SACO, Maine — The U.S. Army has awarded a $28 million contract to General Dynamics to manufacture as many as 12,000 machine guns at its facility in Saco, according to U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree’s office.
The contract initially approves the purchase of 6,000 M2A1 machine guns, with the option to procure as many as 6,000 more, according to a media release from Rep. Pingree’s office.
The M2A1 machine gun can be mounted on Humvees and features an innovative barrel design that allows soldiers to change barrels quickly to limit their exposure to enemy fire.
“This contract will support hundreds of good-paying manufacturing jobs at the Saco facility,” said Pingree. “It’s a testament to the incredible quality of work being done in Maine. Our workers are known for their craftsmanship, and I’m proud that they will be producing a piece of equipment on which American military personnel will be trusting their lives.”
A spokesman for General Dynamics could not be reached for comment late on Tuesday afternoon.
Come on, there has got to be a rebellious rebuttal by the left to this, these are jobs created by making wepaons to kill. Where is the humanity? But Barack Obama would rather a surcharge on med device makers who innovate and help humans through all sorts of ailments and meanwhile the war machine keeps on churning…
Do you seriously believe that Obama is not interested in reducing military spending? If he showed his cards in this regard the right would eat him alive. Just look at how they go on and on and on about the Libya attack. When Obama is reelected he will get to address this issue. Congress has painted itself into a corner and will have to deal with military spending.
If Romney is elected he has already said he will increase military spending 15%. Romney will let Israel attack Iran, thousands will be killed from the resulting radiation spread around the world and the US will be dragged into another costly, deadly war.
It’s a reasonable question to ask if we are better off than when Obama took office. My answer is yes for all the reasons given in the Washington Post and NYT’s endorsements of Obama. A much more important question is are we better off after 12 years of war, 6,000 American lives lost, 50,000 wounded American veterans, 150,000 Iraq and Afghanistan lives lost, a increased animosity towards the US and a $4 TRILLION dollar price tag.
What we have to show for all of it is the Patriot act that allows NSA to watch everything we do and a massive new government agency, Homeland Security, that still hasn’t solved the issue of government agencies communicating with each other.
Yes to the first question. And BO would rather compromise his integrity with diluted politics to stay in office than defend his principle. Yeah that is the guy I want to lead us for 4 more years of whatever comes to mind. No planning, no leadership, no direction, just meandering along and growing governmnet…
Do we really need 12, 000 wheat threshers? Romney promises to double defense spending. This, despite the fact that the military has strongly opposed any increase in its budget. That money would share help a lot of disabled vets and people fighting cancer and other horrid disease.
That LePage is at it again, creating more jobs for Maine. Son of a…GUN.
Penguin had nothing to do with this deal. The negotiations around this have been active for several years.
What did he have to do with the loss of all the jobs in Maine you left wingers so proudly spew? If you are fair, don’t lefties want what is “fair” then you would cast blame and credit when they are both deserved. I love the left mentality. It sure does weaken the competitive pool.
Laughable. Lamentable. The radical right never gives credit.
LePage has nothing to do with the allocation of these federal funds. You just make things up as you go along, don’t you?
I know… Great job done by Mr. LePage… Keeping Mainers at work….
I am as antiwar as they come, but even I recognize the need for Maine to benefit it’s fair share of federal spending.
Besides, guns don’t kill, people do. I’ve been in the Saco facility and what I see is Maine craftsmanship and excellence producing a high quality product. The same is true for BIW. These are excellent facilities which can be converted to peaceful production.
The issue is the massive cost of military spending and the failure to address the actual threats while massively exceeding unrealistic threats. The military industrial congressional complex is so deeply interwoven into each and every state that it has made itself untouchable.
The fact remains that if some of the trillion dollars per year was invested in nonmilitary industry than that investment would be paying us returns instead of death and destruction.
It’s no secret that during the cold war the threat of communism was inflated. We have the capability for mutually assured destruction. Who is going to attack us with ships and planes? The US and our allies have 10 times the conventional defense of China or Russia. Why would they even think about attacking us when we are systematically wrecking our own economy without their help.
A little appreciated aspect of President Obama’s first term is he has let the extremists put themselves into a corner with sequestration. When he is reelected Congress will be forced to reevaluate our defense needs. It is our best shot at reducing military expenditures in a organized, effective way.
You make solid points which I have no reason to counter , but I do prefer a caveat tacked to the popular claim that “guns don’t kill, people do.” True any gun (or any other inanimate object, a hammer, for instance, a length of rope or hobby knife or an automobile) doesn’t kill on its own, but many of them one makes it easier for one person, so inclined, to kill another. For obvious reasons, guns top the list in making that act quick and easy, or so it would seem. And for that reason alone, the rightful ownership and use of firearms ought be subject to regulation every bit as much as any other devices manufactured for the expressed purpose of intimidating, disabling or killing (eg. grenades and small rocket launchers). The old “the Second Amendment states the right to own and bear arms, etc., etc….(while ignoring the part about “a well-regulated militia”) argument is good to a point, but limitations on who are allowed to enjoy that right and what sort of arms they may legally possess has long been among prerogatives of the people’s government.
No one need hold breath waiting for such controls, for the firearms industry is ever alert to spare no expense in defeating anyone threatening to cut into their very lucrative sales – and there is no one better at it than they. Besides, lots and lots of people like to shoot things just for the hell of it.
Thanks for a thoughtful post.
Now if we could just repeal the 86 ban Mainers and most of the rest of the country could buy some of those nice new machine guns.
Ah yes, the Ma Deuce.
If one must be a “ground pounder” there is nothing quite like the .50 cal MaDuece to lay down some serious firepower.
Obama 2012!
Can I have one?
I loved the ma-deuce! remember them well from my time in the navy! what a fun weapon to shoot! it’s may not be a new design but any weapon that has been in continus production for almost a 100 yrs is one hell of weapon!