Defense Tech: Army (might) Abandon "Leap" for M4 Replacement

[Kino74]

Cheapest way would be to adopt improved magazines such as pmags and adopt the Mk262 round.

You solve the vast majority of malfunctions using quality magazines and already there are better bullets that can be used so reinventing the wheel just to have something new is not the answer. We're not going to a new caliber anytime soon given the current economic outlook and our allies will have to adapt the caliber also and their economic outlook is even worse.

Piston uppers have shown only to be effective for SBRs and suppressed SBRs and will not be effective for the general soldier so why buy something new that is really not needed?

 

[elmerfudd]

For all the folks saying the money's not there, it's just not true. Let's suppose that we have 200,000 frontline troops right now. To supply all of them with a $1000 rifle, (about the current cost of an M4A1), it would cost us $200 million dollars. That's a fraction of the price of one B2 bomber. To supply all 1.2 million soldiers and marines, (certainly an overestimate since many would not be armed with rifles), would cost about $1.2 billion dollars or about the cost of one B2 bomber. In any event, it would not need to be done in a single year. I remember when the M16A2 came out in the mid 80's. We in the national guard did not get them until about 1990. So with $515 billion dollars being budgeted for 2009, a gradual phase out of the M4A1 would run about 0.0004% of military spending.

 

[amprecon]

Yeah, whatever excuse they use is just that, just an excuse.

 

[JShirley]

Tell me one thing the SCAR-H can do that a Mk 14 can't.

Oh, okay. Quickly and easily change calibers.

 

[gvnwst]

considering that the air force (not meaning to bash them in any way) shoots off $800,000 missiles quite often, if i read right, with this in mind, the cost of replacing all small arms is inconsequential.

 

[jerkface11]

None of these rifles are ENOUGH better than an M4 to warrant the switch.

 

[gvnwst]

we need to make energy weapons! the goverment couldn't get much stupider if they didn't adopt them!

 

[Marcus L.]

Here's a weapons procurement briefing given by Jim Schatz to the National Defense Industrial Association:

http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2008Intl/Schatz.pdf

It is lengthy, but the historical accounts and promotion of small arms technological advancement is compelling and comes from a lot of expertise.

The cost of equiping our entire military with new small arms designs and accessory equipment every decade or two is quite small in comparison to a few GPS guided missiles. The boots on the ground win the war, and the enemy should fear the US military when things get up close and personal. I favor aggressive small arms advancement and extreme testing, followed by adoption when the previous generation equipment loses in competition.

 

[elmerfudd]

None of these rifles are ENOUGH better than an M4 to warrant the switch.

Since we have to replace a fair number of M4's each year anyway, why not replace them with something better? There are better weapons out there. Saying a weapon is "good enough" so we will continue to use it is fine. That is if you're a third world country and good enough is all you can afford. We've got a military budget the size of the rest of the world's countries combined. There's no good reason for us to give our troops weapons that are just good enough when for a tiny fraction of our military budget we can give them the best there is.

 

[HorseSoldier]

Since we have to replace a fair number of M4's each year anyway, why not replace them with something better? There are better weapons out there. Saying a weapon is "good enough" so we will continue to use it is fine.

While it creates logistical issues and ends up costing more overall to do it this way, that will probably be how it goes if/when they do replace the M4.

Has to be done at a fairly high level of swapout, obviously, since mixing and matching spare parts streams down at the platoon, company, battalion, whatever level and such is not an ideal solution. And needs to be done differently than the M14/M16 switch over, where you had guys who'd never seen a 16 until getting in theater in some cases and such.

 

[Bart Noir]

Marcus, I did enjoy that slide show you linked to. But the "historical" section sure had some mistakes in it!

Confederate Calvary used mostly Hall model 1843 breech-loading rifles. Union forces fought with mostly Springfield model 1855 muzzle-loaders.

Yeah, sure, all those thousands of Spencer carbines were not actually being used by the Federal Cavalry who carried them????

1890 –1st model Springfield Trap-door single-shot rifle, second longest serving US service rifle (besides the AR-15/M16/M4 @ 43 years) retired from service after 25 years: -50 years after the first bolt-action repeater was fielded in Germany!

So the US troops didn't have any Trapdoors in Cuba and the Philippines? Guess again. And who the heck had a bolt action repeating rifle in 1840? Nobody. There were not even metallic cartirdges suitable for that use, in 1840.

1901 –Browning Machine Guns and the BAR offered to US Ordnance Chief General Crozier, and turned down.

What!? The 1917 Browning machine gun and the 1918 Browning Automatic Rifle had not even been invented in 1901. And the Marines were using in fact using another Browning machine gun (the "potato digger" being made by Colt) even before 1901, but I gues the slide-show author was bitchin' about the USA Army.

Bart Noir