Bullet penetration myth busted

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   Here are some more references that don't go directly to the penetration "myth," but do support often mentioned disdain for the Carbine in Korea. 

The first are from War Baby II, by Larry Ruth, published by Collector Grade Publications in 1993, on page 518.

Mr. Ruth quotes Jack Lewis, owner of Gun World magazine, who wrote an article titled, "The Controversial Carbine (that) G.I.s the globe over have sworn at - or sworn by" in the early 1960's.  Mr. Lewis mentioned that in the winter of 1951, "During a charge by narcotics-imbued Chinese troops, I saw one of them shot 8 times with a Carbine and he just kept coming.  The jacketed 110-grain bullets didn't even seem to slow him down.  He was finally dropped by a private armed with an M1 Garand rifle."

Mr. Ruth also quotes Philip B. Sharpe, from his book titled "The Rifle in America," where Sharpe references a military hunting trip in Germany by several soldiers with Carbines.  They were hunting a very small deer, known as a Roebuck.  They encountered a 45 pound buck at a distance of about 30 feet, and everyone opened fire, but the buck kept running.  About 40 shots were fired in what the author thought was "the worst exhibition of shooting he had ever seen."  He indicated that he had to apologize when the deer dropped after a spine shot, and it was determined that the small animal had been hit 22 times.

In War Baby III, by Larry Ruth, published by Collector Grade Publications in 2013, on page 1224, Mr. Ruth quotes Chuck Karwan's 1997 article from Guns Illustrated, where Mr. Karwan states, "In my opinion, the M2 Carbine is the source of much of the bad reputation that the M1/M2 Carbines gained for being ineffective.  I am convinced that the vast majority of cases where enemy soldiers are reported to have absorbed an entire magazine of ammunition and kept coming were actually cases where the soldier dumped a full magazine on full auto in the general direction and simply missed him."

I quote these limited excerpts from the 2 books because I think they go hand in hand with the bullet penetration "myth."  The Roebuck account is particularly interesting to me.  M2 Carbines were the prevalent Korean service Carbine, and in the heat of battle, likely produced many missed shots on full auto under pressure.  Perhaps the thick Chinese uniforms became the scapegoat for poor marksmanship, full auto weapon control, and cartridge capability when used in a main battle rifle role.

Your thoughts?

David Albert
dalbert@sturmgewehr.com