I think the greatest irony in this current situation is that while some bad feeling has been generated due to the comments of some people analyzing the military (or non-military) conduct of the characters in Aliens, the fact is that Wayland-Yutani deliberately sent that specific unit to the planet with the sole aim of getting some or all of them infected with an alien egg.
They deliberately chose a unit (and it's equipment) that would not be able to achieve the military mission and while Cameron was most definitely telling a Vietnam War tale with all the badness that the Vietnam experience entails, I believe it cannot be overstated that the role of the Colonial Marines in the operation was to become infected so that the Wayland-Yutani Corporation could get its hands on what they thought could be a new bio-weapon.
The Marines in the movie were being f**ked over by big business, just like we all get screwed over by big business.
They were a disposable asset.
They were never allowed (or even meant) to achieve their military objectives so over-analyzing the personnel or their actions is ultimately fruitless - they were set up by higher authority right from the beginning to fail.
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