By Kevin Dockery

Few firearms manufacturers have proven themselves as successful as the Knight’s Armament Company (KAC). In just 25 years, C. Reed Knight, Jr. has taken his company from being a modest but skilled R&D shop into a unique modern military supplier. The structures that have held the shops and offices of KAC have changed from being a small two-story building in an orange grove to a sprawling complex of buildings, bunkers, and range facilities with the main plant having more than 400,000 square feet of work space.

The new location of the Knight’s Armament Company is in the old McDonnell Douglas Astronautics facility on Columbia Blvd. in Titusville, Florida. The Titusville plant is only a relatively short drive from central Florida and the huge convention center at Orlando. It is when the SHOT Show is at the Orlando center, such as it was this year, that KAC takes advantage of their facility’s location, and the invited guests of Mr. Reed Knight can take advantage of his own style of southern hospitality.

Even in the middle of January, central Florida can be a hot place, especially for writers and guests who have come down from the colder (much colder!) northern climes and countries. The well-upholstered and air-conditioned transportation put on by Knight’s made the afternoon trip to Titusville a quick and comfortable one. The crowds from the buses were filled out even further once at the plant by the number of people who arrived in their own vehicles. Any way you had arrived, the trip was well worth the time with what was waiting for everyone at Knight’s.

After a quick organization, and the filling out of the more and more common legal forms and releases, the writer community and dignitaries were invited to try out a number of products from both KAC as well as other manufacturer’s. It was trigger time again.

When the Shot Show was last in Orlando a few years ago, Reed Knight held his first open house at the Titusville facility. At that time, the primary guest of honor was General Mikhail Kalashnikov himself and an extensive demonstration was put on of the Knight Armament’s line of products. This year, the open house was a much larger affair and General Kalashnikov was unable to attend. Even the good general might feel that he missed out as instead of witnessing the Knight products, writers and others were invited to try them out for themselves.

Just moving around the huge facility was an event in itself with vans moving groups of people from one firing site to another. Part of the reason for this was the different ranges needed for the other companies that were also taking part in the KAC open house.

The first of the ranges visited was the close-in firing demonstration held by Lewis Machine & Tool Company of their M16 variations. One of the highlights at this position was a chance to fire the CQB version of their Monolithic Rail Platform upper chambered for the powerful 6.8mm round. Having seen combat with Special Operations Forces in Afghanistan, the 6.8mm round with its heavier bullet is proving to be a valuable asset, one worthy of further examination. With the radical rail system patented by LMT and machined out of a solid aluminum forging, the strength of the system is phenomenal, and the accuracy that comes with that strength is also world-class.

The LMT 6.8mm upper Close Quarters Battle specimen available for the demonstration was quick to handle while remaining controllable, even on full automatic fire. The future of the 6.8mm round is still vague at best. But no matter the caliber, Lewis Machine & Tool has a winner in their solid Monolithic Rail Platform uppers as well as their own line of receivers and complete weapons.

Transport took the groups finished with shooting at the first range to the next open range where a new line of rifles from Knight’s Armament were waiting for use. Even though we were all looking forward to examining the new weapons, it was hard not to be impressed with the layout and facilities of the Titusville compound. There were rows and rows of huge concrete and earth bunkers, leftovers from the days that McDonnell-Douglas Astronautics Company loaded up Dragon missiles on the site. The massive bunkers would hold up to the ignition of enough ammunition to satisfy the most jaded of SAR readers, while still leaving enough room to outfit a small country – or shoot up on a Knob Creek weekend. If there is an expansion into heavy ordnance in Knight’s future, the Titusville facility has more than enough assets on hand to take care of any job short of making solid-fuel space-shuttle engines.

At the next range were some very familiar weapons, with new twists that were not immediately apparent. The SR-15 series of rifles and carbines are upgraded AR-15 style rifles with a number of improved features developed by Knight engineers. On the table were a pair of SR-15 E3 URX (Upper Receiver Extending) carbines, both with KAC folding iron sights and attached Harris bipods. Inside, the carbines boasted dual extractor springs, redesigned locking lugs with increased strength, and a number of other new and patented features. The overall design of the SR-15 proved such and improvement over the original design that it was adopted as the basis for a heavy-barreled 5.56mm sniper rifle, the Mark 12 Mod 1 Special Purpose Rifle. The URX E3 carbines were to prove only slightly less accurate, and nearly two pounds lighter, than the GI Mk 12 Mod 1 rifle, but at the short range available to the shooters at that table, the guns showed themselves to be more than adequate.

It was at the last range that the wait was longest to fire the weapons, and the reason was obvious enough. To a long-gun shooter, the last range area held a real treat. On the benches were premier examples of the KAC engineers, and the lasting legacy of Eugene Stoner.

Seven years ago, the Navy SEALs adopted a modified version of the SR-25 rifle as their new semiautomatic 7.62mm sniper rifle – the Mark 11 Mod 0, a replacement for the venerable M14-based sniper weapons still in the racks. On the bench was a single example of a Mk 11 Mod 0 rifle, set up with both a sophisticated electro-optical sight and a long Knight-produced sound suppressor. The optics was a CS6000 thermal imaging sight capable of detecting human activity out to a range of 2,200 meters. All-in-all, a very serious weapons system.

Lined up next to the Mk 11 were the two newest versions of the SR-25, the recently adopted XM110 U.S. Army Semi-Auto Sniper Rifle System (SASS). The XM110 has a twenty-inch match grade 1:11 twist heavy barrel, as does the Mk 11. But the muzzle of the XM110 barrel is threaded to accept a flash suppressor. The trendy desert tan color of the XM110 rifles also made them stand out, but all the weapons shared the same basic characteristic – long range accuracy combined with a quick follow-up firing capability.

Firing some of the best weapons available might prove enough for most to spend an afternoon away from the Shot Show. But Reed Knight’s rendition of southern hospitality required that he offer much more. Underneath huge tents in the parking area near the main building were set up long rows of tables, just what were needed to partake of the excellent barbeque served up by the caterers. Keeping with the overall country-western theme of the day, Reed Knight, along with his staff and sons, were wearing western outfits, complete down to Colt single-action revolvers riding in low-draw holsters. In the background was both a mechanical bull for the more adventurous among the guests, as well as a much safer Country-Western band, the Bama Band, who were twice nominated for the Academy of Country Music’s Band of the Year Award and were for 20-plus years the touring band for superstar Hank Williams, Jr., that fired up their music in the sunset hours.

But it was the tour of the KAC main plant that really drew the crowds. On the plant floor were Mazak machining centers – quarter-million dollar chunks of computer-controlled precision. And there were rows of the big machines stretching out across the plant floor. Each machining center is capable of turning out identical parts for as long as needed, and then they can be reprogrammed to produce other components with a minimum of fuss, given skilled staff. And Knight’s Armament has 300 personnel making up that skilled staff manning the 400,000 square feet of floor space.

To help the production machines make their parts at KAC is a new Fanuc robotic arm. The bright yellow arm was twisting and turning through a complicated measuring protocol, dancing the same moves over and over for the on-looking crowd.

On the production floor, rack after rack was filled with parts in various stages of manufacture. The area was quiet for the open house, but the bins and racks of parts stood in mute testimony of the demand for Knight’s components and assemblies to aid the United States and the Global War on Terrorism.

There is something to be said for the success of a design when you see hundreds and hundreds of parts to make up the Knight Rail Adapter Systems (RAS) that are seen on many of the weapons serving in the hands of our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. The basic idea for the RAS came to Reed Knight when he watched footage of our troops in Grenada back in 1983. A long-time competitive shooter, Reed saw the guns in the hands of our troops with flashlights duct-taped to the forearms. Knowing that there had to be a better way to secure the illumination and aiming devices desired and needed by the troops, Knight and his engineers came up with the rail system, now used in every branch of the service.

Other components for successful Knight designs filled the bins on the floors and tables, but it was the second floor that held the crown-jewels of the tour. The Knight firearms library holds an extensive collection of weapons for study, many of them museum-class specimens in their own right. Taken as a whole, the library of firearms can easily compete with a number of large weapons museums around the world. Only these weapons are for study to help develop new designs to keep American arms technology in the lead for many of the world’s militaries. The Knight Working Reference Collection is incredible to experience.

The large number of guests at the open house had to be broken up into smaller groups to go through the plant and finally visit the collection. Since a number of unauthorized photographs of part of the collection have been posted on the Internet, cameras are strictly forbidden for the visitors to the collection. For the readers of SAR, Reed Knight graciously allowed this writer to bring a camera into parts of the collection to illustrate this article.

In the hallway leading up to the main room housing the bulk of the library, glass walls show the interiors of two side rooms housing two very special collections.

With justifiable pride, Reed Knight stood in front of the E. M. Stoner Memorial Gallery. Not just any firearms were contained in the gallery, it was a tribute to the firearms genius and hard work of Eugene Stoner, a designer and engineer well known to any who study the art of modern weapons. On the walls of the gallery were unique specimens of Stoner’s designs, most of them one-of-a-kind prototypes.

Opposite of the Stoner gallery was another room holding the examples of the products and weapons made by Reed Knight and his people over the years. A centerpiece of the KAC Shot Show booth was 6x35mm KAC Personal Defense Weapon. On the walls of the gallery were specimens of that weapon along with a number of others. When Reed was asked which of the pieces was his favorite, he reached over and pulled down a Mk 11 rifle, a particularly beat up and badly damaged piece.

The reason for Reed’s pride in that particular rifle? It had taken its damage in combat, serving in the very capable hands of a Navy SEAL.

SAR would like to thank Reed Knight and his son Trey, as well as their staff, for the wonderful opportunities they have afforded the small arms community in the past years, and to salute their commitment to the pursuit of knowledge and future development in small arms. The Knights have helped countless designers, writers and researchers over the years, and the readers of many firearms magazines, especially Small Arms Review, have benefited from this commitment to academic research. During the event at Knight’s, over 1,400 people experienced the hospitality and received a good old fashioned Barbecue in addition to their test firing demonstrations and tour of the plant and the Knight Collection. Those who toured the Collection were treated to explanations and anecdotes from Reed, Trey, George Kontis, Col. David Lutz and other employees of Knight’s, and SAR’s Dan Shea was also drafted/volunteered to serve as a guide for several tours as well. It was clear that everyone involved was proud, and indeed humbled, to help the attendees experience the amazing depth and focus of the Knight Collection. Again, SAR would like to thank the Knight’s for their generosity in sharing the history and knowledge they maintain in their Collection, and indeed, for keeping the torch alive in an age when political correctness has threatened our national security by chiseling away at our martial knowledge.

“The one down there with the pistol grip, that was the one I carried in Vietnam; the early version. Andy Grandy of Frankford Arsenal designed that. He called me and I went up there and shot it. He put the loader extension on it so it held eight rounds. With that duckbill at roughly thirty meters you hadda two foot high, twelve foot wide pattern using Number Four buckshot.” Retired US Navy Chief Petty Officer James “Patches” Watson, Curator Emeritus, UDT-SEAL Museum

(Editor’s note: It’s one thing to visit a military museum, but another thing entirely to get one-on-one guided tours by the museum’s Curator Emeritus, as well as its Executive Director. In this report by Military Affairs Editor Robert Bruce, SAR is pleased to provide our readers with what might be considered the next best thing. Small Arms Review is known and apparently respected by influential members of the UDT-SEAL Museum’s board and staff. As a result, our customary request for special access – including a close look at important artifacts currently on display and others in the holding safes – was enthusiastically supported. Special thanks to Association President Willard Snyder, Executive Director Mike Howard, Curator Emeritus James Watson, and Curator Ruth McSween, for taking the extra time and trouble. – Robert G. Segel)

The Chief was standing in front of the museum’s Vietnam War diorama, reminiscing in his distinctively husky and New Jersey-accented voice about three combat tours there, pointing out and describing to this correspondent a particularly important one of the many interesting weapons on display.

While a casual observer might consider the crudely chopped scattergun with only passing curiosity, the bearlike, 69 year old retired SEAL calls it his “Sweetheart.” Watson spoke with great affection about how this beautiful example of deceptively simple form and decidedly lethal function came to be and how it performed in the ultimate arena of combat.

Such a moment is of inestimable value to those who appreciate the presentation of military history through actual artifacts with a direct link to men who carried them in war. This is “provenance” at its finest, a ten dollar word in the museum culture that simply translates to “origin.”

The story of this stubby shotgun first caught our imagination in reading the books Point Man and Walking Point, Watson’s gripping narratives recounting his experiences as a “plank owner” (original member) and combat veteran of SEAL Team Two, written in collaboration with frequent SAR contributor Kevin Dockery.

My duckbill-modified, pistol-grip Ithaca became my “Sweetheart” during my second and third tours in Vietnam. The lack of a stock never bothered me because I would normally carry a shotgun only when I expected to be in close quarters. Close up, I could point my shotgun from the waist and blow away any target I had in front of me out to twenty or thirty yards without any trouble. (Excerpted from the book Walking Point, Copyright 1997, Bill Fawcett & Assoc. Used by permission.)

Now, SAR was privileged to see, and later to handle and photograph, this very weapon in the presence of its near-legendary SEAL owner. Also, to make an audio tape recording that captured for future generations “Sweetheart’s” story and much more in Watson’s own words. This interview, we’re told, will join many other recordings in the museum’s archives, preserving oral history of US Navy special warriors from WWII to the present.

But that’s getting ahead of the main story, a tour of a uniquely fascinating modern military museum.

Birthplace of the Navy Frogmen

Anchored on the very beach where the largely unknown NCDUs – Naval Combat Demolition Units – of WWII began a heroic saga that continues even today, the small but superb UDT-SEAL Museum in Fort Pierce, Florida, opened in November 1985 with Watson at the helm. Now, after twenty plus years of improvements and additions – as well as repairs and restorations following numerous savage storms – visitors enjoy an extraordinary feast of hardware and history.

The museum itself, its original structure a visually striking, brilliant white cylinder with a spiral ramp to a rooftop observation deck, is surrounded by a large fenced compound protecting an exciting assortment of historic vehicles used in naval operations on land, sea, air, and beyond. A pedestal mounted Huey helicopter, icon of the Vietnam War, seems to have just taken off, straining for altitude above mini subs, riverine and oceangoing craft, dune buggies, and – seemingly out of place to those who don’t know why – a pair of space capsules.

The eye sweeps along its virtual flight path toward the nearby Atlantic Ocean, close enough to hear waves breaking and to catch the strong and evocative scent of seawater, carried inland on the steady Tradewinds.

It is from this dazzling white sand beach and clear blue waters that silent sentinels in concrete and rusting steel were recovered from the surf zone. More than a dozen original beach obstacles from WWII, used in demolition training to prepare for the epic invasion of France known as D-Day, now line up alongside the museum.

Wide pathways lead the visitor from one display to another, bordered with hundreds of emotionally powerful memorial bricks. Look closely and find the names of heroes of Naval Special Warfare like Roy Boehm, “The First SEAL.” Additional bricks display other names, and are available to all who support the museum’s mission.

We walked the verdant and well-kept grounds with current Executive Director Michael Howard, a friendly, energetic and wiry 50 year old retired Navy Captain with over 26 years of service including SEAL Team One and command of several Naval Special Warfare units. Howard appreciates this historic location but also notes the daunting environmental challenges that come with it including high temperatures, salt air with humidity, extreme winds, and frequent torrential rains.

Most recently, he said, “Hurricanes Frances and Jeanne hammered us and the whole place was almost destroyed. Boats actually got up and floated. All these are in different positions now than before the hurricanes.”

The Huey was particularly hard hit, he said, with the tail boom breaking off and other extensive structural damage. “New Piper Aircraft, up in Vero Beach, took on the repair project at no cost. They restored it and, with the help of Kauff’s Transportation and Recovery, we got it remounted on the pedestal.”

Pointing to the museum’s two Vietnam War era PBRs (Patrol Boat, Riverine) and a pair of current issue DPVs (Desert Patrol Vehicles), the Captain spoke of plans to improve on these already impressive displays. “One of the projects we’re working on is getting weapons on these boats and vehicles,” he said, hastily adding, “fake weapons.”

“We think that’s important to make the displays a little more dynamic, realistic looking, with more punch,” he said. “That’s what SEALs and boat guys and helicopters supporting them are all about – firepower.”

Since then, we’re told that highly realistic replica .50 caliber M2s have been bought and installed. Wisely, these are made with durable polymer resin that won’t corrode in the harsh salt air and, in this day and times, have the essential advantage of being completely inert.

A Proud Beginning

The Executive Director’s tour moved inside where walls of the main hallway are covered with impressive plaques listing units and personnel from the first NCDU in 1943 to the Plank Owners of SEAL Teams One and Two. These frame the entranceway to the World War Two gallery, heralded by an imposing wall-sized photo enlargement showing men of NCDU 200 during training at Fort Pierce in 1944.

Stepping a few feet inside, Howard paused in an area flanked by illuminated display cases containing individual mannequins representing the rapid evolution in WWII from NCDUs and Scouts and Raiders to UDTs (Underwater Demolition Teams). Each is authentically uniformed, equipped and armed, he said, often with items donated to the museum by actual veterans of the period or their families.

The Hagensen (sic) Demolition Pack is common to all, a generic name given to variations based on a clever field expedient explosive charge with two pounds of pre-rigged C2 packed in a canvas haversack for land or underwater use. The original is credited in official Navy D-Day documentation to Lieutenant (j.g.) C. P. Hagenson (note “son” with an “o”).

Also notable in this section is a tribute to Lieutenant Commander Draper Kauffman, “The Father of Naval Combat Demolition,” who set up NCDU training at Fort Pierce in June of 1943.

Moving around the gallery, Howard acknowledged SAR’s obvious bias by pointing out numerous examples of American and enemy weaponry. All of the standard Navy and Marine Corps small arms have honored places, from the M1911 .45 auto pistol through ’03 and M1 rifles, the M1 carbine, Thompson submachine gun, as well as John Browning’s famous BAR and his unstoppable M1917A1 machine gun.

As counterpoint to standard US firearms, we were pleased to find nice examples of German P38 and Luger pistols, as well as an MG34 machine gun, prominent in the D-Day case.

Japanese weaponry is similarly in evidence, including a representative Nambu pistol and Arisaka rifle. Most impressive to many visitors is the large, radiator-finned Type 92 heavy machine gun, dramatically posed beneath a Japanese battle flag. UDT 24 autographed this flag while occupying Japan, post surrender.

Also prominently displayed is a Samurai sword, formally surrendered by General Tomoyuki Yamashita after losing the battle for the Philippine Islands in 1945. While it was believed for many years that this was the general’s own priceless family heirloom sword, recent expert examination showed otherwise. Howard speculates that, anticipating the inevitable, the canny general sent his home, appropriating one from a junior officer to hand over to the Americans. Both the original surrender document and Samurai sword were presented to the Museum by Draper Kauffman’s family.

North Gallery

Moving ahead in time from victory in WWII and the Occupation of Japan, SAR’s VIP tour continued in the North Gallery with Chief Watson taking over duties at the Korean Conflict wall, fronted by a tripod-mounted .50 caliber Browning M2HB machine gun. This awesome example of John M. Browning’s genius was fielded in the 1930’s, then served with distinction in WWII, Korea and Vietnam. Remarkably, it is still going strong today on Naval Special Warfare Combatant Craft.

The large and menacing machine gun is intentionally set on a boxlike riser at knee height. This, the Chief says, encourages visitors to reach out and touch the gun, a significant departure from the rules at most museums and a particularly memorable experience for many in the school groups and others that regularly visit.

Watson told us that Korea was where UDTs started doing many of the things that would later become SEAL missions, “Going behind enemy lines and attacking fuel depots, bridges and railroad yards.”

The North Gallery’s tightly packed displays of photos, equipment and weapons from Korea to the present Global War on Terror are strongly enhanced by a video presentation on Basic Underwater Demolition School. BUDS is the hellish entry ordeal that all aspiring SEALs must successfully complete. Repeating automatically at regular intervals on a wall-mounted monitor, its sounds of pounding surf, straining men, screaming instructors, throaty cadence chants, gunfire, and explosions fill the gallery, bringing to life the harsh world in which these silent artifacts have served.

The evolution of diving gear for waterborne combat operations is well represented and the museum is particularly proud to have a fine example of the Lambertson Amphibious Rebreather. A “closed-circuit rig” that doesn’t release telltale bubbles, it was introduced in the latter part of WWII for OSS Maritime Units and UDTs.

Walls of Weapons

Noting our quick glances over his shoulder during the introduction to Aqua Lungs and such, the Chief – who definitely shares SAR’s intense appreciation for weapons of all kinds – quickly moved on to the primary focus of our visit. Guns are what we want, and the museum has got plenty of ‘em.

Several large Plexiglas-faced displays are filled with 20th Century military firearms, enticing the visitor to move up close for an intimate encounter. The tall, shallow cases allow examination literally inches from exotic and unusual pistols, submachine guns, rifles, grenade launchers, and more. Read serial numbers, see selector markings, note mechanical details, almost smell the gun oil….

Standing in front of the first case, containing a variety of allied and enemy weapons from the Vietnam War era, Watson recalled his time in preparation for SEAL Team Two’s deployments when, at the prophetic insistence of Team Chief Bob “The Eagle” Gallagher, “We trained with these because you never know if you’re gonna hafta pick one up and use it because you ran outta ammo or something happened to yours.”

The two weapons at the top were ChiCom copies of the RPG-2 (NVA B-40) launcher and generic AK-47 with underfolding spike bayonet. Four submachine guns lined up underneath; an M45b “Swedish K”, French MAT-49, and a Russian PPSh-41, nicely paired with the North Vietnamese K-50M that’s made from it by chopping the barrel and cooling shroud then replacing the fixed wooden stock with a telescoping wire version.

The Chief doesn’t hold the K-50 in high regard, citing at least one he fired with an apparent sear problem. “Hang on ‘cause it wasn’t gonna stop ‘till it was empty,” he said. “Definitely a piece of junk.”

But a big smile appeared when we stepped in front of the next case and he pointed out several of the US weapons his team and others used in ‘Nam. In addition to an early version M72 LAW (Light Antitank Weapon), there were three grenade launchers on display that he heartily approved of. A 40mm M79 “Thumper” often accompanied the Chief as a STAB (SEAL Team Assault Boat) coxswain on riverine missions, and his team got some of the first underbarrel-mounted CGL-4/XM148 launchers off Colt’s assembly lines.

The last of the trio is the exceedingly rare “China Lake Pump,” serial number 4 of a total run said to be only sixteen guns. This is an imposing cross between an M79 and a pump shotgun that allowed the grenadier four quick rounds when things got really hairy.

Of course the Chief has a story to go with the weapon. “When I went back to Vietnam in 1996, serial number 13 was hangin’ on the wall in their war museum,” then added with a knowing look, “I tried to find out who lost that but was unsuccessful.”

The enthusiasm level kept rising as we moved to behold yet another weapons case, this one filled with belt-fed machine guns. The topmost weapon is an HK 23, a sturdy but heavy West German-made 5.56mm that the Chief notes was combat tested by a Team Two buddy, the late John “Fly” Fallon.

But, he says, it didn’t stack up to Gene Stoner’s lighter, compact and modular guns. “Stoner designed a system – a rifle and machine gun combination,” he said, putting emphasis on the word system.

“When I went into Cambodia … I’d take the stock off it and use the short barrel. You wanted to make everything as light and small as you could.” The system aspect of Stoner’s guns is well presented in the three variants on display, showing how a basic receiver group can be reconfigured with various barrels and feed mechanisms. A 63A assault carbine version with folding wire stock and 30-round magazine is sandwiched between two belt-feds. Above is a Mark 23 Mod 0 with a generous 150-round drum and below is a 63A1 with a 100-round box.

(SAR notes that at least one of the Stoners and a good number of the other weapons on display are on long-term loan from the Naval Historical Society’s fabulous holdings. See Robert Bruce’s NHS feature in Volume 7 Number 1.)

Silencers vs. Suppressors

A bit incongruously sharing this machine gun case is an M16A1 with one mounted suppressor and another below, teamed with its cutaway version to reveal the engineering secrets inside. These prompted a quick lesson from the Chief, enlightening those handicapped by Hollywood-generated ignorance. “There’s no such thing as a silencer,” he declared, “every weapon makes some noise in functioning – even a bow and arrow.”

Pointing to the Mark II suppressor and its cutaway on display, he added, “When you use this one without subsonic ammo you’d hear the crack of the bullet when it broke the sound barrier. But it creates deception in locating the direction somebody’s shooting from. If we’re standing here and (points left) a guy’s out there shooting with a suppressed M16, you’d think he was over there (points right) ‘cause what you’d mostly hear is the bullet breaking the sound barrier.”

Shotguns, Shorties and Starlight

Then, turning to his left, Watson paused in front of the Vietnam diorama, figuratively traveling back in time nearly forty years to a nighttime raid on a bamboo hut on the other side of the world. Dramatic life sized figures of three men with green camo face paint and exotic armament are checking out a Viet Cong guerrilla weapons cache, a variety of weapons of communist bloc and other origin.

“The SEALs here just discovered it,” the Chief says, “the guy on the left is carrying a standard Model 37 (Ithaca shotgun) with a ‘duckbill’ – the later version with the ring around it.”

And there, sitting on a wooden ammo crate in front of the SEAL, was Watson’s own “Sweetheart,” described at the beginning of this feature. But he isn’t pleased that this makes it look like his gun had been captured. “That didn’t happen,” he declared, “we’re gonna get some stuff moved around.”

The SEAL on the right carries another interesting combo, a chopped M16 dwarfed by a big, strange apparatus attached to its topside carrying handle. The Chief shakes his head as he recalls his own brief experience with this ungainly rig.

“Here’s one of the first ‘Starlight Scopes,’ but it was too heavy and cumbersome,” he said. “I used it once mounted on a CAR Fifteen (submachine gun version of the Colt AR-15 rifle)…. Too heavy and when you put it up to your eye to use it there’s a green glow. Take it away and you’re blind; night vision’s gone in that eye for thirty minutes.”

Post-Vietnam to GWOT

The North Gallery continues with exhibits showing activities and operations since Vietnam, overseen by an eerie life-sized hologram with the spectral three dimensional presence of a SEAL armed with an MP5 submachine gun. He tirelessly guards displays showing Naval Special Warfare units in action in Grenada, Panama, Persian Gulf, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Noteworthy among the photos and artifacts is another tall case packed with examples of Navy edged weapons from the Mark I KA-Bar of WWII thru the new Gerber Silver Trident, the Chief’s own design in collaboration with Bill Harsey, Jr.

Across the way, visitors can walk right up and touch a battle-damaged 12.7mm ChiCom Type 54 heavy machine gun, a clone of the Soviet DShKM, captured by SEAL Team Two’s Fourth Platoon during a still-politically sensitive operation in the Persian Gulf in the late 1980s. Roughly equivalent to Browning’s M2HB, the exotically configured and impressively large weapon should spark recognition of how lethal is the arsenal of our current enemies.

Operation Desert Storm, the 1st Gulf War, is the final major exhibit, shown in display cases full of captured Iraqi gear dominated by a mannequin in “chocolate chip camo” uniform, representing a SEAL operating far behind enemy lines. Then, the last bit of wall space available in the museum holds a meaningful tribute to the eleven SEALs killed on a combat rescue mission in Afghanistan on 28 June 2005.

Safekeeping

Few museums have everything in the collection on display and this one has packed a small storage room literally from floor to ceiling with rare, unusual and truly exotic artifacts. Stepping up close we encountered vintage tactical radios, diving gear, uniforms, and other interesting items from decades of NSW operations. How about an example of the distinctive XM257 shotgun ammo that goes with the “Duckbills” on display? Got it. “Bazooka” rockets used against beach bunkers? Yep.

Also, three large safes line one wall of the room, jammed with weapons and other high-value artifacts. Their massive doors swing open to reveal an eclectic mix ranging from Great War vintage machine guns to GWOT RPGs. Chief Watson pulled a few out for us to handle (wearing the necessary white cotton gloves, of course) and graciously gave us the opportunity to shoot detailed photos. In addition to a 1917-made Lewis Gun that served in WWII protecting UDT craft, there’s Robert Marshall’s M1 Carbine (UDT 3 and 5) and a ‘Nam era S&W Model 39 auto pistol with suppressor.

But our props really started turning when the Chief set a trio of crude handguns down on the white background paper of our makeshift studio. “These are homemade VC pistols,” he said, “captured by Team Two’s ‘Fly’ Fallon and his PRU (Provisional Reconnaissance Unit) on a Phoenix operation.”

There, right in front of us, were jungle workshop weapons; surprisingly well made by resourceful guerrillas, captured by a real SEAL on a CIA-directed mission, brought back home by him, then personally donated to the museum. This is powerful provenance and future visitors can look forward to the time when space is available to put them and their story on display.

Artifacts Sought

Curator Ruth McSween has recently come on board. With a Masters Degree in Museum Studies, she brings a high degree of professionalism to the demanding tasks of cataloging, preservation, presentation, and much more.

McSween encourages the continued contribution of letters, photographs, uniforms, oral and written histories, weapons, and other memorabilia, relating to the history of Naval Special Warfare of all eras. Like most museums, they have a need for certain historical items to fill important gaps in the collection: OSS Maritime Units, the history and evolution of Special Warfare Combatant Craft, and photographs of UDT platoons executing hydrographic reconnaissance survey work.

Additionally, she says, “We would like to increase the number of artifacts that date to more recent operations including both wars in Iraq as well as the war in Afghanistan.”

Bigger and Better

Available space for major exhibits ends after the first Gulf War. So museum leaders are aggressively pursuing funding for expansion to showcase recent and ongoing NSW operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and other battlegrounds of the Global War on Terror.

Howard explained that there are existing architectural plans for a dramatic new addition but day to day operational costs have to take priority. “Right now we’re only making ends meet,” he said.

Association President Willard Snyder, interestingly a retired Army Colonel (Infantry) with service in 12th Special Forces Group (USAR), told us the Board of Directors is working to “get one focus and move ahead financially.” Both Snyder and Howard see corporate donors – such as major defense contractors – as natural sources of funding and other support.

Howard, Snyder and the Chief all emphasize the essential contributions of rank and file members whose dues, volunteer work, donations of artifacts, personal and professional networking connections, are the museum’s firmest foundation. Increasing membership – open to all who wish to support preservation and presentation of the history of Naval Special Warfare – is a top priority.

Find Out More

Membership details and a printable application form may be found on the Museum’s excellent website at www.navysealmuseum.com. Additionally, the site offers a stunning “virtual museum” tour as well as a wealth of information on history, heritage, and links for those interested in SEALs and other current Naval Special Warfare units. Go on-line shopping at The Ship’s Store for an interesting assortment of UDT and SEAL memorabilia including shirts, caps, pens, mugs, patches, stickers, videos, and plenty of books such as Chief Watson’s Point Man.

See For Yourself

No trip to Florida by a modern military history buff or small arms enthusiast would be complete without a side visit to tropical Fort Pierce and its UDT-SEAL Museum on beautiful North Hutchinson Island. Most anytime is fine, but particularly during Muster, the yearly gathering of past and present SEALs and other NSW members. The 21st Annual Muster, featuring spectacular combat demonstrations and other exciting activities, is scheduled for November 10 through 12, 2006. There’s detailed info on the museum website.

UDT-SEAL Museum
3300 North Highway A1A
Fort Pierce, FL 34949-8520
Telephone (772) 595-5845
www.navysealmuseum.com
Other Useful Websites
www.nswfoundation.org
www.navysealteams.com
www.navyseals.com
www.seal.navy.mil
www.realseal.org

The AUSA (Association of the United States Army) holds its annual meeting every year during the fall in Washington DC., except for the one in 2001 which was abruptly canceled. It seems most of the attendees were suddenly busy overseas with the opening shots in the War on Terror. The meeting has been held at the Washington Convention Center every October for the last three years. The DC Convention center is the only place in the District area that’s both big enough, and secure enough, to hold the meeting: particularly the display hall. This is the 51st annual meeting of the AUSA. This year more than 30,000 members and guests attended the exposition and meetings. It is a very significant event, both for the Army and for the public that it serves.

The Washington Convention Center is not just a large but is also a convenient location for the AUSA annual meeting. It is located northwest of the US Capitol Building, at Mount Vernon Square/7th Street. With a Metro station literally at the door, the Yellow and Green lines of the subway make the Center very easy to get to from the entire DC metropolitan area. The maps that are given out at the registration booths show the full exhibit area, a complete schedule of events, and a map of the surrounding DC area showing hotels, restaurants, and the Metro lines.

Few other military shows can boast being larger than the AUSA annual convention and none of those are in this country. Outside of a military base, no other displays will show more or bigger hardware. When General Dynamics wants to show off one of their premier products, they just bring in a fully functional Abrams main battle tank right from the line. One year, the tank inside the display area had been on a hot range only a few days earlier – the bomb dogs loved it.

If you think something the size of a modern battle tank might stand out in an indoor display, think again. There were 130 displays from Army units and organizations, as well as more than 400 industrial displays from representatives from the United States as well as more than a dozen countries from around the world. The AUSA show occupied more than 450,000 square feet. The exhibits covered nearly a quarter-million square feet of space all on their own. Not only were all of the major weapon systems used by the Army represented in the exhibits, so was the bulk of the ancillary equipment, from uniforms, ammunition, communications, vehicles, food and water. Even the Chaplain Service was well represented. Unless you’re over in the Sandbox or the Rockpile, AUSA is probably the only place you will ever see a Field Communion Kit, packed for field carry in its fitted web gear.

Besides just the general run-of-the-mill weapons and equipment (there is such a thing?), both futuristic prototypes as well as historical displays were available for viewing, in many cases in a hands-on presentation. This is a very prestigious show. Moving through the aisles will have you literally rubbing shoulders with four-star generals. Back in the 1980s, President Reagan was a luncheon speaker at the AUSA Convention, and he has hardly been the only President to attend. Manufacturers and industry representatives seem to try to outdo themselves every year with bigger and better displays, bringing out their very best and showing it to its maximum advantage.

The AUSA annual meeting does a great deal more than just give defense industry representatives a place to show their goods. The many conferences, seminars, and presentations at the event make it a significant professional development opportunity for the career soldier. The Annual Meeting delivers the Army’s message, this year being a Call to Duty – 230 years of service to the nation. The exhibition area also showcases the capabilities of the organizations that make up the Army as a whole.

This year’s meeting came at the end of this country’s fourth year in the global war on terrorism. The intensity and commitment of the Army’s service men and women can be clearly seen on the faces of the many of them who attend the meeting. Walking through the halls and areas of the Convention Center, you see representatives of all of the Army’s major commands, and organizations, sometimes both past and present. Walking through the exhibition area it is not out of the ordinary to see the pleasure in the face of a veteran of such units as the 82nd Airborne or the Big Red One when he meets a young soldier who is now serving in his old unit. And that soldier carries forward the pride of the veteran in his service in Afghanistan, Iraq, and all around the globe.

Information on the Army, its present actions, and its recent as well as past history, are available just by taking the time to stop and watch. Presentations are constantly being given on the exhibition floor while the area is open. Multi-media shows back up the talks given by the soldiers who have “been there and done that.” And these are also the people who use the hardware, materials, and services that are showing all around them.

The Exhibition Area

The industry displays are the heart of the exhibition area, and they are well worth the work involved in getting to the meeting. All of the major companies, and more than a few of the smaller ones, are around the floor. General Dynamics, AMC, Bell Helicopter Textron, Heckler and Koch, FN, Colt, Alliant Tech, AAI, Glock and more show weapons systems ranging from small arms to artillery, armored vehicles, and aircraft. The Army organizations also show their materials and capabilities. One particular area that should be pointed out is the Army PEO (Program Executive Office Soldier) display pavilion. It is probably the single most interesting and wide ranging display pavilion in the exhibit area. The PEO office is tasked with the mission to develop, acquire, field, and sustain everything the soldier wears, carries, and operates with. It is a huge organization with a very large field of interests. At the PEO website (www.peosoldier.army.mil) you can read the details about the organization, its divisions, and the equipment they are responsible for. But reading about it is not the same as a hands-on examination of the material. It is at the AUSA exhibition that the individual can do that close up and personal look at some of the gear that only exists in experimental or prototype forms.

Most of the materials and services on display in the exhibition hall were not the sorts of things you could expect to buy privately. Some would be on sale to the public eventually, such as the 7.62x51mm drum magazine from the Beta Company. But most would never see a gun shop showroom. That doesn’t mean an attendee would have to leave empty-handed. Almost every single piece of material in the hall, from single rounds of ammunition to massive trucks and armored personnel carriers, had literature available to explain, give technical details, or just describe them. These pass-out documents could range from a simple single-sheet on a particular item, to full company catalogs – printed or on DVD, of a company’s entire line of products and services. Most of the military organizations at the exhibition followed suit with their own literature.

Just one organization, the U.S. Army Medical Research and Material Command (USAMRMC) had an entire book of several hundred pages available that detailed each item they had in use or under development. And in the big tent-covered display, USAMRMC were showing examples of many of the items in the book – from a new style of efficient bandage to the latest vaccines and pain killers.

Dillon Aero Inc. had their miniguns and mounts on the floor, as well as a catalog listing their upgrade services, parts, and accessories. They don’t just make reloading machines. Ammunition, the feed devices to carry the ammunition, and the web gear to carry the feed devices, could be seen, sometimes handled, and almost always read about. Designers and developers, engineers and salespeople, were on hand to explain what could be seen by attendees. Entire lines of ammunition of all calibers were shown by the manufacturers. Producing companies from as far away as Norway, Sweden, South Korea, and Singapore had tables, cabinets, and racks of rounds ranging from 5.56mm to 240mm cannon shells. Many of the displays included cutaways of the ammunition and fuzes, showing not just what the rounds were but how they worked. Full ranges of color codes, and what they all meant, were sitting behind glass.

Simulation systems, ranging from an enclosed live-firing range with Simunition-fitted weapons to tank main gun training devices, showed the new methods of training today’s warfighter. It could be startling for an attendee to be walking down an aisle and suddenly hear the subdued blast of a 120mm Abrams gun firing, immediately followed by the mechanical sounds of reloading and the cry “Up!” indicating another shot was ready to go. Once you saw the simulator, which was the entire turret of an Abrams sitting on the floor, you at least understood that it wasn’t an attendee’s reaction to the parking situation in DC. The armed Humvee inside a tent-like booth allowed soldiers to actively engage the enemy attacking them, learning how to repel an ambush without costing lives or putting out live rounds. These are among the means that make the United Stated fighting man unequaled in the world.

The hardware and training to use it were not the only subjects covered by the industrial representatives at AUSA. Maintenance was not forgotten. Tools, diagnostic equipment, shelters, even wreckers capable of moving a broken-down main battle tank were spread out for close examination. Otis Products had a large display showing their wide range of excellent cleaning kits, several of them being present military issue. Once a weapon was clean, it had to be lubricated. Adaptive Molecular Technologies had their product on display, not that it would be known by that name, Militec-1 is a very popular and successful synthetic weapons lubricant, so highly thought of that soldiers would spend their own money to purchase it. But the people who make Militec-1 are long-time supporters of AUSA and they were doing a land-office business passing out samples of their product. The bottles of lube were well received by soldiers, many of whom were soon to return to the combat zone.

Black Tie Finale

The last major event of the AUSA meeting is a Wednesday evening black-tie formal affair: the George Catlett Marshall Memorial Reception and Dinner. These are two separate affairs, the dinner following the reception and require purchased tickets, something that sells out very quickly which shows the popularity of the event. Black-tie requires formal evening dress for civilian men and the women and, for military guests, full Mess Dress uniform. Not something you see everyday, even in Washington. For everyone attending, it can be an education in military style and due to the wide variety of foreign dress uniforms, the reception can be a startling view.

The exhibit area closes early on Wednesday so that the representatives can prepare themselves and the booths for the incoming guests. A separate ticket is required for the reception and the later dinner, and the one for the reception is well worth the price. This is the evening when the exhibitors and the AUSA staff put on a show for their guests. Entertainment is offered that ranged from military singers, a country western band, and even a ventriloquist in an evening gown. In all, the reception and the formal dinner following it made for a very interesting conclusion to a unique military event.

Admission Policy

The AUSA annual meeting and exposition is a private affair and not open to the general public. Admittance is limited to AUSA members, members and civilian employees of the U.S. Armed Forces, designated representatives of member and exhibitor companies, invited guests of the Association, and those who have an identifiable relationship with the U.S. Army. It is not difficult to join the Association and www.ausa.org is the website of the AUSA and it invites concerned citizens as well as all of the above to join them in AUSA membership. The annual meeting dates for 2006 are 9-11 October, once again in the Washington D.C. Convention center.

One of the first major US search-and-destroy operations, where troops went out and tried to hunt down and exterminate the VC in their strongholds northwest of Saigon, was called OPERATION CRIMP. Beginning in early January, 1966, US and allied troops were almost immediately ambushed and fired on by an enemy who disappeared as suddenly as he had first made himself known. The means of this military magic was discovered by a US Army sergeant when he sat on a nail that was sticking up from a hidden trapdoor.

The sergeant’s painful discovery was the first uncovering of the tunnel complexes of the Viet Cong. Tunnels dug into the root-sewn red clay soil could extend only a short distance, or be a part of huge, multilevel, underground complexes that would extend for miles. There was only one way to find out just what was in the tunnels – a soldier had to go down into the dark and search them.

Army dogs didn’t work to search the tunnels, they were killed by unseen traps too quickly. So a new type of American soldier had to come out from the ranks to face the VC in the new arena. Tunnel Rat was the term that was quickly coined for these generally small-stature soldiers who would go down the holes. Like green ferrets, Tunnel Rats would go into the dark, forbidding tunnels and discover whatever might be there.

Lurking in the warren of dark, hot, humid, tunnels, the tunnel rats might find boobytraps, snakes, venomous insects, weapons caches, or a weapon in the hands of a very live VC. One thing that the tunnel rats were always sure they could find underground – a quick death.

Tunnel entrances were often little more than an 18-inch square camouflaged wooden trapdoor. Through this trapdoor would go a tunnel rat equipped with a flashlight, handgun, knife, and bravery.

The subterranean world of the tunnel rat was made up of tunnels dug through soil that was described by an engineer as being like natural, reinforced concrete. According to the Viet Cong plans the tunnels were no smaller than 0.8 meters or greater than 1.2 meters wide. Ceilings were no greater than 1.8 meters high, and much more often closer to the minimum 0.8 meters high. But the larger tunnels were usually in the deeper layers of the complex. The areas usually searched by the tunnel rats were often little more than 30-inch wide tubes cut through the sticky earth.

The M1911A1 Colt .45 automatic was the general handgun used by the tunnel rats during their early explorations. But the sound of the big .45 going off in the close confines of a tunnel was deafening. The M1911A1 was also considered too big and too cumbersome as well as being too loud.

Revolvers were chosen by a number of tunnel rats as their search techniques became more sophisticated through experience. The .38 revolver was relatively small, light, and easy to handle. In addition, the Smith and Wesson or Colt weapons available could handle the dirt and muck of the tunnel environment easily, and a second shot in case of a misfire was only a trigger pull away.

In the condensed world of the tunnel rat, even the M2 carbine with a folding stock was nicknamed “The Cannon.” IN general, pistol suppressors were not available, and when they were, the tunnel rats found them to be long and made their handguns ungainly.

A tunnel exploration kit was developed in 1966 by the Limited Warfare Laboratory (LWL). The communications system in the kit didn’t work well. The cap-mounted lamp slid around and either was pointing the wrong way, slipped down over the tunnel rat’s eyes, or gave the VC an aiming point that was almost guaranteed to be fatal.

The weapon in the kit was a .38 Special Smith & Wesson Model 10 (M&P) revolver with a 4-inch barrel, a small high-intensity aiming light and a muzzle mounted suppressor. The hip-holster issued with the weapon was very hard to draw from in the tight confines of a tunnel. The revolver was huge with its aiming light and muzzle can. And even with a tight cylinder gap, the suppressor didn’t reduce the sound of the shot enough to be worth the trouble.

The designers back at the LWL probably hadn’t had a lot of faith in the revolver suppressor as well, they issued ear plugs in the kit to be used when firing underground. The Tunnel Exploration Kit was abandoned in service, most tunnel rats wanted nothing to do with it, and it was quickly withdrawn.

By 1969, subterranean combat in the tunnels of South Vietnam had been refined by time and experience. The tunnel rats knew what worked for them and were exceedingly conservative in adopting any new hardware or weapons. It was in July 1969 that ten of possibly the rarest modern US military handgun ever made arrived in Vietnam.

Earlier, in December, 1967, the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MAC-V) had recognized that the need still existed for a low-noise weapon for what were now officially called the tunnel exploration personnel in the Republic of Vietnam. The tunnel rats had been using a variety of weapons since the suppressed S&W fiasco eighteen months earlier. Some tunnel rats had competent armorers and machinists make up suppressors for a variety of handguns, including several for the M1911A1. But the big .45 didn’t operate dependably with a simple muzzle can, though any sound suppression given the big pistol was well liked by the rats who didn’t mind its size.

A few of the OSS-ordered WWII era suppressed High Standard HD .22 automatics made they way into Tunnel Rat hands. But these weapons were very few in number and wanted by a number of other special units. Personal weapons were used by the rats, ranging from .25 caliber automatics to sawed-off shotguns. MAC-V looked at some of these field improvisations and added their characteristics to their request for a new weapon.

To increase hit probability in the dark tunnels, ammunition for the new weapons would be of the multiple-projectile type. A spread of shot would be much easier with when the target may only be visible for a fraction of a second, or maybe not visible at all. Since the tunnel combat was by nature at a short range, the weapon was to be lethal at 25 feet, minimum. Basically, MAC-V wanted a small, handheld, suppressed shotgun for the tunnel rats.

The Army LWL passed on the project to a qualified civilian contractor, Aircraft Armaments Inc. (AAI) of Baltimore, Maryland. AAI had been working for a number of years on various applications of captured piston and expanding capsule (teleshot) technology for both the military as well as NASA and the aerospace industry. The company’s experience with firearms had them quickly applying the captured piston concept to the tunnel weapon project.

In the captured piston system, propellant gases from normal smokeless powder drives a piston pushing a payload down a cylinder with one open end. When the gas-driven piston strikes a constriction at the open end of the cylinder, it is trapped and held in place. The payload continues away from the cylinder, moving at what can be a significant velocity.

The captured piston seals off the end of the cylinder, trapping the propellant gases inside the system where they can bleed off slowly. With no propellant gases escaping violently, muzzle blast, flash, and the resulting noise, is reduced considerably. Exchange a steel cartridge case for the open-ended cylinder, and a plastic capsule full of shot for the payload, and you have the heart of the tunnel weapon.

The “muzzle velocity” of the projectile, in this case the shot charge, is dependent only on the length of travel and pressure pushing the internal piston of the round. A sealed-in percussion primer ignites the propellant charge in a normal way. Heavy threads at the muzzle end of the cartridge slow and stop the piston as it shears through them. The capsule continues out the barrel of the weapon and breaks up on hitting the resistance of the air, releasing its shot charge.

To increase the lethality of the shot charge, heavy metal shot was used instead of the usual lead shot. Sintered tungsten-steel alloy shot was formed under pressure for the subprojectiles. The sintered-metal technology involved compressing powdered alloy in a die between two punches and gave the shot a noticeable belt in its center, topped by two hemispherical ends. The shot looked much like a round ball with a band around the center.

To fire the new ammunition, a revolver system was used to eliminate any problems with trying to function a semiautomatic weapon. To maximize available space for the ammunition design, the largest commercially-available revolver design was chosen for development into the tunnel weapon. The revolver decided on was the Smith & Wesson Model 29, .44 Magnum.

The .44 magnum barrel was removed and a simple short cylinder threaded into its place. The stub barrel had a 0.400 smooth bore reamed through its center. The extractor rod of the revolver was cut back to just in front of the end of the muzzle. Outside of the barrel, the main mechanism of the revolver was little changed outside of the cylinder.

Each chamber of the .44 magnum Model 29 cylinder was reamed out to 0.528 inches straight for its entire length. Over 2.75 ounces of steel were removed from the cylinders that originally weighed over half a pound. This gave the cylinder walls of the tunnel weapon enough strength to function and carry the ammunition, and that was about all. But since the steel cartridge case itself held the pressure of the propellant gases, the cylinder walls could safely be made very thin.

An additional coil spring was placed near the top of the mainspring to give the hammer additional power to hit the slightly recessed primers of the special ammunition. The precision sights of the Model 29 were useless with the new ammunition and the rear sight was removed, leaving a square slot in the top of the revolver for rough aiming if desired.

When fired, the new ammunition gave out little more than low-intensity sparks. The blast and noise of a normal revolver shot was almost completely eliminated. The 15-pellet load gave the revolver the shot spread of a very open .410 shotgun.

The ammunition did have an unusual safety problem inherent in its design. The round didn’t have to be in a barrel or cylinder to have a lethal velocity if fired. In case of a round going off from heat or a blow, the shot would be moving at the same 750 foot per second velocity it would have if fired from the weapon. To insure safety in storage, special 1/8 inch thick steel liners were put in the ammunition cans holding the tunnel weapon ammunition. If the rounds went off in a fire or other mishap, at least the pellets wouldn’t leave the ammunition can.

The shot from what was now called the Quiet, Special Purpose Revolver, would penetrate a 3/4 inch thick sheet of plywood at 15 feet. This was later used as part of the demonstration of the weapon to its users in Vietnam. In July, 1969, ten Tunnel Weapons and 992 rounds of ammunition arrived in Vietnam for testing.

Five of the new weapons and 496 rounds of ammunition were each issued to the 1st and 25th Infantry Divisions for a 90-day field test period. On 22 August, 5 Tunnel Weapons and 125 rounds of ammunition were transferred from the 1st Infantry Division to the Americal Division for the balance of the testing period. Training time for the new weapons ranged from none to several hours, but it usually always included a firing demonstration at the recommended plywood target.

Accuracy was reasonable with the new weapons. One user could hit a flying sparrow at 20 meters with a single shot. But that marksman was very much the exception. Most users trained for an hour or less with the new weapons, firing 30 or fewer rounds each during the session.

Acceptance of the new weapon was limited by the very conservative tunnel rats. But within weeks of their arrival in Vietnam, the tunnel weapons were being carried in their special shoulder holsters into the tunnels of Vietnam.

The “silent” quality of the tunnel weapon gave some of the users questions regarding its lethality. During one tunnel mission, a sergeant with the 25th Division demonstrated the effect the tunnel weapon had on human targets.

While slipping through a tunnel complex, the sergeant crawled around a corner and met face to face with an NVA soldier; “The NVA was sitting and just as surprised as me, but I was able to fire the Tunnel Weapon…. before he could use his rifle. I drug him outside but he was dead.”

In another incident, a sergeant armed with a Tunnel Weapon took out a VC outside of a tunnel. “I shot him coming out of a bunker. He was running, and he was about 20 to 25 feet away.”

The shot load of the Tunnel Weapon was effective but it didn’t have the stopping power of a regular bullet. A number of other encounters with VC and NVA troops in tunnels resulted in wounded and disabled enemy forces, but they were not killed by the shot load of the Tunnel Weapon.

The steel cartridge cases also had some problems with the recessed primer system. The steel firing pin of the revolver didn’t always strike the primer solidly enough for it to go off. This resulted in a high (18 percent) failure to fire rate on the first weapons. The firing pin was replaced in-country with a harder metal one, and the ammunition primer redesigned. But the very conservative tunnel rats never liked or trusted the tunnel weapon completely. What they had been using for several years had worked for them and they were still alive. That was enough.

But another group of US forces liked the tunnel weapon – a lot. The 25th Infantry Division issued their Tunnel Weapons also to members of one of their reconnaissance and Intelligence platoons as well as to its Ranger company and infantry companies. The Americal Division used its Tunnel Weapons with its Ranger and Infantry companies. This put the tunnel weapons to use in ambushes, prisoner snatches, and other more covert actions.

The Tunnel Weapon was found to be ideal for ambushes, especially at night. Enemy soldiers were killed at ranges of less than ten feet with other troops nearby never hearing the shots. Comments on the weapons from these users included;

“If we had five such pistols we could stay out for a week at a time…without ever giving our position away.”

“That pistol is the most magnificent weapon I ever seen in action. I could use three of these in my platoon. The pistol doesn’t make any noise louder than a cap pistol. It hits the target just by using the pointing method. I never aimed the weapon. This weapon is far by being better than a .38 pistol we had. It’s more accurate, it’s very quiet, and it handles better than any other pistol I’ve handled.”

“For our use it works real good. We have to avoid contact and the weapon doesn’t compromise our position. For our platoon we could use five or six of these weapons.”

There were some suggestions made for improving the weapon, and especially the ammunition. The primer pocket was redesigned and that eliminated a lot of the misfire problems. But besides its use in 1969, the Tunnel Weapon was never fielded again in any numbers after the evaluation period. Only the ten examples, and a single specimen maintained by AAI, were ever made. Two of these are at the US Ordnance Museum at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Specimen #5 is on public display there and the AAI specimen is there in storage.

On a very odd note, one of the Tunnel Weapons was reported lost in Vietnam. This weapon was later recovered in California where it had been used as a suppressed weapon in a murder. Almost no live specimens of the ammunition exists, especially not in private hands. The captured-piston ammunition for the Tunnel Weapon and other systems has been declared a suppressor by BATF.

QSPR (TUNNEL WEAPON) TECHNICAL DATA UNIT # 5
OVERALL LENGTH – 6.75 inches
BARREL LENGTH – 1.372 inches
BORE DIAMETER – 0.400 inches
WEIGHT (EMPTY) – 2.01 pounds
WEIGHT (LOADED) – 2.37 pounds
WEIGHT (CYLINDER) – 0.419 pounds

AMMUNITION
CASE DIAMETER – 0.526 inch
RIM DIAMETER – 0.550 inch
ROUND LENGTH – 1.866 inches
ROUND WEIGHT – 0.971 ounces (27.5 grams)
PROJECTILE – 3 piece plastic sabot containing 15 tungsten-steel alloy shot
    PELLET DIAMETER – 0.147 inch (belt)
    PELLET WEIGHT – 7.5 grains (each)
MUZZLE VELOCITY – 750 fps
EFFECTIVE RANGE – 50 feet
MAXIMUM RANGE – 1,400 feet
SOUND LEVEL – 120 Decibels at 1 meter from muzzle

By Kevin Dockery

Vietnam was the first war zone where the US forces began making real use of suppressed weapons in combat. All of the US services fielded some suppressed weapons at one time or another during the Vietnam War. Originally, the vast majority of these weapons were WWII designs that had been stored away since their use by the OSS during that conflict.

Since there was a stigma attached to suppressed weapons in combat, some high-ranking officers and politicians considered them just weapons for assassins, not combat soldiers. When the Navy SEALs asked for a suppressed handgun to be designed, the request was couched in careful terms. The need was voiced for a means of quietly eliminating guard dogs. The planned use for the new suppressed pistol resulted in its now famous nickname – the Hushpuppy.

Developed in the 1966-1967 time frame, the Hushpuppy was based on the Smith and Wesson Model 39. A longer barrel, higher sights, elimination of the magazine safety, and a few other changes were done to adapt the weapon to its new configuration.

The biggest change was the removal of the standard slide stop and its replacement with a special, extended version, the slide latch. The slide latch has a right and left side component, both of which have a raised triangular front tip. When the rear of the latch is depressed, the front tips engaged into triangular cuts on either side of the slide. With the slide latch engaging the cutouts in the slide, the action remains locked during firing. This makes the hushpuppy a single-shot, manual repeater, but also eliminates the sound of the action cycling when fired.

The new weapon was called the 9mm Pistol Mark 22 Mod 0. To suppress the sound of firing, the Mark 3 noise suppressor was designed. The Mark 3 suppressor is a simple muzzle can containing a spring retainer and suppressor insert. The insert is the heart of the suppression system.

Contained within the 2-inch sealed aluminum capsule of the suppressor insert are four spaced 1/4-inch thick soft urethane plastic disks. The first bullet passing through the insert makes the hole that the subsequent projectiles will pass through. When the sound of firing raises to an unacceptable level, or after 24 shots have been fired through it, the suppressor insert is simply replaced, effectively refurbishing the suppressor.

To maximize sound suppression of the admittedly specialized weapon, the Mark 144 9mm round was developed. The Mark 144 round was a special, heavy-bullet subsonic round. The green tip of the Mark 144 round indicated that it was loaded with a 158-grain full jacketed bullet that had a nominal muzzle velocity of 965 fps. The Mk 144 cartridge was reportedly developed under navy contract by the Super Vel cartridge company. The first production run was for 7,000 rounds, the second being for 12,000 rounds. By 1970, the Navy put out a bid for a further 30,000 rounds of Mk 144 ammunition, but this was picked up by other companies.

To refurbish the Hushpuppy in the field, the Navy packaged the Mark 26 9mm Pistol Accessory Kit Mark 26 Mod 0. Along with a new suppressor insert, the Mk 26 kit came complete with 24 rounds of Mk 144 ammunition. In addition to the ammunition and suppressor insert, the Mk 26 kit had specialized plugs, caps, and disks, that could be used to waterproof the Hushpuppy so that it could be transported underwater, either assembled or the pistol and suppressor separated, to a depth of 200 feet.

The chamber plug in the Mk 26 kit was a plastic “round” with am O-ring in the center of its body. With the chamber plug in place, and a white, plastic muzzle plug disk over the front of the Mk 3 suppressor, the Hushpuppy could be carried underwater assembled and sheathed in its holster.

Coming up to the surface, all a Navy SEAL would have to do is pull back the slide of the Hushpuppy, automatically ejecting the chamber plug. Slipping the slide forward would chamber one of the waterproofed Mk 144 rounds in the Hushpuppy’s magazine. The plastic muzzle plugs were designed to be safely fired through.

The Hushpuppy would put 8 shots into an 8-inch circle at 25 yards. Roughly converted from the original measurements, the sound of the unsuppressed Hushpuppy was 160-decibels, the sound of the unlocked suppressed pistol firing was 133 decibels. With the slide latch engaged and firing Mk 144 ammunition, the Hushpuppy had a peak sound pressure of 129 decibels. Usually, the target would never hear the shot.

All told, only between 100 and 120 Hushpuppies were ever made for the Navy. The SEALs first started fielding the new pistols in late 1967. By 1968, each deploying SEAL platoon had at least one Hushpuppy assigned to it. Production never really met the demand for the weapon. In 1970, SEAL Team Two acquired 45 more Hushpuppies to support their operations in Vietnam – they always wanted more.

Set up on its three folding metal legs, or tied to a convenient tree or other support by the two cloth flaps on either end of the mine, the Claymore could be aimed like a shotgun. When fired by its battery pack firing device, the M18 Claymore would blast its fragments out in a fan-shaped swarm. The beaten zone of the blast fan of the M18 Claymore was 2 meters high and 30 meters wide at a range of 30 meters. The fragments remained dangerous out to over 200 meters in front of the weapon.

Type classified by the Army in 1959, the M18 Claymore was found to have a number of shortcomings when used by the troops. With a short time a modified weapon, the M18A1 Claymore became standard issue. It has remained standard issue in the US arsenal today.

The M18A1 Claymore’s body is a glass-filled polystyrene plastic molding produced in two parts. The rectangular mine body is curved outwards towards it’s front in order to control the spread of the fragmentation when the mine is fired. Inside the front portion of the mine body is the fragmentation matrix consisting of 700 steel balls held in place with a plastic resin.

The rear of the mine body holds the charge of C-4 explosive. Detonation of the C-4 blasts the fragmentation outwards in an expanding arc with a velocity of about 3,000 feet per second (914 m/s. The design of the Claymore’s body is such that the spread of the fragmentation remains in a 60 degree fan-shaped beaten zone 2 meters high and 50 meters wide at a distance of 50 meters from the point of detonation. This area of maximum effectiveness is called the killing zone of the mine and is one of the significant improvements of the M18A1 over the earlier M18 model.

Within the killing zone of an M18A1 Claymore, the fragmentation has a high enough velocity to penetrate a standard US Army armored vest. And additional area of moderate effectiveness extends outward from the mine to a distance of 250 meters. The area of moderate effectiveness is also wider than the killing area and covers an arc 90 degrees to the right and left of the center of the killing zone.

Because of the blast of explosive when a Claymore is fired, all personnel must be undercover when within 100 meters of the mine and no one should be within 16 meters of the point of detonation. With the 16 meter danger area of a Claymore, the backblast of the explosive can cause concussion injuries of personnel, even when they are under cover.

Even when friendly personnel are undercover and at a proper distance, the power of a Claymore going off can be staggering. In a large ambush, where a number of Claymores are fired at one time, the effect is incredible, even when the operators know what is coming. During one PRU ambush operation in Vietnam, the SEAL advisor had over a dozen M18A1 Claymores laid out, and fired them all in a single shot.

“The mines going off sounded like an ARC LIGHT strike (B-52s w/500 lb bombs). Then my PRUs opened up, covering the entire area with a swath of fire. As the firing stopped, there was only dust and a ringing kind of silence.”

Mike Boynton USN (Ret.) Excerpted from “Hunters and Shooters,” Edited by Bill Fawcett. Avon Books: New York. 1995. Page 122

Just about all of the troops who used the Claymore mine liked it. The sudden blast of firepower coming out from a Claymore, or a line of Claymores, could wipe out an incoming group of enemy forces, or cause them to break up in confusion where they could be picked off one by one.

One of the primary uses of the Claymore was for area defense. Positions such as firebases, hilltops, or even just a few holes in the ground and some cover, could be quickly defended by a ring of Claymores. Another very popular use for the Claymore was as an ambush weapon. When properly laid out and aimed, the Claymore could literally sweep an area clear of vegetation, and any personnel who might be there.

The Claymore comes complete in a bandoleer with everything necessary to employ it. The firing system supplied is electrical and includes an M4 blasting cap, an M6 special electric cap attached to 100 feet of firing wire, and a squeeze-type M57 firing generator intended to fire a single cap.

The Claymore can be set up with the M4 blasting cap inserted into either of the cap wells at the top of the mine’s body and secured in place with the screw plugs provided. The 100 feet 30.48 m) of firing wire attached to the cap is unwound from it’s spool out to the firing position. At the position, the shorting plug is removed from the firing wire and the wire’s end plugged into the M57 firing device, also called the “clacker”.

The M57 clacker has a safety bale that prevents the operating handle from being depressed unintentionally. Moving the safety bale on the firing device allows the handle to be squeezed, firing the mine. To test the firing circuit of the Claymore without firing it, an M40 test set is supplied, one per case of mines. The bandoleer of the mine kit containing the M40 test set is marked by a green tag on the shoulder strap of the bag.

The M40 test set itself is a simple green box that has a socket to accept the M57 firing device at one end and a plug intended for the M4 blasting cap assembly at the other end. By placing the M40 test set into the circuit, the firing system can be tested by squeezing the firing device. If the circuit is sound, a visible light will flash in the test set without setting off the cap. Simply removing the test set and plugging the M4’s wire into the M57 firing device readies the Claymore for firing.

In the humid and corrosive environment of Vietnam, even testing a setup M18A1 Claymore didn’t guarantee the mine would go off. Even mines that tested positive seemed to have a mind of their own on occasion. During one operation in the T-10 area of the Rung Sat Special Zone, a squad of SEALs had laid out an ambush for a number of VC thought to be operating in the area. As a group of 10 to 15 armed VC walked into the kill zone of the ambush, the SEAL officer in charge prepared to trigger the ambush.

“Whispering, I said, “Claymore!” The VC were right there, 30 feet away. We would have had them cold. We wouldn’t have had to fire a shot. Only the damned Claymores didn’t go off. We cranked them two or three more times and they still didn’t go off. I couldn’t believe it. Still on all fours, I said, “Open up,” to the Stoner man and the whole squad started shooting…

… we called in slicks and left in style, guns blazing and the Seawolves hosing the place down. We tried the Claymores one last time before the helos came in. The damned things went off. Lesson: explosives can be unreliable so you’d better have a backup plan.”

Captain Rick Woolard USN (Ret.) Excerpted from “Hunters and Shooters,” Edited by Bill Fawcett. Avon Books: New York. 1995. Page 238

Even with the occasional disappointment, the M18A1 Claymore mine earned itself a solid place in the US arsenal. Use of the mine was only limited by the operator’s imagination. Claymore’s were used as boobytraps, base defense, and as a counter-ambush device when a group of US forces were trying to break contact with an pursuing enemy force. For this kind of use, a prepared Claymore would be carried by the squad, outfitted with a non-electric firing system and a 30-second time delay.

The chased squad could quickly emplace the Claymore to cover the path behind them. Pulling the fuse igniter on the Claymore would start the delay and the squad would pull out. As the pursuing VC would come after the squad, they would often run right into the killing area of the mine as the Claymore detonated. The simple act of setting up the Claymore and pulling the fuse actually takes longer to describe than to do.

Some applications of the Claymore worked better than others, Some just never worked at all. One young officer had the idea of lining the sides of a truck with Claymore mines, just the thing to break up a VC ambush. But even with a heavy lining of sandbags, and an armored cab, the truck would only stand up to one such firing before being turned into a twisted pile of junk. And it was very hard to find a soldier who was willing to sit, even in an armored cab, and allow a bunch of Claymore mines to go off all around him.

Probably the biggest compliment to the efficiency of the Claymore mine is the fact that it is the most copied directional mine in the world. Even the Viet Cong worked hard in their jungle workshops to turn out their versions of the Claymore. The VC DH-10 directional fragmentation mine was around a foot in diameter and weighed over 30 pounds. But it could blast its cut-up steel rod fragmentation out to over 200 meters and take out personnel. Closer in, the DH-10 could destroy vehicles and even bring down helicopters.

TECHNICAL DATA
M18A1 Claymore mine

TYPE: Directional antipersonnel fragmentation mine

IDENTIFYING COLOR CODE: Olive drab body

CONTAINER MATERIAL: Fiberglass filled polystyrene plastic

FILLER: C4

METHOD OF ACTUATION: Military blasting cap or primacord; Command detonated with the M57 firing device and M4 electric blasting cap; Remote detonated with a military blasting cap or primacord and a suitable firing device

EFFECTS: Blast drives 700 10.5 grain (0.68 g) steel spheres out in a 60 degree fan-shaped sheaf (arc) from the point of detonation

AREA OF EFFECT: (16 m) Blast radius from C4 explosion; Highly effective fragmentation in an area 55 yds (50 m) wide by 2.7 yds (2.5 m) high, 55 yds (50 m) in front of the point of detonation

LENGTH: 8.5 (21.6 cm) M18A1 Mine; 4 in (10.2 cm) M57 Firing device; 100 feet (30.48 m) firing wire M4 blasting cap

WIDTH (DIAMETER): 1.38 in (3.5 cm) M18A1 Mine; 1.35 in (3.4 cm) M57 Firing device

HEIGHT: 3.25 in (8.3 cm) M18A1 Mine w/legs folded; 3.25 in (8.3 cm) M57 Firing device

EFFECTIVE RANGE: 109 yds (100 m)

MAXIMUM RANGE: 273 yds (250 m) Forward danger radius; USE Local defense of fixed installations and forward areas. Antipersonnel/antivehicular ambushes and directional minefields

Envisioned by Army Ordnance as a means of giving field-artillery firepower to the infantryman, the M18 was considered to be the largest of the type possible to have the ability to be carried and crewed by one man. Or, as Col. Jim Crossman wrote, it put “rifle accuracy and cannon power on a man’s shoulder”. Weighing approximately 45 pounds versus 2,700 for the 57mm antitank gun and wheeled carriage, it shot a 2-3/4 pound projectile with a muzzle velocity of 1,200 feet per second. It was first demonstrated as the T15 at Aberdeen Proving Grounds in early September 1943 and by early 1945 Ordnance sent guns with demonstration teams to Europe and the Pacific. Initial reports were enthusiastic. It is capable of being fired from the shoulder, off of a built in rear bipod/front monopod arrangement or from the 1917A1 tripod, which is actually the most common means.

There were several shells developed for the M18. The standard HE (high explosive), the HE, AT (high explosive, anti-tank) which used a hollow charge for penetrating armor and a smoke round designated WP for its white phosphorus content. Interestingly, a canister shell was also fielded. This was made of thin sheet metal that contained 133 stacked steel slugs. Upon clearing the muzzle, the sheet metal cover ruptured and exposed the slugs, converting the M18 to a giant shotgun.

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) inherited, or maybe more accurately, captured the design and factory for the Type 36. After World War II, the United States supported the Nationalist Chinese in their war against the communists. Among the help provided were drawings, specifications and technical assistance in producing a version of the M18. When the Nationalists left the mainland for Formosa (Taiwan), they had to abandon the plant to the Reds. The Chicom Type 36 is slightly heavier than the M18 and it has a few smaller differences more based on the manufacturing technology employed than on actual design changes. Like the American version, the Type 36 was usually fired from a tripod though it could be fired from the shoulder as well. An advantage of the Type 36 was that it could fire US or Chicom ammunition whereas the M18 could only use US rounds. The effectiveness of the guns was similar. Effective range was about 500 yards (though some sources say as much as 1,500 yards), armor piercing ability nearly 3 inches and firing rate was between 5 and 8 rounds per minute. By 1968 the M18 and M18A1 were listed in Army Ordnance manuals as being Standard B (limited) issue.

During the wars in Vietnam both the US M18 and the Chicom Type 36 were generously provided in great numbers to allies. The Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army had plenty and so did the French, the South Koreans and the South Vietnamese as well as US forces.

Just about everyone involved in the Vietnam War put the 57mm recoilless rifle to use, including some naval units on both sides…

An incident told in Brown Water, Black Berets by Lt. Cdr. Thomas J. Cutler, USN, describes the armaments of North Vietnamese Trawler #459 as being 12.7mm deck guns and a 57mm recoilless rifle. These were put to use the night of 15 July, 1967 when the trawler headed for the mouth of the Sa Ky River while trying to run a US blockade and was cornered by several US ships where it came under fire and was destroyed.

The US experimented with the M18 on small craft as well. The Norwegian manufactured NASTY class patrol boats (PTF’s), often manned by SVN LDNN crews advised by US Navy SEALs carried one for use from the bow. Later these were replaced due to backblast concerns. These problems didn’t keep the 57’s from seeing any action. PTF’s were often used to provide transportation and cover for sabotage missions in coastal areas of North Vietnam on their SOG 34 Alpha missions. On one particular mission, an NVN Swatow gunboat ambushed PTF-6 near Hon Me, wounding several South Vietnamese crewmen. With a landing out of the question, they evaded the enemy vessel while destroying a gun emplacement and some buildings with their 40mm, 20mm guns and 57mm recoilless rifles. Along with PTF-3, PTF-6 then turned south and safely headed home.

A MAC-V HQ study in 1965 stated that a favored VC daylight tactic for ambushing riverine craft appeared to be the use of 57mm recoilless rifles supported by small arms fire as opposed to mines. This was due to the accuracy and point target capability of the 57mm. An example of this happened on 07 February, 1966 when VC fired upon the Panamanian ship Lorinda on the Log Tau River in the Rung Sat Special Zone with 57mm recoilless rifle and assorted machinegun fire. The Lorinda made it to its destination but was heavily damaged by this attack. One result of this was the installation of the Mark 48 turret onto Monitor and other riverine craft. This turret on ASPB’s had already received hits from VC 57mm RR fire as well as RPG-2s and RPG-7s with little effect.

Probably one of the best uses for the 57mm RR was devised by the US Special Forces at camp A-103. There were 3 fairly large hills next to the camp and situated on each was a hilltop outpost considered essential to the camp’s security. Since these guns looked down on the camp not only was their accuracy and power appreciated but also the concern for the backblast was essentially removed with the breech venturis pointed at the sky. On the other hand, the VC and NVA took advantage of the mobility of the 57mm RR especially when attacking fixed targets such as A-camps or fire support bases. A typical infantry combat support company was, among others, assigned a 57/75mm recoilless company. These were generally used in a direct fire role in support of larger indirect fire weapons such as rockets and heavy mortars, and usually the last to withdraw when providing cover fire while the heavy weapons packed up and left. The recoilless rifles were also considered to have better accuracy than rockets and were therefore also used against smaller targets such as bunkers and command and communication centers.

Ownership in America today

The US M18 or M18A1 is fairly rare in collector’s hands. Few if any escaped either shipment to a needful ally or the cutting torch. Under US Federal Law, it is classified as a Destructive Device by virtue of its larger than 1/2 inch bore. In speaking with a few enthusiasts, I found that the vast majority of these rifles are built from formerly demilled parts sets. The largest source for these, as well as a good supply of spares is Hayes Outapalik out of Missoula, Montana. Gun Parts Corp/Numrich also lists some parts. Though cases and projectiles are available from several sources, at this time only a brave few are beginning experiments to fire full-bore loads of home rolled rounds. And these are from a tripod with ballistic protection placed around the breech. Most folks own or have made sub-caliber devices (see SAR Vol. 4 #12, Sept 2001). These are available in a surprising variety of chamberings from .22 rimfire up to .50 BMG. The most unusual I heard of was those in 6.5 Carcano. I suppose this makes sense when you realize many of these guns were sold to Italy. A special mention of the .50 BMG unit is required. This actually imparts too much stress to these old guns, especially on the aluminum brackets that hold the tube to the mount whether it is tripod or bipod. The suggested way around this is to either fire the plastic projectile M858 round which has very little recoil, or mount the gun to a recoiling MAG-58 mount without sandbagging the feet. This will allow enough movement to help preserve the rifle’s integrity.

Luckily, there is also an experienced gunsmith out there to put these parts sets together. That’s Steve Carlesco at GSI in New Haven, Connecticut. He has already made several non-firing wall hangers, a few Title 1 subcaliber only rifles and some full bore rewatted 57mm guns. For the latter the customer supplies the pre-approved Form 1.

I should also mention that some experienced individuals in the field of DD’s believe the 57mm recoilless rifle to be dangerous to the shooter. There are a few high wear parts that were intended to be replaced at regular intervals. Without a ready supply of these and a complete record of your gun’s firing history, it is best to listen to the cautions of the experts and follow their recommendations for firing full power rounds if you so choose.

The 57mm recoilless rifle served ably during the cold war. It was portable, powerful and accurate. It gave the infantryman artillery power at a time when similarly powerful field guns weighed thousands of pounds. Yet by the mid-1960’s cheap mass produced Soviet and Chicom RPGs and the US M67 90mm recoilless rifle had rendered the 57 obsolete. For a time though, in a humid simmering cauldron called Vietnam, when the cold war heated up, it was there, doing its duty on both sides of the fence.

Kevin Dockery and Phil Labudde helped immeasurably in the preparation of this article.

Sources:

Part sets, spares, cases and projectiles:
Hayes Outapalik, P.O. Box 8423, Missoula, MT (406) 549-4817
Projectiles and cases only:
Big Sky Surplus LLC, 3018 E. Sinto, Spokane, WA 99202 (509) 535-9486
Gunsmithing, assembly and general advice:
Steve Carlesco, GSI, 41 Main Street, New Haven, CT (203) 467-8437

Working with outside companies such as Honeywell Incorporated, Picatinny came up with a fuze system for the new grenade that was considered a marvel of miniaturization at the time. Even with the small size of the fuze, it was as large as the fragmentation body itself and made up over 50% of the complete projectile. Further studies of the new projectile centered on determining which would be the best way to launch and stabilize it in flight.

Colonel Rene R. Stutler, Chief of Small Arms Research and Development for US Army Ordnance, at his office in the Pentagon had decided that a shoulder fired launcher dedicated to launching the new grenade would be the way the project would go forward. A deputy to Colonel Stutler, Jack Bird, became interested in the grenade launcher project and investigated the idea on his own time.

Taking a piece of pipe that would accept a golf ball, Bird capped off one end and drilled several small holes through the tube’s side. With a spring placed in the tube and a golf ball dropped down over the spring, a stick was used to push the ball down against the pressure of the spring. A nail slipped through one of the holes in the side of the tube held the ball in place on the compressed spring.

Demonstrations of Bird’s “launcher” took place in the central courtyard of the Pentagon. The high arcing trajectory of the golf ball when the cross nail was pulled out demonstrated remarkable accuracy for such a crude device. The high lobbing arc of the ball reminded a number of the onlookers of a nine-iron stroke on a golf course. Jack Bird suggested the program for the new weapon be named after the popular term for a nine-iron at the time, a Niblick. Stutler agreed and Project Niblick was so named.

Once the basic projectile had been established, both a launcher and a means of propelling the grenade were needed. Springfield Armory received funds in June 1952 for its Research and Development Division to conduct a study of various devices to launch the new grenade design. A number of designs were established, built, and tested at Springfield Armory using the various forms of ammunition, now known as the Niblick projectile, coming from Picatinny.

Launchers for the Niblick projectile at Springfield Armory from 1952 into 1955 concentrated on muzzle attachments for the M1 Garand service rifle. These launchers used a blank cartridge to propel a Niblick projectile much like a standard rifle grenade. Designs ranged from a simple tube to a complex 8-round semiautomatic launcher attachment that had a circular magazine holding the projectiles. None of the designs had much advantage over the standard rifle grenade and did not show enough promise for further development.

The Niblick projectile used in most of the muzzle launcher attachments was a drag-stabilized round with an extending skirt that spread out behind the fired projectile. A spin-stabilized Niblick projectile, resembling a fat bullet, was found to have much more promise in terms of accuracy. A cartridge design with a self-contained propellant was needed to further develop the potential of the Niblick projectile.

To fire the very large Niblick projectile from a cartridge case, the standard method of simply filling the case with propellant would not fit the needs of the project. When a standard small arms cartridge is fired, the projectile receives a very violent push from the rapidly burning propellant that gradually lowers in pressure as the projectile moves up the barrel. Using the standard cartridge system with the Niblick projectile would create several recoil problems, eliminating the possibility of a shoulder-launched weapon. Lowering the velocity of the Niblick projectile to allow a shoulder-fired weapon would cause most propellant powders to burn erratically at best, ruining accuracy from round to round, and badly cut back on the effective range of such a system.

During World War II, the Germans had faced a similar question, but for different reasons. The German question was how to build a worthwhile antitank weapon that would be lightweight, use few critical materials, and still have range, accuracy, and lethality. The use of a rocket projectile was ruled out due to an inherent lack of accuracy at long range and a very high consumption of fuel when compared to projectile weight.

A new internal ballistics principle, the “Niederdruck” or high-low pressure system was developed in Germany during WWII and was used by Rheinmetall-Borsig to solve the antitank weapon question. In the high-low pressure system, a relatively small amount of propellant is burned in a high pressure chamber until it reaches a threshold pressure and ruptures a seal. With the seal ruptured, propellant gases bleed through small holes in a metal plate into the low pressure chamber where they bear on the projectile. When fired, pressures in the high pressure chamber reach the 30-40,000 psi range while the low pressure chamber maintains a reasonably steady 3,000 psi. The high pressure chamber allows the propellant to burn completely and efficiently. The low pressure chamber gives the projectile a steady push with the pressure curve having a flat, almost optimal, line.

The steady push of the low pressure portion of the high-low system gives a useful velocity to the projectile but also allows for a more fragile projectile to be used than that of a regular cannon. The low pressure also gives a low recoil impulse but is very consistent for accuracy. The major stress of firing is in the high-pressure chamber so the barrel and resulting support equipment for the weapon can be made much lighter.

The German weapon that fielded the high-low pressure system was the Rheinmetall 8cm Panzerabwehrwerfer 600, or PAW 600. The PAW 600 fired a fin-stabilized, hollow-charge round that would penetrate 5.5 inches (14 cm) of steel, out to an effective range of 600 meters. the smoothbore weapon had a light barrel with only the breech section requiring heavy walls to withstand firing. Set up for action the PAW 600 only weighed some 1,389 pounds (630 kilograms) while a conventional 5-cm Pak 38 cannon weighed 2,205 pounds (1000 kilograms) and only had some 400 meters additional range with much less penetration.

Though considered revolutionary in concept and the only major ballistics advance of the war, the high-low pressure principle was not developed further in the years following World War II. In the 1952-53 time period, Picatinny Arsenal revived the high-low pressure system to propel the Niblick projectile in a self-contained round of ammunition.

The high-low pressure cartridge case was made of aluminum and was unique in its design. The center of the cartridge case was the high pressure chamber, a thick walled extrusion in the center base of the case. Spaced around the side of the high pressure chamber are six precise vent holes. The inside of the high pressure chamber is sealed with a thin brass cup that contains the powder charge and closes off the vent holes. The bottom of the cartridge is closed off with a thick base plug that holds a percussion primer.

When the 330 milligram (5 grain) propellant charge of M9 smokeless powder is ignited by the percussion primer, it builds up a pressure of 35,000 psi while burning. When the 35,000 psi point is reached in the high pressure chamber, the brass seal ruptures and the propellant gases bleed out into the low pressure chamber where they are reduced to a pressure of 3,000 psi. The 3,000 psi pressure moves the projectile up the barrel at a relatively slow rate, maintaining close to full pressure throughout a 14-inch barrel length. The Niblick projectile left a 14-inch barrel with a muzzle velocity of 250 feet per second and a right-hand spin of 3,700 rpm due to the rifled barrel.

The self-contained Niblick round kept a relatively low bore pressure in the launchers when compared to standard ammunition. The only point of high pressure stress when firing the round was taken up by the high-pressure chamber itself. These facts allowed the barrels of the various Project Niblick launchers to be made of aluminum. The low muzzle velocity also prevented any of the launchers from having excessive recoil even though a very large and heavy projectile was being launched for a hand-held weapon.

A number of launchers for Project Niblick were produced at Springfield Armory in 1953 under the direction of the project director, Cyril Moore. Two specific designs of launchers for the Niblick round showed considerable promise. One device was a simple shotgun-like fixture for determining ballistic data for the complete Niblick round. The other launcher was designed to fire six rounds semiautomatically. This was the first of the Project Niblick weapons that was a dedicated, shoulder-fired system. With a large rotating cylinder, the device acted much like a shoulder-fired revolver. Though the idea of semiautomatic fire held promise, the first device was found to be unsuitable for military use.

In the 1954-55 time period, the focus at Springfield Armory was on utilizing the complete Niblick round, though there was still some experimentation with the earlier types of projectiles. At this time, the S-3 launcher, a single-shot, break open, shoulder fired device with a rifled barrel was produced. This device greatly resembled the Federal Laboratories tear gas gun that was popular with police departments at the time but with a more complex sight and a forward hand grip.

A more complicated launcher that had semiautomatic capability was developed and under study by 1955. Identified as the S-6 strip-type shotgun, this was the first weapon to use a semiautomatic capability built into a conventional shotgun format. The S-6 used a harmonica-like strip of three Niblick rounds, each held in its own firing chamber, and feeding through the side of the receiver to give a semiautomatic fire capability. As each round was fired, a spring would drive the strip clip through the receiver until it indexed on the next loaded chamber. This form of launcher met with high approval in the conferences between Springfield Armory and Army Ordnance personnel and effort was put into refining the design.

A second generation semiautomatic S-6 launcher was available within a few months of the first model being accepted for development. Shortcomings from the first S-6 were eliminated in the second generation design. Further work was needed to meet the military needs of such a weapon system and study continued on the design. Other launchers were examined, including large flare-gun like pistols, to use the Niblick round, but none of the designs met with much success.

Later in 1955, the experimental Project Niblick weapons were due to be tested by the Army Infantry Board. Lieutenant Colonel Roy E. Rayle, the Small Arms R&D Chief at Springfield Armory, suggested further development go into another single shot launcher like the earlier S-3 design. Instead of developing a new design, Rayle suggested an already existing pattern, such as the Stevens Model 220 hammerless shotgun with a top-mounted safety and release lever, be modified to fire the Niblick round. The advantages of such a design would be the simplicity of operation and ease of training to recruits.

Lieutenant Colonel Rayle’s suggestion was followed and a second launcher was developed along the lines of the S-3, this one identified as the S-5 shotgun. The S-5 was the first attempt to build a Niblick launcher that followed the lines of a conventional, single-shot, sporting shotgun. The lines of the S-5 remained simple and the mechanism straightforward. Further development continued on the design especially on the shoulder stock and sight configurations. An immediate drawback to the S-5 that limited its appeal to the Army personnel was that the system was single-shot only.

During testing, the S-6 repeating grenade launcher was found to have problems with accuracy and was considered awkward to handle and operate. These problems were quickly traced to the harmonica magazine. A lack of a positive seal between the mouth of the magazine and the rear of the barrel caused propellant gases to slip though the gap. This caused irregular muzzle velocity in the S-6 weapon and greatly limited the firing accuracy of the system. The much simpler S-5 launcher was favored by the Infantry Board testers. A decision was made to try and correct the problems with the S-6 launcher in order to retain the semiautomatic capability while retaining the S-5 design in reserve.

By 1958, the S-6 design had evolved into the T148E1 and T148E2 launchers. The T148E2 design was more complicated than the E1 as it incorporated a break-open design to help seal off the barrel/magazine gap. The greater number of components in the T148E2 design eliminated it from further development in favor of the simpler T148E1 pattern. A limited pilot-line production of 200 T148E1 launchers was conducted between 1 January and 30 June 1958 to supply a number of the weapons for field testing and further evaluation. The gas bleed-off at the chamber/barrel gap still caused an unacceptable loss of accuracy and the T148 project was terminated after 1 July 1960.

A conference of Army and Springfield Armory personnel decided the S-5 design, now known as the XM79, should be reactivated. US Army Infantry Board testing determined that a new sighting system should be designed and a few shortcomings of the XM79 be corrected before acceptance. The new sight design was ready by October 1959 and all XM79 launchers produced up to that point refitted with the correction. On 15 December, 1960, the M79 was officially type-classified and adopted by the US Army. Further production difficulties in producing the complicated rear sight limited weapon availability for some years after adoption.

By 1965, the M79 grenade launcher was in full production and available for issue to all of the services.

There is no other weapon so closely connected with the Navy SEALs of the Vietnam era than the Stoner light machine gun. For the operators in the Teams, the weapon was either lauded or vilified, loved or hated, with very little middle ground.

In spite of appearances, the Stoner 63 system and its variants were not first taken into combat by the men of the Navy SEALs. Instead, the U.S. Marine Corps had combat tested the Stoner as early as 1966. The USMC tested the Stoner, had it modified, liked it, and were promptly told they couldn’t have them.

As has been mentioned, the Stoner 63 was unique in the field of military weapons. A single receiver could be used to assemble any of a variety of weapons, from short carbine to a fixed machine gun. When set up as a carbine or rifle, the gas system of the Stoner is above the barrel and the weapon fires from closed-bolt. Set up as a belt or magazine fed machine gun, the gas system of the Stoner can be seen below the barrel and the weapon fires from open bolt. This arrangement allows the Stoner to fire most accurately (closed bolt) as a shoulder weapon while the open-bolt system allows air to circulate better and prevents cook-offs in a support-fire automatic weapon.

Early in 1967, the SEALs first became interested in the Stoner 63, primarily as a belt fed light machine gun. The SEALs were entering a new stage in their direct actions in Vietnam. SEAL Team Two was just starting to deploy platoons for combat in Vietnam at the end of January, 1967. Maximum firepower in a minimum package was a prime concern to the SEALs. On January 17, 1967, the US Navy Test Station ordered eight Stoner 63 light machine guns for testing in combat by the SEALs.

Within a month of the new Stoners being received by the Navy, they were sent out to the SEALs in Vietnam. The limited number of weapons available resulted in only one Stoner being shipped to each deployed platoon. Though the Stoner was known for requiring regular maintenance for consistent functioning, the weapon was well received by the SEALs.

SEAL TEAM ONE – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORY – 1967

SPECIAL TOPICS

(b) PERFORMANCE OF WEAPON SYSTEMS

The Stoner system malfunctioned frequently, but the problem has been eliminated to a certain extent by the proper indoctrination of personnel on the gas system of the weapon. The Stoner system performs well when properly cared for and is the most effective automatic weapon for SEAL Team operations. The weapon itself is sufficiently light that the automatic weapons-man can carry a realistic combat load of ammunition and still move with relative ease.

There were a number of difficulties with the new weapon being fielded in the Teams. But in general the Stoner fit the need for a light weapon with high firepower nicely. One of the more unusual problems the operators had with the Stoner was a certain lack of ammunition. Though the Stoner fired the same .223 round the SEALs had in abundance for their M16’s, the Stoners required linked ammunition. Though a limited supply of pre-linked ammunition was supplied, packed in 150-round plastic ammunition boxes that could be hung on the Stoner, the majority of the Stoner’s ammunition had to be supplied locally.

The special S-63 link for the Stoner came packaged in a small cardboard drum that held thousands of links. The link was very much a reduced-size version of the M13 link used with the M60 machine gun but was unique to the Stoner weapons system. There were more problems with the Stoner 63 for the SEALs than just policing used links and loading belts. It was very much a case of one service not talking to the other that resulted in the SEALs having many of the same problems with their Stoners as did the Marine Corps when they tested the system.

In spite of the minor difficulties run in to while fielding the new weapon, the Stoner soon earned itself a solid position in the SEALs armory. The Stoner needed more cleaning and closer attention to detail in its maintenance than other weapons did, and there were still bugs that had to be worked out of the system.

The SEALs liked the Stoner, but the weapon still needed a good deal of improvement before being fielded in quantity. When the second Platoon of SEAL Team Two returned from Vietnam after their first deployment, a series of recommendations were listed by the Platoon officers and men. Included in these recommendations was a very specific one directed to the Stoner;

Excerpt from SEAL Team Two, 2nd Platoon’s Vietnam operations, 30 January to 30 May 1967

Weapons and Equipment

8. Use of the Stoner LMG is not recommended until the drum magazine becomes available.

The plastic box used to attach a supply of ammunition was considered just too difficult to use in its available form. Hanging as it did one the side of the LMG, when the box was knocked off by an operator’s knee, the ammunition belt would just trail out of the box into the mud. This was only one of several recommendations taken into account by the Navy when they ordered additional Stoners for the SEAL Teams. On 25 May, 1967, Cadillac Gage received a phone call from the Naval Ordnance Test Station requesting a delivery date for 36 additional Stoners. All of these weapons were to be 63As in the light machine gun configuration and equipped with the 150 round drum magazines.

The Stoner machine gun had become a stock item in the SEAL armory by the middle of 1967. Several hours were dedicated to the weapon, its use, and its maintenance during pre-deployment training for Vietnam. Each deploying SEAL platoon now had at least two Stoners, one for each squad, with more desired. SEALs who demonstrated a penchant for the weapon were usually allowed to carry one. These SEALs were often referred to as Stonermen in later recounting of particular actions. For the weapon itself, SEAL Team One was the primary unit for developmental items and the Stoner was secure on their list for attention;

SEAL TEAM ONE – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1967, Enclosure 3, (j) Research and Development, pg 13-14

.. A listing of special procurement actions completed is summarized below:

(#22) Stoner 63A
(#28) Stoner Drum Magazine
(#29) .223 Linking Machine for Stoner Ammunition

The new drum for the stoner made the weapon considerably more dependable while moving. An ammunition belt was secured in the drum and held underneath the receiver, close to center of balance of the weapon. Early experiments by Cadillac Gage in 1966 had resulted in a small 100 round drum, but this device was quickly dropped as impractical. The first model drums were made of spun aluminum and had a double-pinned bracket that secured them to the bottom of the receiver at the back of the forestock and front of the trigger group.

The double-pinned drums were secure, but very difficult to reload without taking them completely off the weapon. The second model drum was secured by a pin to the rear of the forestock where it was free to pivot. The rear portion of the drum mount had a lug that fit under the magazine catch on the front of the trigger group. This model drum could be unlatched and swung down for reloading without having to completely dismount the drum from the weapon.

The drum was mechanically very simple, not much more than a round container with a removable back. A 150 round belt would be coiled together in a counter-clockwise spiral and inserted into the back of the drum with the bullets forward. The loose end of the belt would be slipped up the guide located on the left side of the drum. The back of the drum would then be secured in place with its twist-latch and the ammunition supply for the Stoner would be ready for use.

A stamped-metal cover was hinged at the outside, top of the feed guide on the left side of the drum. This cover could be folded back, exposing a short length of the belt. A somewhat fragile spring clip was on the side of the drum’s feedway to help keep the loose belt from slipping back into the drum.

Individual SEALs developed their own manner of carrying ammunition for their Stoners. Since the drums were relatively slow to reload during a patrol, the loaded drum would be kept secured for use while moving on patrol. When set up for an ambush, another method would be used to feed the Stoner.

SEALs would often carry their extra supply of ammunition belts slung across their shoulders and crossing the chests and back like bandoleers. Sometimes, an extra t-shirt was worn over the belts, keeping them out of the worst of the dirt and mud and preventing them from shining. On getting into a fixed position, such as an ambush site, the belt in the drum of the Stoner would be taken out of the feed tray and left hanging from the drum.

A loose belt of ammunition from the SEALs “bandoleers” would be piled next to the weapon, possibly on a piece of cloth or gear to keep it out of the mud, and loaded into the weapon. In case the SEAL with the Stoner had to break cover and move out, it was a simple matter to snap the end of the drum’s belt onto whatever belt was left in the feed tray.

Unlatching the magazine release allowed the empty drum to swing down until the back cover was free of the weapon. Turning the cover latch would remove the whole back of the drum. To reload the drum in the field, a SEAL could reach to his bandoleers of belts and break the link connection between any two rounds.

Keeping the loops of belts in 150 round or shorter lengths made the next step in reloading a drum relatively easy. The SEAL would pull out his loose belt of ammunition, wrap it clockwise around his finger, and slip it into the back of the drum. feeding the end of the belt up the feed chute, securing the cover, and snapping the drum back into place underneath the weapon allowed the fresh belt to be loaded into the receiver.

Other SEALs made additional modifications to their weapons to fit them to the individual’s taste. No changes were allowed that could jeopardize the dependability of the weapon, otherwise it was up to the individual SEAL. When the Stoner 63A’s arrived at the two SEAL Teams, they were accompanied by a number of complete systems for the weapons. Though the primary configuration of the Stoner used by the SEALs was as the belt fed light machine gun. At least two SEALs used other configurations.

These SEALs found the carbine configuration of the Stoner to their liking. The only magazines supplied with the Stoner systems held a full 30 rounds of ammunition. This larger magazine capacity was considered a big plus by the SEALs who knew about it. The standard M16 magazine at that time (1967) held 20 rounds. The larger 30 round M16 magazines were available, but were very scarce in the SEAL Teams in 1967 and 1968. The short, handy, Stoner 63A carbine, with it’s folding stock and 30 round magazine was the only other configuration of the Stoner system to see any use by the SEAL Team in Vietnam.

One reason that the Stoner system didn’t see wider use with the SEALs in the carbine or rifle configurations was the limited number of 63A receivers that had been purchased by the Navy. Eventually, all of the available weapons were set up as belt fed light machine guns. But some of the conversion parts were still put to use by the SEALs. At least one Stonerman attached the vinyl-covered tubular steel (referred to as the wire type) folding stock of the carbine configuration to his Stoner machine gun. This made for a very compact package of firepower, even though the folding stock wouldn’t secure properly to the side of the weapon.

In spite of the good reception the Stoner received from the SEALs, there were still a number of problems with the design that had to be worked out. Most of these details developed from the SEALs experience with the weapons. The SEALs also gave their Stoners a lot of hard usage so even with the careful maintenance they received, weaknesses showed up faster with the Teams than they would have with other units.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1968, Enclosure 1, Special Topics, pg 9

The Stoner LMG has been modified due to suggestions submitted from members of SEAL Team TWO who have used the weapon in combat.

Cadillac Gage was very responsive to the SEAL requirements for modifications to the Stoner 63A. Feedback from the field resulted in a number of minor changes to the weapon. The only difficulty with the company response to the input from the Teams was the gradual changes in the parts to the Stoner system. It soon became hard for anyone not very familiar with the differences between the Stoner 63 and the 63A and the Team’s requested modifications to the 63A to make sure the correct parts went into the correct model guns.

But during the Vietnam era, such problems of commonality of parts were not a difficulty for the SEALs. Operators who preferred the Stoner made sure that their weapons operated correctly, and this testing was conducted constantly during predeployment training. This made sure that any problems were corrected long before any specific Stoner went into combat.

One problem with the Stoner centered on the basic design of the weapon and took a major change to correct it. The ejection port on the Stoner was on the left side of the weapon when set up in the light machine gun configuration. Feeding from either the plastic box hanging from the feed tray or the 150 round drum caused a jam known as “spin-back”.

Sometimes when firing, an ejected cartridge case would strike the box, or more often the drum, and bounce back into the receiver. The empty case would block the bolt going forward and stop the weapon from firing until it was cleared. This problem did not happen constantly, only about one or two percent of the time when the weapon was fired. This spin back problem was serious enough to require correcting.

Moving the ejection port of the Stoner was out of the question as that would require a major change in the receiver and a number of internal parts. Instead, the direction of feeding was changed from the left side of the weapon to the right. The right hand feed involved replacing the feed cover and feed tray but eliminated being able to use the drum magazine. SEALs who found that their individual Stoner either didn’t have spin-back problems, or liked the drum enough to accept the occasional jam, stayed with the left-hand feed. Others used the new right hand feed mechanism and a new method of feeding a belt.

SEAL TEAM ONE – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1969, Enclosure (2) (c) 6, Research and Development

2. SEAL Team ONE is in the process of being supplied with a new type of feed system for the Stoner Weapon, that practically eliminates the danger of shell spinback which was one of the major causes of malfunctions.

c. LINKING MACHINE FOR 5.56MM BALL AMMUNITION – Provides a portable linking machine for 5.56 MM Ball ammunition as used by the Stoner 63A weapon system. One unit is now in SEAL Team [ONE].

Along with the right hand feed mechanism was a new method of loading the Stoner 63A with the 100 round plastic boxes. The hanger was a device that fit underneath the center line of the receiver, in the same position the belt drum was in. A plastic ammunition box could be slipped into the hanger where it would be held securely and the belt fed into the weapon. The box hanger system went through a number of variations with only one design seeing widespread use.

The box hanger that became standard issue was a right hand feed system that held a single 100 round ammunition box horizontally across the underside of the receiver. The belt fed up a covered tray and into the feed cover. A spring-loaded latch was on the inside of the hanger’s feed tray to keep the belt from slipping back into the ammunition box when the weapon wasn’t firing. This latch helped cut back on the strain on the feed mechanism.

A new style of quick-detachable mount was used to hold the standard box hanger in place underneath the receiver of the weapon. A spring-loaded plunger was squeezed to release the front latch, which fit over the forestock holding pin. The rear of the quick-detach mount had a curved protrusion that fit over the front pin of the trigger group. This box hanger only worked with a right-hand feed top cover and feed tray. But other systems were tried.

Both China Lake and Cadillac Gage made a variety of box hangers and drums to try and come up with the best ammunition holding system for the Stoner. Some left-hand feed box hangers were made, but these had the same spin-back problems as the drum. A 250-round belt drum was made in limited numbers at China Lake for testing by the SEALs. But the Stonermen who tried the 250-round drum found it was too large and unbalanced the weapon, making it clumsy to handle.

Other box hangers were tried that held 150 round plastic ammunition boxes or secured the ammunition belt under a long cover, hinged at the bottom. None of these systems found the acceptance of the right-hand feed, 100 round belt box hanger.

But with the belt box hanger came another new problem with loading the Stoner 63A. The cocking lever for the machine gun versions of the Stoner 63A was still in the same location as the lever for the earlier 63 model. The cocking lever had been made longer on the 63A, and was more secure to use. But the box hanger and the right hand feed interfered with the operator easily reaching the cocking handle to charge the weapon. The feed tray of the box hanger would block much of the cocking lever so that the operator could only reach the lever with one or two fingers.

To ease the cocking lever problem, a solution was taken from the carbine and rifle configurations of the Stoner 63A. The forestock for the Stoner 63A machine gun was modified with a wide, six-inch long slot cut in the bottom center of the handguard. The protruding rod cocking lever of the carbine and rifle versions was modified by removing the center plunger and installed under the barrel of the machine gun, fitting through the slot in the bottom of the handguard.

Now a Stoner gunner could use either hand to pull back the cocking rod, easily charging the machine gun with whatever feeding system the weapon might be mounted with. Some operators found the protruding cocking rod to be a little short for their comfort. A piece of tubing forced over the rod of the cocking piece would extend it several inches and satisfy the operators who thought it too small.

The size and weight of a weapon was always a consideration in the Teams. Even with its light weight, the SEALs wanted the Stoner to be made even more compact if possible. Using the carbine configuration barrel as a starting point, Cadillac Gage designed a short, heavy machine gun barrel for the SEALs in 1968.

This short barrel was heavier and larger in diameter than the carbine barrel, but was the same overall length. To cut down on the weight of the short machine gun barrel, the outside was fluted with six deep flutes cut lengthwise into the steel. The flutes removed some weight and increased the surface area of the barrel, allowing it to radiate heat better and cool quicker.

Referring to the new barrel as their “commando” model, Cadillac Gage began supplying the new part to the SEAls in 1968. The short barrel also had a gas port selector underneath the front sight, but this selector only had two settings. The commando barrel could be slipped onto any SEAL Stoner 63A, removing 6.25 inches of length and about 1.56 pounds of weight.

A short commando barrel, right hand feed top cover, and 150-round drum, assembles a Stoner 63A into what is considered the “classic” SEAL Stoner configuration. Most of the 63As in SEAL hands were modified with the new cocking system and the new right-hand feed mechanisms. The short commando barrel had some difficulties in operating the Stoner in certain environments. With the very short section of barrel, actually just the flash hider, in front of the gas port (underneath the front sight) there is very little residual gas pressure to operate the action of a Stoner fitted with the short barrel. The longer standard barrel maintained a higher gas pressure for a longer time when the weapon was fired. This allowed for a greater level of energy to be available to operate a dirty or sluggish action.

But a number of SEALs swore by the new short barrels and made sure that their Stoners remained as clean and well lubricated as possible. The advantage of the short commando barrel was that it made a compact weapon even smaller and easier to handle in the close brush and jungle. Some SEALs made the Stoner an even more compact weapon for close-in use by removing the buttstock completely and trying a piece of line onto the weapon to act as a sling.

The short commando barrel, right hand feed, and 100 round box hanger completed the final version of the SEAL Stoner. This weapon resulted from the input of the SEALs having used the Stoner in combat for almost two full years. In this final form, the Stoner received a nomenclature assignment by the Navy as the Mark 23 Mod 0. The original request for the nomenclature was submitted on 14 March 1969, Mark number assigned on 31 October 1969, and the final approval made on 4 December 1969. The description of the weapon on the assignment request was;

Gun, Machine, 5.56 Millimeter, Mark 23 Mod 0 …is a gas operated 5.56MM automatic weapon using disintegrating metallic belts, belt fed, fires from the open bolt position, has a quick change barrel, with right hand twist rifling (6 grooves) one turn in 12 inches, fires 700 to 1000 rounds per minute, with a muzzle velocity of 3256 feet per second. Giving a maximum range of 2895 yards (2653 meters), the maximum effective range is 1203 yards (1100 meters). The overall length is 40.25 inches. The gun empty weighs 11.68 pounds. Manufactured by Cadillac Gage Company, Roseville, Michigan. Company designation is 5.56M light machine gun, belt fed, Stoner 63A

The nomenclature assignment fit both the long and short barreled Stoner, with either the right or left hand feed. All Navy purchases of the Mark 23 Mod 0 were of the short-barreled, right hand feed versions with the 100 round box hanger. The Mark 23 was offered by Cadillac Gage to other military customers as the “Commando machine gun.”

The correct nomenclature of the final configuration of the SEAL Stoner becomes difficult at this point. The Mark 23 Mod 0 Stoner was referred to as the Stoner 63A in most Cadillac Gage literature and this was the designation used by SEAL Team Two.

Receiver markings on the Stoner series had not significantly changed during the entire production run except for the address of the company. All Cadillac Gage Stoners were marked STONER 63 .223 CAL. just in front of the serial number. All of the modifications requested by the SEALs and incorporated as a whole in the Mark 23 resulted in significant changes in the weapon. Both SEAL Team Two and Navy documentation refer to the Mark 23 as being known commercially as the Stoner 63A1.

NWM of Holland had licensed production of the Stoner weapons system for sale in Europe. Only a handful of the Dutch weapons were produced, reportedly on about 60 US made receivers. These weapons were advertised in a September 1969 booklet produced by NWM and titled the Stoner 63A1 Weapons Modifications. The machine gun configuration illustrated in the booklet, identified as the XM207, was identical to the Mark 23 except for an NWM designed bipod and mount and a long barrel.

The most numerous Stoners in SEAL hands were the Mark 23/63A1 weapons purchased by the Navy in 1969 and 1970.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1969, Enclosure 1, VI NEW EQUIPMENT, pg 14

4. (U) During the year, the Team received twelve new Stoner 63A1 light machine guns which, although they are only half the operational quota requested, will help provide each platoon with greater firepower in the field.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1970, Enclosure 1, VI. NEW EQUIPMENT, pg 12

3. (U) Twelve new Stoner 63A1 light machine guns were received. Each deployed platoon now has two of these weapons per squad.

Estimates according to available documents puts the number of Stoners purchased outright by the Navy for the SEALs at 8 Stoner 63s, 36 Stoner 63A’s, and 48 Stoner 63A1’s (as Mk 23’s). Additional Stoner receivers and systems may have been transferred into the Teams from the stocks of Marine weapons that had been turned in to storage.

With the final acceptance of the Mark 23 machine gun, no further purchases were made of parts for the Stoner 63’s that were in inventory or accessories that would fit the earlier weapons. This means that drums gradually became harder to find for those SEALs who preferred that method of loading. Though the drums were simple and had few parts, the method of securing the rear cover with a twist latch was subject to wear. This resulted in an increasing number of drums being sealed with tape prior to going out on an operation. This made reloading the drums very difficult in the field.

As a field-expedient solution, a number of SEALs modified a mount for the Stoner that would accept the ammunition drum from the Soviet RPD machine gun. The Soviet RPD used a stamped steel drum to contain a 100-round non-disintegrating metal belt of 7.62x39mm ammunition. The drums were commonly found in munitions caches and were available to the SEALs in some numbers.

Each RPD drum would hold a 150-round belt of Stoner ammunition easily, and feed it smoothly into the weapon. The quick-detachable mount portion of an ammunition box hanger could be removed by simply cutting away two rivets. A sheet metal extension would be locally fabricated and secured to the mount with two screws. The addition of a twist latch, such as used on a screen window, completed the mount. The RPD drum mount would fit underneath a Stoner and could be set up to feed into either a right or left-hand feed weapon. In addition, an empty RPD drum was easily and quickly exchanged for a loaded one to reload the weapon.

Throughout the Vietnam War, the Stoners were demonstrated to be a useful addition to the SEALs arsenal. But this didn’t come without a cost. Technical training on the Stoner weapons system was increased to help minimize problems with the weapon.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1969, Enclosure (1) V. PREDEPLOYMENT TRAINING

Some members of deploying platoons…….received special training in the maintenance and use of the Stoner 63A1 light machine gun and the M16A1 rifle. The machine gun instruction was administered by the manufacturer of the weapon, Cadillac Gage Company, Detroit, Michigan

Any new weapons system has to go through a development process to locate and eliminate errors in the design. Sometimes these errors were located with little more than some difficult incidents for the operator.

The quick disconnect barrel of the Stoner was held in place with a push-button latch just in front of the feed cover. With the bolt cocked, the only thing holding the barrel in place was the barrel latch. If the latch had been depressed accidentally, such as while moving through brush on a patrol, as soon as the trigger was pulled, in forward moving bolt had as good a chance of pushing the barrel off of the weapon as it did of firing the cartridge it had stripped from the belt.

In spite of the general opinion the SEALs had about the Stoner, there had been some serious incidents with the weapon. One incident in particular almost resulted in the Navy dropping the weapon entirely. To field-strip the Stoner for cleaning, one step in the procedure is to remove a takedown pin found just above and behind the pistol grip, With the takedown pin withdrawn, the receiver can pivot up and away from the stock and trigger group. This allows the bolt and internal mechanism of the Stoner to be withdrawn.

With the Stoner machine gun operating from an open bolt and the sear which holds the bolt in the cocked position part of the trigger group, separating these parts with the bolt cocked will release it to drive forward. If there is a round in the feed tray, the weapon will fire. If there is a belt in the feed tray, the weapon will fire uncontrollably until either the belt runs out, or the bolt flies out of the back of the partially opened weapon. Something very close to this situation happened to a squad of SEALs from SEAL Team One while inserting on an operation.

Mike Platoon of SEAL Team One was operating in the Kien Hoa province of Vietnam, having moved down into the Mekong Delta area from the Rung Sat Special Zone just a short time earlier. On 29 April, 1968, the platoon was moving in for an insertion from a Mark 4 landing craft. The trip to the insertion point was an uneventful one up to a point. The SEALs were relaxing aboard the boat as was normal prior to an operation. One SEAL, Walter Pope, was armed with a Stoner 63A fitted with a 150 round drum. The Stoner was up, leaning against the side of the armored landing craft as the unit moved along the waterway.

It was never determined exactly what happened next, but the sudden results were that Pope’s Stoner fell over on its side as it began firing wildly. According to witnesses, Pope had not been touching the weapon when the incident began, but suddenly the Stoner was firing uncontrollably.

Frank Toms, reclining nearby, was half-asleep when the accident happened. He was suddenly awakened when he was struck with an estimated 6 to 10 bullets from the runaway Stoner. Walter Pope dove onto the firing Stoner and pulled it into himself to stop the firing and protect his teammates in the boat. Pope took an estimated 40 rounds from the Stoner but prevented any one else from being struck with the ricocheting rounds bouncing around inside the armored boat.

First Class Boatswain’s Mate Walter Pope was killed instantly, but saved his fellow SEALs in the boat. Frank Toms recovered from his wounds. The intense investigation that followed could only come up with the most probable reason the accident occurred. The take down pin on the trigger group of the Stoner at that time was retained by it’s own friction and a small spring detent in the pin itself. It is thought that the vibration from the boat’s engines and pitching of the craft in the water worked the takedown pin free of Pope’s Stoner.

Sitting as it was, muzzle up, the force of gravity as well as the spring tension inside the cocked weapon would have combined to separate the two parts of the receiver, releasing the bolt to drive forward. In this situation, the weapon would have continued firing until it had jammed or run out of ammunition.

As far as Frank Toms is concerned, Pope’s actions that day saved his Teammates and is deserving of the highest award that can be given. The SEALs were in immediate contact with Cadillac Gage about the incident, how it happened, and how to prevent it from ever happening again.

The pivot pin that held the feed cover to the receiver of the Stoner was secured in a different manner than the detent-held takedown pin. The pivot pin is made of two parts that screw together securely, and are further held together by a spring detent inside the body of the pin. It takes the point of a bullet to release the detent and then the two parts have to be unscrewed before the pin can be removed.

This pin was immediately supplied by Cadillac Gage to the Teams in sufficient quantities to replace all of the earlier pins in service. The field stripping procedure on the Stoners with the new pins took a little longer, but the accidental discharge of a weapon due to the receivers separating didn’t happen again.

The Stoner was not the only light machine gun used by the SEALs in Vietnam, But it was one of the most unique. All production of the Stoner ceased by 1971 and Cadillac Gage closed the records on the weapon system in 1973. The Stoner remained in the SEAL inventory until the early 1980’s. By 1983, the last few Stoners remaining in SEAL hands were removed from active duty due to a lack of parts and support to maintain the weapons in operating condition.