Posted on 09/17/2008 9:00:29 AM PDT by LSUfan
In a move that could reverse years of Army small arms policy, the service is asking industry to send in ideas for a new combat rifle that could replace the M4 carbine.
In late August, the Army issued a solicitation to the arms industry asking companies to submit proposals that would demonstrate "improvements in individual weapon performance in the areas of accuracy and dispersion ... reliability and durability in all environments, modularity and terminal performance."
And in a dramatic gesture that could throw the door wide open to a totally new carbine, the service did not constrain ideas to the current 5.56mm round used in the M4.
(Excerpt) Read more at military.com ...
I know FR is a little sarcasm impaired at times but please tell me you’re kidding.
Yep.
What’s wrong with going back to the dual purpose Phaser. It was an effective weapon back in the late 60’s although I would do away with the outmoded “stun” function and replace it with a “kill faster” function.
Them there is girly guns that shoot big pistol ammo.
They just went through all this nonsense with the XM-8. Why are they starting up again?
I have had the opportunity to test fire it - 200 rounds in both semi and full, suppressed and unsuppressed.
IT kicks some serious ass.
Very accurate in full-mode, and does not go high and right when in full. The recoil is straight back.
There was a problem with the Garand family of weapons: round output in the early days of the Chinese offensives. The Chinese were, strangely enough, more plentifully equipped with more men with more varieties of automatic weapons. It was thought that American soldiers needed to be given lighter rounds and higher volume of output. Thus, Eugene Stoner's Armalite found favor within the Army that had a baleful experience in Korea.
However, in Afghanistan it was found that lighter rounds (from say, the 9mm family of Baretta weapons) didn't necessarily put the Jihadi to sleep. So there has been a trend back to the 1911 as a sidearm. I haven't heard about a trend away from the M-4 as it is the Government Issue rifle, but it does appear that people are looking for a happy medium between round output and stopping power.
Best,
Chris
Here’s an idea. Go back to having more than one type of infantry weapon/chambering, so that people fighting door to door and people fighting on the North German Plain don’t have to compromise. And give up on the principal of wounding the enemy. Our enemies are dirt bags and don’t slow down to help their wounded.
Yes, I’m kidding.
We need a modern, upcaliber equivalent to the Carbine, however. Methinks the .223 round has had its day.
Best,
Chris
LOL!
So there has been a trend back to the 1911 as a sidearm. ............... Like something was wrong with it? Can never reason why they dropped it other than to up date it to a newer look. If they wanted 9mm they could have modified the 1911. If you go house to house, why mess with a M16 derivative when you can unpack, degrease and reissue the stored Thompsons. (Rhet)
You could even re-chamber to 7mm-08 or 6.5 Grendel - or for added punch to the squad, leave at the 7.62
“The Army used ‘M-1’ a few times too many.”
That’s for sure. I remember wiping down and stacking the M-1 chair in the mess hall.
To build on what you said, there is a fundamental problem with the assessment that lighter calibers create greater strain on the enemy by creating wounded vice dead. The problem is that we studied ourselves, but we don’t fight ourselves. Our enemies are dirt bags by nature and aren’t overly worried about their wounded.
Additionally, the Jihadists want to die, wounding them only keeps them alive to detonate.
Finally, we used to have different weapons for different tasks. In room to room fighting in the third world, you need a round that is capable of penetrating cinder block walls and killing a man on the far side, yet it only needs to be able to do this from close range, not 200 yards.
My uncle was drafted right out of high school in June 1950 and served in a reconnaissance platoon for the 24th Infantry Division (Indian Head). He went all the way to the Yalu River before the big ChiCom counterattack in December.
During the battle, we was first armed with a M-1 carbine, but he chucked it for a Garand immediately after he had to pump about ten .30 caliber rounds into a ChiCom solider who was charging him with a bayonet. He said that the little ChiCom just would not go down. My uncle ended up shot in the head (he obviously survived--it was a spent bullet), lying in a foxhole, surrounded by ChiCom troops (jumping over him at night), and nearly froze to death before he was finally resuced and reunited with what was left of his unit.
Needless to say, he's a big fan of the Garand even today, while condemning the M-1 carbines as next to useless in toe-to-toe infantry combat.
I don’t recall an M14 carbine. Please educate me.
M1 carbine? You got to be kidding. limited to 150 yards for realistic accuracy and power. P@$$ ant cartridge with a bad record of stopping power. Why go backwards? HK 416? Yawn. Just a redesigned upper that will cost us taxpayers 3x what it’s worth. Not impressed by Sig, either. Snooty people to deal with. Let’s stay USA stuff, please.You wanna go old school? How about the AR-18 (aka: AR-180 in semi), maybe with a slightly heavier barrel and a rail system. Or a stoner, has a quick change bbl. Both reliable as heck, and reasonable to mfg.
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