Indians For Guns

I own a couple of SIG handguns and therefore frequent SIGForum. I saw a post on there that I thought I would share with the membership here at IFG.

They were posted by a young Marine who is getting ready to come home to the US from the Helmand province of Afghanistan. He is apparently the SAW gunner for his squad. He wields an M249 Light Machine Gun in 5.56 x 45 mm. He says he has never had a malfunction in combat with it. Which is interesting since the Marine Corps is going to replace it with the M27 IAR. Some good views of the M249.

The M249 is gas operated and air-cooled. It has a quick-change barrel, allowing the gunner to rapidly replace an overheated or jammed barrel. A folding bipod is attached near the front of the gun, though an M192 LGM tripod is also available. It can be fed from both linked ammunition and STANAG magazines, like those used in the M16 and M4. This allows the SAW gunner to use rifleman's magazines as an emergency source of ammunition in the event that he runs out of linked rounds.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M249_light_machine_gun

Some of the photos show the squad on patrol and some show the living conditions, the terrain and the people of Afghanistan. There is an interesting set of photos of an IED damaged MRAP vehicle. It's amazing that MRAP technology has progressed to the point that so little vehicle damage can occur from a IED. Notice that the headlights are still intact and the tire isn't even shredded. The captions explain most of the images.

Either way, I hope you guys enjoy the photos as much as I did. It's not everyday that one gets to see photos from the average grunt's point of view (in a combat zone).
Here they are

All the M249 Barrels are made in Canada , isn't it's funny that they don't even mention the name in wiki and also the Colt pistols. But you can't buy them both, not very funny - Haji

It's amazing that MRAP technology has progressed to the point that so little vehicle damage can occur from a IED.

I doubt if MRAP vehicles can withstand IEDs with explosively formed penetrators. There have been many cases where Maoists have blown up mine resistant vehicles in India.

goodboy_mentor wrote:

It's amazing that MRAP technology has progressed to the point that so little vehicle damage can occur from a IED.

I doubt if MRAP vehicles can withstand IEDs with explosively formed penetrators. There have been many cases where Maoists have blown up mine resistant vehicles in India.

That's true. There have been cases of explosively formed penetrators damaging tanks. However, most of the IED's in Afghanistan and Iraq seem to be just pure explosive. On the other hand the cabin of the vehicle must be right above the penetrator for it to hurt the crew. If the tire sets it off, it's most likely not going to do much to the crew.

Some of those photos in that series reminded me of the planet Tatooine from Star Wars.

Yes indeed XL very nice picture's.

Thank's
Baljit