Soldiers will be soldiers…give them something that *can* be screwed up, and they *will* screw it up.
Haven’t ordered a copy of Chassepot to FAMAS yet? You can place your order right now!
Forgotten History
Martyr of Verdun: Émile Driant’s Command Post
Émile Driant was a French army officer who served originally as an aide to General Boulanger (and married his daughter). This connection would tarnish his career when politics forced Boulanger to resign (and shortly afterward […]
Bolt Action Rifles
Vintage Saturday: Liberators
This is a pretty widely-published photo, but it sure is a good one. It also shows very clearly the US’ horrible excuse for a backpack of the time. For the record, the soldier on the […]
Book review
Book Review: Honour Bound – The Chauchat Machine Rifle
I’ve discussed the much-maligned CSRG machine rifle (the Chauchat) previously – it was not the utter disaster that common knowledge would lead you to believe. You won’t find much literature on the Chauchat, but fortunately […]
In the old days we just threw a bucket of water – or used a hose – when things got “hung up”. Sorry 😉
When I was a new cadet, I had heard that a fellow cadet had rammed an M16A2 bolt into an upper reciever backwards during a rapid disassembly drill. The weapon upper was destroyed. I am not sure if the story was true or even possible! Cadets are stranger sometimes than Joe!
When I was in basic training at Ft. Jackson, SC in August 1972, the M-16 drill sergeant said a conscript from Puerto Rico, who was extremely unhappy at being in the army, had tried to reassemble his M-16 with the bolt/bolt carrier reversed, and he hammered it in (NFI). The drill instructor’s point was don’t do that or you’ll go to jail too.
“Me prendez-vous pour un imbécile!?” CLANG!
“Oui.”
You just can’t seem to make any gun idiot-proof. I believe this is one of many reasons why Kirk hates the M60, as it is clearly a rushed design put forward into the hands of people who could easily find 200 ways to break the thing without even trying.
“(…)M60(…)”
Sometimes, I am wondering why U.S. forces in 1940s used weapon designation system, arranged to improve chances of mistake, with very various weapons/equipment have Mdigit name, c.f.:
https://enrique262.tumblr.com/post/186816974900
even though during Great War, they used (common) designated-it-by-year-of-adoption for example M1917 revolver or M1903 rifle.
quick nitpick:
either “prenez” or “prendriez”. unless you want your soldier to sound illiterate 🙂
Sorry, just a bit rusty on proper French verb conjugation. It’s been over ten years since I took the Grand Concours (and I’ve likely misspelled that too). But you’re right, either use the proper conjugation or use a conditional conjugation.
“Directions unclear, dick stuck in bayonet socket”
“I’d you make something idiot proof, they’re just gonna make a better idiot.”
Soixante-neuf ou soixante-quinze?
They’ll think of everything! Nice pair of wartime “stoved” finish/enamel MAS 36 rifles. Le Creuset finish gave way to parkerizing because it is best used on pots and pans of course…
“Soldiers will be soldiers”
-Can we disjoin them?
-[examines bayonets lugs] Impossible?
-So what we will say, when our Caporal-chef would find that we did that?
-[intensive thinking]. It is not bug – it is a feature?
-?
-Combining two rifles we created powerful two-handed battle bludgeon
-…
“(…)give them something that *can* be screwed up, and they *will* screw it up.(…)”
Although from different era and different country, I think this quote from http://www.svejkmuseum.cz/I_10_2.htm fits here:
Ich melde gehorsam, Herr Oberst, ich bin besoffen.
One take on Murphy’s law: “If there is a right way to do a process and perhaps more than one wrong way to do that same process, expect someone to do that process in any particular wrong way if left unsupervised.”
That’s funny and could be said in any language from every military around the world. How is it said in Russian?
Честь имею сообщить, господин полковник, я пьян.
My rifles have all the requisite holes, but, at least on my two MAS36s (pre- and post-war) the bayonet socket simply unscrews under finger pressure. No need to remove the nose cap, or poke firing pins in holes
I mis-spoke, er, typed. Our post-war rifle, which has a holey bayonet, has a finger-tight socket that can be unscrewed. Our pre-war rifle has an original, knurled bayonet, no hole, and the socket is much tighter. The rifles in the video are the pre-war (and possibly wartime manufacture, I don’t know when the design changed). Post-war rifles are identifiable by the stamped sight-hood.
“(…)Soldiers will be soldiers…give them something that *can* be screwed up, and they *will* screw it up.(…)”
I would said that this work in both direction – as there will be one who screw, another one can proved able to fix piece supposedly beyond repair.
According to https://iremember.ru/en/memoirs/tankers/dmitriy-loza/
In my battalion we had Senior Sergeant (Starshina) Nesterov, a former kolkhoz tractor driver (Kolkhoz is sort of farm – Valeri), in the position of battalion mechanic. In general each of our tank companies had a mechanic and Nesterov was it for the battalion. At our corps level we had a representative (whose name I have forgotten) of the British firm that produced these tanks. At one time I had it written down, but when my tank was hit everything I had in it burned up -photographs, documents, and notebook. We were forbidden to keep notes at the front, but I did it on the sly. Anyway, this British representative constantly interfered with our efforts to repair separate components of the tank. He said, “This has a factory seal. You should not tinker with it!” We were supposed to take out a component and install a new one. Nesterov made a simple repair to all these transmissions. One time the British representative came up to Nesterov and asked him, “At which university did you study?” And Nesterov replied, “At the kolkhoz!”
As much as I admire the mechanic one hopes that the others following their lead would not, for example, replace a factory-sealed washer with a local one not realizing the the factory washers are zinc yellow-chromate plated for corrosion resistance in wet environments and the replacement is not, and then in a month the new washer has rusted, expanded, and jammed something that should not be. Of course if the replacement in the field enabled something to be battle ready instead of pulled off the line …
I attended the University of War and my senior trip was VietNam. We learned how to make things work.
I salute you, sir. Nothing beats raw experience to show what works and what doesn’t work. If only Army Ordnance got that lesson through their heads and stopped chasing the unicorn I dub “the ultimate weapon to defeat all other weapons.”
Ian, please make a mud test with a MAS 36?
Ancient US Army saying
1) Leave three privates in the middle of a desert with nothing but an anvil
2) Come back a couple of days later
3) One private will be AWOL
4) One will be drunk
5) The third will have gotten the clap
6) The anvil will be broken
“Leave a marine with a crate of rations to guard an anvil, and you’ll come back to a broken anvil and a pile of shit”
At morning formation, issue a squad of privates with three 12″ stainless steel balls.
Come back after lunch.
1 ball will be missing.
1 ball will be broken.
1 ball will be pregnant.
it could be used as a way to hang 2 rifles on a wall in a very interesting fashion.
they would be unlikely to be stolen, as the average person who steals those sorts of things would be unable to get them apart to remove them from the building.
so, it’s an anti-theft feature!
Sounds like something the Czechs would do to prevent their fancy toys from getting stolen! Where’s Denny when you need him?