https://www.armytimes.com/news...cement-for-soldiers/

How the Army is building an unparalleled rifle and SAW replacement for soldiers

By: Todd South   15 hours ago

A lot of attention in Army modernization often goes to headline-grabbing missile systems or farther shooting artillery, but a piece of gear close to the hearts of most soldiers is their rifle.

There’s a lot being done to transform what the grunts and their close combat companions in special forces, scouts and engineers bring to the fight.

Army Times spoke recently with a team of small arms experts at the Soldier Lethality Cross Functional Team, and Program Executive Office-Soldier and the Army Marksmanship Unit about where the Next Generation Squad Weapon program stands and what’s happening next.

Recently the Army down selected to three competitors for prototypes to build both an automatic rifle and a rifle with a common 6.8mm cartridge to replace the M4 for an as yet undetermined number of troops in the Army, Marine Corps and Special Operations Forces.

Those companies are AAI Corporation Textron Systems; General Dynamics-OTS, Inc.; and Sig Sauer, Inc.

Textron unveiled a 6.5mm caseless, telescoped ammunition rifle at the annual AUSA show last year. The GD submission is a bullpup version in which the magazine is loaded behind the handgrip, closer to the shoulder. The Sig Sauer submission has more of a traditional assault rifle build.

The big attention grabber early on with news of the program was the decision to go with an intermediate caliber between the currently fielded 5.56mm and 7.62mm calibers. That floated in the 6mm range for some time but the Army ultimately went with 6.8mm.

There’s some history there.

Some of the work that went into deciding on the 6.8mm caliber round for the NGSW program originated with the Army Marksmanship Unit.

Troy Lawton, an Army veteran, former AMU member and now civilian staffer, helped develop the 6.8mm special purpose cartridge for special operations forces years ago to solve some lethality problems at range that they were having in the M4 platform. Now, that exact round will not be what ultimately becomes the NGSW rifle or automatic rifle, but the beginnings came out of that effort.

Lawton has been part of developing reduced training range variants for that caliber form, which he showed to Army Times. The bullet has a dimpled back end that helps slow it down so that it can retain the same accuracy as a fully powered round with the same recoil but stop shorter than the farther maximum distances that the standard round would shoot and go beyond what many current Army ranges can handle.

The exact specifications of the 6.8mm being provided to industry around which they’ll build the new round and weapon were not disclosed, but Daryl Easlick, test and evaluation specialist with the SL CFT, gave Army Times a shorthand, noting that the 6.8mm SPC was developed for the M4 platform but kind of like a “big brother” to that round.

The new round has other, undisclosed, at-range lethality effects that the Army is trying to achieve while also not overloading the weight of the weapon or the ammunition.

The calendar goal is to have an infantry brigade combat team equipped with the automatic rifle, replacing the current 5.56mm Squad Automatic Weapon, by 2023.

The exact number of rifles to be fielded initially beyond that IBCT has not yet been determined. Col. Elliott Caggins with the SL CFT told Army Times that recommendations from the team would head to senior Army staff by October.

One thing that future automatic riflemen will have, though, is a way to conduct both of their roles. The NGSW-AR will need to have a selector switch so that the shooter can go to semiautomatic when needed, Easlick said.

While the addition of a more accurate, farther shooting rifle and automatic rifle may mean some changes for shooters and different practices on reduced range sites, Easlick said the team has been tied in closely with Army marksmanship developers.

He didn’t envision a “vast overhaul” of Army marksmanship training in the coming years with the new rifle.

Some of the weapon work will also link closely with the work being done by other teams, such as the SL CFT and PEO Soldier on the Integrated Visual Augmentation System, or IVAS.

“Our team is talking with IVAS daily,” Caggins said. “We understand that the fire control and power management piece will interact with the IVAS system, whether displayed in the system or a reticle pattern you can see in the IVAS system and the network.”

While they’re working together, one won’t determine the other’s delivery date.

Sgt. 1st Class Brion Baker told Army Times that they’ve already gotten feedback from a range of soldiers, from the freshest E3 to the senior E6s, mostly in the infantry, scout and engineer military occupational specialties.

Maj. Samuel Butler with PEO Soldier’s next generation weapons program said that a lot will happen with the three companies over the next 27 months.

They’ll do as many “soldier touch points” as vendors are prepared to do, mostly to inform their development process. But in 2020 there will be the first prototype test by the government, followed by a second prototype test to look at technical specifications, controllability and mobility, and a user test.

After that test, in two years, the three companies will be reduced to one for a production contract and unit equipped in 2023.

Not this shit again

I keep thinking of our allies in Eastern Europe. "We went through all of this shit just to convert to the 5.56, half of us dumped untold thousands of perfectly good mags just to meet STANAG, and now we've gotta go through all of this shit again?

Here's hoping for some neat part kits after 2023 - or so, depending on how the actual process goes here.

This ^^^^

How often does the press really need to state new weapons and calibers are in the works? Based on previous attempts -- weapons and calibers that may never go into wide-scale service, if any service at all.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

We wupped Johnny Reb with the 1861. Why do we need anything new?

Yea, about that....

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
We wupped Johnny Reb with the 1861. Why do we need anything new?

That's not the issue here, and you know it.

Not all that long ago -- probably this summer -- virtually the same article hit the press. And the article arose as a thread here, too. I'm pretty certain I commented on it, as did a few others. Actually, a new 6.8mm cartridge has been discussed for quite a while. Some believed the new 6.8 would fit in an AR15 platform and be similar to the 6.8SPC. Others felt it might be more like a .270-ish bullet in a 308-ish case. Now the thoughts are in a noticeably different direction.

But I suspect nothing has changed over the past few months. We now just have another "look what we are thinking about developing". Woo-hoo.

I'm all for change that brings improvement. So let us visit the 223/5.56. The 6.8SPC was supposed to the next thing for our service folks. Then the 300blk. We can't forget 6.5 Grendel. Lately there's 22 Nosler and 224 Valkyrie. But the 223/5.56 lives on.

The 308 Win has been around for a long time. It's a great all around cartridge, but it's getting long in the tooth. Pick a new brass case -- Creedmoor or x47 Lapua. Throw in a smaller bore bullet -- 6mm, 25 cal, 6.5mm, 7mm -- and a better all around cartridge exists. But the 308/7.62x51 lives on.

Stepping up to more oomph in a .30 bore, the 300WM ha been around a long time. Its belted case is getting long in the tooth. Newer chamberings exist that do long distance work better than the 300WM -- 30 Norma, 30 Nosler, 300 PRC. A few military units have even tested them. But the 300WM lives on.

This ongoing hubbub of the next, most greatest, uber bestest firearms systems is just tiring. If history provides any lessons, the items discussed in the latest article likely will not see widespread deployment.

The XM8 and OICW are going to be so rad in this new caliber.

quote:

Originally posted by fritz:
This ongoing hubbub of the next, most greatest, uber bestest firearms systems is just tiring. If history provides any lessons, the items discussed in the latest article likely will not see widespread deployment.

Yes, I was attempting a little irony, but if it is tiring, it’s for one reason and one reason only: Because we make it so. Despite my interest in the military and in firearms from a personal standpoint in particular, I don’t make any effort to follow all the never-ending proposals, counterproposals, all the drama associated therewith—and certainly not all the whining about ancient wine in not-so-new bottles. When someone can do nothing more than post, “Here we go again!” about these stories, I can only think about the never-ending complaints about the garbage on the teevee. There’s this thing called an “off” switch and I am amazed that so few people seem to be acquainted with it.

The same is true about all these stories about weapons developments. If they are tiring, ignore them. If I am interested at all, I start paying attention when they are actually fielded and meaningful reports of their effectiveness are available. Gone are the good old days when an inventor could walk into the White House, convince the President to come out back and fire a few rounds with the latest and greatest, and walk away with an order for a few hundred thousand units.

Not that anyone is asking for my advice about that or anything else, but if they did, that’s what I would recommend as having worked very well to limit my tiredness or frustration for all the decades of my life.

I doubt there's a single significant shred of new information in this article -- it seems almost exactly like the one from a few months ago. We will likely get the same "news" in a few more months, and a few months after that. Sometime, maybe 2 or 3 or 4 years from now, some kind of decision will be made.

If that's the current state of development news, then I will state with a few others here -- not this shit again.

^^^ hence the remark about the same shit over again....it’s not that some of us don’t have things to say, it’s just the same stuff about trying to get a new caliber or new rifle for the military.

First they would have to actually get millions of new rifles, ammo for same, have enough ammo for about five years of ammo to be kept in storage, create ancellory items (slings/cleaning gear/mags/mag pouches/etc) create maintenance programs...and more.

All those things cost money and time, once visited, they figure out how much that costs and things are usually shot down. Even if the new weapon system can use some of the old systems stuff, like mags or pouches or sights...it’s still extremely expensive.

This is why we who have been involved in stuff like it say, not this shit again.

I was involved at a lower level of examination when the CG was replacing the M60. And also when the CG was replacing the M9 with the Sig P229DAK in 40 S&W. Just getting the round entered into the NATO designation was a hire undertaking...and guess what...none of our NATO allies use the round we stuffed down their throats, they kept the round they have been using for decades. But we, the US taxpayers spent millions so that one agency could use a cool new round.

So forgive me when is say, not this shit again. It’s a waste of time. Unless we steal some alien technology and start producing phasers...the M16 series of rifles/carbines will be here for decades to come.

I have two thoughts on the New Supergun.

Leaked alleged performance is at the .270 Wby or 270 WSM level. That equals heavy recoil and short barrel life.

An all new design under 21st century conditions is going to be expensive.

I conclude that procurement will be small with issue only to the roughest toughest most eliteist tier operators. There will be vigorous competition among COs to show their outfit is elite enough to get the new stuff.