Jp: I don’t spray and pray, either. However, when dealing with a round as crappy as the 5.56mm, it sometimes doesn’t hurt going rock and roll, especially if you’re trying to unass out of a bad situation.

I’ll take my chances against a single shot of 5.56mm if I’ve got my 12ga to return fire.

I carried a CAR-15 (the predecessor to the M-4 you’re carrying) for a brief period in the Army and then dumped it for a Remington 870P 12ga. Much more effective in the jungle environment we were in and it didn’t jam every 15 minutes like the CAR. That thing was nothing but trouble, especially when it came to fouling. The whole history of the M-16, M-177, CAR-15 and M-4 is a bad one, and the Army has tried to make the best of a bad situation (i.e. going to the 65gr SS109 round) that dates back to the Vietnam War.