Quote:
Originally Posted by Yournamehere
Technically no, it's not the 4th rifle, but it is the 4th carbine. During WWII We had the M1 Garand and The M1 Carbine, both were M1s but one was a battle rifle , and the other a carbine, so there was and is s separation between the two.
If you think about it even further, we had the M1 Carbine, the M2, and the M3, the latter two being more or less failures, which is why we just went to the M16 and kept it that way until the shortened versions got up to speed (XM177 and so forth) leading to the M4 Carbine. Of course, that's just my conjecture based on what Excalibur has said and my own knowledge.
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I don't think that explains it either. When it comes to
rifles, there hasn't been an "M15" between the M14 and M16. For that matter, there haven't been any rifles that received the designation "M2" through "M13". The M16 was only the 2nd rifle we adopted after the M1 Garand.
Long story short, I'm really not sure how they do it. But believe it or not, things aren't as organized and systematic in the DoD as you might think, even when it comes to weapons procurement. The Colt Model 777 and Model 920, for instance, were both adopted as the "M4 Carbine" even though the 777 has an M16A2-style receiver, while the 920 has a flat-top receiver. They literally bought two different Colt carbines but gave them the exact same designation. So I'm really not sure there's a consistent method.
Of course, before WWII, it used to be done by date. Like Colt M1911 and Springfield M1903, for instance.