#308

With the soldier’s load growing beyond the bounds of reason, and the Army set to replace the M4 Carbine in some units with the new Interim Combat Service Rifle, questions have arisen about how the soldier’s burden has changed over time. In the comments section of several of my articles relating to these subjects, readers asked if I could compare the current soldier’s load with the soldier’s load from World War II, to see how they compare. As always, I am happy to oblige.

Manufacturers who are gearing up for the US Army’s Interim Combat Service Rifle competition better know where to get their ammo for testing, and the Army is ready to help. The US Army is facilitating the procurement of 7.62mm M80A1 ammunition to competitors for testing purposes, according to a new amendment to the ICSR solicitation. The amendment states that contractors can procure ammunition from either Orbital ATK (who operates Lake City Army Ammunition Plant), or Olin-Winchester. The process is described in the handy dandy flowchart below:

Yes, the M4 Carbine will be replaced by a 7.62mm Interim Combat Service Rifle, and also no it won’t. Ah, I see I need to explain.

This is a guest post by Zain from Pakistan

In January of 2001, the US Army introduced a new slogan to replace the classic “Be All You Can Be” which young men had recruited under for over two decades. The branch’s new slogan was “An Army of One”, signalling a brand new take on a force that wanted desperately to reinvent itself. Those behind the slogan sought to re-humanize the Army, atomize it, bring it down to its individual components, i.e., the people who filled its ranks. It would be, they hoped, the slogan of a new Army that through the strength of its individuals helped make the world a better place. Over the next 5 years, however, it became the slogan under which men and women all over the world would sign up to fight in Afghanistan and Iraq as part of what became known as the Global War on Terror.

The US Army’s Program Manager for Individual Weapons has issued a new Request for Information (RFI) to the industry for a new 7.62x51mm Interim Combat Service Rifle, which seeks to bring out the best battle rifles the market has to offer. The RFI, posted at FBO,gov, reads:

As we wrap up our SHOT Show coverage, we turn to a new company on the US market, but an old name in Australia: Lithgow. This Australian gun company dates back to the Lithgow Small Arms Factory, established before World War I and located in New South Wales. Today, Lithgow brands itself as a high tech manufacturer, advertising its military Atrax bullpup rifle as using a completely novel polymer in the construction of its barrel cradle, for example. Lithgow’s US arm themselves will not be importing the Atrax (that will be handled by Dasan), but rather a line of premium bolt action rifles that have been sold on the Australian civilian market for several years now.

At the 2017 SHOT Show, Sako/Tikka was showing off their products, especially their newest entry into the T3 family: The T3x TAC A1, a dedicated from-the-factory precision rifle offering built from off a T3x base rifle. The TAC A1 is, unlike the rest of the T3 family, bedded into an aluminum chassis, not a polymer or wood stock. The chassis adds stability to the rifle, but also sports a number of additional “tactical” features that help transform the T3x from a sportsman’s rifle to a tactical/precision weapon.

Stag Arms is quite famous for the companies left hand ARs, offering variants where other manufacturers tend to not operate in the Southpaw domain, Stag has curved out a niche in the market. This year is no different, with .308 Win rifles and a featureless rifle being added to the line up. The featureless rifle is built using a partnership between Stag and Hera Arms in Germany, working on producing a thumbhole stock with an aluminum insert to prevent holding the stock like an “assault rifle”.

Nestled in the back of the first floor of the 2017 SHOT Show, in a 1900-series booth shared with another company, was a solitary representative sitting behind two very interesting looking precision rifles, both bolt-action bullpups. This was the booth – half booth, really – of Polish arms manufacturer  Zakłady Mechaniczne Tarnów (ZMT for short). The factory was founded as a railway plant almost exactly 100 years ago, during World War I in 1917 – though there was no sign of this centennial at the booth. The rifles are variants of the Polish “Bor” sniper rifles, one in .308 Winchester and the other in .338 Lapua Magnum, and their military counterparts have been in use with the Polish armed forces since 2008.

During SHOT Show 2017 Industry Day at the Range, I dropped by the IWI USA booth to see what they had for attendees to shoot. Besides their highly competitive Galil ACE 308, they had also brought the 5.56mm variant of the ACE, which is just now making it into the country. I got a chance to fire these two rifles side by side to compare them. Sadly, IWI’s reps tactically operate their booths with touchscreen-baffling gloves on, and since I ride solo at shows like this that meant I got no photos of me actually shooting the rifles. Oh well, we’ll have to make do with some glamor shots.

It feels like déjà vu: India has once again issued a Request For Information (RFI) for a new rifle, this time in 7.62x51mm NATO caliber. The RFI was reportedly issued on the 27th of September, making it two and a half months between the nation’s government announcing they were preparing the document, and actually issuing it. DefenseWorld reports on the RFI’s contents:

Once again SIG has added to it’s ever expanding line of handgun and rifle ammunition. This offering is a match grade .308 in the “Elite Performance” line. This round uses the highly successful 168 grain Match King bullet.

In this episode of TFBTV we’re back in the Great White North taking a look at the XCR-M pistol.

Previously, we talked about the Soviet 7.62x39mm caliber, which was paired with the famous Kalashnikov automatic rifle. With its much heavier bullet, larger caliber, and lower velocity, the 7.62x39mm contrasts heavily with the US 5.56mm caliber, and US weapons manufacturers took note. The .300 AAC Blackout is in many ways similar to the 7.62x39mm caliber, being – like the 6.8 SPC – inspired by it, but designed to add new capabilities. The origin of the Blackout lies in the earlier .300 Whisper, a wildcat developed by JD Jones from the .221 Remington Fireball to fire both heavy subsonic projectiles and lighter supersonic rounds with ballistic characteristics similar to the 7.62x39mm, while being highly compatible with existing AR-15 type rifles. Versus the older Whisper, the Blackout is little changed, but its introduction, backed by the force of Advanced Armament Corp, Remington, Barnes, and other companies, made it virtually an overnight success on the US civilian market.