"New research shows the US Army could soon develop a" Topic

… rifle with hyper-velocity rounds.

"The Army has been on the hunt for a new rifle for nearly 30 years to replace the rifles it currently fields in its infantry units.

Once upon a time, the service seemed to be close to adopting a new weapon, though the projects ultimately went nowhere.

But perhaps soldiers should be glad that the Army didn't go with the infamous Heckler & Koch G11 or the futuristic XM29 OICW, or the ill-fated XM8 assault rifle…."

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Amicalement
Armand

That is good to hear.

Disappointed the XM29 and XM8 aren't available, since they appeared to be quite promising. Hopefully, someone will be able to reduce their size/weight, and make them more affordable in the near future.

Seems to me they would be very useful on the battlefield.

When it comes to rifles there are two camps in the US Army.

The first dreams of a gun that will, with a single trigger pull blow a damn commie in half a mile away. They hate everything else, ideally it would be a "Manny Mansfield" style all wood and steel .30 cal "real man's rifle"

The second are the people who don't care what weapon the army has, all they care for is what they can put on it. Optics, laser designators, bipods, emergency sights, flashlights, night vision, ballistic computers, scopes, rails to mount more rails on, foregrips, minifridges, pigeon coops, spare ammo, stereo systems, lead weights etc …

They are only interested because higher velocity means the bullet gets there faster, hence it increases accuracy, thus getting us closer to "one bullet, two commie halves."

And they will notice that the barrels wear out, that it doesn't save any extra weight so they can't strap five new must have gizmos to the gun.

In the end, no matter how much everyone complains the M16/M4 work … the AR platform pretty much hits the "most popular gun ever" Which means the US military has a ready pool of people who know how to use an Mx rifle and 5.56mm instinctively, they know how to operate the controls and that's something introducing a new rifle will completely throw off course.

The OICW derived weapons simply didn't work. The XM29 was a minifridge disguised as a gun. The XM8 begat the G36 which was a bit of a lemon.

ACR, OICW and others, they all promise to change warfare, but each and every time they come with huge disadvantages, huge costs and don't really produce such better results that everyone agrees to drop the gun they are holding on the spot and hold their breath until they get the new one.

I take all these claims with a salt flat or five …

I do like the looks of that ! Regardless … it comes down to effectiveness on the modern battlefield. Of course a weapon is only as "good" as who is firing it. Based on training & experience … plus the weapon itself.

Well trained & experienced troops with an effective weapon makes a big difference on the battlefield.

The fact is that the US Army has a weapon that the troops understand upside down and backwards and works well – plus I don't see any likely better weapons in the hands of likely opponents

After all, the Land Pattern Musket (aka Brown Bess) was in service for as I recall about 115 years!

You'd think, after 50+ years, that they'd be able to come up with something that is more effective, reasonably priced, and a lot more lethal than the M-16, or its derivatives.

I'd even settle for a 6.5mm – 7mm version, with a bit more punch than the M-4's, 5.56mm provides.

A shame at least 1 – 2 AR-10s aren't provided to each squad, in order to help supplement the squads' LMGs/SAWs. From what I've read, in some terrain and theaters, like Afghanistan, and no doubt, Iraq, the troops need a weapon with a bit more range and energy than the 5.56mm can offer at greater than 400 yds. range.

Sometimes good enough is the best you'll get.

From an individual shooter's point of view the 6.5mm is a huge step up from 5.56mm.

If you look at the actual advantage spread over many tens of thousands of soldiers, combined with the fact that even the 6.5mm is underpowered for use in MG's and for longer range fire and that what you gain in range is offset by the need for new receivers and barrels, the cost of switching to a new ammo type and then spend the next decade or two tweaking it, the fact that the weight of the ammo carried goes up again (boooo !!! That means they can't add another five pounds of gear !!!) and your magazine capacity goes down.

And at the end of the day what have you actually gained ? What does indeed look like a huge benefit to an individual shooter, it's merely an incremental change that ends up costing a ton of money, has many disadvantages and doesn't fundamentally solve the problem.

The big change will come when they do come up with something that has such a huge advantage over existing rifles that all the other disadvantages that will parade alongside it can be ignored.

And even that "big change new rifle" will be considered a failure because it doesn't have x,y,z feature …

Guns today are about as good as it gets, most ammo types, be they 100+ years old like the 9mm end up being a good compromise, they are now the default standard, sure you can design a "better" 9mm that is not compatible and end up crying into the wilderness "But, but mah bullit is bettuh !!!"

When people say a particular gun is vastly superior to say a Glock 17, they talk about details like a better grip, slightly more accurate, maybe has an extra round on the Glock etc. But from a broader perspective the advantages are minimal, we are now at peak gun tech, all new improvements are incremental and minimal.

Even old guns of the right design are still valid today, a vintage 1911 will still kill you stone cold dead, whereas a car built in 1911 is not going to survive the daily commute to work very long and strapping a 1911 phonograph to your arm to go jogging is problematic at best.

For 50+ years they tried every new idea in the book, three round burst, SPIW/sabot/flechette, caseless ammo, duplex ammo, guns with counterweights and superfast ROF to fire two or three shots with less felt recoil than a single shot, they tried to strap a computer the size of a minifridge to guns, etc.

Want to complain about the 5.56mm ? The Russians still use the 7.62mm RIMMED, even have the PK MG which is considered one of the best in the world, it's not broken, it doesn't need fixing. Sure they can switch to a new cartridge, but they make it work, and so does the 5.56mm on an M16 platform, that is tweaked and upgraded to the chagrin of all the neckbeards who know the perfect gun a variation of a 6.x bullet telescoping, duplex flechette buck and ball sabot HEAP, tungsten-cored bullet with a polymer version of an 1877 Briggs and Weston rifle stock, a hybrid of the Schmidt-Rubin and the H&K rollerball delayed 4 GW ram-pulsed gasblock system and a radial polygon ceramic barrel with a one in sixteen zillion twist, which will yield a gun that in a perfect vacuum will shoot an MOA smaller than a billion. times Reyo's number of a Planck Space.

I'm not defending the US Army, but they pretty much conform to the idea that perfection is the enemy of good enough. The M16/M4 has worked so far without being perfect.

I agree with … The M16/M4 has proven to be a very effective weapon. And does what it was designed for. And again, in almost all cases … a weapon is only as good as the trooper using it.

the 5.56mm can offer at greater than 400 yds. range.

The max effective range of both the M16's 5.56 and M14's 7.62 NATO FMJ is @ 460m. Meaning you should be able to hit a target 50% of the time at that range. I've used both and qualified with both. The Max effective range is not based on the round, etc. But the effectiveness of the standard sights. Generally known as Peep sight rear and Post with protecting ears in front.

Regardless of the Max ranges of the 5.56 @ 2500m. And the 7.62 NATO @ 3750m. Note: on the US ARMY Rifle Qual ranges, the most distant target is 300m. Which really was tiny … But in most cases my comrades & I could hit it. For obvious reasons.

The situation that was found to happen in the deserts, the US troops[and others]found themselves in the past few decades. Obviously in the desert you can see much farther than in temperate and jungle environments. And generally even in Urban/MOUT.

The AK-47's max engagement range was considered @ 250m generally. Based on weapons' design, i.e.the 7.62x39 round sights, etc.

E.g. The IDF Paras in '56 in the Sinai found their 9mm Uzi was having a problem engaging the Egyptians' AK-47s, again having an effective range of @ 250ms. Where the Uzi's 9mm pistol round was much less. I.e.probably @ 100ms or so … Of course what gave the IDF the edge was their quality over the most of the Arab armies in war thru '73 and beyond.

Also note: today the average firefight takes place at @ 250m or less. Based on number of factors. E.g. the troops' capabilities, weapons used, terrain, etc.

"all the neckbeards who know the perfect gun a variation of a 6.x bullet telescoping, duplex flechette buck and ball sabot HEAP, tungsten-cored bullet with a polymer version of an 1877 Briggs and Weston rifle stock, a hybrid of the Schmidt-Rubin and the H&K rollerball delayed 4 GW ram-pulsed gasblock system and a radial polygon ceramic barrel with a one in sixteen zillion twist, which will yield a gun that in a perfect vacuum will shoot an MOA smaller than a billion. times Reyo's number of a Planck Space."

hahahaha

Great post. I remember Combat and Survival magazine in the '80s and '90s touting the coming new era of flechette rounds ("lighter to carry and more effective!") hahahaha. It's proven the US infantryman can go toe to toe with any force on earth and win with good ol' 5.56 mike mike. That goes double for that 100 year old tech Ma Deuce backin em up.

Oddly enough while the West got stuck in the big intermediate cartridge vs the US imposing a "real steak-eating, red-blooded man's .30 cartridge, only better." and went nuts that the AK outperformed the M14, the Soviets for a brief period were terrified that the West had figured out a better gun.

It was a false alarm, but the Soviets did understand that the 7.62mm NATO could still outgun their AK's so they introduced the SVD DMR to add long range aimed fire to support the other troops in the squad and prompted them to step back from using an intermediate cartridge in their LMG's.

So one man's magically perfect bullet is considered inadequate by the other and in this light it's quite interesting to note that the current 6.x mm candidates, case size excepted all have roughly the same bullet weight and velocity as the venerable Italian and Japanese 6.5mm, considered by most "experts" to be really bad, underpowered ammo …

You're unlikely to get the perfect rifle, with maybe the exception of Switzerland who can afford to give their militia a match-grade rifle as standard. Even the Israeli's who produce some of the better small arms in the world end up using M16's because they are cheap and exporting the Galils and Tavors generates much needed cash !

It's proven the US infantryman can go toe to toe with any force on earth and win with good ol' 5.56 mike mike. That goes double for that 100 year old tech Ma Deuce backin em up.

Can't argue with that … !

I agree with all that Patrick … As I said I had used both the M14, M16 and even the AK-47.

You're unlikely to get the perfect rifle,

Very true … Regardless from a Plt Ldr/Co Cdr's standpoint. The perfect rifle is the one that gets the job done. And part of that again is the training & experience of the troops … and even their leaders' capabilities. E.g. you can see this in the series of Arab-Israeli Wars and even the 1st & 2d Iraq Wars, etc.