Strange, years went by and I never noticed that some of the commandos in Columbia were toting suppressed MP5s.

I just picked up on that detail. Seems to me that a 9mm sub would be worth a great deal less in that environment than, say, the CAR15s some of the others were using. Add the suppressor and you've got a weanie round with an air brake on it.

The other weapon that I noticed on the first go-round was Dafoe's character carrying the pistol M16. A 10.5" barrel on an M16 seems almost as stupid.

Then again, I might be missing something.

The MP5SD3 is a common carry SMG for spec ops units. During my time your options for a suppressed weapon fgor use during "Quiet time" was the MP5SD and the PPK/S in .22LR! So the MP5 is a natural. It is quiet as a whisper, it is ACCURATE as hell, controllable fire, and efficient. It is also a pain in the ass to keep clean and in firing condition once it has been in the field for 6 weeks straight without the oppotunity for a detail cleaning.

a 9mm Subgun makes a good bushgun believe it or not. You won't engage at 300M in triple canopy, with the MP5 system you can carry at high port and engage targets by reflex from 5-50M with no problems, and the subsonic Samson rounds aren't "Weinies". For close up work I would take an MP5 over ANY gun on earth, and I am an AR fan. Shyort enough to control and not long enough to be snatched away if you arent paying attention, and accurate enough t put a 3 shot burst within 1/2" at 25'. You just cant beat that.

As far as the M16 Pistol goes.. two ideas (I dont know why it was in the movie). "Clark" the chracter, is a former Navy S.E.A.L. , and they had all manner of custom, chopped weapons, including weapons similar to that one., OR.. (more likely) The prop man thought it looked too cool to leave out of the movie! :)

I don't believe the special forces
detachment was intended to do direct action
missions on a large scale.In the book they took
out some airport guards and such,but it was all
low key work.You saw what happened when the drug
cartel got pissed and went out to hunt them down
The Rangers(I believe the were portrayed as SF
in the movie)got slaughtered.So if you are on a
operation running around indian country with a
dozen other operators, blowing up drug supplies
and removing the odd sentry,I don't think you
want every man armed with a LOUD CAR-15.
 Oh,I nearly forgot,but is'nt Chavez the only
one with a MP-5SD?I know the Captain and a few
others had CAR's and M-16's.

Actually the black-ops team were not SF or Rangers in the book.  They were all hispanic, spanish speaking troops, didn't matter what unit they came from.  Chavez was a "leg" at the 3rd Batt., 17th infantry (my old unit ;)) 7th ID(L) Ft. Ord. None of their equipment was american in any nature (totally blown in the movie with U.S. b.d.u.'s etc.).  Yep, silence was the big issue, at that time the mp5 would have been the only real option.  Just my 2 cents.

Lightfighter, out.

... C&PD is one of my top favorite movies of all time!

Yeah, that's what I recall.  It's been a while since I read the book, but as I remember, they had several teams and each team had a couple of scouts armed with SDs and the rest had M16 and support weapons.  But I'd have to pull out the book and reread to know for certain.

Agree, they didn't focus enough on the actions of the 'commandos' on the ground and they completely screwed up the rescue scene.

In the book they dropped into the enemy camp with a PaveLow (or was it a Chinook?) and had a pretty spectacular battle.

In the movie it looks like Chavez is carrying an ordinary MP5 with a suppressor, not the integrally suppressed MP5SD. Also, the Spec Ops forces got slaughtered only when they were ambushed after their position was given away by the politician working with Ritter. Was that the NSA? Further all of their operations were to blow up stuff, not start shooting people. The question I have after watching that movie is this. When Clark and Ryan go back to rescue the prisoners and find Chavez, Chavez tells them that he was on point about one mile ahead of the rest of the squad. First, is it unusual to have the sniper be the point man? Secondly, I thought the point man was right in front to warn of booby traps and stuff. What was he doing one mile away?

Clear and Present Danger was one of the worst book to movie projects ever done! Tom Clancy was probably spinning in his grave and the freekin' guy ain't even DEAD!. I hope they don't ever BASTARDIZE Without Remorse that way. But hey it's Hollywood, why make accuracy an issue with them. They've obviously seldom worried about it.

Yaeh, C&PD wasn't the best book to movie translation, but not many are.  I think H&K and Colt (or clones) must have provided most of the weaponry.  I seem to remember the bad guy (the intel advisor) having an MP5PDW, and most of the insetion team having some M-16 based weapon system.

My wife and I took the niece and nephews to Harry Potter this past month.  Entertaining for a "kids movie".  My wife (a elementary teacher) spent the hour after picking the thing apart!

Hopefully they will hire a good tech advisor when they make Rainbow Six.

Another couple of movies that have some decant firefights:

Proof of Life (M4's, AK's and same great M249 SAW action).  Just fast foreward throught the love stury part... as usual, the book is better.

Heat (Colt Commando's, FAL's, FMP's, shotguns, pistol work, the list just goes and goes).  Turn your surround sound on, 'cause Michael Mann got that part right.  This was one of the only movies in which the gunfire sounds accurate-why is that?

MSH441

I just read the book a little while ago, and caught the movie on TV. Kinda dissapointing, but they do have to make a lot of compromises to squeeze a near-700 page story into a 2-hour movie. I remember that in the book, there were 4 insertion teams. Most of the men were armed with M16s, and there were 2 "Squad Automatic Weapons" of unspecified type, and the point man had a silenced MP5. One of the squads was essentially slaughtered because 1) radio support was cut off, they still thought they would be picked up by the PaveLow in a specific location 2) enemy was given pickup locations by National Security Advisor Cutter 3) they were outnumbered about 20 to 1. They fought well, but nobody could beat those odds. The other was in a heavy battle when they were picked up by the heavily armed PaveLow. It sounded like an exciting scene, but of course the movie screwed up all of the parts that they didn't skip over. Not to mention that, for some reason, Cortez kills the secretary in the movie, which would give the FBI all sorts of evidence on him. And... I could probably stay up all night doing this, but you get the idea.