M-16: a personal reflection

In fall of 1972 I was drafted into the United States Army - the end result of a really complicated set of circumstances.  I was an immature pacifist student at the time - 19 years old and looking for some direction in my life.  I couldn't know this at the time but as it happens this was the last draft call - the military in the U.S. was made over into an all volunteer - some would say mercenary - organization after this time.  I was generally opposed to conscription - I had been trying to lose weight and missed the low end of the weight limit by 2 pounds.  I tipped the scales at 129 pounds, rather pathetic, but this was during the last years of the Vietnam War and all that came with that, and I was a skinny kid anyway so it wasn't a long stretch to get down to 127.. Just missed.

Having made the moral choice to accept my fate - the alternative meant either Canada (again) or prison, and neither of these worked for me at that time - and with the predawn fog hanging over the mushroom-encrusted cowpatties and orange groves of Central Florida, I was bundled off on chartered bus to the "induction station" in Jacksonville in early October.  On arrival I was inducted, injected, inspected, neglected (but not rejected), tested, transported, and finally reported to Fort Dix, New Jersey for what was termed "Basic Training" or just "Basic".  This was where American teenagers were taught to be killers - although given my skeletal frame I doubt that I could strike much fear into our Soviet adversaries at that time without some serious technology on my side.  This training was said to take about 8 weeks - the physical shock of separation from life outside made it clear that something had happened, most particularly the shaved head and the new OD green wardrobe, the regimentation of daily activities, frequent physical and emotional humiliation, and then finally the training..

M-79 Grenade Launcher

the "blowing things up" part

I was part of a "Company" composed of about 200 boys about my age and we were daily instructed in the use of any of a number of devices mainly used for doing either of two things - killing people or blowing things up.  The blowing things up part mostly was comprised of "how to's" for using small explosive devices - grenades - either thrown or launched from handheld weapons, and also cheap, throwaway rocket launchers.  The grenade launcher was particularly interesting in that it was foolproof - given a 15-second lesson and being allowed to fire it one time i scored a direct hit on the wrecked vehicle decorating the "grenade range". Had this been fired at a "live" target the results would have been catastrophic for the occupants.

The grenade throwing didn't work out as well for me.  We were given a dummy - i think it was filled with something to make it weigh as much as a real grenade - and instructed in how to throw it, a challenging task for a 129-pound immature pacifist.  I believe this was meant to determine whether you could throw it far enough not to blow yourself up before you were given a live device. It should go without saying, I failed this test, thank you.

the "killing people" part

An early M-16 Rifle

Then there was the "killing people" part.  This involved becoming familiar with the Great American Assault Rifle - the AR-15, now (and then) designated as the M-16 - scary thing, that..  We also got a day working with the M-60 Light Machine Gun.  Most days we would walk/march in formation for miles to one of several "ranges" where we were given rifles and ammunition and instructed on how to shoot placards with silhouettes of forms on them meant to represent people. Mind you this was not a "Human Target" in the sense of a human target, rather it was a rectangular "target" that had a printed form on it in the shape and size of the upper body of a "human" with head attached, i.e. a target silhouette.  The shooter would typically lay under cover with the rifle pointed forward and gaze "downrange" - a scrubby, badly landscaped area that typically rose into the distance.  Automated targets would pop up at random intervals ranging from 50 to 300 yards, and you were expected to shoot them - in a way it was a sort of game.  If you hit the target it would "go down" although we learned early to shoot low because you could knock the target down by kicking up rocks from in front.  Earplugs were mandatory as the rifles were quite loud - I can remember forgetting mine on a "night fire" session and using cigarette butts as a poor substitute.

The M-16 was a weapon - not a gun.  There is a difference. If one was to use the word (gun) referring to their weapon they would be forced to recite for the entire Company at roll call:

This is my weapon.

This is my gun.

This is for fighting.

This is for fun.

..five times.  It should be clear what the weapon and what the gun were in this farce.

Permanent Polar Pack 1946

One of our students was recently looking for maps related to the three Olympic games held in London (1908, 1948, and 2012) to support writing about changes in the city during those times.  As I was scrounging about looking for resources to help I came across an interesting map from 1946 at David Rumsey's marvelous collection of historical cartography made available through the Old Maps Online web portal.

This map was part of the "Ice Atlas of the Northern Hemisphere" - a survey of ice conditions compiled by the U.S. Navy over a number of years.  The maps were based on all sorts of observations.  Maps in the atlas showed monthly averages of ice conditions - the one that caught my eye was the map titled "Ice Chart, Northern Hemisphere, September".  Through this summer reports from the major geoscience agencies in the U.S. have detailed the record melt of Arctic sea ice, as well as the early melt of the Arctic snowcover in spring 2012.

These types of historical documents take on new scientific significance given our current need for data regarding sea-ice and sea temperature change over the past century.