Exploring a major U.S. armory housing billions in military assets

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Fluctus channel. All nations' militaries rely heavily on armories to protect and store weaponry. Without them, soldiers and marines would be forced to keep their weaponry with them or in less secure areas, potentially causing havoc. Military armories originated as secure facilities for storing weapons and ammunition, dating back to ancient civilizations. These structures evolved from simple fortified warehouses to sophisticated facilities incorporating maintenance workshops, security systems, and climate control to preserve military equipment and munitions. Military Armory Specialists or Armourers oversee weapon accountability, security, and maintenance in secure installations. Their responsibilities include inventory management, Weapon inspection, procedure issuance, and regulatory compliance. This is the job, you know, get to come here and go to work, give out guns. I have to be here, my weapons need to go out, my Marines need their weapons to go rifle-qual, pistol-qual. Maybe guys are going out somewhere, maybe they have some kind of deployment going on, maybe they have some exercise that needs their weapon, you know. I need to be here, because why? That's a mission accomplishment. Armouries provide secure storage for guns, ammunition, and military equipment. They help to maintain accountability, offer maintenance support, limit access, assure correct weapon condition, and allow for the rapid deployment of weaponry during training or operations. There's a lot that goes into it. As a team back here, we try our best to maintain everything, make sure everything is operational, go from there. When drawing weapons, troops sign them out using ID verification and documentation procedures. Each weapon's serial number is logged after training. Troops clean weapons, undergo inspection, and formally check them back in. Armourers verify conditions before securing weapons in designated storage. A good example is the 341st Security Support Squadron Armory at Malmström AFB. which is constantly operational and supports nuclear security duties. As Global Strike Command's largest 24-hour facility, it maintains weapons and equipment for security forces guarding missile fields and base assets. Armourers also maintain and repair weapons in designated armory workspaces to ensure operational readiness. Yellow tags help to identify weapons that need to be maintained, repaired, or inspected before they may be returned to duty. This visual approach aids in the identification of firearms that are temporarily inoperable and prevents their inadvertent issuance. Our all-time purpose for here at Station Armory is to support anything that goes on station-wise. So if we have Operation Bat Bowl coming up, that's us supporting it. If we have other units coming for field ops or field meets or anything, the Army coming for Border Patrol, that's us supporting them by storing their weapons, storing their ammo, and just providing them with any type of support that they need. When troops check out weapons, the serial numbers are recorded. If a soldier reports a malfunction, the weapon is promptly marked for inspection, noted in maintenance logs, and a replacement weapon is supplied. Armorers evaluate all weapons upon their return, and any damaged ones are repaired or replaced. To ensure that no round is in the chamber, the armorers issue weapons with the bolt pulled back and the weapon on safe so the chamber is visible. When the weapon is issued, the airman or soldier receiving the rifle investigates the chamber and confirms that it is clear. When they're on the racks, they're in rack safe, so it's on semi and the bolt is forward. And when we issue it to people, we're going to lock the bolt to the rear so you can see that it's clear and put it on safe. So we can issue it to them and they can say safe, clear, and then when they give it back to us, they'll give it back to us, safe, clear, and then we clear it out, we send the bolt forward, put it on semi, pull the trigger, close the dust cover, and make sure the M68's off, and that's rack safe, that's how all the weapons stay on the racks. After safety, record keeping is critical in an armory. Armory personnel use serialized inventory cards and digital technologies to keep precise weapons stock records. Each weapon has a card that records maintenance, history, inspections, and assignments. Custodians conduct regular inventory, log all transactions, and ensure that every serialized object is strictly accountable. One problem that arose throughout the years was that armories were designed to store weapons and their accessories, but there was no space to keep downgrades. Older accessories were stored wherever there was space, leaving the armory cluttered. Systems like armory storage solutions were developed to make the armory space more user-friendly. Honestly, everything's more organized, they've got more space. We didn't have very much space in our cage, it was pretty small from the get-go. It helped with all the pistols and the rifles for sure. During guard mounting, the armory works with guard commanders to issue weapons according to stated duties. Troops show appropriate identification and documentation, sign out their allocated weapons by serial number, and perform function checks. After shifts are completed, weapons are returned, examined, and logged back into inventory. Guard mounts also help commanders inspect their troops. Prior to guard mount, I pretty much arm up the entire flight, give them all the equipment and their weapons that they're going to be using for the day. Pretty much all the posted patrols will routinely get an M9 pistol, they'll get an M4 carbine, and then they'll also get a choice of at least one less than lethal weapon, either a taser or a baton. There are also much older weapons in the armory at Marine Barracks Washington. For ceremonial events, the U.S. Marine Corps Silent Drill Platoon utilizes the M1 Garand rifle. The Garand dates from World War II and the 500 still left need to be maintained and sometimes repaired since they are often thrown into the air. So rifles aren't meant to be slammed on the deck or thrown in the air and things like that. So normally when like wood breaks and things it depends on like how it breaks how we have to glue it together and sometimes we have to get in there with a drill and like put some dowel rods in to help it like reinforce itself. We have to make certain SOPs to make sure Marines aren't shaving their stocks down too much. Even more rare are the precision weapons repairmen of the Marine Corps. There are 200,000 Marines. From them, only 60 can repair precision weapons. They are not only capable of repairing these weapons, but can build sections, such as the barrel from just a blueprint. Once the barrel has been built using a lathe, it is tested with live rounds before becoming operational. By the early 1980s, the Soviet Union had more troops Tanks, artillery guns, and nuclear weapons than any other nation on Earth. Even after developing such a majestic military power, the Soviet Union fell in 1991 because it wasn't a military defeat. It was purely an economic and political collapse. During the Cold War, nuclear weapons were tested and produced at various testing sites in Soviet states. As the Soviet Union collapsed. Approximately 32,000 strategic nuclear warheads were abandoned in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus, most of them atop intercontinental ballistic missiles ready to be fired at targets in the U.S. However, today, 14 of the 15 successor states to the Soviet Union are nuclear weapons-free. It took almost 20 years of collective international effort to deactivate these nuclear weapons. The weapons were returned to Russia, where they were dismantled, and the nuclear material in the warheads blended down to produce fuel for civilian reactors. In addition to nuclear warheads, hundreds of thousands of light arms, anti-aircraft weapons, heavy artillery, and rocket launchers were abandoned in Soviet states. As compared to other countries, Ukraine possessed a large arsenal of old and obsolete weapons and munitions, which posed a potential threat not only to Ukraine, but also far beyond its borders. Years after the dissolution of the USSR, Ukraine was unable to dismantle this weaponry. Therefore, NATO launched a NATO Partnership Trust Fund in 2006 in order to help Ukraine destroy these munitions. The first phase of this program saw the safe destruction of 15 tons of ammunition, including 400,000 small arms and light weapons and 1,000 man-portable air defense systems. These weapons were destroyed at local Ukrainian facilities in a unique way. For instance, large bullets, typically used with a machine gun, were shoved into a rotating cylinder until they were completely de-shaped and deemed unusable. Other ammunition, like mortar shells and missiles, were dismantled by hand, and explosive material was removed. On the other hand, small arms such as rifles were disassembled by highly trained personnel. After dismantling the weaponry and ammunition entirely, the remaining parts were put in specially built burning boxes or furnaces, making the weapons absolutely unusable. In the end, The military armory is far more than a locked room filled with rifles. It is a disciplined system that keeps entire units ready for action. Whether they are standing guard at a missile field, preparing for field exercises, or deploying across the world, every inspection, every serial number check, every yellow tag, and every careful handoff between armorer and service member ensures that weapons remain safe, functional, and accountable. That's the end of this video. I hope you enjoyed it. Make sure to subscribe to this channel so you don't miss any of our new content. See you next time.