Army Captain Slams New XM7 Rifle As “Unfit,” Sig Sauer Says Otherwise

The infantry officer and Expeditionary Warfare School student presented his findings, which lambasted the new rifle for its ergonomics, weight, and durability.

Joseph Trevithick, Howard Altman
May 2, 2025 6:42 PM EDT

Army Capt. Braden Trent has caused something of a stir this week, saying that data he has collected points to his service’s new 6.8x51mm XM7 service rifle suffering from serious reliability and other issues, including excessive barrel wear and regular breakages of key components. He claims, based in part on observations of live-fire exercises involving XM7-armed soldiers, that these problems, together with a host of other factors, make the gun “unfit” for its intended purpose. The gun’s manufacturer, Sig Sauer, has strenuously pushed back on Trent’s assertions and outright denied a number of them.

Capt. Trent presented his findings, which come from an unclassified student thesis, at the annual Modern Day Marine exposition in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday. The Army infantry officer is currently attending the Expeditionary Warfare School, part of the Marine Corps University in Quantico, Virginia.

“My project began as a fact-finding mission. I wanted to find out, how does this new product [the XM7] increase soldier lethality and what data can I provide at the unclassified level to help soldiers and leaders alike make better decisions at the tactical, operational, and strategic levels?” Trent said in his presentation at Modern Day Marine. His research, “consisting of in depth historical analysis, testing with experts, ballistics research, extensive dialog with soldiers, industry and leaders,” came “to the conclusion that the XM7 is unfit for use as a modern service rifle...”

Complete article with photos:

https://www.twz.com/land/army-...sauer-says-otherwise

Sig: I had a guaranteed military sale with the Spear! Renovation program! Spare parts for 25 years! Who cares if it worked or not!

Let’s see-

The barrel is too long.
The ambi magazine release could allow the mag to pop out.
ONE regular army unit tore a bunch of shit up.
Army units blew through all of their ammo quicker because of smaller magazine capacities
And bigger bullets weigh more


Did I miss anything?

I think it was a dud from the start. I believe Sig greased alot of palms to get the contract & sell their "new" rifle.
It's not the Infantry rifle any one of our services needed. Just looking at the cartridge specs, they had to know it would burn through barrels at a rapid pace. Not to mention the parts breakages I've read about.
Eventually it'll be scrapped & onto something else. Most likely from Sig again. Isn't strange that Sig has been getting every military contract it seems...hmmm. How's that M17 working out?

quote:

Originally posted by Delta-3:
I think it was a dud from the start. I believe Sig greased alot of palms to get the contract & sell their "new" rifle.

Disagree completely. Sig built the *exact* rifle that whatever fuckups in Big Army wanted, and compared to the bullpup and the caseless rifle that made it through the tests, this was the best of the three. Turns out, there's far too many people at Big Army that are fuckups all together, much like the same fuckups during Vietnam that looked down on the M16 compared to what "real soliders" wanted in the M14. What we haven't seen yet is the butthurt Generals that wanted this rifle sabotage the next rifle program.

What I really want to see is what a bimetal 5.56x45 can do at that 80,000 PSI threshold (possibly in a MCX style rifle) giving soliders a more powerful rifle cartridge, a smaller rifle, and the same amount of ammo.

And let’s not forget the Marine Corps M27 program. A horrible idea that became reality.

And the SCAR 16 that was given the same grade as the XM7 because it had a tendency to throw empty brass into the BCG track unless it had the perfect STANAG magazine and the reciprocating charging handle because some dipshit saw the AKM had one and that's the reason it was SO reliable...

This message has been edited. Last edited by: DanH,

Or the near sexual relationship that the military has with manual safety’s on pistols. If they want a manual safety on a pistol, they need Togo back to the Beretta.

Stop fucking up a Glock by trying to put a manual safety on it.

Where the hell is DARPA when you really need it?

To throw another acronym at the situation, really hope DOGE gets ahold of the top levels of the military industrial complex at some point.

After almost 100 years the army realized John Garand was right and a .270 projectile was superior to a .30 for combat.

They designed what they thought was the "ideal" .270 / 6.8 mm projectile and told the bidders to provide a rifle and cartridge that would launch their projectile at 3000 fps from a 16" barrel. That is what Sig did, and they did it in an otherwise "normal" rifle and action that mostly follows the AR manual of arms. The bimetal case was the trick to get pressures high enough to get the required velocity.

The army did NOT give the desired range, trajectory, and terminal ballistics to the bidders and ask them to come up with a suitable cartridge and projectile. If they had done that the .277 Fury would likely have a much better ballistic coefficient, retain velocity at longer ranges, have a lighter projectile, and use less powder and pressure. A slightly different caliber may have resulted as well.

This is the folly of the army. Make stupid assumptions and ask for something stupid, then complain that you got what you asked for.

Back in WWII the army realized the need for multiple small arms as no one can do the job -
Carbine for lighter duties, main battle rifle, smg for cqb, etc. since WWII, they have tried to have one gun do it all and the concept is simply a failure.
My examples of typical army behavior was giving me a full length M16A4 when I went to Iraq where all our activities were CQB street and door to door fights, then an M4 when I was in open terrain with long range engagement potential in Afghanistan.
Going back to a mix of systems like in WWII is really the best answer. ( supply logistics do get more complicated in this scenario of course)

Follow-up article.

Why the Army’s new XM7 rifle reignited a debate over volume of fire

An infantry officer’s critique of the XM7 argues that the lower round capacity of the service’s new rifle could put soldiers at risk. An Army general said the rifle’s new ammunition “stops the enemy at one round.”

by Patty Nieberg
Published May 12, 2025 9:56 AM EDT

An Army captain’s research paper, written at a Marine Corps professional school, criticized the service’s move to a new rifle and reignited a long-standing debate among infantrymen: heavier caliber or more rounds?

In 2018, the Army began developing its Next Generation Squad Weapon rifle, the XM7, as a replacement for the M4A1 carbine. Compared to its predecessor, the Sig Sauer-produced XM7 fires a heavier round that the Army says improves “accuracy, range, signature management, and lethality.”

But the larger 6.8mm round comes with a price: the XM7 can only carry 20 rounds in a magazine, while the M4’s standard load is 30.

Army Capt. Braden Trent argued in a recent academic paper that the lower ammo count was a major flaw. Combat training and marksmanship experts who spoke with Task & Purpose were split.

Brig. Gen. Phil Kinniery, commandant for the Army’s Infantry School and Maneuver Center of Excellence at Fort Benning, Georgia, was adamant that the new XM7 is an improvement on the firearms used by the Army for 20 years of war in the Middle East.

“From having been in several firefights throughout my career and deployments in Afghanistan and in Iraq, that [6.8mm round] round stops the enemy,” Kinniery told Task & Purpose. “What we’re actually bringing to infantry soldiers or, really, the close combat force across the Army, is something that stops the enemy at one round versus having to shoot multiple rounds at the enemy to get them to stop...”

Complete article:

https://taskandpurpose.com/new...ifle-round-capacity/