SCAR Testing Review Military

[k9870]

Well id take anything over a famas, enfield or aug, as i hate bullpups The m4 is in existence, we give people good deals on m16 series rifles to try and get the world to use it, its modeular, and whatever the military uses must be good, right?

I think the reason nothing else akes it is everyone says "the m4 is good enough why buy something better."

m4s are good, there is just some way better stuff. Politics also has something to do with it, god forbid they spend money on new guns....even though we could replace all the existing m4s and m16s with SCARs for the price of a single B2 bomber. The m4 is also currently used so people with one will be partial and biased, most are incapable of admitting there is anything better. Although I know some vets who claim that the Daewoo Rifles used by SK troops are better....

[MT2008]

Originally Posted by k9870

Well id take anything over a famas, enfield or aug, as i hate bullpups

Right, but you don't necessarily represent the opinion of every fighting man and woman on the face of the Earth.

Anyway, those aren't the only ones. What about Japan? They use the Type 89, which is basically a glorified AR-18, and yet their SF also uses M4s. Take a look at the Wikipedia article on the M4 and check out "Users". You'll see endless countries whose SF use M4s, even though the rest of their troops use something else...not necessarily a bullpup, either.

Originally Posted by k9870

The m4 is in existence, we give people good deals on m16 series rifles to try and get the world to use it, its modeular, and whatever the military uses must be good, right?

Wrong. These are SF units we're talking about, who buy M16s and M4s in extremely small numbers. I'm not referring to countries like Taiwan or Saudi Arabia that depend on U.S. supplies to equip ALL of their troops. I'm talking about countries like France, Japan, the U.K., etc. that have their own defense industries, and in most case produce their own service rifles. Their SF has the option to use these rifles, or anything else they want. But they choose M4. Why is that?

Originally Posted by k9870

m4s are good, there is just some way better stuff. Politics also has something to do with it, god forbid they spend money on new guns....even though we could replace all the existing m4s and m16s with SCARs for the price of a single B2 bomber.

Per-unit cost isn't the only issue; it's also a matter of training all of our troops on the new weapon, and the fact that we're involved in two wars. In circumstances like that, the money goes to stuff that's a priority. And it isn't the DoD's priority to re-equip our troops with a new service rifle just because every kid who plays "Call of Duty 4" thinks the SCAR is cooler than the M4.

Not to mention that small arms are pretty much irrelevant to the broader, more strategic picture of American military prowess, anyway.

[k9870]

If we refused to ever adopt a a new rifle to to training and costs well be using m4s when we are being ripped to shreds by lazer cannons. The m4 has seen its day, its just a matter of time now. And for the record, video gamers love m4s and there is no SCAR in call of duty. And m4 fans will discredit everything, say the dust test is inconclusive or rigged, etc. Im willing to bet if the m4/m16 never existed, and something else was in use, people would be saying that thing is better and shouldnt be replaced.

Not that these pissing matches ever go anywhere. Im betting way back there was complaints when they tried to replace trapdoor springfields with krags....

[Gunmaster45]

Originally Posted by k9870

The M4 has seen its day, its just a matter of time now. And for the record, video gamers love M4s and there is no SCAR in Call of Duty.

Because all gamers in the future will make decisions on our military firearms right?

To be fair, the first Rainbow Six Vegas has an FN SCAR and no M4 at all. By the second one, they give you the M468, which was dumb because I wanted a damn M4! No 6.8mm for me please, I want realistic 5.56mm. And they got the magazine capacity wrong I believe, don't 6.8mm's hold 28 rounds, not 30?

[k9870]

I thought the 6.8 held 25? I loved the lack of M4, its the most overused video game gun. And gamers should never decide military weapons, because the DE 50ae would be the standard sidearm. I want to see a 6.5 type round redisighned to feed more reliably (6.5mm tends to jam easy) then youd have manageble recoil with better punch and ballistics.

A good compromise may be keep the AR platform, in the form of the LWRC IAR, in an intermediate caliber.

[MT2008]

I love how you still keep dodging my point about other countries' SF units all carrying M16s and M4s, even though they have the option to choose anything they want, including the M14s that you worship. Even after I shot down your last excuse...

Originally Posted by k9870

If we refused to ever adopt a a new rifle to to training and costs well be using m4s when we are being ripped to shreds by lazer cannons.

Right, because we all know that the DoD is that far behind the curve...at a time when most of our country's enemies are still armed with the same old 7.62x39mm AKs that your dad and his dad encountered in combat decades ago.

It's not simply costs and training, it's whether the new platform provides sufficient advantages to justify the cost. Military procurement programs are inherently conservative by nature. Nobody denies that. But IMO, that's actually a healthy mindset. Running out and buying the newest weapons platform on the market, simply because this or that test shows that it jams a little less frequently than the current platform, is not sound policy.

Originally Posted by k9870

And for the record, video gamers love m4s and there is no SCAR in call of duty.

(1.) Every video gamer I've ever met thinks that the newest H&K toys (like the 416) are the best firearms ever, and hates the M16 platform. There's even a group on Facebook urging the DoD to adopt the 416, and (not surprisingly), the members are all high school-age gamers who aren't even old enough to buy a semi AR-15.
(2.) Point taken that there's no SCAR in the game. I've only played the demo. That being said, it was a metaphor. You do know what a metaphor is, right?

Originally Posted by k9870

And I still say the m16 took forever to work out the kinks, the sp-1 was a TRULY AWFUL RIFLE THAT DOES NOT DESERVE TO EXIST and now you have okay rifles.

Actually, it's debatable whether the early M16s (SP1) were really "awful" - the USAF (which was the only service that used them in large numbers) simply tried to make the rifles as cheap to manufacture as possible, the reason being that they didn't really place much of a priority (or funding) on small arms. Of course, the SP1 wasn't the version that saw the most service in 'Nam. That was the XM16E1, which is the version most people are referring to when they're thinking about the M16's controversial early history in Vietnam.

Also, how long is "forever"? Pretty much all of the M16's best-known faults were corrected by the time of the A1 model, in the late-60s. That's less than 10 years. Unless you think every M16 variant before the M4 and M16A4 were crap?

[jdun]

He keeps changing the subject and dodging valid points that are made in the thread.

Anyway for those of you that are interest on how the AR15 DI works and wonder why AR15 DI has a piston click on the link. It's a very simple system and all done in a nice compact package. If you still don't understand it I'll try to explain it as best as I can.

http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.htm...f=130&t=165511

[MT2008]

Also, discussing the (alleged) faults of the 5.56x45mm round seems irrelevant, since (1.) everyone, including the Russians and Chinese, use smaller calibers nowadays, and (2.) there are AR variants available in 7.62x51mm. If caliber is your biggest grievance with the AR platform, then you have no legitimate complaints.

[Spartan198]

As much as I do like the SCAR, my stance on it remains the same. I still have my suspicions that this "Special Operations rifle" (the 5.56 version at least, I imagine the 7.62 version will see some use) might end up sharing the same fate as the Mark 23...

What I don't get is that if SOCOM wanted a gas piston so bad, why didn't they just buy an HK or LWRC upper, slap it on an M4 lower, and be done with it at a fraction of the cost?

Well, chances are HK would charge out the ass for theirs, but I'm sure you'll understand my point.

Or maybe I just answered my own question or something, I don't know. They deemed this civvy unfit for military service...