Video taking off 6.5x its usual first day

Ian McCollum questions the case for a 600-meter infantry rifle

The Forgotten Weapons host argues that a rifle's reach matters less when terrain keeps its user from seeing the target.

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Forgotten Weapons Story of October 28, 2026Trari Newsroom

Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 358,770 views a day, 6.5 times a normal first day on this channel (55,230).

Why a 600 meter rifle is a waste of time

Ian McCollum starts with a limitation that better rifle engineering cannot necessarily fix: the soldier still needs to see someone to shoot at.

In Forgotten Weapons' Short, "Why a 600 meter rifle is a waste of time", he revisits post-Korean War research into battlefield visibility. McCollum describes a study covering thousands of sites across Canada, France, Germany, North Africa and Korea. Its question was specific: how far away could a prone rifleman spot a standing, person-sized target?

According to his account, in 70% of cases the maximum visible distance was just 300 meters. His argument follows from that finding: the costs and design compromises needed for a rifle effective at twice that distance often buy capability a typical infantry engagement cannot use.

The Short reached roughly 286,000 views in 15 hours, putting its estimated first-day audience at more than six times the channel's usual Shorts start. Comments had already exceeded ten times the usual full-day count.

Some viewers discuss the difference between a controlled shooting range and broken, obscured terrain; others raise Afghanistan as a setting where longer-range capability could matter. Those are counterpoints to McCollum's argument, not findings from the study he describes.

Forgotten Weapons often explains obscure prototypes by examining their mechanisms. Here, McCollum turns the question around: before asking what a rifle can do, ask what its user can actually see.

Published on Trari