Army Launches Competition for More Powerful Combat Rifle

[TacOfficer]

http://www.military.com/daily-news/2...bat-rifle.html

IIRC didn't the army just conduct some sort of review that said the M4 was just fine the way it is?

Please correct me if I'm wrong?

TO

[TacOfficer]

Originally Posted by Brush Okie

The military procurement system is more F%^&ed up than a soup sandwich. They have known the 223 was not doing the job since Somalia. I have seen people shot with 223 expanding bullets and it really does a number but the military is stuck with FMJ. A least go back to 55 gr bullets that tumble in the intern.

I did not intend to start another caliber "discussion", my issue is there seems to be a political bent. When the last goof was in office it seemed "everything if fine we can make do with less, not to worry". Now that there's a , can I say, pro military CNC it's "we need bigger and better, serious issues must be address".

It always troubles me to see a lack of integrity in what's suppose to be an honest assessment of the needs of the foot soldier.
,

[Peregrino]

Originally Posted by TacOfficer

It always troubles me to see a lack of integrity in what's suppose to be an honest assessment of the needs of the foot soldier.
,

You'd have better luck finding (female) virgins in a whorehouse than "integrity" in military procurement. Bluntly - the further the requirement gets from the end user, the less likely you are to encounter it. Especially if it's a big enough action to garner congressional interest. Eisenhower warned us; nobody listened.

[TacOfficer]

Industrial military complex aside, are they now trying to bring back the "battle rifle" to augment/replace the carbine for infantry?

I'm open to the discussion of application of infantry in modern warfare, and the preferred rifle/carbine. I assume there will always be a need for dismounted, door to door fighting, so with a variety of missions, what is the preferred weapon for your standard issue 11B?

Maybe the wrong question, but I'm trying to get some perspective of what the troops need: short, maneuverable with more rounds carbine, or longer reaching, heavy caliber rounds rifles? I understand each mission varies, but I'm thinking along the lines of standard issue, not specialized for a specific mission.

Was the Carbine an evolutionary mistake? Should the battle rifle have matured?

If the QPs went into the infantry/big army, what would they want? (maybe a better question).

Thanks

[TacOfficer]

These were along the lines I was thinking of, thank you.

[Team Sergeant]

Distance.........

For close in, 5.56 is supreme.

Outside of 300m you need to step it up to .30 cal.

Something in-between, I really doubt it. And while thinking about it and before you answer or throw out your opinions remember why we went to 5.56. You really want to carry 300 rounds of .30 cal ammo (and mags) as a basic load?

And I don't think the US Army is going to go BTHP for infantry ammo any day soon. So we're going to have to get used to the little damage FMJ does.

[WarriorDiplomat]

Originally Posted by TacOfficer

http://www.military.com/daily-news/2...bat-rifle.html

IIRC didn't the army just conduct some sort of review that said the M4 was just fine the way it is?

Please correct me if I'm wrong?

TO

As a weapons guy and a gear head the M16/M4 series of weapons are politics and palm greasing...it is an over complicated design with a direct impingement system in which the junk from the bullet is dumped in the middle of the small parts in the bolt within the bolt carrier group which is how the gas operating system works in this gun.......this is really appreciated when using every other style of rifle such as the VZ58, AK's or HK's and others when at the end of the day its time to clean you realize how clean the gun is in comparison hence the reason the AK is the preferred weapon of third world countries when the soviets were equipping the sponsored states and guerrillas these cheap weapons will work in any condition and last forever.....

The issue I have with the 5.56 caliber is the small size and the typical green tip armor piercing that makes confidence in hitting the target not so good....The special ball is better because upon impact there is immediate feedback more so than the standard round. We have adapted our training to fit this as well as its a good habit anyway...shoot until they drop 2-1 etc......IMO a good heavy round and better marksmanship would help us reduce the emptying magazines unnecessarily when we have a bad guy dead to rights....adrenaline effects us but not seeing instant results from a hit is equally an issue.

As far as fighting house to house the M4 is not a preferred weapon especially if we are trying reduce collateral damage due to the weapons penetrating effects though I have not heard of much fratricide from going through walls in mud huts...the bullet should kill the target without hitting someone in the next room.

[JamesIkanov]

I have heard wild speculations and conjecture on other forums that there is some interest in some upper circles in a ".264 American", which is sort of like a modern redo of .280 British. I personally long for the timeline where we have that crazy bullpup FAL in .280, but hey. Its basically a close cousin of 6.5 Grendel or 6.8 SPC or what not. I like it conceptually but it seems like an objectively wasteful thing to "upgrade" . Army just bought new handguns, just spent a bunch money getting M855A1 made, etc etc. I'd rather see a bunch of government dudes trying to get lighter body armor all figured, because the tech is very much out there in my opinion....

Disclaimer: I'm an armchair hack.

[PSM]

Why is it that the the Air Force and Navy/Marine air units get several different multi-million dollar platforms for various missions and the leg guys are saddled with one or two? The cost of one F-35 could procure oodles of special goodies for the ground pounders.

How about an armory which includes weapons of many calibers and capabilities available for the specific mission and at the request of the soldiers tasked with that mission?

Pat

[TacOfficer]

James,
The question the article raises for me is two part:
Is the army considering, back to the battle rifle for a new type of warfare and is there to be an arms race between small arms and body armor.

The best answer from my modest perspective is what would an experienced soldier carry into battle as the infantry. The caveat is the particular weapon would be standard issue, not some specialized one off, if you get my meaning.

TO

[Tuukka]

What is the current training level and time spent per each infantry soldier on marksmanship/shooting?

How often is this armored threat being faced?

If the soldier cannot shoot well enough, far enough, what difference will a larger calibre rifle do, with added weight and reduced round count carried as penalty..

I would guess more $ and time on training, with a FF rail and a field capable two stage trigger would do more..

[JamesIkanov]

Doing a bit of googling on this subject to get myself a bit more informed (my previous post focused more on the "interim" part of this project somewhat blindly)

It seems as though there are a few factors at play here not readily available in the Original post at top:

1)Even though they're pitching M80A1 as "better" than M855A1, M80A1 has absolutely no fucking chance of popping an ESAPI either. ESAPI, and somewhat comparable civilian "Level 4" plates can somewhat reliably take .30-06 tungsten/steel cored AP. Civilian shit has to do it 100% of the time on the first hit, military just has to do it 50% of the time for weight reasons. Both of these EPR rounds are REALLY good against Level 3 armor, which is roughly equivalent to a regular SAPI, AFAIK. They punch holes in AR500 steel all day long, UHMPWE plates, and I think most L3 ceramics. It's completely unreasonable to expect them to beat something that takes AP .30-06 and keeps trucking.

2)The guy talking about this in the article is also involved in the production of some secret sauce AP round with better penetration stats than either of the aforementioned rounds, and they hope to be fielding it in the next year or two, specifically in 7.62x51.

3)There are (I believe) already 5.56 Tungsten/steel Cored rounds, along with 7.62x51 rounds of same, that are capable of beating the armor they want beaten, albeit with some range restrictions. The rounds I reference are the M955 AP for 5.56 and it's 7.62x51 equivalent. I can't be 100% about this, as while I can buy or acquire a plate to test on, getting the AP ammo itself is expensive, illegal, and very very hard, to say the least.

4)The reason it's interim is because the whole point of the program is to patch a gap in capabilities while a bunch of very technically qualified people continue evaluating a variety of 6mm rounds.... the army as a whole seems to have very very little interest in returning to .308 versus the capabilities of a 6/6.5mm round.

I think, but cannot be sure, that this is a program with a specific goal of equipping some units (which ones, I couldn't tell you) with a DMR or Marksman rifle capable of beating ESAPI plate equivalents, while someone else figures out a new service rifle in a 6.5mm/.280 type cartridge that can maintain an AP advantage over 5.56 or 5.45 projectiles.

I speculate that part of the reason for the transition or goal of transition from 5.56 to 6.5/6mm is that these rounds are intermediate between 5.56 and .308, or in more realistic terms, can probably be adapted to function well at longer ranges than 5.56, maintain most of the ballistic effectiveness and AP ability of .308, hopefully while keeping most of the weight advantages of 5.56 ammo. I definitely think that's been motivated by some infantry experiences in recent memory, but that is again only my opinion.

I don't know a whole lot about an arms race between ammo and armor, but it seems plausible. Almost all my experience is with civilian ratings of body armor, and I have some vague understanding that there is something of a bit of one up manship in terms of threat versus armor. I guess to be more clear, in something of a more civilian context, there already is an arms race. IIA for pistols, but if it's a big pistol then you need II and if they're some kind of gang banger and have an UZI or a MAC or whatever than you want IIIA, but if you've gotta deal with some kind of active shooter with an AK then III works and is all good and dandy but if it's some crazed lunatic with .30-06 AP then you better have some 4, and so on and so forth. The thing with the civilian world is that conceal ability is a factor, whereas with the military it's always been more like a weight thing, AFAIK. That means that .mil essentially defaults to a III equivalent in most cases, hard armor rated for rifles. That's actually what most units went to the ME with as far as I recall from various sources of literature, until the one up manship game came into play and snipers using AP 7.62x54R started targeting the side plates on people's IOTVs, and getting double kidney blowouts, which are fucking nightmares to try and treat in ideal conditions. As I've read (emphasis on read) that was the main reason for people getting ESAPI plates.

In most ways, the best armor currently available can't be beaten by the best standard infantry carried round available, which does present a lot of interesting questions. I doubt armor tech is going to regress any time soon (I actually expect that it will be getting a lot better, and I'm mildly hopeful for light, rifle rated, soft armor within the next decade or less, and that current soft armor standards will be available in materials that are generally comparable to the feeling of regular clothes, albeit very expensive, within a similar time frame) so the natural end result is that people need pointier bullets. The question for me being, how the fuck do we improve from here? Tungsten/steel is fucking hard. If modern armor can already beat Tungsten/steel core .30-06, then what exactly can we pull out of a lab to beat modern armor?

I can recall of one example of a promising concept, but it was very far from a battle rifle. It was essentially very strange, very swedish, UZI/MAC type clone. It fired very hot 9mm (I think it was 9mm, could be offbase) and had a specialty round that was a saboted AP core. It could beat not just the soft armor rated for SMGs but some of the lower end of the rifle rated armor as well, all out of a subgun barrel. I can't say whether we'll see similar things in rifles, but either more complex AP ammo like saboted projectiles, or some very impressive materials science is needed to go much further.

TL;DR: The army doesn't want battle rifles. There is definitely an arms races of AP versus Armor.

Hopefully I'm not just running my mouth here.

[TacOfficer]

Thank you TS and WD,

I suppose any compromise between the carbine and rifle would be a failure of both.

I would hope the competition between philosophies will yield an improved system.

TO

[Team Sergeant]

Actually two rifles would be a great compromise. We have a jungle uniform, a winter uniform, desert etc.

Why on earth don't we have a short range, med range and long range rifle?

And making one that does all three, that's called a failure.

[7624U]

Originally Posted by Team Sergeant

Actually two rifles would be a great compromise. We have a jungle uniform, a winter uniform, desert etc.

Why on earth don't we have a short range, med range and long range rifle?

And making one that does all three, that's called a failure.

We have that Scar-L 5.56 Scar-H 7.62
Long range M-2010 in 300.WM