Mutiny At Arfdotcom

MK318 is not a match bullet, it is not as accurate as MK262. So MK262 will still has it place somewhere some place.

The problem with MK318 is that while it is barrier blind to laminated glass and some of the other stuff, the steel tips in the M855 and M855A1 are steel better choice in defeating steel plates and soft armour & Polyethylene plates. Penetration of common personal armor and steel plates are considerations in a big conventional fight.

I suspect that is why the army is kinda clinging to the M855 basic design concept.
 
The 20" M16A2/A4 was a creation of 80's. A lot of design features are based on KD range shooting with iron sights, which came from a generation of shooters that gain their experience at Camp Perry. A lot of efforts were put on increasing "hit-ability" from the 80's to the 90's, and hence the ACR project in the 90's, but nothing came out of all these efforts. The best single thing they have ever done was the issuance of ACOG to everyone. That is one single thing that increases hit-ability the most, and totally eludes any argument for 20" pole sticks needed for sight radius. Now, why make lives difficult in and out of AAV and helicopters? Why make people struggle with a pole stick on the beach and the build up area? Even around trenches (either defending or attacking), it is much nicer to a have carbine and than a 20" pole stick.

What gets this really going, the biggest irony in the USMC rifle squad right now is that the automatic rifle men are carrying the slightly lighter, shorter and the more accurate M27 IAR. The whole point of replacing M249 with M27 IAR is to make sure the automatic riflemen can keep up with the rest of the squad. Now the reverse becomes true. The riflemen that carry 20" pole sticks(with RAS) have no weight and accuracy advantage( in fact disadvantaged because the IAR is free floated) over the automatic riflemen, in fact, since they are supposed to carry extra ammo, radio, AT4...they are actually more burdened than the gunners. If I am the squad leader, I probably want all of my riflemen carry M27 IAR instead of M16A4. M16A4 was obsolete, the obsolesce had become so painfully obvious when the M27 entered into service awhile ago

The USMC is caught between a rock and a hard place. They cannot replace M16A4 with M27 as a general issue weapon ( money and the big procurement process ). The second best is to swap the M16A4 out of the line Marine with M4 from the support. This makes a lot of sense because the M4 is lighter and more compact than the M27, which restore the rifle squad dynamics back to where it was supposed to be. Now the support trades are getting screwed with a 20" pole sticks that totally do not make sense for what they do.



TV-PressPass said:
Arfcom always did love to get their panties in a bunch! It doesn't surprise me one bit that they're at it again.



I prefer the Brits informal acronym: FISH and CHIPS (fighting in someone's house and causing havoc in people's streets) ;)

For me, the bigger question that informs this decision is:

What kind of war is the USMC expecting to fight next?

Specifically, are they training and refining for another asymmetrical counter-insurgency campaign? Or picturing a peer or near-peer opponent with A2/AD capabilities? It seems like the rest of the Navy is leaning towards the latter.

If you're gearing up for COIN, then by all means have a wide variety of guns and optics that you can swap and pick for each specific task. Usually the initiative is on your side.

But if you're gaming a future where your supply and logistics systems might actually be at risk, it seems you'd make different choices in order to make each rifleman the most effective rifleman he (or she) can be in the widest range of plausible situations.

But honestly, what do I know? I'm just a guy who reads Ghost Fleet and points a camera at exercising troops. I'm no more qualified (but hopefully more levelheaded) than the Arfcom crew.

It's definitely easy for us outside the system to say "they picked wrong" or "if it was up to me I'd give everyone an Hk417/MCX/X95 etc" but all us in arm chairs are making a mistake by thinking any army is trying to get The Best Gun.

Budgets are real, as are existing inventories, training programs, and manuals of arms. It might be fun to ignore those things and imagine, but the organizations trying to outfit people don't have that luxury.
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20 inch rifles come from a dated expectation of combat between 200-600 m when in reality it is about 200 m or less and the 14.5 inch works just great .
 
Savage said:
20 inch rifles come from a dated expectation of combat between 200-600 m when in reality it is about 200 m or less and the 14.5 inch works just great .
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Funny seeing this quote. It's common knowledge that this same factoid was the guiding principle in most WW2 infantry weapon designs. I wonder what happened to change this philosophy back to longer barrels in the Cold war. Now we're learning the same lessons again it seems? So bizarre.

You can't make everyone happy. In the desert everyone wants accurate fire out to 600m, then they move into the cities and want 10.5" FIBUA rigs. 14.5" or 16" seems to be a happy medium IMHO, especially with the right ammo. But I don't get to make those calls, so meh..
 
Not surprising. AR15.com is a joke of a website that is full of fanboys and people who spend a lot more time behind a keyboard than a trigger. I can't stand that place. The average age of arfcom must be somewhere between 15-17.
 
kthomas said:
Not surprising. AR15.com is a joke of a website that is full of fanboys and people who spend a lot more time behind a keyboard than a trigger. I can't stand that place. The average age of arfcom must be somewhere between 15-17.
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Agree they are all operators and make John Rambo look normal!
 
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