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From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: early bad press may be justified
Message-ID: <10145@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 12 Oct 89 03:18:55 GMT
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From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
>From: chenj@cmcl2.NYU.EDU (James Chen)
>I read in Insight that the M16 rifle & M-1 Abrams tank got a
>lot of bad press early in their development.  They have, however,
>turned out to be excellent weapons and the early fears unfounded.

This depends on who you talk to.  M-16 reliability has gone from superb
(original Stoner AR-15) to dreadful (US Army "improves" design to produce
original M-16) to barely passable (later variants).  I haven't heard a
recent report on the M-1.  Do remember that the Army has a large vested
interest in portraying its decisions as correct and its weapons as great.
It's not uncommon for off-the-record interviews with actual users to tell
a very different story than that found in the official press releases.

                                     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
                                 uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu