Okay so I have been in Afghanistan for about four (4) months now and have seen and or heard about five (5) negligent discharges already. Today a young soldier lit off a 3-5 round burst into the ground right outside my tent.
Now yes a big part of this problem is the fact that some soldiers are just poorly trained but another part is that in my opinion some people should NEVER be allowed to carry fire arms.
So here is how I think we can fix this problem-
1. Train soldiers to carry with one in the chamber.
If they know that they have a round in the chamber they will be more cautious. We do it overseas, why not train like it.
2. STOP PULLING THE TRIGGER WHEN YOU CLEAR A WEAPON.
This teaches very bad habbits, why would you ever pull the trigger to make sure it is clear.
3. While on ranges, stop treating the weapon like it can go off at any moment.
Move up and down range with your weapons, teach muzzle control and awareness. We have to get away from the "weapon up and down range at all times" idea, train like you would act and carry while forward deployed.
I could go on and on but I am sure I have already sparked the start of a wild fire, so lets do this!
Weapons
I understand your frustration! However, I don't completely agree with some
of your suggestions (not saying they are wrong), and would have my own list.
Yes I have been deployed and have heard of these things happening.
1. You say have them carry loaded all the time because they will be more
cautious when they have a round chambered. I feel that if this were the case
then we wouldn't see five negligent discharges in four months. The only way I
see to fix this would be to constantly have them carry a weapon (in a
field/training environment) and counsel them on muzzle awareness. Evaluate them
during the exercise and make on the spot corrections with some sort of
corrective actions for the problems.
2. Never fully understood the whole pulling of the trigger during clearing
either, but I will say that with engaged leadership, properly clearing their Soldier's
weapons at clearing barrels, it should not be an issue.
3. A weapon Should always be treated like it is loaded. I have learned that
in the military as well as civilian courses. Weapons up and down range are for
safety and have likely saved more lives than you know. Like I said in the first
comment, if this were not an issue we would not be having this discussion.
Just want to re-iterate, I am not saying that you are wrong and/or that I am
right, just another perspective. And I want to say finally, UCMJ for the ND’ers
and reprimands for the leaders that did not properly clear said weapons would
also lessen the amount that you see.
He's our Supply Sergeant and was reading over my shoulder, so I outed him. It's always fun to bust on him.
You get better by using your weapon more, carrying it more, inspecting it, cleaning it, performing functions checks and etc....I am talking about weapons immersion, get into the arms rooms during directed maintenance timelines, get your weapons out when you attend mandatory training....get used to carrying and handling your weapons and get rid of the fear of being around them.
There's no such thing as an accidental discharge.....you cannot accidentally pull the trigger. There are a series of events that must take place for your weapon to be ready to fire, the last of which is the finger on the trigger. You placing your finger on the trigger mechanism is not an accident - it is either an intended action or a plain out complacent and lazy action.
You are directly responsible for the way you employ your dang weapon, you have an INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY for the cleaning of, accountability of, inspection of and employment of your weapon.
Step 3 should be: Physically and visually inspect.
Which means, to me, the one clearing the weapon puts his finger in
there and feels for any ammo and at all times this is being observed by
the Soldiers NCOIC.
I don't know of a policy that states you don't pull the trigger. I think many times it is an unwritten rule to avoid the discharge, which is a result of not doing the other steps properly. That is what happens when we start cutting corners!!!! Stop pulling the trigger, then we stop observing the chamber because we won't be pulling the trigger, then we are shooting the guy next to us in the chow hall as a result of cutting corners.
The only argument I see here is this
Is it really an ND if you fire a round into the clearing barrel? Or is it more a dereliction of duty on the leadership for not making sure the chamber is clear. I mean after all, the act of pulling the trigger after being told you are clear is in no way unintentional. Kind of a rhetorical question but it is food for thought.
For clarification I post Soldiers with M9s and there is no pulling of the trigger in the procedures listed in the TM, FM or STP for the M9 pistol.
You are correct SGT Pefley, if the steps are followed properly then removing step 8 cannot be blamed.
You are correct SFC Gilley it is on the leader checking that the proper procedures are followed and that the weapons are in fact cleared before leaving the clearing barrel. As for NDs I think that is just an easy way to pigeon hole all wrongful discharges by commands.
But then you find things like this! I know it is older as it says "per FM 23-68" but none the less I have seen things like this in Iraq as well as in training environments. Still says a step of clearing the M( is to pull the trigger (number 7). But if we follow the FM 3-23.35 then we are all on the same sheet of music in what you described.
In basic training I was taught that you were supposed to pull the trigger (with the muzzle still in the clearing barrel) so that you could, a) make sure that if there was a round in the chamber, that it went into the clearing barrel and not a "battle buddy" and, b) put the weapon on safe.
As I'm sure you know, a weapon can not be put on safe unless it is cocked. Therefore, they would have us cock it and put the weapon on safe.
I argued this point with my DS, and, spoiler alert, I lost. I think that if you have properly cleared the weapon, it doesn't matter if it is on "safe" or "semi" because there aren't any rounds in the chamber. However, they need to be able to visually confirm that they are operating as safely as possible. If my weapon is on "semi" they have know way of knowing that my weapon is safe. If it is on safe, barring any mechanical malfuntions it is a safe weapon.
Roger SFC Gunning I agree that it would be very hard to get soldiers to be able to carry red, I am not saying that they should carry that way while on post state side, I am saying that while on the range and while in theater. During training would likely cause more ND's as we tend to train harder than we fight but it could always be something to look into maybe in the long run.
Thank you for your input.
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