He said military

A1 in basic.

A2 first duty station in Korea.  Only saw it once for quals.

A2 in Germany.  Stayed in site safe for years.

Txl

I carried a normal A2 and one with an M203... I was happy when I got the M4.

What if I told you...scopes such as the ACOG up to 4.5x and the M5 RAS rail for the M16A4 sre authorized for service rifle matches now?

To answer the OP- I didn't mind my A2 as a private. I liked my M16A4 I got later better.  I actually liked the A4 over the M4 at first, but I am very tall and the M4 was weird to get used to. I now very much appreciate the Mk18 over all of the above.

What those ppl said.
A2 rear sight was easier to adjust.
20 inch barrel is regardless.

I liked the M16A2 back then because it was the only type of M16 I was familiar with (USMCR 91-97). Now, owning an A1 clone built off of surplus parts and a couple of carbines, I'd rather have a lighter weapon.

We need more pics.



Carry handles were never wrong.

Army Strong

Foreward grip with easy to access optical controls


FN rifle. She ran to 600 yards aLL dAY LOnG

I preferred the A1 over the A2 or the GAU-5 carbines I'd get stuck with when range day came around.  Gorilla-sized hands fit the A1 handguards so much better.

Hated the LOP, was retarded long.
Then I got issued a M249.
Suddenly the A2 was awesome after humping that thing and the ammo around in Iraq and garrison.

I only got to fool around with the A2 after I got out. I  picked it up and immediately thought "the motherfucker who designed this never carried one around all day".
Yeah, it's a great target rifle. Combat rifle? I dunno about that.
M16A1 FTMFW. Three round burst? Who the fuck thought that up?

The A2 was a mistake. So was the M4.

How can you tell? Simple; the A2 lasted only so long as it took for the Infantry to see the M4, which was designed as an afterthought to provide to support troops, and then once they'd tried the damn things out, support troops never saw them. Everything went to the grunts.

This tells me two things: One, that the idiots behind the A2 did not really know what the infantry needed, and that two, the limited thought and testing that went into the M4 was what produced the problems it had inherent to it.

When they went to refresh the fleet after the A1 versions wore out, the thinking apparently was "Let's build us the ultimate match rifle...", not "Let's figure out what the combat soldier really needs, and then give that to him...". Thus, as soon as the unwanted stepchild of the support troops, the M4, showed up, everybody glommed onto it, because it was a better answer to the actual needs of the combat troops.

Unfortunately, nobody really gave two s**ts and a damn about things like ballistic potential and mechanical reliability when they were designing the M4, or it wouldn't be what it is. It was an afterthought, and intended for use by support troops as a self-defense weapon, not a first-line infantry weapon--Which was why they didn't care that the then-standard M855 wasn't a good ballistic match to that short-ass 14.5" barrel, or that the button-broach barrels selected for the TDP did not have good lifespan on them.

Reality is, we were poorly served by the inhabitants of the procurement bureaucracy. The M4 should have had a somewhat longer barrel, a mid-length gas system, and an entirely new specification for ammo before it was ever put out for issue as the basic individual weapon. As it was, it was barely adequate, and most of the choices made for its design stemmed from convenience factors like the need to be able to fit the then-standard M203 and the bayonet--Which are the two things that got us the 14.5" barrel, not the ballistic logic of it all.

As it stands, I think we were poorly served by the process for both weapons, and I suspect that better weapons could have been produced, had the emphasis been different, with better thinking done to support that.

Anyone defending the A2 fiasco has to answer the question of "If the A2 was such a great improvement, why did it get replaced by the M4 as it became available...?", and then explain how it was that the M4 itself was never meant to even be issued to the front-line combat soldier; it was, from inception, supposed to be the modern equivalent of the M1 Carbine, a weapon for support troops in lieu of a pistol.

I made a clone of the M16A2 my tank was issued because I found my arms room card.

The designer of the M16A2 was a Marine infantry LtCol, a Vietnam Veteran, and is a member of Arfcom (@ColdBlue), so not only are you being rude to a member, but you're also showing your ass by not knowing the weapon's history, which ColdBlue has been kind enough to share to arfcom.

I was issued an A2 but I was a POG so only shot it to qualify.

I did shoot 3rd Award Expert and opted out the 4th year. I liked it.

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I qualified and carried the M16 M16A1 GAU & M16A2.  I used these in two different services.  For handling and using all day, you can't beat the GAU or M16 or M16A1.  I do remember thinking that I liked the longer M16A2 for shooting as a rifle, however, I am in agreement with everyone else's opinion of the greater weight and length did not do it any favors in the carrying it around all day and night.

The M4 is easily a better service rifle, but I’ll always have a soft spot for a musket A2.

Loved it. No complaints.

I know the history quite well. I also know what an utter waste of money the A2 was and is. That rifle never should have seen the light of day, nor should the M4.

The testimony to that are the facts on the ground. As soon as the M4 was available, everyone and their brother wanted it, and we got the spectacle of a weapon that was a half-ass design in the first place doing a de facto replacement of the A2 as quick as the Army would procure them. The troops on the ground voted with their feet, and they voted for the M4 configuration, which was a highly imperfect solution in and of itself.

Thus, from that, one can extrapolate with ease to my position that the people behind the A2 did not know what combat troops actually needed, and instead, chose to saddle us all with a rifle design optimized for known-distance range shooting over open sights. The fact that the Marines later followed the same path is more evidence to the fundamentally flawed set of assumptions and beliefs that the A2 program leads had about what was needed.

You can't get around those facts. The A2 lasted about as long as it took for a slightly-less-bad weapon to become available, which tells me that the flawed M4 was a better answer than the A2 ever could be.

Reality is, neither weapon should have been adopted. What should have been adopted would likely have looked a lot more like the M27, with a 16.5" barrel and a mid-length gas system. And, thanks to the essential incompetence of the people who were paid to determine what combat troops actually needed, and then give it to them...? We've got a lot of wasted money, and God alone knows how many more casualties generated because of the low lethality provided by the M4 before the advent of M855A1, and the unwieldy excess size of the A2.

You can't argue with the facts, and courtesy be damned. They got it wrong on both weapons. Neither one of them should have ever seen fielding.

I liked it enough that I bought an A2 when I got out.  But I eventually got tired of the carry handle and sold it.  I sort of wish I had kept it (for nostalgia), but no big deal.

Honest question, is that a militia group?

Between A1 and A2 I liked the A1 because it was full auto.

In the era it was issued, there wasn't a better rifle issued anywhere.  Nothing more reliable, nothing more ergonomic and certainly nothing as accurate.  It was cutting edge in the mid 80's and an important step on the way through the current evolution.  Even in 2019, name a more accurate service rifle in widespread issue.

Yes, and the M4A1 is best.

I’ve carried the M16A1, M16A2, M4, and M4A1.
I’ve also carried the M40A1, M249, and Remington 870.

Best all around—M4A1.

Two words.

"Brass deflector"

Being a lefty, I hated the A1.

38/40 every time. No real complaints from me.

For the love of God this

Ha, another 80's here.  Have A1/A2 and 1911/M9 quals in my SR.  Liked sights of A2, triangle and stock of A1.  Perfect rifle, pull rounds off A2, put triangles on, put that upper on A1 lower for LOP and full auto.

I liked the A2 when I first got my hands on it as a PVT 0311.  Shot expert the first time and every time. Liked the A4 more better but the A2 holds a special place in my heart and safe.

I was good with it, but like others, I hated the 3 rd burst.
I was in before ACOG’s and red dots.
Only snipers had scopes.

This. It’s rather silly to judge historical weapons based on what we use and know now. I LOL’ed at the above comment as if it read,”Fuck the Garand. It should have been magazine fed and in 5.56. Nobody needed a 1000 yard main battle rifle in regular combat.”

Based on your past post, you clearly didn't know ColdBlue, an arfcom member, designed it when you called him an idiot, nor did you know he had more combat experience as an infantryman that you did, and you sure didn't know the requirements at the time and why decisions made were made. You're still just regurgitating internet myth. Search ColdBlue and read his posts, he was quite candid about the history about the why of everything on the weapon system.

And stop using the idea of longevity of the A2 as some sort of indication of effectiveness when the shorter M4 became in vogue because body armor and MOUT, two factors not exactly prevalent in early 1982-3. 

And the mid length gas system wasn't even invented until the early 90s, either by KAC or by Armalite (they argue about who did it). So its kind of hard to have used it for a rifle designed in 1983? Or should they invented a time machine first?

Is that a My Little Pony Colt marking?

It is!

When I started making clones there was kind of a row in the retro section about making them too close to the real thing and it being fraud.

Since my A2 clone has a real serial number I wanted to make it blatant that it wasn't a real Colt.

I was issued one.... It worked... big, long, sucked with the PASGT Armor... Had to electrical tape a Surefire G2 onto the handguard so I could see inside a MOUT room during training....

Once we got M4 MWS's issued, I never looked back...

No love or reminiscing the A2 Musket...It was what it was during a period of time in our Military....Small arms don't win wars anyhow.... That said, I'm sure the A2 would have stacked up commies fairly well.

Started off with a M16a2 and the anpvs 4 as my night vision. It was quite unwieldy. Then transitioned to the pvs 7b and m16 with AN/PAQ-4C which was a bit of an improvement. Then the transition into the m4 with the m68 cc0 and pvs14 and the peq 2 then the peq 15. The m4 was a better package overall and never missed the m16.

It was a fine rifle. I never wanted anything else because there wasn't anything else. Now I know better. However, if the SHTF today and all I had was as A2 I am sure I would manage fine.

Natl guard marksmanship event.

They were ok.

Managed heat better than the carbines in my opinion.

3 round burst?  I would just remove the burst cam and no more 3 rd burst to mess with.   Never will forget the 1st sgt yelling "who da fuck has the SAW and where is it at?" when my opfor group lit them up in NTA on Oki....

Semper Fi.  The Armorer. lol
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I had an A2 in bootcamp and SOI. I absolutely loved the hell out of the rifle. I carried an A4 with an ACOG in Iraq so I had a straight comparison between the two. In my opinion the M16A2 is by and away the finest iteration of the M16 ever fielded. I know the A1 was lighter, and I know the A4 is more capable, but I'd take an A2 over either of the others any day of the week.

But then again I never needed the rails for anything....

For what it was in its time frame, it was probably the best assault rifle in the world.

A2 a musket lol try an M14 out.
Contrary to some I don’t think the 14.5 in barrel is an improvement considering the ammo that’s in use.
There are some important improvements that were needed and also finally getting optics wide spread I like to think we are on the right track.

I like the Pony engraving, That's cool as hell!

It's a mistake to assume that the greater popularity of the M4 automatically means it is superior.  Soldiers are virtually guaranteed to prefer a lighter, shorter weapon over a longer, heavier one unless they find themselves in a fight where the smaller one proves itself inferior.  Most of us spend a lot of time carrying our weapons and little if any time firing them in combat.

Loved the A2.  The accuracy is awesome. I must be a genetic freak because at 6’ the LOP was fine even with a flack jacket on.

As a POG, I actually much preferred a 20” barrel.
It wasn’t my job to kick in doors, but to guard the gates and do perimeter patrol.
Fuck short barrels. It is open desert. I want the ability to shoot your ass from as far away as possible.

When I was in we were switching from the m16 to the mk18 for ship board operations.  For the application the mk18 was much better.

I definitely could have got it on if I had to.

Look, I was there; there were better weapons on the world market, in a lot of respects besides the ergonomics. I owned a Valmet M76 in 5.56mm that was a damn tack driver out past what I could do with my issue Colt M16A2. It had a shorter barrel, built-in night sights, and was impossible to jam. It was also a folding stock, and a hell of a lot more compact. So, yeah... There actually were better weapons available, although I still prefer the human engineering on the M16 series.

The handwriting was on the wall as early as the Son Tay Raid--The issue M16 was too big, too bulky, and there were superior sights available. Even the Israelis and Finns were smart enough to put luminous night sights on their standard-issue weapon, something that apparently was a bridge too far for the A2 program.

The A2 looked really good to me, as a Sergeant helping run the company arms room. It was new, not worn out, and it sure seemed cool. When we got our first ones there around '88, it was the latest, greatest thing--But, looking back at it, from the vantage point of today, after spending 25 years on active duty? It was emphatically not what it should have been.

The major things wrong with the A2 design was that it failed to take into account a lot of the actual lessons of Vietnam, namely that even the M16A1 was too damn big, especially for what the cartridge offered. As well, there were a bunch of things that were added that were entirely useless, like that sight they took from the Colt LMG. The premise of that thing is flatly insane--Probably 90% of your shots in combat are taken at fleeting glimpses of the enemy at random ranges out to around 300-400m max, and they're giving us an insanely adjustable sight that's only really superior to the A1 sights past those ranges? Oh, and they didn't bother to give us any sort of night sight, when they had the opportunity? Don't even get me started on all the other things that a real "Product Improvement Program" should have meant, like better corrosion-proofing and coatings. Or, as another example that the Canadians were putting on their version of the M16, cold hammer-forged barrels with superior accuracy and life.

Let's face the facts of the matter: The A2 program was tasked with producing a better combat rifle. What it actually provided the troops was a superior range toy that didn't address many of the problems of the A1 at all effectively. And, when a better combat rifle came along, by accident, the A2 was dropped like a hot potato--That's how "right" the A2 program got it. The A2 actually had one of the shortest service lives as a front line combat weapon in American history, when you get down to it--It was finally fielded in mass numbers by the late '80s, and was undergoing mass replacement in the infantry formations with the M4 by about '95. That tell you anything?

The M4 itself is another travesty of poor program management; it was originally intended as a handier, more easily-carried weapon for self-defense by support troops. Because of that, they really never did thorough ballistic testing to see if it maintained lethality to the full range that the A2 did with the standard ammunition. Turns out, it did not--And, we didn't really discover that until the 2000s, when we finally did something about it. In the middle of a freakin' war. What year was Somalia, when that first appeared in combat situations, and what year did we get M855A1 into mass issue, again...?

There were apocryphal reports of lethality issues with the M4 and some of the similar weapons that the Rangers and Delta were using in Somalia. Nobody in the procurement system thought to do anything effective about it until reports started coming back in from Afghanistan, over ten years later, and the military started getting bad  press about it. Thus, the M855A1, which itself has some issues.

Then, there's the pathway by which the M4 became our standard individual weapon for front-line combat troops. If you recall, the thing was supposed to be for support troops like artillery and engineers, as well as drivers and such-like in infantry units. The original plan was, A2 for line infantry, M4 for support troops.

Only thing is, that's not how it worked out. Once the M4 started coming into the line units, and people got their hands on it, all of a sudden we're diverting them from the support bubbas over to the front-line combat troops.

Huh. Funny, that. Kinda makes you wonder about the whole "The A2 is the ultimate expression of the M16 as a combat weapon..." idea, doesn't it?

To me, looking back, it appears as though the A2 program was a rathole we never should have gone down--And, if you go back and look at the available information, that should have been clear. Just like the idea of an intermediate-caliber assault rifle should have been clear to the guys who adopted the M14...

There is copious literature available in DTIC from Army Research Laboratories, discussing the shortcomings of the M16A1 that were identified in Vietnam--With the recommendations that it be replaced with something shorter and handier.

For more handwriting on the wall, you can look where they tested and prototyped red-dot sights shortly after Vietnam. Colonel Bull Simon was the guy who put those on his men's carbines for the Son Tay Raid, where they proved themselves under fire. Post-Son Tay Raid reports recommended that such sights be investigated for general issue and use.

Took Big Army until the 2000s to pay attention, and realize the superiority of that sighting system over iron sights, especially under combat conditions where fussy little adjustable iron sights aren't really of use until you're in a situation where you really ought to be engaging with either your indirect fire, or your damn snipers in the first place.

No, to be honest, I'm going to stick to my position that the A2 and M4 should never have happened in the first place, and they should have paid attention to the actual lessons of Vietnam, developing something that would have looked a lot more like the M27 than anything else. Hell, Colt was even offering pistons back in the 1980s and 1990s, if we'd have wanted them...

TL;DR--The M16A2 was a mistake we shouldn't have made, and the M4 just compounded the error. Marines finally got the individual weapon right with the M27, in terms of size/barrel length. Piston, maybe not so much. Cost? Sure as hell not...