Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire 101st Airborne soldiers are first to receive new Next Gen Squad Weapon

well, the government did it. i didn't think they would. i wonder if the rest of NATO will go to 6.8x51?



https://taskandpurpose.com/news/101st-airborne-next-generation-squad-weapon/

101st Airborne soldiers are first to receive new Next Gen Squad Weapon
Close combat forces will receive the new weapons including a National Guard armored brigade in May.

BY PATTY NIEBERG | PUBLISHED MAR 29, 2024


Soldiers with the 101st Airborne at Fort Campbell, Kentucky are the first to receive the Army’s new Next Generation Squad Weapon (NGSW) system this week.

On Thursday, soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment were equipped with the NGSW ahead of April training where they will practice with new equipment, according to Army Futures Command. The training will involve a train-the-trainer course to prepare NCOs to conduct follow-on training across the company.

The Army also plans to field NGSW systems to a National Guard armored brigade in May.

The two NGSW rifles, which increase lethality at longer ranges, will be used by close combat forces which have historically sustained “80% of the casualties in combat,” according to Brig. Gen. Larry Burris, commander of the Army Infantry School and Army Maneuver Center of Excellence in a brief to reporters in 2022. Other forces will continue to use the M4 and the M249 weapons systems.

“For example, the company supply sergeant will continue to carry [an] M-4 or another weapon, not the Next-Gen Weapon,” Burris said.

The XM7 will be the new personal weapon for soldiers across the Army and replace the ubiquitous M4 rifle, which has designs originating from M16s used by Vietnam War soldiers. The XM250 will replace the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon, a 1980s-era gun.

The XM7 weighs around 8.4 pounds, which is slightly heavier than the M4, weighing about 7.3 pounds. The XM250 is about 12 pounds, significantly lighter than the SAW, which weighs approximately 18 pounds.

When it comes to firing, the XM7 and XM250 rifles are designed to use a larger and heavier bullet size “with improved armor-penetrating capabilities,” according to Fort Campbell’s public affairs.

“There’s fewer rounds required for the soldier to carry,” Lt. Col. Micah Rue, product manager for soldier weapons at the Army’s Program Executive Soldier office, told Task & Purpose. “They don’t need as many as they needed in the past to neutralize the target. But if you look at the round itself, it’s actually a more substantial round.”

The new weapons will use 6.8mm ammunition while previous weapons used 5.56mm ammunition.

Officials began the NGSW development process after a 2017 study “recognized the need for weapons that will perform better at range,” according to AFC.

The Army has used over 25,000 hours to develop and test the NGSW system with soldiers, including those from the Kentucky base who were the first operational users of the XM7 rifle and the XM250 in September.

The Army also did natural environment testing in extreme cold and hot, tropical environments after studies in a closed, simulated environment where researchers take the weapon, put it in a freezer, let it soak overnight, and then shoot it for testing, Rue said.

With the help of several Army offices and private companies like Sig Sauer and Vortex, the Army was able to “deliver on schedule as promised,” despite “challenges, setbacks, and speed bumps,” Lt. Col. Mark Vidotto, lead of the NGSW for the Soldier Lethality Cross-Functional Team at Fort Moore, Georgia, said in a press release.

The rifles are a generational shift for the Army which will begin to retire its older inventory of personal and squad weapons with designs dating back to the Vietnam-era.

“This is the first time in our lifetime, the first time in 65 years the Army will field a new weapon system of this nature, a rifle and automatic rifle, a fire control system and a new caliber family of ammunition,” Burris told reporters in 2022 after the Army awarded a 10-year contract to Sig Sauer for weapon production.

“This is revolutionary,” Burris said, adding that the Army used rapid acquisition authorities for a process that “may have taken eight to 10 years to complete,” but instead took “roughly 27 months.”

Commander of the Army’s office for armaments and ammunition at Picatinny Arsenal, Brig. Gen. William Boruff, told reporters that fielding the weapons to certain units would be based on ammunition availability. The production of new ammo, he said, requires the Army to start a new industrial base – an issue the entire Department of Defense has struggled with while supplying Ukraine with enough munitions and maintaining its own stockpiles simultaneously. A combination of increased demand for munitions and older, dried-up production lines has led the DOD to establish new facilities and billion-dollar, multi-year contracts with defense contractors.

The Army set up a plan to produce the new ammunition at a contractor-operated Lake City Army Ammunition Plant in Missouri. After seven to eight years, the Army plans to take the production lead with Sig Sauer as a second source.

“The NGSW fielding is a culmination of a comprehensive and rigorous process of design, testing and feedback, all of which were led by Soldiers,” said Col. Jason Bohannon, project manager at PEO Soldier. “As a result, the Army is delivering on its promise to deliver to Soldiers the highest quality, most capable small-caliber weapons and ammunition.”

6.5 (well, 6.8) Creed....??

Cool. Now Sig and Vortex can use hi-def action photos of the new weapons system in battlefield scenarios to sell us more polymer pocket pistols and 3-9x deer scopes!

Never have liked the idea of the 277 Fury, makes no sense at all to me, three piece case seems overly complicated for a high-volume ammunition user like the US armed forces. It has basically the same case dimensions as the 308 Win. I think the 6.5 CM would have been a much better choice for practical purposes. The 277 Fury is ballistically similar to the 270 Win (130 gr @ 3,000 FPS).

The .277 Fury SAAMI (voluntary) MAP chamber pressure of 80,000 psi (551.6 MPa) enables a 135 grains (8.7 g) projectile muzzle velocity of 3,000 feet per second (914 m/s) from a 16-inch

277
136 gr
3000 fps
.493 G1
@ 1000 yards
v 1414
E 600
T -295"
MOA 28

6.5 Cm
135
2850
.584
@ 1000 yards
V 1508
E 682
T .298
MOA 28

Granted the G1 is not similar and the 277 is spec'd with a 16" barrel the CM seems close enough with a lot less bother.

I bet the wizard had a hand in this .

“There’s fewer rounds required for the soldier to carry,” Lt. Col. Micah Rue, product manager for soldier weapons:

Seems to be going in the opposite direction from the 308 to 5.56 (more ammo, same weight), if I were a soldier in the field, I think I'd like the idea of "more ammo", not less.

But, will it blow the lungs right out? Also, Ft. Moore, Georgia, isn't familiar to me; where is it? GD

This is a classic textbook example of the military industrial complex doing what it does best...invent it...and then invent a need for it.
Correct me if I'm wrong here...but the main argument for dumping the 7.62 NATO to the 5.56 was ammo loadout weight,right? So now we adopt a round that weighs 3 times that of 5.56?...the XM-7 rifle is 2 pounds heavier empty too. So weight WAS a big deal...until it wasn't, I guess.
I'm not sayin' it won't be good...I'm sayin' it's strange how the procurement people threw out lightweight as a desirable attribute. I was always of the opinion that the M-4 was great in close quarters and jungle...but it sadly lacked out in Injun country where ranges and visibility increased.

That struck me as well. Is fire superiority and suppressing suddenly not part of an infantry fight?

It was Ft. Benning until the woke administration renamed all of the bases named after Confederate Generals.

Ron

Wasn't that the reason in the 50's that they went from the 30-06 to the 7.62x51/308?

The entire concept a this new cartridge MAKES ZERO SENSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I believe it will be a HUGE disaster of epic proportion.

Does it come in rainbow colors for the queer armed forces?

Some people don’t fully comprehend keeping the same ballistics, but shortening the case by a half inch.

Serious mistake this is.

Perhaps better to have R&D'd a new 5.56 round in the 70 grain range and improved propellants coupled with an increase in individual weapon barrel length to 18" or so to take advantage of same. Alternatively, just go back to 7.62 with modern improvements.

This new wonder round to me smacks of expensive teething problems, and what happens when near-peer body armor can defeat it?

That sounds like it's going to be a goat rope to me. And the loss of a true squad machine like the SAW seems like a recipe for disaster. But I'm just a arm chair general.

You must remember in today's Queer Army most of the upper echelon have never been in combat, and those that say they have were in rear with the gear, they all depend on the special ops guys to do their fighting for them, and the special ops guy's have already turned down these weapons, just like in S.E. Asia when the S.F. turned down the Stoner, the people that are in the SCHITT should have their choice of weapons. Rio7

With the way the army operates, you will have US forces on the same battlefield with two different standard issue rifles firing two completely different rounds. That alone will complicate logistics.

The purpose of the round is to increase range of lethality, but that only matters when you hit your target. As stated, fire suppression and maneuver is key. Less rounds on the modern battlefield seems counterintuitive to what is needed.

well what a moronic move. The first to get the new stuff are the very same folks that parachute into battle with VERY dicey resupply. It's like the Pentagon just set the airborne fellows to be slaughtered when they run out of ammo.