09-28-2013, 04:39 PM
The seemingly endless 7.62x51 fiasco created a class of rifles that should never have been born:
* Self-loading battle rifles
It ignored basically everything we already knew from even the Great War of 1914-1918, and instead of accepting the German trends with the Sturmgewehr, Army Ordnance Corps gave us the abortion known as the M14, which was nothing but a detachable magazine fed Garand with a less reliable operating system, chambered in an old-era, slightly-shortened battle rifle cartridge (in performance, recoil, weight). They called it a "light rifle" to make it sound new and innovative.
The only practical role for a 7.62x51mm NATO service rifle is in the Designated Marksmen/Squad Sharpshooter and Sniper duty positions.
As far as calibers go, it's interesting how NATO and Warsaw Pact took two different routes initially-
Route # 1: 7.62x51 full power battle rifle cartridge
The US drove the British and Belgians to ignore the superior work the Brits had done with the .270 & .280 Enfield's, forcing the over-powered and heavy 7.62 NATO onto our allies.
Route # 2: Warsaw Pact Intermediate Cartridge M43
The Russians had already looked at the short, German bottle-necked cartridges, and adopted the M43 7.62x39 Russian Short, to be used in the SKS Carbine, RPD Belt-fed Squad Support Weapon, and Avtomat Kalashnikov true assault rifle.
As soon as the ARPA combat trials with the AR15 were conducted, and the .223 Remington wound ballistics were witnessed first-hand, it was a game-changer. Everybody wanted AR15's, and the units that could get what they want started buying them by the thousands. The M14 was still barely in initial-rate production, and eventually began to be fielded with conventional units. Its service in Vietnam as a standard infantry rifle was abysmal, because of limited soldier's load and ammunition carrying capacity, its extreme length/bulk/weight, and uncontrollability for smaller soldiers.
Drastic Change of Course
The US got off its own track quickly because of the M14's failures, and jerked to the opposite side of the spectrum to the SCHV concept.
After evaluating the extensive experiences of small arms in Vietnam, the Russians ditched the 7.62x39 AK and AKM in favor of their own SCHV cartridge, the 5.45x39mm chambered in a further lightened AK variant known as the AK74, pushing the AK's and AKM's into reserve units as AK74's filtered into the system. The AK74 would first see major service in Afghanistan starting in 1979. The 5.45x39 Russian SCHV cartridge remains the primary Russian service rifle chambering to this day.
All Roads Led to SCHV
So in the end, both West and East ended up with SCHV rifles as primary service rifle systems. The US got their earlier because of the utter disaster that the 7.62 NATO was as a standard rifle chambering. The biggest losers in a sense were our European NATO allies, and the various nations around the world who would absorb these crazy 7.62 NATO self-loaders, which are still a mainstay of armies from South America to Africa, with soldiers who are so small in stature, that US teens average taller and heavier than them.
The European NATO allies couldn't go back to their parliaments and get funding for new rifles after begging and obtaining the go-ahead for the ill-advised 7.62 NATO FAL's, L1A1's, and G3's. It wouldn't be until the 1970's that NATO would start developing their own 5.56 NATO assault rifles, with the British SA-80, French FAMAS, Austrian Steyr AUG, Belgian FNC, Italian AR-70, German HK33, & Swiss SIG 550 series.
All the NATO nations except Germany adopted their home-grown SCHV (5.56 NATO) rifles, with Germany keeping the G3 until adopting the Stoner rotating bolt AR18 system-based G36 in 5.56 NATO in the 1990's. Norway also kept their G3 licensed production until adopting 5.56 AR15 variants later.
Some of the post-war oddballs were the Czechs with the VZ52 chambered in 7.62x45mm, and the Swiss with the SIG510 in 7.5x55:
![[Image: 510s.jpg]](http://www.swissrifles.com/pe57/510s.jpg)
* Self-loading battle rifles
It ignored basically everything we already knew from even the Great War of 1914-1918, and instead of accepting the German trends with the Sturmgewehr, Army Ordnance Corps gave us the abortion known as the M14, which was nothing but a detachable magazine fed Garand with a less reliable operating system, chambered in an old-era, slightly-shortened battle rifle cartridge (in performance, recoil, weight). They called it a "light rifle" to make it sound new and innovative.
The only practical role for a 7.62x51mm NATO service rifle is in the Designated Marksmen/Squad Sharpshooter and Sniper duty positions.
As far as calibers go, it's interesting how NATO and Warsaw Pact took two different routes initially-
Route # 1: 7.62x51 full power battle rifle cartridge
The US drove the British and Belgians to ignore the superior work the Brits had done with the .270 & .280 Enfield's, forcing the over-powered and heavy 7.62 NATO onto our allies.
Route # 2: Warsaw Pact Intermediate Cartridge M43
The Russians had already looked at the short, German bottle-necked cartridges, and adopted the M43 7.62x39 Russian Short, to be used in the SKS Carbine, RPD Belt-fed Squad Support Weapon, and Avtomat Kalashnikov true assault rifle.
As soon as the ARPA combat trials with the AR15 were conducted, and the .223 Remington wound ballistics were witnessed first-hand, it was a game-changer. Everybody wanted AR15's, and the units that could get what they want started buying them by the thousands. The M14 was still barely in initial-rate production, and eventually began to be fielded with conventional units. Its service in Vietnam as a standard infantry rifle was abysmal, because of limited soldier's load and ammunition carrying capacity, its extreme length/bulk/weight, and uncontrollability for smaller soldiers.
Drastic Change of Course
The US got off its own track quickly because of the M14's failures, and jerked to the opposite side of the spectrum to the SCHV concept.
After evaluating the extensive experiences of small arms in Vietnam, the Russians ditched the 7.62x39 AK and AKM in favor of their own SCHV cartridge, the 5.45x39mm chambered in a further lightened AK variant known as the AK74, pushing the AK's and AKM's into reserve units as AK74's filtered into the system. The AK74 would first see major service in Afghanistan starting in 1979. The 5.45x39 Russian SCHV cartridge remains the primary Russian service rifle chambering to this day.
All Roads Led to SCHV
So in the end, both West and East ended up with SCHV rifles as primary service rifle systems. The US got their earlier because of the utter disaster that the 7.62 NATO was as a standard rifle chambering. The biggest losers in a sense were our European NATO allies, and the various nations around the world who would absorb these crazy 7.62 NATO self-loaders, which are still a mainstay of armies from South America to Africa, with soldiers who are so small in stature, that US teens average taller and heavier than them.
The European NATO allies couldn't go back to their parliaments and get funding for new rifles after begging and obtaining the go-ahead for the ill-advised 7.62 NATO FAL's, L1A1's, and G3's. It wouldn't be until the 1970's that NATO would start developing their own 5.56 NATO assault rifles, with the British SA-80, French FAMAS, Austrian Steyr AUG, Belgian FNC, Italian AR-70, German HK33, & Swiss SIG 550 series.
All the NATO nations except Germany adopted their home-grown SCHV (5.56 NATO) rifles, with Germany keeping the G3 until adopting the Stoner rotating bolt AR18 system-based G36 in 5.56 NATO in the 1990's. Norway also kept their G3 licensed production until adopting 5.56 AR15 variants later.
Some of the post-war oddballs were the Czechs with the VZ52 chambered in 7.62x45mm, and the Swiss with the SIG510 in 7.5x55: