Could be a number of things. Hard to tell. His techniques were poor. Incorrect immediate action. Also, bad procedures such as pulling the charging handle rather than tapping the bolt release. My first guess is poorly maintained weapon and magazines. It looked like he had the magazines laid out. Should be upside down in magazine pouch. Keeps the clean. If you get dirt in the top of a magazine, it will muck up the. Chamber for any following magazines.

And then what was with waving the rifle around like that ?


His techniques are so bad that it makes me think his maintenance probably was too.

hrmm, the deciding variable Soldier or n00b dressed up as a soldier?

He obviously forgot the SPORTS pnemotic

SLAP (the bottom of the magazine)
PULL (Charging Handle)
OBSERVE (the Chamber)
RELEASE (Charging Handle)
TAP (Forward Assist for the bolt housing)
SQUEEZE (Trigger)

He had the pull and release down well. Of course it is easy for me to say these things sitting in my living room listening to the Waddle and Silvy show on ESPN1000 and drinking another cup of coffee.

Watch to see if he does SPORTS.

Nope.

Tom posted while I was typing.

SPORTS is the correct immediate action that I referred to in my first post. And he was doing the release wrong. You release with the bolt catch/release after magazine change , not by pulling the charging handle again.

hrmm, looks kinda young and confused.

Why would you have your sleeves rolled up, but be wearing gloves and other protective gear

Why would you be wearing a vest and not a helmet in a fire fight, considering his head is whats actually exposed when he leans out to take the shots. and when he sits up to play with the rifle from the 2:00 mark onward his head is exposed over the top of the barrier.

I can maybe justify the sunglasses,, but I'd use either clear or "HD Vision" Yellow tinted safety classes over them heavy tinted and REFLECTIVE glasses he's got on.

also, as pointed out before SPORTS, not this crap he's doing, most soldiers get enough training to know what to do, he seems to panic, and change clips every other jam, waves his weapon around in the path of the bullets, he's lucky his weapon wasn't hit, let alone his hand and exposed arm, and he's lucky he didnt take a ricochet off the weapon, or off the barrier into his head.

and why the eff would you be playing with a camera pointed at yourself.... this isnt myspace.

what is a "nasty girl" unit ?

Slang for National Guard


Although I can't view the video, I am certain it's as described, where SOldier failed to perform SPORTS correctly and had bad Techniques, Tactics and Procedures (TTP's) within his unit. Not to mention chain of command probably fialed to conduct pre-combat checks (PCC) before moving out as well.

My experiecen is the M4 is highly capable of prefomring in all conditions if properly maintained and utilized. Never had any bad moments with it.

Matt

He should have looked down the barrel to see if he could spot the problem in there.

Cheers!

Rick...

Also forgot to add, not sure why more unit's are not punishing or prohibiting Soldiers from taking video footage while they are actively on patrol. It amazes me how many want their 2 minutes of Youtube fame at the potential sake of getting themselves killed or their battle buddy, just to get some "cool" footage to show the lookie lou's back home that they are bonafide combatants. How about keeping your situational awareness about yourself and others versus pulling out the camera or phone to record what often is reckless or dangerous? Maybe I'm just too grizzled and old school.

Matt

You can release the bolt via the charging handle without any problems IF you don't ride it forward like he did every time. It will cycle just as well as using the bolt release, though it takes a bit longer to do. I was also wondering about the video myself, while watching it.

-Jenrick

I think you're missing the reason for the very specfic steps observed while performing SPORTS. When you pull the charging handle to the rear, you are holding it back to inspect or OBSERVE (hence the O in SPORTS)the chamber for multiple rounds fed, ie blockage and to ensure it's cleared before proceeding. Otherwise, if you just allow bolt to go forward by releasing the charging handle, you will not know what's causing the malfunction in the chamber, if it's the culprit in question. It could also be a over stretched magazine spring, bad retainer lip on magazine, improperly fed round, dirt, etc...

Matt

Obviously an idiot who thinks this video of himself is "cool," too stupid to realize how stoopeed he actually is.

Agree 100%!

Matt, good comments. Note my comments on releasing the bolt are after changing magazines, not as part of immediate action.

Yeah, I'm of "the old ways" too.

Old ways I think are often better, though not always most productive in today's society...ask my kids.

Matt

Ft Lewis - Lightfighter ?

If you want video, mount a helmet cam and let it roll.

25th ID Lightfighters.....to light to fight to heavy to run as we used to say

Yes, through and through, though now have a cool battlefield taxi.. the Stryker.

Also, watched the video on my cell phone. I think it was all staged so he would have something to make him look cool for his family back home. As his PSG or 1SG, I would have shot the rock pile he was hiding behind for him not wearing his ACH (Helmet), then would have thrashed his a** for making a video if we were indeed defending our COP or patrol base, bcause if you notice, he ensure's he's never out of video range of his recording source.

Secondly, he had malfunctions because it looked as though he reinserted the same deficient magazine he orignally had issues with. A rookie mistake in the heat of the moment. Also, not sure why the nasty girl comment came up, I never once heard or saw anything posted regarding that. His patch was a 101st unit, which suprised me as to the discipine of the Soldier as portrayed in the video.

I just noticed the patch on his left arm. Seems he's Airborne.

I won't say I'm an M4 expert (All my guns are Eastern Bloc, including my Czech over-under.), but he just has no clue, it looks like he is mentally breaking down and not keeping rational.

Again, not cool and not necessarily something I want recorded for posterity sake. We have that capability now, to use for feedback, but in real world application, it's a distraction. It's great for training but leave it at home.

They were here, now all in Hawaii and Alaska. we have three Brigades of the 2nd ID, aka Arrowhead Division.

Agree about him being confused, which I think he's more focussed on trying to look cool for his people that will watch him and could have potentially gotten him killed. This is why I wouldn't always want a camera in my face because everything is not always calm, cool and collected as you see in a movie.

At least he was together enough to yell "get some" at one point...

Was he riding/shoving the handle forward? Looked like it to me.

I think the basic problem is a rifle designed by some Stoner and foisted by Strange NcNamera

it's in the comments, a soldier criticized his procedure and comments how it wouldnt be so bad if he belongs to a nasty girl unit.

The 101st is an airborne unit in name only. It's actually an Air Assault division these days (doesn't necessarily mean, though, that he's not gone through airborne school).

As for his corrective procedures, yeah, they're pretty messed up. In my experience with the M16, nine times out of ten, a simple pull and release of the charging handle solved the problem I was having.

He needs to unlock the IRNV and improve his noscope headshot skillz

This looks like bad magazines to me. The M16A-1's we were issued back in the day were sensitive to that. A previous poster mentioned that he had the magazines laid out in the dirt. We were trained to keep them in the pouches to avoid that. We carried six, 28 rounds in each, three in each pouch.

Miao, Cat

That guy is a n00b. While it is easy to say that sitting here on my couch, I noticed the same things our rifle gurus here have noticed. He appears to have his mags laid out. Recipe for a jam. And then he's not wearing a hard hat, and he's waving his gun about like crazy when clearing/reloading. What if his squad was laid out on a line next to him, he waves the gun like that thinking it's jammed, there's actually a round in the chamber, and it goes off? This guy looks almost as dangerous to his own unit as he is supposed to be to the enemy!

Also, does the M4 really need that much waving about to change mags? I've only briefly fired the C8, which is similar. When you empty your mag in the G3, you just need to use your left hand to press the mag release, get a new mag (that's sitting upside down in the mag pouch on the left side of your vest ), slap it in and pull the cocking handle, since the G3 doesn't lock the receiver in the rear position when it empties. All this takes place with the weapon still pointed downrange, no faffing about like that.
This guy should have been able to keep the weapon pointed in one direction while at most twisting it around the longitudinal axis to get at the different bits, right?

Not the Arrowhead division, the Indianhead division. I served in the 2ID.

You're correct. I meant Arrowhead Brigade, which is only one of the three Brigades stationed here, not a Division.

I'm not an AR ex-spurt, but I've seen enough of them have problems even in relatively benign environments that it would make me uneasy about trusting one that isn't top notch in component and build quality, and carefully tested, tuned and maintained by someone who really knows that system.

I'm thinking that relatively few ARs in service outside of elite units have the aboves things going for them.

Yeah, what an idiot/baffoon/noob! After all he volunteered to get shot at!

How can you guys just talk #%&*$# about someone fighting for our country...you're judging his character and abilities from some stupid youtube video lol, get a life or re-up in the military and show him how it's supposed to be done

Personally I thank him, even if he didn't follow proper "DOJ military-spec SOP's" while getting shot at

While they have certainly had their growing pangs through the 60-80's, most of the defects involved faulty ammo and bad weapons maintenance. If modestly kept cleaned and lightly lubed, it's a fantastic weapon. The other problem is part of weapons maintenance is also taking care of your magazines, which is something many people do not do. I am only a fanboy because I have spent twenty years in and around mulitple variants, but it was the post Vietnam vet Drill Sergeants and First Sergeants I had growing up, that reinforced weapons maintenance to where it became second nature. I have found the accuracy and reliability to be first rate. Counterpoint to all of this would be the AK. A fantastic rifle in it's own right, but not nearly as accurate and not as precisely machined. It's a great revolutionary weapon that requires little to maintain and has tremendous stopping power when it connects. However, I have seen many fights where tables were turned in favor of accurate return fire instead of spraying as much lethat metal into a kill sac.

AR-15/M16/M4-haters will rejoice, no doubt. Never mind an AK, this guy might actually be trying to shoot at - and hit - someone further than 200 yards.

Already Indefinite status, so no more reup-ing. : )

I personally take these sort of displays as hugely dangerous and distracting, professionally. He is fighting for our country, which is fantastic, but he also endangers himslef and his comrades by being an idiot sevant with the video and focussing more on looking cool instead of professional focused on his rifle fundamentals and respectable to the rest of his team, squad, platoon or unit.

Matt

I did 23 years of service with two combat tours. I don't need to justify #%&*$# to anyone. Besides what Stryker said, that kind of crap encourages others to do it too. Takes their focus from where it should be. Then you have a bunch of soldiers trying to out-do each other. Everyone trying to take good movies. Start staging stuff. Bad for discipline as well as mission and safety. Real combat and combat units isn't Hollywood. If you haven't been there you probably won't understand what we are saying.

Which brings us to the real issue, the big picture: Someone in DoD needs to smarten-up and put the word out that if anyone is caught posting photos or videos of ANYTHING pertaining to their military duties or military operations on the Internet, or otherwise releasing information, they'll have their tender portions clapped between two bricks.

Just because these clams want to show off on the Internet does not mean that I want to be picked up and identifiable in the background while they clown around. Besides which, the less that is promulgated about anything, the better off everyone is.

Cheers!

Rick...

Nine years of struggling to get MEPS to waive me in. I finally got it and had a training accident that pushed me out. In order to not get dropped and permanently DQed, I had to give up my Combat MOS (11X-Ray) for a meh job with the hope that I can go OCS and switch over to Combat Arms.

OG will vouche, he's seen my paperwork. Everyone at MEPS knows me on a first name basis, been down there so many times over 9 years.

I'm glad he's serving, but not keeping it mentally together is a dangerous thing. It's like the other white belts at the BJJ mats. They get angry or lose control and they hurt someone. Saw it the other day because a guy was thrashing about without thinking his elbow gave a nice black eye to a blue belt.

There's a difference between criticizing the action and criticizing his service, no one has done the last.

Timothy is right that I will vouch for his efforts at getting back on Active Duty. Yep I've seen his documents and have been tracking his efforts for quite a while.

Timothy, you need to reverse your last sentence -- but we know what you meant.

The design seems to be reasonably reliable but not robust, anything goes even a little out of spec or if it doesn't get more care than most small arms require then its probably going to have issues. While there's been a lot of improvements in magazines and other key components lately, it still has most of the same basic faults it had 4 or 5 decades ago

Sauron , dead on target.

The M16 is a very good weapon. Look at all the Special Ops, SWAT, foreign countries, etc that could use any weapon and choose the M16. D@mn fine battle rifle. I carried one off and on for two decades. Can't think of one I would have preferred.

Amen, though M14 holds a very close second place.

Fixed. Stupid typo.

Not insulting m16, but those deals are more politically based than efficiency.

While I like the M16/M4 design, I also like the fact that I can toss my G3 into the back of a jeep (or Mercedes G-class in the case of the Norwegian Army), toss two crates of ammo on top of it, drive up a bumpy gravel road to the shooting range, and still have it shoot straight. I wouldn't like to try that with many other weapons, say the M4, H&K416 and so on. Sturdiness is a good thing

And by the way, I have been enrolled in the Norwegian Home Guard since 2005. Still am. Again, we're not knocking this guy's servitude, just his egocentric and dangerous behaviour.

semmern, your norwegians are using the HK416 in Afghanistan, correct?

Yep.

The problem is, under stress it's a lot easier to just slap the left side of the weapon with an open palm - which guarantees you'll hit the bolt catch - than it is to grasp the charging handle and risk a short stroke if your fingers slip off.

Nah, the M16 may require more in the way of maintenance than an AK47, but in the hands of disciplined and trained troops there's absolutely nothing wrong with the rifle itself. Now, the caliber is another story.

My estimate is that at least 8-10 of the posters in this thread have been there & done that, which makes us qualified. The soldier in the video is a liability to his unit, judging from the lack of technical competence he's displaying.



Like I said, many of us HAVE re-upped at one time or another, and even 13 years after getting out I can still train anyone on an M16/AR15. Even 13 years after getting out, hardly a day goes by that I don't wish I'd stayed in, either.



If I could talk to him, I WOULD thank him for what he's doing - and then I'd offer some friendly constructive criticism on his actions in his video. No yelling or screaming, I'm not in his chain of command and don't have stripes any more; just straight-up man-to-man suggestions intended to reinforce something he had been taught to do. There's a reason they're called SOP - because they work. Not following SOP doesn't work.

I've seen M16s that had been run over by both wheeled and tracked vehicles, resulting in broken handguards and stocks, have new furniture slapped on and the barrels rodded/gauged to check for bends then put back in service with no problems. I wouldn't trust anything made of stamped sheetmetal to come out as well.

Not really. Even countries such as Vietnam used captured/left over M16A1s and CAR-15s for their special forces until the ammo and spare parts supply ran out.

You shouldn't talk crap about things you have no concept of.

I didn't read it as he was talking crap, he was just asking what it meant. Unless there was something I misread somewhere.

Matt

ah... I may have misinterpreted his post.

EDIT: missed his post on the first page. my mistake.

stryker, i deleted it because i didnt want to get into a AD vs NG thing either.

LOL, how did you delete it?(thanks Vertigo for guiding me to the light, deleted*) Have never been a big fan of comparing guard/reserve to AD. They are both very different.

Matt

I don't think the video is from a combat situation but more from a training environment. JHMO.

The fact that he is not wearing a helmet, or whatever acronym you military types use for a combat helmet these days , makes me believe that is true.


Maybe this is a blooper video made to show what "not to do" in a combat situation.


Wheels

I guess that's entirely possible, but can tell you that there's absolutely no conventional unit that allows wearing of the boonie hat during a live fire training event. Matter of fact, I know of no unit that wears the boonie hat CONUS. Even our headstrong scout units are generally not foolish enough to violate this tenant unless blessed off by BDE or higher leadership. It's strictly an "in theater" headgear. Also, based on the uniform and it's configuration in the video, I suspect that it was taken in theater and is strictly just poor form by the service member. But that's just my take on it.

Wouldn't know about the boonie hat, as the USAF doesn't (didn't) have such a strict requirement with it. Have been allowed to wear them on the active flightline on conus bases.

I at first thought the video was from a war game of airsoft but not so much anymore.

That was my first thought, too, but if he'd been an airsofter he and his rifle would have been loaded down with about 10 men's worth of tacticool gear LOL

if you go to edit post, there is a checkbox to delete it outright.

I am feeling this is staged, hell I have been out over 25 years and I can still remember SPORTS, hell I do it when shooting my friends m4/ar15 weapons. Plus no helmet and waving the freakin weapon all over the place, I mean really. Oh well just my impressions.




Bullet

Jammed? *slurp* Rasberry jam! Only one man would dare give me the rasberry...LONE STAR!



The Jedi Master

Staged? Airsoft? Training exercise?

Was I the only one able to hear the crack of incoming rounds? Some people need a reality-check.

I never heard them, but then my high freq is gone due to military service,lol. The patch I saw on the left looked like pukin chicken, I did not see nay other badges on his left chess or over the left unit patch. Doesn't really mean anything other then no real identity. Also even tho I was never in a critical situation I still go thru the drills when shooting as thye were beat into my small mind :P. I do not know what the training is like now but when I was in #%&*$# was put in to stay and forcefully at times,lol.



So I guess we will never know!



Bullet

i get the feeling that this was a training video they play then they ask the soldiers to point out the mistakes in the video. (just as we did).

Not sure what additonal patches would make a difference about, if you're referring to a CIB, ABN wings, ranger tab, etc, are all thats authorized on left chest. They're also frowned upon getting sewn on for theater display. As far as pin on badges, they are unauthorised in theater. Besides, what's wrong with the 101st? They have alot more honors than most other divisions.

I don't think its a training video and I too hear the crack of return fire. I do think it may be staged a bit, note the camera angle and that it never leaves his face, to his dismay as he incorrectly handles SPORTS. And, as was pointed out before, he had his magazines arrayed on the ground already, major faux pas for the M16/M4 series. His wearing of a boonie hat could certainly signify an unexpected attack, though if it's an unexpected attack, why would you even care about getting a camera set up to take video of you in action? My first instincts are to defend my men and surrounding area, not look cool with a boonie hat, which are not made of kevlar.

Anyway, in the end, just believe its some immature kid who's focus was not on the mission at hand, but on youtube notoriety. Let's hope he's smart enough to relaize how stupid he looks professionally and pulls the video down. It makes American Soldiers look untrained and potentially inept. Thankfully, he's the exception, not the rule.

Matt

Helmets are now known as ACEPODs, which of course stands for Apogeal Cranial Exothermal Protective Outerwear Device.

Excuse me, I have to go out to the MPDU to see if there are any eggs. I'll be back in a moment. Oh, MPDU? Mobile Poultry Domiciliary Unit. It's a moveable chicken coop.

Cheers!

Rick...

Eggs? Surely you must be talking about OPCUs? Oval Proteine Container Units.

I am sorry I meant no disrespect, however when I was in we were required to wear those on our duty uniforms and as I stated probably does not mean much again if that was live fire, no reason to doubtit, the safety comcerns alone waving firearm, loaded, towards what I presumed friendlies, just based on him calling out. I served in FT. Campbell from 82 to 83 so I am familiar with the unit. Again I am stating what I used to know am I am aware things change. Now I will state what I saw leaves me to believe this was staged .

Bullet

Agree, about being staged, but staged in theater versus CONUS. I did 2 tours at Campbell and the training and infrastructure were phenomenal....much better than Bragg, where focus is on jumping, as it should be to some extent, being an airborne unit. Its funny that with the advent of the ACU, soon to be multicam, that we are now authorized and encouraged to sew our badges on again. When it was optional, no one really wore them and the new Sergeant Major of the Army is highly encouraging (read as you will comply) senior NCO's to again sew their badges on, to serve of role models for new Soldiers. I can see some benefit to that, as a young, new recruit, envious of my leadership with various tabs, wings and EIB/CIB's...I wanted to be like them. Anyway Bullet, I wasn't attacking your post, just didn't make the connection of what iportance the badges would have in regards to his actions. As I learned a long time ago, there are tab wearers and tab bearers. I knew which one I wanted to be.

Matt

I guess with the tabs I was saying the level of training. I mean I was combat support and we trained like we would fight. I remember a warrant once when we were running and I was #%&*$# about a five mile jaunt and he explained the reason we should run. I never #%&*$# again as what he said made perfect sense. So I guess if we could see the cib or any other tab we maybe able to deduce the level of training. I am just guessing but most the tab bearers I knew were awesome and I learned a hell of a lot from them. Also the tab wears usually ended up in training billets in our units. I do not know if it is the same today of not.



Bullet

I'm pretty sure it's real.

Multicam uniform and boonie hat are in-theater only uniform items. I'm pretty sure I hear the crack of incoming rounds too. If it was training, he'd probably be wearing MILES gear. From what I see, he's probably on a small FOB or COP that's been ambushed and might have been caught away from the rest of his combat gear. You'd certainly never leave a FOB without being in full battle rattle. I'm just guessing about this particular situation though.

I hate to sharpshoot the guy any further, but the sleeves are not supposed to be rolled up in any fashion in that uniform.

If the video was done for YouTube fame, where's the account getting famous? If the person in the video is actually the uploader from LiveLeak, his video description certainly does not appear to indicate this.

Too much of the internet has become a clamor for "viral" status and page views, even reaching into product descriptions and reviews that are completely staged. Perhaps I am a bit jaded, knowing what can be crafted with so little effort on a computer these days.

An unfortunate reality of such videos. It's not clear who created this video, who first released it onto the web, or much of anything. It's much like an unsourced claim. Anybody sniffing out some real facts would be welcomed.

Loosely enforced when in theater, as there's an arguement that it helps provide some additional ventilation when your core is covered in IOTV and other gear. Anyway, just unfortunate this is posted for any reason, for all the professional faux pas that exist within it. Whatever the reason for posting by whomever posted it, my only hope is it dies away and doesn't make American Soldiers look any less professional or trained.

Matt