Colonel is not pretending to give information. Most of us have quite a bit of information on the subject. He is giving an opinion, one which most of us know is well supported by the known facts. Of course, it is not the only possible interpretation, or even the only believable one. You choose yours. He chose his.

I'm not sure how one defines a conspiracy theory as opposed to noting that a large federal agency spent a lot of money going from 9 to 10 to 40 to 9, each time with what it considered full justification, while the facts, whatever they are, of cartridge performance didn't change quite as much.

You can hold a differing opinion without trashing everyone else's.