In a classic, “What I meant to say was…” moment, Army spokesman Matt Bourke answered Military.com’s Matthew Cox’s questions about the TACOM message banning the use of polymer magazines. In a seeming reversal, Bourke explained that the TACOM Maintenance Information Message, published in its enirety here at SSD on May 11th, wasn’t direct in nature at all but rather informative.
So, game on. Use those commercial magazines at your own risk. Some are better than others.
So does this mean I can get supply to buy them off of GSA?? I’m a little confused about the message. Any chance of getting an official approval of poly mags?
No, what you do get is clarification that the “ban” message was informational in nature only.
Wouldn’t be the first time TACOM overstepped their bounds.
The not so hysterical thing is that they didn’t bother to research any of the facts before blasting that message out. For example, PMAGs have NSN numbers assigned and the Army orders them by the hundred thousand. 4th ID alone has issued hundreds of thousands. It is entirely likely that some SGM somewhere decided he would make a decision to bring uniformity back to the Army. Probably one who never did any time in combat arms…. Glad they reversed course. One hopes they will do more research next time…