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5.56 NATO ROUNDTABLE JIM SCHATZ answer to the trade-off balance issue.” The report goes on to state that, “The 6.8 mm projectile had a near optimum balance of MASS, VELOCITY, and CONFIG- URATION to maintain its effectiveness, even at lower impact velocity.” “The clear and unequivocal best performing cartridge in the JSWB-IPT was 6.8mm” which was also validated by the 11 August 2006 USMC Test Evaluation Report for the Alternate, Phase I. Ironically, these statements and recommendations from the expert panel were omitted from the final U.S. Army report. 17. The 5th Special Forces Group (Airborne) with concurrence from U.S. Army Special Forces Command (Airborne) leadership developed the 6.8x43mm Remington Special Purpose Cartridge and MURG (Modular Upper Receiver Group) concept to enhance the terminal effectiveness of 5.56x45mm carbine platforms (MK12 SPR, M4A1 Carbine, MK18 CQBR) to deal with combat failures of short-barreled 5.56x45mm weapons in common use today. Documented accounts of enemy personnel being hit as many as 15 times with M855 drove the 5th SFG (A) to take action to address these ammunition failures. One well known and documented example of these M855 failures is provided by MSG Anthony Pryor – 5th SFG (ABN) – Silver Star recipient - Afghanistan mountains – 23 January 2002. “…Pryor snapped his gun around and shot the terrorist at point blank range with two rounds of 5.56. “The man crumpled. So I went left to right, indexed down and shot those (two more) guys.” “What he thought were their corpses sagged lifelessly to the floor. “I realized that I was halfway through my magazine, so I started to change magazines. Then I felt something behind me, and thought it was one of my teammates…” The blow came suddenly. With stunning power.” He heard a noise, looked over and saw the ghostly apparition of the two men he had shot clamber back to their feet, fumbling for their weapons. Or the account of U.S. Army SFC Bill Bennett, briefed to the U.S. Congress in November of 2007, a Special Forces medic who was killed by an insurgent in Iraq after that individual was shot 7-9 times in Member of the Polish Army CIMIC (Civilian- Military Co-Operation) team emerging from an armored Hummvee with his wz.96 Beryl assault rifle undergoing intensive ‘in-theater’ tuning. the torso. The same bad guy then gets up and comes over a wall and reengages the other team members, gets shot another 6-8 times from about 20-30 yards and is finally killed by SFC Bennett’s fellow team member SSG Springer who shoots and finally kills him with a M1911 .45 ACP. These are just a few of the documented accounts on this subject. One need not go too far to find other examples, though there are those who seemingly would prefer not to explore the known short comings of the 5.56x45mm cartridge for political or competing commercial or economic reasons, maybe as a result of entrenched institutional resistance to change or maybe they are operating under the flawed concept of “good enough.” Combat equipment should never be just good enough. Failures of 5.56x45mm round in combat are not new nor are they a unique occurrence in the current long range war in Afghanistan. They have been occurring for years at even CQB ranges throughout the theater of operations we are engaged in at the cost of brave U.S. and foreign friendly war fighters. 18. The USMC and the U.S. Army are putting retractable butt stocks on 20 inch barreled M16’s to retain range, penetration and accuracy in shorter, more portable 5.56x45mm weapons to provide terminal effects not available from carbine length 14.5 inch barreled platforms. 19. The U.S. Army PM-MAS (Product Manager – Maneuver Ammunition Systems) and ARL (Army Research Laboratory) developed the M855A1 EPR (Enhanced Performance Round) with a non-SS109-style projectile to increase the terminal performance and penetration of the standard issue 5.56x45mm cartridge from short-barreled M4 carbines based on failure reports from U.S. troops in combat and confirmed in a 2006 Lethality Study conducted by the U.S. Army. 20. In the December 2006, CNA “Soldier Perspectives on Small Arms in Combat” survey commissioned by the U.S. Army (PM Soldier Weapons) of 2600 OIF/OEF combat troops stated on Page 29: “Twenty-six percent of M9 users requested higher caliber ammunition and increased stopping power. M4 and M16 users echoed this recommendation. When speaking to experts and soldiers on site, many commented on the limited ability to effectively stop targets, saying that those personnel targets who were shot multiple times were still able to continue pursuit. M249 users also expressed a desire for increased ammunition caliber, but to a much lesser degree than other weapon users. Twenty percent of M9 users called for a replacement. 20% of M4 users Recommend larger caliber bullet and increase stoppage - lethality” 21. The South Korean Army is fielding this year the K11 - a 20mm shoulder-fired multi-shot air-bursting grenade launcher with a maximum effective range of 500 meters (the maximum range for a point target for even accomplished Marine Corps riflemen armed with the 20 inch barrel 5.56x45mm M16A2/A4). How long will it be before this unique technology is in the hands of unfriendly states? (South Korea is actively offering the K11 for export sale now and has reportedly already delivered some K11s to a “friendly” Middle Eastern nation). The stand-off range of their new K11 individual weapon matches that of our issue M16 rifle (500 meters) and exceeds that of the Army’s pure-fleeted 14.5 inch barreled M4 carbine (460 meters). As an air-bursting grenade launcher it does not rely solely on well-placed single rifle or machine gun rounds from a trained marksman while under combat stress to induce casualties on the enemy. 22. During the 2010 NDIA Joint Armaments Conference in Dallas then MARCO- SYSCOM Commanding General BG Brogan spoke about the need to conduct a “Trade Study to compare new projectile technology in other than 5.56mm and 7.62mm” rounds for the next USMC service rifle. 23. Last year USMC 4-star General James N. Mattis, nominated for CENTCOM Commander at the time of writing, emailed his 3 and 2-star command CGs about his serious concerns over the failures of USMCissue 5.56x45mm rounds in combat with USMC troops (after a visit to Walter Reed Hospital and hearing accounts of multiple 5.56x45mm failures that resulted in friendly casualties with USMC Lt. David Borden who, “lost a leg to a suicide bomber when he and other Marines emptied a magazine (5.56x45mm) into the man charging them, at close range.”. GEN Mattis wrote in his email about his/ the “USMC interest in shifting to a higher caliber assault rifle,” and “Physics say that the best advances in bullet technology will not give us the increased stopping power/ energy in the 5.56, since any improved 5.56mm ammunition could only be more effective if adopted in a 6.8mm or other heavier round.” 24. The USMC earlier this decade conducted an extensive joint USMC/FBI Test Evaluation Report for the Alternate Ammunition Study, Phase 1 dated 11 August 2006 that clearly showed that various medium-caliber cartridges/projectiles tested (6.8x43mm Rem. SPC, 6.5mm Grendel) were superior in terminal performance when evaluated against comparable cartridges in caliber 5.56x45mm NATO (M855, M995, MK262 MOD 1 and then FBI-issue Federal LE223T3 with 62 grain Bonded projectile). The Conclusions and Recommendations from that evaluation test report were: 1.2 Conclusions: 1. At this time, identification of a projectile that is less susceptible to intervening barriers appears to be of substantially greater importance than the identification of an optimal cartridge size. 2. The capability of the current issue M995, Mk262 Mod1 and M855 could be improved upon by substituting a “purpose-built projectile” — a projectile whose terminal ballistics are less affected by intervening barriers than current service rifle ammunition, thus providing a more consistent capability for our Marines. 3. Improved performance could be realized through the development of a cartridge with a caliber other than 5.56mm. 4. If an alternate cartridge is identified, the “purpose-built projectile” technology could be developed in the caliber of that cartridge, thus merging these two efforts and realizing an optimal ammunition. 1.3 Recommendations: 1. Commencement of phase II is recommended. The objectives of phase II would be: a. Expeditious pursuit of an improved purpose-built projectile for the 5.56mm NATO cartridge that is “blind to barriers”, i.e. a projectile whose terminal ballistics are not affected by intervening barriers. b. Continued study to determine the optimal cartridge size that satisfies current requirements and to aid in the development of future requirements.” 25. At the 2010 NDIA Joint Armaments 124 SPRING 2011 SPRING 2011 125
5.56 NATO ROUNDTABLE JIM SCHATZ Conference in Dallas U.S. Army PM-Soldier Weapons Majors Shawn Murray and Elliot Caggins briefed the results of a survey conducted during 2 weeks in Afghanistan in 2010 wherein combat troops stated, “One of 8 key focus areas the troops stated needed urgent effort on was 5 - increased firepower (caliber) at extended ranges,” and wanted more 7.62x51mm MK48 LMG’s to replace 5.56x45mm M249 SAWs to deal with both protected and long range targets. 26. At this same May 2010 NDIA conference the U.S. Army ARDEC (Armaments Research, Development and Engineering Center headquartered at Picatinny Arsenal, NJ) Program Manager for the LSAT (Lightweight Small Arms Technologies) program once again briefed that the current LSAT ammunition, LMG and new LSAT Carbine system architecture was a “scalable design” and open to and had been modeled for a “larger caliber” alternative to the current 5.56x45mm prototypes (6.5mm had been discussed in public the forum previously). 27. A confidential unreleased study and test report prepared by the U.S. Army AR- DEC on an optimum assault rifle cartridge identified not 5.56x45mm as the optimum assault rifle cartridge but one within the 6.5mm-6.8mm range. 28. The majority of states in America do not allow cartridges under .25 caliber to be used for deer hunting, to include .223 Remington and 5.56x45mm rounds even with enhanced non-Hague compliant hunting-style (deforming) projectiles. 29. The Communist Chinese developed and have since fielded an entire family of 5.8mm ammunition (specifically to outperform the 5.56x45mm NATO round) and weapons versus the traditional Chinese Communist practice of fielding the service rifle cartridge of Russia, e.g. the inferior 5.45x39mm round. The Chinese consider the 5.8mm caliber family of weapons to be so effective and superior to the weapons chambered in the 5.56x45mm NATO round that they do not export this technology to other customer states. 30. One of the prime conclusions of the December 2009 NSWC Crane-compiled test report entitled Comparison of Terminal Ballistic Performance of M855, MK318, 115 gr. 6.8 SPC and MK319 concluded that the M855 in its current NATO SS109-style loading was inferior in many important regards to include accuracy, short range (CQC) and 100 yard terminal effects, a tendency for through and through over penetration and inferior barrier penetration. It is worth noting that the medium-caliber 6.8x43mm Rem. SPC round included in this test report was tested not with the BTB (Blind to Barrier) SOST projectiles used in the MK318 and MK319 SOST rounds tested but with a conventional OTM (Open Tip Match) bullet and thus would likely have performed far better with the SOST projectile when compared to the 5.56x45mm SOST and M855 rounds tested. 31. The factual contents of the excellent monograph written by U.S. Army Major Thomas P. Ehrhart entitled Increasing Small Arms Lethality in Afghanistan; Taking back the Infantry Half-Kilometer discusses the unsuitability of the SS109- style 5.56x45mm cartridge in modern warfare, in particular in the long-range war in Afghanistan. Key observations and conclusions in this excellent study include, “Small caliber high velocity rounds are especially dependent on this instability (yawing) for their lethality. For the M855 cartridge, maximum stability is from 150 meters out to 350 meters and it is therefore potentially less lethal between these two ranges.” Major Ehrhart goes on to state, “With the recent halt in production of the M855A1 cartridge (2nd iteration M855A1 ‘Lead Free Slug’ {LFS} variant), which designers promised would deliver this effectiveness (enhanced terminal effectiveness), it appears all options within this caliber have been exhausted.” On the subject of training as it relates to hit probability of the rifleman, Major Ehrhart states that, “The limited capability of the current M855 cartridge combined with the extended distances of engagements in Afghanistan requires that shot placement on target is more critical than ever before.” And on page 28 of this document Major Ehrhart recounts the factual report about when, “Lieutenant Colonel David H. Petraeus (then current 4-star Commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and U.S. Forces in Afghanistan) was shot in the chest by an M855 round from an M249 squad automatic weapon. He walked out of the hospital several days after the accident.” Major Ehrhart also provides more than 100 references and documents, official and otherwise to support of the conclusions and statements on this subject as contained in this monograph. 32. From December 2006 through May 2007 the U.S. DoD Technical Support Working Group (TSWG) conducted an interagency/international assessment of various medium-caliber MURG upper receivers to improve the terminal effects of 5.56x45mm M4-style platforms. These extensive user tests documented that such a drop-on medium-caliber conversion was feasible and effective in nearly doubling the terminal effects of the short-barrel 10-14.5 inch barreled carbine. It was also discovered that operators were able to engage targets with equal or better accuracy when compared with 5.56x45mm platforms. The additional recoil impulse of the more powerful 6.8x43mm Rem. SPC cartridge when compared to identical platforms in 5.56x45mm did not degrade the ability of the test personnel to rapidly engage multiple targets – in practice both calibers were identical contrary to common myth. From a compact carbine a medium-caliber COTS MURG option delivers 56-77% heavier and 24% larger frontal surface area projectiles and two times the projectile mass to the target, as well as a 33% increase in muzzle energy when compared to even the very best 5.56x45mm cartridges, and at no degradation of hit probability even in rapid fire. To no ones surprise ballistic gelatin testing performed by the FBI, the USMC, and other agencies within the U.S. DoD with both calibers employing similar projectile designs reveal far greater permanent and temporary wound cavities for the larger, heavier projectiles. 33. Recommendations to the troops from the U.S. Army Infantry Center and School at Fort Benning (recently combined with Colombian marines armed with 5.56 mm Galil assault rifles raid a building while participating in amphibious beach assault training during Southern Exchange and Partnership of the Americas 2010 in Ancon, Peru, July 24, 2010. The exercise is designed to enhance cooperative partnerships with maritime forces from Argentina, Mexico, Peru, Brazil, Uruguay, Colombia and the United States. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Brian J. Slaght/Released) 126 SPRING 2011 SPRING 2011 127
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