During our last visit, we were able to see the newest offerings from the ST Kinetics Small Arms Division. The CPW, or Compact Personal Weapon, was the first item we looked at. We were impressed with the ergonomic design, the light weight, and the multiple caliber concept. On this visit, we got a deeper look at a matured design that is coming to market. The choice was made to stay with 9x19mm due to the prevalence of the caliber…
The famous MAG-58 General Purpose Machine Gun has its roots in John Browning’s 1918 Browning Automatic Rifle: the BAR. FN Herstal’s relationship with Browning is well-known and it’s no surprise that the excellent BAR operating system would evolve in their hands. The FN Model D BAR added features such as a quick-change barrel, but the core operating system was alive and well throughout the evolution. Put simply….
There’s nothing else like it in any of the other branches of America’s Armed Forces. Its uniquely lethal products, the work of a small and tightly-knit group, must function flawlessly and consistently 24/7 for the Corps’ Scout Snipers and other hard-chargers in some of the world’s most harsh terrain and weather. Other weapons and custom loaded ammunition created there must also consistently deliver pinpoint accuracy for world class shooters of the USMC’s Competition In Arms Rifle and Pistol Teams….
Indian Army’s snipers desperately lack adequate training, suitable weaponry and specialized supplementary equipment. The Army attaches little importance to snipers who can alter not only the course of battles and politics, but even history, by simply executing the one enemy who matters the most. After the Mumbai terrorist attack the operational usefulness of sniping has gained credence among military, security and law enforcement agencies. There is a new realization that snipers are force multipliers and that their skillful employment can impose caution, cause attrition and demoralize the enemy….
The Czech arms industry made a great impact in 20th century weaponry history with a large range of remarkable products. Probably the most original of them all was a “special submachine gun” named the Skorpion, a successful effort for covering the gap between service pistols and traditional submachine guns chambered in pistol cartridges. The Skorpion, in its initial, less powerful caliber, i.e. 7.65mm Browning (.32 Auto), has not met modern security unit’s requirements for some years, much less that of the armed forces; nevertheless….
The focus of our visit to MARSOC‘s Schoolhouse was Special Operations Training Branch, currently housed in an orderly formation of a dozen or so modular classrooms while construction is underway nearby on a more traditional campus. There, Lieutenant Colonel Clark Watson, SOTB’s Director, walked us through the high points of the Initial Training Course, a comprehensive SPECOPS basic training program that is the next step following Assessment and Selection for those seeking to become CSOs….
It defies logic that United States Special Operations Command did not include the Marine Corps until a little over five years ago. All the more so because the Corps is arguably the most nimble, aggressive and experienced component of the U.S. Armed Forces in the dirty and demanding business of fighting “small wars” in remote corners of the world….
Bumar is now a household name in Poland and one in circulation for over 55 years. But it was only in the last 10 years that it became a high-roller in Poland’s defense industry as a core company around which a concern of Bumar Group was built. It all started in 1953 when Bumar Construction Machinery Industrial Union was organized in Warsaw as a state holding company governing construction machinery, manufacturing and trade. Of course, as was a matter of custom….
Combat experience in Afghanistan has prompted some rapid changes in the small arms carried by ISAF foot soldiers; and most especially by the U.S. Army, USMC and the British Army and Royal Marines. The purpose of this article is to outline these changes, determine the lessons learned, and look ahead to examine the extent to which the growing variety of rifles including DMRs (Designated Marksman Rifles), carbines, IARs (Infantry Automatic Rifles) and LMGs (light machine guns) might be replaced in the future by a smaller number of weapons without losing any capability.
The Marine looked sharp. He was dressed in the new MARPAT green camouflage pattern, cut to the US M1967 jungle style and matched to a cover of the same material; he wore the Special Forces harness and carried the M4A4 Carbine. The same standard was observed in the hands of elements of the DM4 from Comandos de Morazán and other troops. This was definitely a leap forward from the rag-tag look observed only a few months before….
Designing “Future Soldiers” space-age suits of armor with TV and other creature comforts has been a popular fad since 1950s, but only in the last decade have such projects significantly moved from concept into the mainstream. Latest advances in microelectronics, mechanics and ergonomics, coupled with shifting the emphasize from the tanks and missiles back towards individual soldier as a result of the end of the Cold War and in accordance with the ‘asymmetric warfare’ doctrine, brought about Future Soldier projects popping up everywhere….
By the time you read this, the XM25 Counter Defilade Target Engagement System with its uncannily accurate airburst ammo will undoubtedly have drawn its first blood in Afghanistan. This sci-fi looking individual armament, initially the “grenade gun” upper half of the ill-fated Objective Individual Combat Weapon, has been in combat operational test mode for several months now with selected elements of US Special Operations Command….
19 February, 2011. A small group of firearms community writers from the United States had been invited to the Caracal facility in the United Arab Emirates. (David Fortier, Bryce Towsley, Tim Ford, and Mike Seeklander joined this author). We gathered at our hotels in the morning, and were taken to the facility where we were greeted by Saeed Ali Al Shamsi from Caracal and given the grand tour of the manufacturing facility….
Firing the Remington Modular Sniper Rifle (MSR) set up on .338 Lapua, with the Leupold Mark 4, 6.5-20x50mm Extended Range/Tactical (ER/T) optic. Leupold, the oldest…
About one week prior to our visit to Lima, the die hard guerrillas of Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) had ambushed an Army patrol, killing all 14 soldiers. The region known as VRAE (for Rivers Apurimac and Ene Valley) has become a hub of military activity with soldiers and police officers chasing the Sendero Luminoso guerrilla group, which has resurrected in a narco-guerrilla form. The extremist Maoist Shining Path guerrilla group was decimated in the 1980s, but a core of some 300 insurgents escaped to the Vizcatán region….
Tactical attendee live firing the M55A3 triple barreled 20mm anti-aircraft machine gun in the ground anti-material roll. This weapon system is highly portable, and provides…
2010 NDIA Chinn Award: Frank Puzycki Each year at the NDIA Small Arms Annual Meeting, the George M. Chinn Award is presented to honor a…
Karen Davies, VP and General Manager of ATK’s Small Caliber Systems including the U.S. Army’s Lake City Ammunition Plant, happily hammers away with the Garwood…
(Sept. 14, 1932 – March 23, 2009) Norman E. Justice was born in Woburn, MA on September 14, 1932, the son of George and Ruth…
Faisal Essa Al-Kaabi, Qatar Special Forces Group, stands guard at the Lekhwiya Historical and Current use displays. Note M2HB .50 caliber (12.7x99mm) Browning machine gun…
As Poland emerged from the chaotic period after Communism, the country experienced many changes. Today, we are just a little more than 20 years from…
Each year at the NDIA Small Arms Annual Meeting, the George M. Chinn Award is presented annually to honor a government or industry individual who, in the opinion of the Small Arms Systems Division Executive Board, has made significant contributions to the field of small arms and/or infantry weapons. Joel M. Goldman has devoted almost forty years in the pursuit of better ways to design, develop, and manufacture small arms weapons, ammunition, propellant and explosives….
Dr. Philip H. Dater was born in the latter part of April, 1937 on Manhattan Island in New York City. He has two brothers, Tom and Sheldon, and a sister Emilie. Dr. Dater has two daughters from his first marriage, Diana and Valerie, and one daughter Julie with his wife, Jane, to whom he has been happily married for over thirty years. He is one of the brains behind Gemtech and his private consulting practice with Antares Technologies has done a lot behind the scenes for the modern small arms community….
At the 22nd annual Small Arms and Cannons Symposium held in August 2008 at the Defense Academy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to simply as “Shrivenham” for the small town in England where the event is held, Volker Kurtz, formerly with Heckler & Koch GmbH for nearly two decades, received the coveted NDIA Professional Service Award for his dedication to the small arms end user, to advancing the state-of-the-science of small arms systems, and to the industry as a whole….
Going Ballistic, an Australian Broadcasting Corporation television documentary from 2000, has a collection of fascinating interviews with O’Dwyer himself and key persons in his life and work. Through it we learn that the inventor admits to being “not a particularly good student” during his high school years in a small town in Queensland, Australia. Interested primarily in the odd combination of physics at school and working on cars in his stepfather’s auto repair business, after graduation he chose to enter the workplace rather than continue on to college….
