Assault Rifles and their Ammunition: History and Prospects

[Tony Williams]

I've just revised my web article (major changes shown in red font): http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/Assault.htm

[LRRPF52]

Tony, have you considered adding the Desert Tech Micro Dynamic Rifle to your bullpup line up?



You might also consider pointing out that in the US Army and Marines, Infantrymen are taught to engage targets with well-aimed semi-automatic fire only, if looking at the Riflemen duty positions. Automatic fire isn't really a primary consideration, although low recoil is expected after the AR15 family legacy.

SCAR-L is pretty much done as a SOCOM procured weapon, while the Mk.17 seems to have some traction to it.

[Tony Williams]

Tony, have you considered adding the Desert Tech Micro Dynamic Rifle to your bullpup line up?

I've focused on production military weapons in this article, although I do refer to the MDR in my article on bullpups.

You might also consider pointing out that in the US Army and Marines, Infantrymen are taught to engage targets with well-aimed semi-automatic fire only, if looking at the Riflemen duty positions. Automatic fire isn't really a primary consideration, although low recoil is expected after the AR15 family legacy.

True, but there still seems to be a wish to have auto fire - after all, the new M4A1 has just changed from the three-round burst to an automatic option.

[LRRPF52]

I've focused on production military weapons in this article, although I do refer to the MDR in my article on bullpups.



True, but there still seems to be a wish to have auto fire - after all, the new M4A1 has just changed from the three-round burst to an automatic option.

That was to get rid of the atrocious trigger weight inconsistencies from the 3-round Burst abortion, not to provide Full Auto capability to the infantryman. The Auto mechanism is very simple, and does not affect the pull weight in the Semi mode, whereas the 3rd burst mech does.

SOCOM has had M4A1 from the start, before big green pickle machine ever got M4's.

People need to get it entirely out of their heads that full auto capability is a consideration with a professional army fielding assault rifles. 3rd world bugger eaters love it, but the implications for combat effectiveness and logistics are not lost on professional soldiers.

For small reconnaissance units, it can be effective for break contact drills, but that's about it.

[stanc]

People need to get it entirely out of their heads that full auto capability is a consideration with a professional army fielding assault rifles. 3rd world bugger eaters love it, but the implications for combat effectiveness and logistics are not lost on professional soldiers.

Thanks. It's good to see someone as highly regarded as you making that point. Whenever I've said the same thing on Tony's MG&A forum, I receive objections from numerous individuals (including Tony) who insist that full-auto is vital.

[cory]

That was to get rid of the atrocious trigger weight inconsistencies from the 3-round Burst abortion, not to provide Full Auto capability to the infantryman. The Auto mechanism is very simple, and does not affect the pull weight in the Semi mode, whereas the 3rd burst mech does.

SOCOM has had M4A1 from the start, before big green pickle machine ever got M4's.

People need to get it entirely out of their heads that full auto capability is a consideration with a professional army fielding assault rifles. 3rd world bugger eaters love it, but the implications for combat effectiveness and logistics are not lost on professional soldiers.

For small reconnaissance units, it can be effective for break contact drills, but that's about it.

Well said.

[nincomp]

The major reasons that I have seen cited for full-auto capability are for a last-ditch defense of a position that is about to be overrun and for breaking contact when the enemy is near. The controllabilty needed is to provide sufficiently accurate fire for 50m or so. Full auto fire is not to be used otherwise.

It is important to note that the American Vets who want full-auto capability are largely those who fought in Vietnam, where massed or "swarm" attacks occurred. It is also pertinent that these veterans were fully aware that such attacks had occurred in three wars within living memory (Korea, the pacific campaign of WWII, and WWI). I am sure that they had heard stories from veterans of these wars along the lines of " My buddy Joe would still be alive today if ..."

Another reason cited is the psychological effect on soldiers to know that the option is available if needed (even if never used).

[LRRPF52]

There were a lot of different factors that contributed to high Full Auto use in Vietnam:

* One of the most used, let relatively unknown practices was probing and H&I fires, which were SOP with a lot of units at night in Vietnam. At a certain prescribed time, usually just after sunset, the entire perimeter of a unit would go Captain Insano cyclic rate, mag after mag into the surrounding areas, because sappers would start their close-in infiltration right at that time with satchels of explosives destined for key positions within the defensive perimeter. A butt-nekkid Asian male with but a loincloth can slip through some of the most well-manned defensive positions under cover of darkness. Untold millions of rounds of 5.56x45 were expended in this manner in Vietnam. Night Observations Devices were very limited in use and issue at the time, and their widespread adoption in the US Infantry units has changed many things about the way we occupy and defend positions at night.

* Quality of Training. With a significant number of draftees, who had no battle drill training in the units they were incorporated into, arriving as replacements in the ill-advised individual year-long tour units especially, a lot of inexperienced soldiers would just revert to going AUTO as a way to compensate for their lack of training. Units that trained, deployed, and redeployed had much better fire discipline, but AUTO was still used a lot more then.

Some More Recent Points
* We already had guys in my unit in 2003 who went up higher in the maintenance echelons and specifically asked for AUTO Fire Control Groups to be installed in their M4's, which surprised me that they even had the parts. Our biggest complaint dating back to the M16A2 is that worthless Burst mechanism and its ill effects on accurate fire in the SEMI mode.

* In the line, the only appropriate place for AUTO from an M4 is at key leader or experienced junior enlisted men discretion, when a SAW goes down at a critical moment where suppressive fire is needed. Nobody should go into combat with the intent of letting loose with a 30rd mag-fed weapon on AUTO as their primary mode of fire, with the rare exception of a few guys on a recon team in dense terrain.

* I often see "professional" armies in Europe that still do this, but it is a major problem if you are not hitting the enemy, and expending your combat power, while bumping up the demand on the system as a whole to resupply you with more ammunition. Everything about it screams inexperience, unprofessionalism, and a general lack of military discipline outside of the scenarios I explained. Even on our belt-fed weapons, we trained to fire 3-5, or 5-7 rounds bursts at certain intervals to preserve the barrels.

[Tony Williams]

Thanks. It's good to see someone as highly regarded as you making that point. Whenever I've said the same thing on Tony's MG&A forum, I receive objections from numerous individuals (including Tony) who insist that full-auto is vital.

What I've said is that armies clearly regard full-auto as vital, because AFAIK there isn't a single assault rifle in service anywhere which doesn't have it, therefore the performance of weapons in automatic fire needs to be considered. I am well aware that the number of occasions on which it will be tactically useful are few.

[BluntForceTrauma]

At any rate, even in rapid semi-auto fire we'd like one's cartridge to have manageable recoil for the mass of recruits so they can get the reticle back on target in fast-action scenarios on fleeting targets.

John

P.S. Two questions: Has the military studied the effects of recoil on combat accuracy? Is it even an issue? I know that, when deer hunting, we tell newcomers that they won't even feel the recoil in their excitement and focus on a deer that suddenly stepped out into the open.

Second, is anyone willing to recommend a recoil threshold, expressed in the standard foot/lbs, that a GPC should not exceed?

[LRRPF52]

Several important facts that get overlooked are that the Sturmgewehr was a totally different animal that has yet to be duplicated in terms of performance capabilities:

* It has a very low cyclic rate of ~550-600rpm

* It uses constant recoil

* It has a lower operating pressure that is quite tame

* Weapon weight is pretty substantial at over 11lbs loaded

Those four characteristics combined make a very controllable rifle, especially in Full Automatic mode of fire, to the point that even a low-trained soldier can hit things with it easily and keep a short burst on a man's chest within 50m. To date, the Sturmgewehr formula has not been duplicated with any assault rifle I can think of. Pressures are one major obstacle right off the bat. Constant recoil is another. Nobody wants an 11lb rifle, so that's a dead-end.

If that thing would have been chambered in 6.5mmx33, it would have been even more of a game changer. Ergos on it are excellent, especially the controls interface, weapon balance, and the way sights line up with your head/eyes using a solid cheek weld. Many of the designs areas of the MP44 were used on the AR15, to include the mag well, recoil spring, ejection port cover, and selector location, although the MP44 has two different means of safety and fire control.

Basically, nobody got it right in the wake of the Sturmgewehr when it comes to designing and producing an assault rifle of its scope, especially not the Russians, with the horribly crude AK, its violent recoil even with a relatively lower pressure cartridge, grotesque ergos, terrible forward balance, and abusive operating system.

If you want controllable Full Auto, there are several ways to do it, but you still want short bursts + low cyclic rate. That then places you in the position of sacrificing some action speed that is very beneficial in close quarters using the Semi mode of fire.

[nincomp]

If you want controllable Full Auto, there are several ways to do it, but you still want short bursts + low cyclic rate. That then places you in the position of sacrificing some action speed that is very beneficial in close quarters using the Semi mode of fire.

Just to make sure that I understand, soldiers can fire more quickly in semi-auto than the controllable full-auto-low-cyclical-rate rifle. How long can a soldier maintain such rapid fire?

Gee, tell us how you really feel about the AK-47.

[LRRPF52]

Just to make sure that I understand, soldiers can fire more quickly in semi-auto than the controllable full-auto-low-cyclical-rate rifle. How long can a soldier maintain such rapid fire?

Gee, tell us how you really feel about the AK-47.

You could have better splits with a controllable low cyclic rate, which is why I've been interested in it. It could make target-to-target transitions very interesting once a shooter learns the cadence of the operating system. With a low cyclic rate, you wouldn't need a burst mechanism, because the trigger is the throttle and burst control.

I was being nice to the AK. I could hash over my experiences with countless variants of it over the past 2 decades shot in high volume.

[stanc]

What I've said is that armies clearly regard full-auto as vital, because AFAIK there isn't a single assault rifle in service anywhere which doesn't have it...

Yes, and as I've said, that is flawed reasoning. The fact that they teach, practice, and employ semi-auto to the almost complete exclusion of full-auto, shows that full-auto is not considered vital. Notice that even in the "break contact" drill seen at 3:40-6:10 in the video below, the carbines are fired solely in semi-auto mode.

[video=youtube;z4gofdTS6h8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4gofdTS6h8[/video]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4gofdTS6h8

...therefore the performance of weapons in automatic fire needs to be considered.

Well, if the weapon is going to have full-auto capability, then I certainly agree that controllability in that mode needs to be considered and evaluated. My question is, if they train and fight using only semi-auto fire, why bother making the individual weapon select-fire? It just adds to the cost and complexity.

[stanc]

If you want controllable Full Auto, there are several ways to do it, but you still want short bursts + low cyclic rate. That then places you in the position of sacrificing some action speed that is very beneficial in close quarters using the Semi mode of fire.

I'd really like to see the VTAC 1-5 Drill done with semi-auto vs full-auto. And with average shooters, not experts like Lamb and Haley.

[video=youtube;FaCpOt9xVy4]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaCpOt9xVy4[/video]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaCpOt9xVy4

[video=youtube;9hXV-Buvs1Y]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hXV-Buvs1Y[/video]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hXV-Buvs1Y

[LRRPF52]

Well, if the weapon is going to have full-auto capability, then I certainly agree that controllability in that mode needs to be considered and evaluated. My question is, if they train and fight using only semi-auto fire, why bother making the individual weapon select-fire? It just adds to the cost and complexity.

One of the things I mentioned earlier about controllability is lower pressures, and neither of the NATO cartridges have that going for them. I can honestly say that there are very few instances in my military career-all of which was spent in a light infantry duty position with an M16/M4, where Full Auto was used. The only ones really were in reconnaissance units, where maybe the 1 & 2 men would immediately go to AUTO upon enemy contact for the initial few seconds of that contact, then bound, and that was only possible with M16A1's, as well as M4A1's. The M16A2 and M4 prevented this with the Burst mechanism.

When you incorporate E-type targets in the terrain you are training in, and run break contact drills, you find out really fast how effective different modes of fire are. Understand that there are a large majority of people from different cultures who don't understand or adhere to the concept of taking cover, as many have superstitious beliefs about their destiny as warriors. If it's in the cards, they'll take a bullet. If not, they think they won't.

While infantrymen in the West will immediately drop, seek cover & concealment, while returning fire, a lot of dudes just don't care, especially in the Middle East and Africa. Totally different viewpoints on bullet exchange on the 2-way range. The more we train to hit, the better off we are.

[BluntForceTrauma]

I had always thought full-auto was used like a shotgun blast. Something for short-range emergencies when you find yourself in the same ROOM as an enemy and you've got to fill him with lead to put him down NOW. This is how I perceive the use of the Suomi SMG in the dark forests of Finland, 1939, and in the rubble of Stalingrad with the PPSh SMG.

Other than that, the iconic image of full-auto is the Marine in Hue sticking his M16 over his head over a wall and blindly emptying the magazine.

John

[LRRPF52]

That room-clearing technique used to be SOP in the 1970's-80's, called hi-lo. Kinda retarded when you burst into a room, dump 2 mags, and hit nothing.

The Suomi and PPSh enjoyed the unique difference of feeding from 70-72rd drum mags. When you see that entire German Special Units employed the PPSh, that says a lot about the design and the cartridge (7.62x25).

The Marine doing the over the head mag dump was an MP if I remember correctly. MPs' understanding of dismounted combat is night and day from an 0311 or 11B.

[cory]

I had always thought full-auto was used like a shotgun blast. Something for short-range emergencies when you find yourself in the same ROOM as an enemy and you've got to fill him with lead to put him down NOW. This is how I perceive the use of the Suomi SMG in the dark forests of Finland, 1939, and in the rubble of Stalingrad with the PPSh SMG.

Other than that, the iconic image of full-auto is the Marine in Hue sticking his M16 over his head over a wall and blindly emptying the magazine.

John

Weapon Safety Rule #5 Know your target and what lies beyond it.

If you're clearing a compound/house with a squad size or larger element, your scattered throughout the compound/house. If you fire and miss you can possibly hit a friendly. A rifle should never be put on burst or full auto, unless you're certain there are no friendlys in the your direction of fire. To add to that, the LMG should always stay at the rear of the stack pulling rear security.

In the Marines we were taught and trained to 2 to the chest one to the head. If you can accurately make these shoots, the bad guy will stop in his tracks. Unless you're using a 9mm then all bets are off. haha

[stanc]

In the Marines we were taught and trained to 2 to the chest one to the head. If you can accurately make these shoots, the bad guy will stop in his tracks. Unless you're using a 9mm then all bets are off. haha

Yeah, I once had a .45 slug bounce off my leg, so I imagine 9mm is pretty worthless.