When you mean air crew do you mean any pilot? Does a pilot of a fighter jet have a carbine in his emergency supplies that go with him if he has to bail
It’s easier just to call it ammo. And the S-4 is indeed the goto person for getting ammo. He has to go to the AHA to get it, but he’s the guy you talk to.
The Marines have planes too. You could call the the Navy’s Army’s Air-force.
I realize that… I just didn’t think the Air Force put rifles in the cockpit. Space constraints, and all that.
Twenty-three years in the Seabees and never. I coached on the rifle range and taught marksmanship in addition to a lot of other activities. The rifle/pistol/shotgun/machine gun were referred to as “weapons”, although sometimes the M-60 was referred to as a “gun” and its operator a “gunner”. The pointy things that go into the weapon were always called “rounds”.
Our instructors were usually Marines and the commands on the firing line were (among others): “WITH a magazine of 20 rounds, LOCK AND LOAD!” “Cease fire and place your weapons on SAFE!” Or if it was a Gunny Sgt.: “IF a mahzina tenny houns, LAH AN LOwwww!” “See fahhh, see fahhhh an playa weppinon SAFE!”
When in the Air Force, I worked at Cheyenne Mountain. NORAD. Top Secret SCI facility.
The security police routinely carried M4’s. Og help you if you were caught not displaying your TS badge in plain sight. You would find yourself jacked up against a wall with a “weapon” pointed at you (or in your general direction). The SP’s took great pride in jacking up anyone they could, especially officers.
Never called cartridges bullets or never saw anyone catch hell for calling them bullets?
Thanks,
Rob
I always heard they enjoyed doing that because they really had nothing else to do, so it was at least something different.
hee hee…love those guys.
“This is my weapon (M16), this is my gun (points at crotch), this one’s for shooting, this one’s for fun.”
They made us say that in basic training whenever someone made the mistake of referring to their weapon as a gun.
We also weren’t allowed to refer to a magazine as a clip.
I also worked at a SCIF, and can confirm military police love to jack people up for not having their badge. We used to screw with them once in awhile though, and stick a little picture of Hitler or Mussolini or someone over our own picture, to see if they noticed. The worst joke you could play on someone was stealing their badge though, because the MP’s wouldn’t let you out of the SCIF either, and you really didn’t want to get “red-badged” (temporary badge) because you could end up getting stopped all day. Whenever someone yelled “red-badge!” everyone had to cover their classified, which was a pain in the ass.
The MPs would (hopefully) jokingly say they weren’t there to protect us and our secrets if the enemy attacked, they were there to kill us and our secrets if the enemy attacked. :eek:
I take it you hadn’t yet told him about your husband the soldier?
Haven’t been in 23 years, but in my short time, I’ve never heard them called “cartidges”. They’re “ammo”, “five-five-six”*, or “rounds”.
“Cartridges”, though not incorrect, sounds like something from a western. Or something you load one at a time into a bolt action or something.
In fact, I’ve heard them called bullets more than cartridges.
*Or “seven-six-two”, or “9mil” or whatever…
They were always called “rounds” when I was in the Canadian Armed Forces, or alternately “ammunition” if the context called for that word. I do not recall “Cartridge” being used.
Fighter pilots carry pistols. When I was in (the 80s), it was a S&W .38 revolver. We didn’t have a rifle or carbine because there just isn’t room for one in the stuff that ejects with you. I presume, but don’t know for sure, that the same would apply to bomber crews equipped with ejection seats.
I rode C-130s & 141s a bunch, but not in a full-up war zone. They did not carry any firearms. I couldn’t say what current practice in, say, Iraq is today. But having a couple M16 or similar aboard a tanker or cargo plane is certainly not out of the question.
I also dealt with USAf helos a bunch and they’d never go anywhere hostile without carbines or better, at least for the enlisted crewmen. The officer pilots carried the same revolvers we did.
Shared jargon is very important, but an even more critical function is shared language. The U.S. military is comprised of Americans from all over the country and even some newly-Americanized immigrants eager to serve their country. Getting a Puerto Rican*, an Alabamian, and a Bostonian to speak a precisely-defined dialect of English that each can understand over the radio is crucial to getting the mission accomplished.
-
- Yes, I know they’re already Americans by birth.
Appreciate the jab, expected from an airman. When I was deciding on services, I thought about Air Force for a minute, then reached down and realized I had a pair. As for Alessan, when I reached down, my pair wasn’t QUITE that big.
For the uninitiated, the AP Stylebook the American journalist’s bible, said to capitalize “Marine”, but not “soldier”, “sailor”, or “airman” when speaking generically about a service member in one of those branches. I don’t know if the 2008 version says the same thing.
I credit a particular PMI (Primary Marksmanship Instructor) who was very clear in his verbal cadence while telling us to make weapons full safe before getting up and moving from the 200 yards line to the 300, or 300 to the 500 yard line:
“UNLOAD, CLEAR AND LOCK! Removethemagazinefromthemagazinewellpullthecharginghandlebackandlockitandinserttheflags, CHECK EM!”
Do Marines know about typos? The rest of us do. Let it go.
The Marine Corps, moreso than the other branches of the service, is very anal about their shared jargon and their little quirks of etiquette that they believe differentiate them from the other services and from civilians. Whatever else one may say about the Marine Corps, they are second to none in inculcating their members with the belief that they are different from, and better than, everybody else. Marines never get over it.
Like Paul In Saudi said, caliber means something else in naval artillery. In this case, the number 50 means that the length of the gun is 50 times the caliber of the weapon. This particular cannon is 800 inches long (50 x 16").
Rifled cannons were noteworthy when they were first adopted. So the navy began using the term rifle to show that a particular ship didn’t have the old obsolete smoothbore cannons. It became the traditional term and you know how the navy never lets go of a tradition.
In the British Army the Gun was your M.G./L.M.G.((Now its the L.S.W.) for infantry or other nitty gritty ground troops.
Though also I suppose as we called Artillerymen Gunners their weapons of choice were guns aswell.
(OK we also called them planks,dropshorts,longrange snipers and a lot of other not so flattering names)