Insufficient training and lax management are the two main reasons the 66th Marine Corps Brigade lost a T75 light machine gun (LMG) earlier this year, a Control Yuan investigation found.
The report for the investigation, which was conducted by Control Yuan members Lin Wen-cheng (林文程) and Wang Mei-yu (王美玉), was published on Friday last week. Apart from the missing LMG, they also investigated a missing cartridge case reported by the Naval Maritime Surveillance and Reconnaissance Command.
After investigating for six months, Lin and Wang proposed that the 66th Marine Corps Brigade be censured and the Naval Maritime Surveillance and Reconnaissance Command improve its operating measures.
Photo: Screen grab from the Republic of China Marine Corps’ Facebook page
The brigade found that a T75 LMG was missing on Dec. 14, 2020, and the battalion and company commanders at the time knew of the matter, but failed to report it to superiors, the investigation found.
The concealment led to the brigade’s failure to immediately find the missing LMG, the report said.
The brigade had subsequently conducted inventory checks on guns and ammunition eight times, and new battalion and company commanders were all informed of the missing LMG, it said.
However, they continued to report that the weapons identified in the inventory checks matched the ones on the books, the report said, adding that the brigade was even found to have borrowed machine guns from other military units for inventory checks.
“The matter was not exposed until March 24 this year, more than two years and four months after the T75 machine gun was first found to be missing. This demonstrates the collective failure of navy command leaders to conduct thorough inventory reviews of weapons in the units under its command,” the report said.
It did not say whether the apparent coverup reflected any systematic issue within the navy, but Lin and Wang said that 70 navy personnel, including a vice admiral, were given administrative punishment.
“Instead of confronting the matter honestly, they chose to conceal it and even falsify information, which in turn caused them to incur criminal responsibility. The navy is at fault for failing to provide sufficient personnel training and proper management,” the report said.
The Naval Maritime Surveillance and Reconnaissance Command lost an empty cartridge after target practice in February, due to a lack of discipline and an oversight mechanism for ammunition management, the report said.
The command was asked to thoroughly conduct inventory checks on ammunition when it is placed in and removed from storage, the report said.
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