#M38

On the heels of the USMC’s effort to field 15,000 more Heckler & Koch M27 Infantry Automatic Rifles, as well as the M38 Designated Marksman Rifle variant, The Firearm Blog has received a copy of a 2016 report intended to justify procurement of accessories and additional M27s to fill a need for a special purpose rifle (SPR). The report documents a test conducted at Quantico, Virginia, by the Product Manager, Infantry Weapons Product Management Office (PdM IW). 9 M27 IARs were tested, each firing 2700 rounds over the course of the test. Notably, the Lead Engineer and Assistant Product Manager for this test was the recently-retired Salvatore Fanelli, who worked at Heckler & Koch in the early-mid 2000s.

In recent months the Corps has been increasingly open about its intentions to adopt the M27 as its standard issue rifle. Back in August 2017, the USMC released a sole source notice for the acquisition of as many as 50,000 M27 Infantry Automatic Rifles. It now seems the Corps will be acquiring the new rifles in smaller numbers initially.

Late last year we reported that the US Marine Corps had begun fielding the M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle as the M38, a designated marksman rifle. The M38 is essentially a standard M27 mounting a variable power Leupold TS-30A2 Mark 4 MR/T scope instead of a standard ACOG.

The USMC has begun fielding an unspecified number of M38 Designated Marksman Rifles. Converting existing M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle’s to the designated marksman role by adding a Leupold TS-30A2 Mark 4 MR/T 2.5-8x36mm variable power scope, replacing the standard ACOG. The Leupold has previously been used with the Mk 12 Special Purpose Rifle.

In March of 1963, a man named Lee Harvey Oswald purchased an M38 Carcano rifle and some quantity of ammunition from Klein’s Sporting Goods in Chicago. Oswald would later use this rifle and ammunition (or so the official narrative goes) to assassinate the then- President of the United States John F. Kennedy on November 22nd, 1963, in Dallas, Texas.

If you have a Mosin-Nagant rifle or if you are a member of Internet communities of military surplus firearms, then you’ve probably come across a marksmanship chart (in Russian) for the Mosin-Nagant rifles. It looks to be a very handy reference. Although many of the parts are self-explanatory, there are some sections of this chart that are not easily understandable and cause some confusion because of being written in a foreign language. I’ve been asked multiple times to explain or translate this or that part of the chart. Eventually, I decided to completely translate it because there is an interest and demand for it. Hopefully, this translation will be useful for many firearms enthusiasts and researchers.