Two things made me roll my eyes at the author of that article and made it difficult for me to finish the whole thing: "It's too complex" and his constant reference to the AR-15 as a service weapon.
Now, some people may say "semantics" about this, but semantics makes a difference. The military does not have AR-15 rifles. They have M16 rifles. And while we can endlessly debate the differences between the two, the fact remains that the AR-15 is NOT the M16 and whatever vast experience he has as a "28-year Green Beret veteran", it WASN'T with an AR-15.
Just sticking with what he wrote, here are a few pretty important details that can make a huge difference between the M15 and the AR-15:
- Most people who own and use an AR-15 have a rifle that has exceptionally few owners. Either they bought (or built) their AR-15 new, or they bought a used AR-15 that has been through maybe 1 or 2 previous owners (maybe a few more in some cases). The M16s owned by the military? Years and decades old, untold numbers of rounds expended through them, and have been in the hands of so many different people (from troops to armorers) it isn't even funny.
- Civilian owners of AR-15 rifles probably aren't operating their rifles under the conditions, and practices, that servicemembers may be operating theirs under. They probably aren't spending huge amounts of time crawling around in the mud/sand/water with their rifles. More likely, they're doing range shooting, competition shooting, hunting, or varmint shooting. They're the kind of people a bit more concerned about doing things that will scuff or otherwise mar the appearance of their rifle.
As a side note, if the AR-15 was anywhere NEAR plagued with the kinds of problems this guy complains about, there's no way on God's green Earth that this rifle would have received it's reputation and constant praise from so many different people in the 6-plus decades it's been around in civilian hands. If there's one constant in the civilian firearms community, it's the fact that they are utterly merciless about firearms that have problems. Manufacturing defects, jams, misfires, trigger feel...you name it. If there's a gun design out there that sucks in some way, it'll be hammered by people and it won't last long.
Now, I used to not like the M16/AR-15 platform because it deviated significantly from the typical rifle/shotgun appearance I so fondly grew up with. But after shooting an M16 on a qualification range once while I was in the Navy, I was amazed at how accurate it was and how easy the recoil felt. Eventually, a couple decades or so later, my wife and I ended up with a couple M&P-15 rifles and we love them. Never had any problems with them, either.
That doesn't make me an expert on either rifle, and I don't claim to be. I'm certainly not going to break down every little thing this guy talks about, but I WILL mention one: Cleanliness.
While it's often a point of pride in cleanliness, it's not necessary for a person to clean their firearm until absolutely no evidence of dirt, grime, lead, etc. can be found. I know, from my cleaning efforts on my first rifle I bought back in 1982 (a bolt action .22 WMR) that I could scrub and scrub and scrub and swab and swab and swab the barrel endlessly and STILL not get a perfectly clean patch through the barrel. Eventually I learned that so long as you cleaned the barrel decently, couldn't find any visual evidence of fouling after a few swabs, that it was time to run an oil patch down it and call it done.
The same applies to the AR-15. Clean it well, then preserve it. It's not necessary to make some armorer happy with a white glove inspection.
