Talk:Weapons of the Vietnam War/Archive 1

Rename?
This should at the very least be renamed "Infantry weapons of the Vietnam War" and be more like what has been done for WW2 JidGom 13:01, 24 Mar 2004 (UTC)
 * Well maybe you could provide an example of what has been done for WW2 so we may model this article after it. I don't think, until that time, that this article should be renamed though, because it contains both Infantry and Vehicle weapons.Thmars10 21:31, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

hya

No Shotguns?
Didnt the U.S army make use of shotguns during patrolling in Vietnam? I remembered that because of the dense jungle, the Marines and Army saw great use of shotguns. Which model I dont know, but I guess Remington was used alot during the war.

Hanchi 2006 December —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Hanchi (talk • contribs).

Focus
If this page is to be devoted to WEAPONS, then jeeps and trucks can only be listed in so far as they actually were used to mount weapons There is a lot missing here Headings are not precise enough --59.101.54.103 05:33, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

French Mausers?
Any Mauser rifles used by the VC would have come from either China (as the Nationalists had used Mausers) or the Soviet Union (which used Indochina as something of a dumping ground for obsolete weapons captured from the Germans). Other dubious items on the page include SVD sniper rifles, the RPK machine gun, and the BMP-1 APC; I've never seen any of these mentioned as having been used in Vietnam. They either need to be properly sourced (that is, from an actual BOOK) or removed.--172.190.54.172 (talk) 04:11, 23 March 2010 (UTC) The SVD was used late in the Vietnam war, the RPK saw limited use as well. the BMP-1 I have not heard of it's use in the Vietnam war. There are several Russian weapons that I have not heard of them being found in Vietnam like the Soviet APS Sketchin or the Scorpion Machine pistol. there are a few American weapons that are hinky as well. I'm removing things that I know didn't show up in Vietnam and a few of the more questionable stuff.Paulwharton (talk) 06:54, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Ruger M77&HK 21
Please show source about Ruger M77 use in vietnam war.I think HK-21 Use in COD black ops.But not in vietnam war. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 182.53.143.205 (talk) 06:29, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Precision Rifles for ARVN, US, South Korean, Australian, and New Zealand
There are no precision rifles listed for these armies. Aside from the M21 (briefly mentioned, but not named) there are no others. What did the other above armies use? Mequellios (talk) 04:03, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Helio Courier?
I'm just looking the english documentary "air war in vietnam" on youtube (in german), it is from the 80's since it begins with a comment "more than 10 years after the end of the war...", but it starts with a comment, that it looked like this was a job for propeller aircrafts in 1962 (as support for the Soutvietnamese Aircraft I think? But I think the USA was also involved in air war before 1964 attack on USS Madox and the Tonkin resolution, I watched a movie about this... Air America?! Flying from Laos and Cambodia?) however the documentary lists 3 of these propeller aircrafts, the Helio Courier, the Douglas C-47 and the Curtiss C-46 Commando with the comment that the last two ones were from the 2nd World War.

At least the Helio Courier is missing in the list, I can't remember that I've ever heard of it before but maybe it should be added to the list... ? Greetings Kilon22 (talk) 14:38, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Overly long summary
It seems that the summary for this article is overly long, the summary should be at most two medium paragraphs.

121.212.130.34 (talk) 07:43, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

Bad citations
there are a lot of citations that are just text

Retartist (talk) 08:23, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

M16 Categorization
The M16 Rifle was only listed as a Small Arm which is actually an all compassing term for handheld firearms. I moved it to the infantry rifles category. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.27.169.238 (talk) 13:13, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

Page Cleanup
I'm going to try and commit to cleaning up bits of this page - there are lots of errors, inconsistencies, and misplaced content. Some moderate changes may be incoming. Chaingunfighter (talk) 05:50, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

Which are VC arms?
I wanted to know what guns were used by the north (in particular, machine guns). Could we put in some info about that?

Think Russian weapons of the era, and WW2 as well (They kind of used them as an outlet for the weapons they were phasing out), so AKs, RPGs, Mosin Nagants, Ppsh-40s and the like,(I'm not sure if the NVA would've used anything after this point, but the Viet-Cong Probably did) also maybe some (infuriatingly hard to find) french weapons like the Mas 36 Rifle, Mas 38 SMG, Mat 48 SMG, and the FM 24/29 LMG, Captured NATO Weapos are also fair game, maybe even a few WW2 Japanese Weapons. Yolo McSwagginz93 (talk) 04:33, 12 July 2016 (UTC)

Unsourced Equipment
While most of it has been cleared out I have been seeing some Unsourced equipment being edited back into the Article. I have never seen a source for things like the APS Machine pistol or the Scorpion. Someone did add the H&K G3 and said it was used by Thailand and US Navy SEALs. Thailand has had a production liscence since 1971 so they may have had German made copies at that time. As for the Navy SEALs they have never used the G3. What causes the confusion is that they did use the T223. There are other weapons that do need sources. Paulwharton (talk) 08:28, 6 July 2015 (UTC) I was checking out some information when I followed a link to a video showing US Marines using the Beretta model 12 during Tet. Janes backs up the video and ID's the weapon. Paulwharton (talk) 08:50, 6 July 2015 (UTC)


 * Some of the weapons you removed actually did serve or were at least captured in Vietnam, and thus are probably relevant enough to be listed. There are also others not listed on the page.

The page is somewhat disorganized, too, and a lot of the weapons seem to be placed in random order (The MP-40 and MP-38 are separated by two other completely different guns under the NVA weapons.) Some of the text needs be to changed as well; "SVT-40 Soviet rifle used in limited numbers, used in early stages of the war" is a poorly written sentence. Also, I feel like it might be worthwhile to list weapons used by both sides commonly twice, such as the Thompson that was used extensively by the VC in addition to the US and its allies. Chaingunfighter (talk) 04:27, 16 July 2015 (UTC)
 * FG-42 -
 * Mauser C96 -
 * Luger P08 - (If you read the document; it's in Vietnamese, dated 1970, and you can see it mentions a "Germany, k.k., 9mm" confirming that Luger came from Vietnam.)
 * Pak-40 Guns -
 * RPG-2 and B-40 -
 * One of the Big issues that this page has is that there are no sources for most of these weapons. Meaning that one has to look up the various weapons and make sure that they were actually seen in Vietnam. Several weapons that were on here were from video games. What makes things worse is that you have to find reliable sources for the information.While I readily admit that I am axing several weapons that possibly were there I am only doing so when I do not have a reliable source. Paulwharton (talk) 08:00, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

Well some of the weapons listed above seem to make sense, FG-42, Mauser C96, and Luger PO8 were German and probably ended up there because the Russians were all like, "Here have all of our outda- I mean extremely valuable vintage weapons that are much wo- I mean just as good as the AK-47, and all of these useless German- I mean valuable war trophies from World War 2 that we feel we need to get rid o- I mean that we feel you could put to better use you usele- I mean valuable allies of ours, have a terri-bly great day!" the RPG 2 and probably the rest were probably the aforementioned ahem "valuable vintage" weapons so I doubt it's vandalism (But they still need sources).Yolo McSwagginz93 (talk) 04:34, 12 July 2016 (UTC)

M2 light and medium tanks.
Who and where? If memory serves, the French and ARVN used a lot of M24 tanks, and some M2/3 halftracks, yeah. Some M5s. M2 tanks were kinda a rara avis; there were, though, some captured Japanese light tanks that were used early on that look similar. Any hard cites on particular units using these? The British during 45/46? Anmccaff (talk) 03:53, 20 March 2017 (UTC)

https://wwiiafterwwii.wordpress.com/2015/07/10/wwii-german-weapons-during-the-vietnam-war/
There appears to be some useful stuff on here, but it's the usual AnonoBlog, with at least some major factual errors. (DOS tip: Cao Dai was a southern, not northern phenomenon, and had little use for the commies, on the whole.) Anmccaff (talk) 06:30, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

Hungarian AMD-65
AMD-65 imperial war museum london has one captured in Vietnam, was the first example of the type to be evaluated in the West. It shows signs of damage from Claymore Mine fragments.Man74 (talk) 23:46, 3 December 2017 (UTC) http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/30030077

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AK-74?
Did AK-74 was used during late part of Vietnam War? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Scout MLG (talk • contribs) 05:44, 11 May 2018 (UTC)


 * No way. There's a minuscule chance that Soviet advisors in the North could have had some AK-74s with them when the war was drawing to a close, but they would have been nowhere near a combat zone. The North Vietnamese didn't even get the AKM (produced in 1959, before the US even got involved) in large quantities until after most US forces withdrew. --173.59.12.122 (talk) 21:53, 24 May 2018 (UTC)

Carl Gustaf 84 mm bazooka
does Carl Gustaf recoilless rifle were used in Vietnam? note: Carl Gustaf bazooka already exist in 1948 Scout MLG (talk) 08:38, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Mossberg M500
does Mossberg M500 were used in Vietnam War? Scout MLG (talk) 09:47, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

AR15, M16, XM16E1, M16A1 and "CAR-15"
I think this needs some change, but I want to talk about it first, rather than make a change that someone will want to revert.

Currently the article states; "M16, XM16E1, and M16A1 – M16 was issued in 1964, but due to reliability issues, it was replaced by the M16A1 in 1967 which added the forward assist and chrome-lined barrel to the rifle for increased reliability.[39]"

Which is rather incorrect and mythical. The designations M16 and XM16E1 were introduced in late November 1963, several weeks after an order exceeding 100,000 was made for the AR15. M16 was applied to all AR15 already in service, which covered more than ten thousand, and included 1,000 already in service in VN with US special forces (very few), ARVN and notably, "Father Hoa", who ran a private militia. The newly designated M16 continued in production for many years afterwards and was *not* replaced by either the XM16E1 or the M16A1 during the VN war, least of all for reliability issues. The US Army insisted on the forward assist device for their version, despite being advised that it was a bad idea. The AR15 program manager, Col. Yount, really was able to offer no technical justification for insisting on this, he simply stated that he was directed to do it by higher authority. The X in the designation XM16E1 did not indicate experimental, it meant limited issue, experimental configuration one. Sometime in 1965, it was redesignated as XM16A1, with retrospective application, then in 1967, it was decided to make it the standard issue rifle, so it was further redesignated (also retrospectively) to M16A1. Both M16 and M16A1 continued in production side by side after 1967. Most of the incremental changes, such as buffer design, chrome lining of the chamber, detail changes here and there, such as fences, firing pin split pin substituted for machined pin, detail changes in extractor, etc... were in lock-step for the two rifles from 1963 to 1973. The M16 even started using the M16A1 bolt carrier in 1967, as it was no cheaper to make smaller quantities the M16 bolt carrier, and occasionally, an M16A1 would be manufactured with an M16 bolt carrier, with this only discovered after issue in VN. of  The forward assist was very detrimental to reliability - if there is a problem feeding a round into the chamber, forcing it in is only going to make matters worse, particularly with the prospect of a rim shear due to a round jammed in the chamber. The only practical way to deal with that is with a clearing rod, yet that is exactly what using the FA achieves. The forward assist was a big part of the problem, the article makes it sound like it was an improvement and a solution to a reliability issue, rather than the cause of problems that it was. Yes, the XM16E1 was improved during its service, but there was no improvement that was not also incorporated into the M16 at the same time, save for those specific to the ludicrous Forward Assist, which was there from November 1963, not from 1967. As the AR15 was already on issue in Vietnam and in combat in early 1963, and was retrospectively redesignated as M16 in November 1963, the M16 was issued in 1963 rather than 1964.

The article then states; "CAR-15 – carbine variant of the M16 produced in very limited numbers, fielded by special operations early on. Later supplemented by the improved XM177. XM177 (Colt Commando)/GAU-5 – further development of the CAR-15, used heavily by MACV-SOG, the US Air Force, and US Army.[30]"

CAR-15 was Colt's name for the entire weapons system, earlier, it was the Colt AR-15 weapon system, then they shortened it to CAR-15. This included several SMG versions (as Colt's described them), several LMG versions, an MMG version using a tripod, several "Heavy Assault Rifles", which were belt fed heavy barrel AR15, and a variety of other things such as survival rifles and grenade launchers, all under the CAR-15 weapons system banner. Several CAR-15 SMG variants were trailed in VN. AFAIK, the USAF designation was GAU-5/A for their SMG variant with M16 upper receiver, and GAU-5A/A for those using A1 style uppers with forward assist, whilst GAU-5 was the M16. Later, Colt's changed their commercial name to Colt Commando for their shortened versions. CAR-15 as a name for a shortened variant was a common term, but actually, it was a "CAR-15 SMG". "Known as the CAR-15" is fine with me, but it was not the name of it. Whilst the US never adopted it, several of the CAR-15 LMG and Heavy Assault Rifle variants did become standardised elsewhere, starting with Singapore in 1963.Psaccani (talk) 15:27, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

Wasn't the MG-42 Used in the Vietnam War?
I found this statement on the internet, but I'm not sure what to think about it.

"The 3rd Colonial Commando Parachute Battalion drew German weapons from surrendered stocks (war reparations) for their 1948–50 tour in Indochina. Photos of MG 42s, Mausers, and MP-40s can be found in Cyril Bondroit’s book."

Is this true in any way? Does anyone have a book from mister "Cyril Bondroit" saying anything about this? TheJawaManiac (talk) 07:17, 20 July 2023 (UTC)