Bullet penetration myth busted

For what it is worth

American Rifleman Dec 1945

What I am not locating is a magazine article I have, possibly another American Rifleman,  with a story about the M1 carbine being a perfect rifle for hunting small deer.

Lets keep in mind it is the "Bullet Penetration Myth" which is being discussed, which is overwhelmingly debunked.

The reason I address the deer is the difference between a deer and a human. Yes both are animals, and both have fight or flight reflexes, but humans have reasoning and consciousness, or what ever you want to call it.

In my career I have personally experienced, more than once, an individual that was dying due to trauma, but they just did not know it. They are talking perfectly fine and in the next moment they are gone.

The flip is experiencing a person with massive trauma that nobody thought they were going to make it, but against all perceived odds, they survived.

Nothing new here as there are many similar accounts from war reports and some movies portraying personal accounts.

In both opposing accounts it comes down to some basic things, disruption of blood flow or loss, lung damage, neuron system disruption (brain).

The way I see it is not a penetration issue, rather a possible mindset issue possibly altered by drugs, that gives the perception that a hit had no effect, like a deer running off.

What I am interested is what thirtyround wrote on on the effects of frozen ammunition.

I believe that in early WW2 this was addressed with certain powders and a change was made. I would think by Korea this was well worked out.

(SCHV) Small Caliber High Velocity evaluation report from September 1953. Testing the .224 cartridge at Aberdeen Proving Grounds.

This is the cartridge that became the basis for Eugene Stoner's  M16 design.

They converted 5 standard carbines with new barrels, one of them is in the Larry Ruth collection.

report discussion:

3, carbine had been considerable disfavor during recent fighting in Korea, probably to some extent because it was deployed tactically as a rifle...

4. ...It is believed that a large portion of malfunctions charged against the weapon in the field were caused by the recognized poor performance of 30-rouind magazines and to unsatisfactory cold-weather lubricants in use during the early stages of the Korean conflict.

Came across this 2004 interview with Ronald Rosser.

For the most part it fits in with the video interviews that now available on line.  However it fills in a lot of details, including the action for which received the Medal of Honor.  One of those details is that he was using an M2 carbine with both 30 and 15 round magazines.  In other interviews its been stated the temperatures were 20 below.  That may or may not be documentable, but its reasonable to assume temperatures well below freezing. Only mention of the carbine not firing was when he was out of ammo.  Not one mention of it being ineffective.  We'ld need to see if there are any maps to get a fix on distances, but he mentions 40 yards to the first trench, and point blank several times. 

If I understand correctly, you got to interview Cpl. Rosser (later Sgt), some of which is posted here

Ola Mize was quite a soldier too.  He stayed in, got commissioned and seems to have been a great leader.   I brought up Rosser here in this thread because this gives us an example showing the carbine and its ammunition could still be effective in the extreme cold.