Hell, I didn’t see an M-16 until the last couple of weeks (summer of’66) in Tiger Land! We trained with the "14," which was a great weapon but not for what we had to go through in Nam. The M-14 was heavy as was the ammo and we couldn’t carry as much as for the M-16 and for "light" Infantry that was a must!

I went through 13 Army and Marine combat operation carrying a Colt 45/8 clips and an M-16/21 clips! . . . NEVER had a problem with either one and both were fired often. Main problem from what I heard was from faulty or out-dated ammo and not the rifle itself. I can only imagine that we were lucky in getting the best ammo as grunts and kept our weapons as clean as possible.

Only problem I can think of was the early slotted flash suppressors that were great for popping the bands around a C-Rat bundle . . . but not very good when in the bush and hooking it on vines or brush. That was corrected soon enough though.

This wasn’t just because I "lucked" out and got a good rifle since I was wounded 3 times and each time issued a different rifle. I probably went through 5 or 6 different ones through my tour for different reasons and NOT ONE of them failed me when needed! . . . LUCKY? . . . Maybe, but most grunts had ‘cleaning rods’ sent from home and had them taped to their rifles just in case of a jam.

As far as accuracy there wasn’t a big concern since the majority of the time you didn’t see your enemy anyway and if you did, it was close enough that accuracy didn’t come into play. And my experience while "zeroing in" a different weapon, I found it very accurate at the distances they were probably going to used at. Best thing about the M-16 was the ability of the auto fire when entering and having to "spray" a hooch. This was probably the ONLY time that I ever used my weapon on "auto."

I loved my 16 and own one today as well as both Colt and Ruger 45 cal’s that I use for home defense and a small 25 cal. Baretta in a "surprise" wallet I carry just in case! . . . . . . . Beanie