Post by Admin on Dec 5, 2020 7:33:52 GMT
How would you explain the power/lethality of an M16 or the AK-47 to someone who's never touched a gun?
While that seems counter-intuitive, it makes sense if you understand how infantry warfare has evolved. The Germans in WW2 were the first to implement this on a large scale. Since WW1, infantry fought with long-range, powerful rifles able to reach out to 1000 yds. Infantry were supported by LMGs and MMGs to provide a volume base of fire.
However, mobile tactics exposed some weaknesses in this arrangement because as infantry advanced or withdrew, when you moved the MGs, the infantry unit lost a lot of their volume of fire until the MGs got re-emplaced.
So, the Germans developed the Sturmgewehr 44 (Stg 44) which was the first mass produced automatic combat rifle. The term “assault rifle” comes from the direct translation of the German designation of this rifle, Sturmgewehr. Sturm = Assault, Gewehr = rifle.
The premise of this rifle was to be able to make each infantryman essentially an LMG with an automatic rifle. However, the full power rifle cartridge would be uncontrollable for a hand-held small arms weapon. So they developed the 8mm “Kurz” cartridge for the Stg 44 which was essentially a shortened version of their standard 8mm Mauser cartridge used in their rifles and MGs. This cartridge was less powerful, but allowed each infantryman to lay down controlled automatic suppressive fire and was still effective out to ~300yds.
8mm Mauser (7.92x57mm) left, 8mm Kurz (7.92x33mm) right
After WW2, the Russians and (much later) the Americans adopted the thinking behind the Stg 44 and developed the AK-47 and M-16.
Stg 44
AK-47/AKM
After WW2, the US Army did an extensive study and found that the vast majority of infantry engagements occurred within 300 yds with most occurring within 150 yards. In addition, they found that far less than 1% of small arms rounds fired in an infantry engagement hit an enemy soldier (for infantry, not snipers). Basically, the entire premise of the marksman-soldier infantryman paradigm was false.
Hitting the enemy was basically a numbers game and volume of fire was essentially the way to win. If 1 in 1000 shots hit an enemy, if you fired 100,000 rounds, you would expect to hit around 100 enemy soldiers.
However, the US took a while longer to move away from full power rifle cartridges because the notion of the marksman-soldier persisted until the Vietnam war.
The M-16 was developed using an even *smaller* cartridge because of the weight of the .30 cal AK-47 cartridge. About 70–90% of the weight of ammo is in the copper/lead bullet. So, the US went with the 5.56x45mm (.22 cal) cartridge instead of a .30 cal cartridge like the AK-47.
5.56x45mm NATO on the left, 7.62x39mm AK-47 on the right:
A 5.56 NATO cartridge weighs 1/2 that of an AK-47 cartridge so you can carry 2x the rounds for the same weight.
M-16A1
To aid in controllability, in addition to the smaller cartridge, the M-16 is designed with the barrel, action and buttstock in a direct line (like the Stg 44). This makes recoil go more straight back instead of upwards as with the AK-47 and helps reduce muzzle climb under full auto fire.
The Russians actually followed suit with the AK-74 which fires the smaller 5.45x39mm round which is similar to the 5.56 NATO. The AK-74 also adopted a more in-line design as well.
AK-74
So, you could say that the power of modern combat rifles has actually gone DOWN with respect to the cartridge it fires. This is in exchange for controllability in delivering a higher volume of fire per infantryman. Most enemy combat kills are from artillery or airstrikes and small arms, with the exception of snipers, are largely for suppression.
