .38 Colt Army. I have not fired it since the day he died. I will give it a real good cleaning, and put the neatsfoot oil to the holster, an leave it with the same loads that he put in the cylinder himself the last time he dropped the hammer. Also you will receive his .30-30 carbine and his 12 gauge Greener. No buck ever went very far that caught one of my Dad’s .30-30’s behind the fore shoulder. No goose kept flying very long that he centered with a load of 4’s.Next I leave you my old Browning five shot 12 bore. I have used that gun so much that it has been reblued and rebuilt twice. Also my house gun, a .357 Magnum Smith and Wesson snub nose. A man who is not ready and able to defend his home does not belong in our family.
