Re: Is 1 M.O.A Enough.
In answer to your question (and that's fair enough), more than a few, including those I own personally and those issued to me with 101st MTU and 5th Army AMU over a four year period. I went through the 101st's sniper school (conducted by 5th AMU at that time) in early 1979, and my issue arms room weapon from that point on <span style="text-decoration: underline">was</span> an M21. Started shooting competitively in 1977, and about half my points towards my Distinguished badge were earned with the M14s.
I've also been shooting Camp Perry long enough to have seen the change over from when M14s/M1As ruled the roost, to the point we find ourselves in today where they are a real oddity on the line. If you shot Perry prior to around '94-'95, I'm sure you'll recall that behind the 600 on Viale, it used to look like a truck park; rows of 18 wheelers from the Army, USMC, Navy Air Force, Guard and Resereve units. Each and every one of them was a fully stocked mobile gunshop dedicated to keeping the M14s out on the line up and running. Constant issues with triggers, rebedding every 1,000 rounds or less, op rod issues, you name it, they repaired it. Never seemed to be lacking for business, either.
You don't see that anymore now that the AR's become the dominant Service Rifle. The few military vans that still do such maintainence are all parked across the road over by Range Control now, and cater mostly to the competitors who still shoot the M1As in the Springfield Armory match (which requires the use of the M1A/M14). We've also seen a shift in that during the M14s heyday, a 470 would make the cut almost anywhere in a leg match. Today, you'd better nail down a 480-485 to safely avoid being "first leather." Ditto with the President's Hundred, where a 282-283 used to be a pretty safe score to make the cut. Today, you'd better be kickin' a 286 or better if the weather's half way decent. This year we had not one, but TWO army shooters post perfect cleans in this match. Never happened with the M14s, nowhere close.
We have one guy on my team, Greg Meredith, who still shoots an M1A, and is consistantly ranked as one of the top 100 HP shooters in the nation. He manages this in spite of the M1A, not because of it. It's his choice, he shoots it very well, but even he's running into the issue with finding decent 'smiths to work on it these days. The guy whose been doing it for him for many years now, is retiring. And as I'm sure you know, you don't hand a match conditioned M1A to the local gun-plumber who fixes busted shotguns, and expect to get a decent rifle back; just doesn't work that way. The guys who were trained by Rock Island are getting to be few and far between now days, and that's going to cause problems for those who still wish to campaign an M14 in the matches. Hell, it already is. Even the USAMU has dropped the M14 for it's LR Service Rifle teams in favor of the M110/AR10, and are very pleased with the switch. Better scores, less maintanence issues, and more wins. That's kinda what they're all about.
So in answer to your question, no, I have no idea how many M14s I was issued over the years (at least a half dozen or so, personally), two M21s during my time in the army, and three personally owned N/M M1As over the years, one of which I still have. As far as my competitive shooting, 35+ years, steadily, though that's going between bolt guns, AR Service Rifles, and M14s/M1As at various periods. I've missed just one Nationals at Perry in the past 20+ years, and still shoot Service Rifle, despite having long since having earned my Distinguished and President's Hundred tab. Until the program wwas disbanded a year or so back, I was still teaching active duty SDMs for the CMP/USAMU, and still teach/coach at the SAFS every year at Perry before the matches get under way.
Any more questions?
