Posted on 05/26/2010 11:41:33 PM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
The Times (the British one) has a story about the continuing debate over the 7.62mm round versus the 5.56mm as employed in the long range firefights in Afghanistan. The story asserts that the 5.56mm round used in the M4 rifle “lacks sufficient velocity and killing power in long-range firefights.” As Defense Tech readers know, we’ve covered this issue before.
As for the stopping power of the 5.56mm round, that very topic came up at a roundtable discussion I attended with the Army’s Program Executive Office Soldier last month at Aberdeen Test Center, Md. It led to an interesting discussion about wound dynamics, the “wound channel” and the “bleed out effect.”
Responding to claims that high-velocity 5.56mm rounds pass straight through the body without killing, Brig. Gen. Pete Fuller, the commander of PEO Soldier, said a new 5.56mm round that will be shipped to troops beginning in June, the M855A1 lead free slug, will get rid of what he called “yaw dependency.”
“The current M855 (5.56mm) ball round is yaw dependent. The closer you are to something you’re shooting at, the less yaw it has and it’s going to go right straight through,” said Fuller. Also, the M4 carbine has a 14 ½ inch barrel compared to the 20-inch barrel on the standard M16. “That shorter barrel cut out 5 ½ inches for that round to get to full muzzle velocity,” he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at defensetech.org ...
That's one way of looking at it. It's not the way I look at it.
“If they’re comparing the 7.62x39 round to the 5.56 round straight up, the larger bullet is not “better.” The 7.62 bullet is larger, but it’s much slower. It’s around 2900 feet per second compared to 2100 fps for the AK-47 round.”
Both the Russian 7.62 x 39 and the US 5.56 x 45 rounds are medium power rifle rounds made for lightweight, selective fire, shoulder weapons......
More appropriate is the comparison of these rounds is their respective Muzzle energies
5.56 NATO x 45 = 1325
7.62 Russian x 39 = 1527
7.62 Nato x 51 = 2802
As you can see the %.56 Nato and 7.62 Russian are similiar in Muzzle energy....within 15% of each other......
While the 7.62 Nato round, a high Power rifle round, is hands above at almost double the ME of these two......
You are correct in stating that calibre/velocity is not the whole story.....all 7.62 mm’s are not equal.......
Did we have female combat soldiers back in the Viet Nam Era?
If that is the reason we switched from the M1 type weapon to the M16, it was a poor one.
“Highly accurate with good performance down range the 7.62 x 51 Nato round along with the Upgraded M-1 Garand known as the M-14 service rifle would again/still be my personal choice to carry into battle.........”
Ditto.
Neither the Vietnamese or women was a factor in this.
Stoner developed his rifle and the 5.56mm cartridge was adopted in 1957, well before either of these was an issue.
Other rumors that need to stop:
1. It WAS NOT made “to wound”. It was made to kill and does that just fine.
2. The bullet doesn’t tumble in flight. The bullet design causes the tail-heavy projectile to tumble in tissue, thus causing fragmentation and greater damage.
3. It was never made by Mattel.
And the list goes on.
“2. The bullet doesn’t tumble in flight. The bullet design causes the tail-heavy projectile to tumble in tissue, thus causing fragmentation and greater damage.”
In effect, this is worse than a dum-dum bullet which is a violation of the Geneva Convention, no?
Probably.
The Hague Accords weren’t very technically sophisticated.
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