the training, with firing against moving targets at unknown ranges. The officer candidate must rapidly assess the range and crossing rate of a pop-up target. Each candidate is given two magazines, with a total of thirty-five rounds, and twenty-nine targets to hit. A score of twenty-five out of thirty-five is considered good; sixteen is poor.
By teaching basic concepts, mixing in a dash of simulated skills training (Phase I), building upon these with actual dynamic training (Phase II), and then testing in a real-world context (Phase III), the Marines produce a rifle combatant who can take and hold a position, and make an enemy think twice about trying to take it back.
The Marines of the battalion pass along the hard-earned knowledge that goes with their trade to the new generations on the way up in the Corps. Some of the courses (designated by MOS numbers) that they run include:
• MOS 8531—Rifle Range Coach/Instructor: This course qualifies an enlisted Marine to safely run a firearms range and to teach the current doctrine and skills to recruits or officer candidates.
• MOS 8532-Small Arms Weapons Instructor: An advanced version of the 8531 course, it emphasizes additional skills and concepts over a wider range of weapons and environments, particularly follow-up and proficiency training. Each MEU (SOC) would likely have one or more of these instructors.
• MOS 9925—Range Officer: Assigned to supervise and manage the official training and shooting ranges of the Corps. Only thirty-two Marines can hold this designation at one time.
• MOS 0306-Infantry Weapons Officer: The officer version of the 8532 course. A MEU (SOC) or regiment would likely have one such officer assigned.
• MOS 8541-Scout/Sniper: This is the famous eight-week course that turns a Marine into the most deadly shooter in the U.S. arsenal, an 8541 Scout/Sniper. With a 40 % dropout rate, it is one of the toughest courses in the U.S. military. Once a Marine completes this course, he is qualified to be assigned to a Scout/Sniper platoon in a MEU (SOC) or other unit.
• MOS 8542—Advanced Scout/Sniper: This five week follow-up to the 8541 course teaches more advanced leadership, tracking, navigation, shooting, and weapons skills.
• MOS 2112-Gunsmith: This is, perhaps, the most traditional course in the Weapons Training Battalion curriculum. It is designed to make a Marine into a completely qualified machinist and gunsmith. You would likely find a 2112 in every MEU (SOC), regiment, or major training base in the Corps. More than a course, it is a virtual apprenticeship. The first six months are spent teaching trainees to build their own tools and jigs. After that, they learn everything from welding broken parts to turning blanks into rifle barrels.
Marines are not limited to taking and qualifying on just one of the MOS courses listed above. During an enlisted Marine's career he may qualify for many MOS codes, not unlike the way a Boy Scout collects merit badges on the way to Eagle Scout rank. The Corps values weapons skills, and encourages Marines to master them, ensuring that individual marksmanship will continue to be a living part of the Marine ethos.
The Weapons Training Battalion is both an armory and a schoolhouse. Yet the battalion is not just sitting on its laurels. Innovations during the past year included moving targets on the qualification courses at Quantico, firing from inside nuclear/chemical/biological (NCB) suits, and a new night combat syllabus. Colonel Nance and his Marines are looking forward to the 21st century. In the next ten years, they expect to specify, test, field, and train a new combat rifle, a new combat shotgun, ammunition, and other systems.
Firearms
A Roman centurion evaluated his legionaires by their proficiency with sword and javelin. Genghis Khan judged his Mongol warriors by their skill at archery from horseback. Air Force pilots judge one another according to the quality of their 'hands' on the stick. Among Navy aviators flying skills are judged by how well a pilot can 'trap' during carrier landings. Every Marine is a rifleman, and the measure of a rifleman is marksmanship — the ability to cause a weapon to project a metal pellet across a volume of space so that it strikes a target with precision. I happen to like this way of sizing people up, because it is a skill that no one is born with. Shooting skills have to be learned. Unlike baseball or other sports which use the same innate reflexes as throwing rocks or swinging branches, there is no natural equivalent to shooting a firearm. Doing it well requires speed and precision — as well as stress and risk — greater than nature could ever evolve. Shooting skills are also gender-independent. The upper body strength required to shoot well is minimal. Despite the cultural traditions and legal barriers that restrict them from combat, women can learn to shoot just as well as men. Some of the top-scoring Russian snipers of World War II were women, and women compete equally with men in a number of Olympic shooting events.
Within the Marine Corps, the ability to put metal onto a target is taught as a common skill. Every officer and enlisted Marine who graduates from the OCS or the Basic School learns to fire and qualify on a variety of firearms. Without an acceptable level of marksmanship, they cannot graduate, or for that matter, stay in the Corps. This emphasis on shooting benefits the Corps in many ways, both obvious and hidden. Most evident is the reluctance of our enemies to face Marines in combat. Before the first shots of the 1991 Gulf War were even fired, many Iraqi soldiers expected to be annihilated by the Marines facing them, so they surrendered when the ground war began. More practically, Marines who can accurately deliver aimed fire will use less ammunition, reducing the load on hard-pressed combat logistical systems.
What follows is a look at Marine small arms today and tomorrow. We'll explore the heavier stuff later, but first we will learn about the weapons that define 'Marine.'
M16A2 Combat Rifle
The M 16A2 rifle is the standard weapon in Marine combat units. Basic marksmanship skills are established and evaluated with this rifle; and every Marine in the Corps, from the newest Private to the Commandant, can fire the M16A2 with precision. The M16 had its origin in German assault rifles, like the MP44, developed during World War II. The MP44 combined the precision of a semi-automatic bolt-action rifle with the firepower of a fully automatic submachine gun or machine pistol. The assault rifle allowed troops to lay down a heavy volume of fire with good accuracy and still have the mobility of light infantry.
Following the war, many armies developed their own assault rifles (today called combat rifles), but with mixed results. The Russian AK-47, designed by Mikhail Kalashnikov, set the pattern for the modern combat rifle. Designed for cheap mass production, the AK-47 could fire semi-automatic (single-shot) or full-automatic (pull the trigger and get a stream of bullets). Because it was simple and rugged and easy to obtain, it became the symbol of Third World 'popular liberation' movements during the Cold War. Western armies lagged behind Russia in combat rifle design during the 1950s, but began to catch up in the 1960s. Belgium's Fabrique Nationale (FN) and Germany's Heckler & Koch (H&K) produced 7.62mm combat rifles on the AK-47 model, but the United States still lagged. Because the U.S. Army had sunk a huge amount of money into a new semi-automatic rifle, the 7.62mm M 14, the Army rejected an experimental FN-type weapon, the T-48. The M 14 could be readily assembled by the same plants that built the Garand M-1 during World War II while the T-48 would have required massive industrial retooling.
In the late 1960s, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) standardized upon a smaller lightweight
