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22 May 09 - 07:00 PM (#2638882) Subject: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: gnu Why did we go to the 5.56? Canuckistan still has it's shitload of 7.62 which was always the standard of NATO, including the Ruskies. My late Bro (RCAF) had some interesting theories. I have my own, and they are not very "nice", including the fact that the 5.56 fires so fast that the subsequent rounds tumble within the vacuum and thereby cause a shotgun spray effect and also kill even when the contact is in such as a shoulder (almost instant) or limb. The reason I ask this is to try to determine if the rules of fair engagement under the Geneva Convention regarding the use of full metal jackets and the like have been compromised by this change. Yes, it is a technical point, but one which bears discussion. Is ALL fair in love and war? |
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22 May 09 - 07:53 PM (#2638920) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Jack Campin This is hardly a new point. Those of us who opposed what US imperialism was doing in Vietnam pointed out exactly what you just did, 40 years ago. I wrote a leaflet about the effects of those weapons (info from SIPRI, I think) and distributed it to disrupt military recruitment events in Edinburgh a few years later. The British government moaned and whined loudly when the IRA got hold of a few Armalites. Dishing it out and taking it are apparently governed by different moral rules. According to bourgeois morality anyway. |
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22 May 09 - 07:55 PM (#2638924) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: gnu Oh... I didn't know it was an issue that many people knew about. >;-) |
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22 May 09 - 09:04 PM (#2638967) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: JohnInKansas The .30 military rifle goes back quite a long ways, exemplified in the .30-06 round which is a "30 caliber" introduced in 1906. It was the standard for US troops at least in WWII and for a time after. In seeking a lighter weight ammo, so that troops could carry more of it, the 7.62 NATO round was introduced using the same "slug" as the '06 but with a more aggressive powder and hence a smaller case. The 7.62 NATO is dimensionally and ballistically identical to the (US)commercial .308 Winchester. Observing statistics that I no longer have in hand, the US Army Ordnance Corps determined that in the "American Revolution" an enemy casualty (killed or wounded) was produced for each (IIRC) 17.6 rounds fired. In WWI it required (memory is vague) about 180(?) rounds fired for each enemy casualty. In WWII the number was up to close to 1,000 rounds per casualty. In Korea (the last war at the time I saw the report) it required slightly more than 300,000 rounds fired to hit one enemy person. (And the 1,000 lb "grasscutter" and "bunkerbuster" bombs were each counted as one round.) With the obvious mandate to "shoot more rounds" the "duplex bullet" was created, and was used in both 30-06 and 7.62 NATO bullets. A short "front" bullet had its tail end cut off at a slant to make it "swerve off somewhere," and a "rear" bullet had normal conical shape. Since obviously American troops couldn't hit what they aimed at, a "secondary" bullet that tumbled deliberately and went in "some random direction" had about the same odds of hitting someone as one aimed deliberately at where an enemy might be. The 5.56 NATO round was created primarily, once again, to reduce the weight of the ammo so that more rounds could be carried. The lighter round made possible slightly higher rates of fire in automatic weapons, but at the highest rates reported the bullets still come out of the barrel a few feet apart, and successive rounds are (shown by extensive testing) unaffected by the preceding one(s). If controllability on the part of the person firing the weapon is removed as a factor, the later rounds may actually be more accurate, and less likely to tumble than the first one(s). In the "jungle warfare" of Korea and elsewhere, and in the increasingly common "insurgent combat," it is much less likely that a specific enemy person will be seen and can be targeted individually, although often the "enemy presence" can be known within an area. By shooting lots of rounds randomly in the general direction of where the enemy might be, occasionally some of them get hit. Having lots of rounds to shoot is facilitated by lighter ammunition, and modern powders permit sufficiently higher velocities so that the "ballistic energy" delivered to a target remains close to what was obtained with older and heavier ammunition, at least up to useful range. Contrary to what might seem logical, military doctrine throughout the world has held for many years that an injured enemy is worth 5 killed, because (in "civilized armies") it takes about 4 - or more - others to care for one wounded, and thus takes more persons "out of combat" than the one burial detail clerk required to collect the tags and do the paper work on a dead one. The vastly improved US medical services in later periods in Korea and all subsequent "conflicts" has the military purpose of getting the injured off the battlefield and out of the way of the remaining fighting troops. It has the peripheral effect of producing higher survivability of the injured, and certainly has very high "moral" (i.e. propaganda) value. Unfortunately, the reduction in "troops out of action" per injured has made the relative value of injured vs dead less of a factor to enemies, and has lead to much more lethal tactics and weapons whose purpose is to kill as many as possible rather than just to remove them from the field of combat via sublethal wounds. Unsubstantiated(?) rumors claim that some insurgents have attempted to eliminate the discrepancy in "injury burden" by simply "executing on the spot" any of their own too badly injured to take care of themselves, to equalize the advantage the more "modern" military has with its rapid evacuation capabilities. Unintended consequences abound. John |
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22 May 09 - 09:17 PM (#2638972) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Amos A remarkable display of your usual impeccable writing, John. Gnu: "Ordinance" is a Protestant Christian term for baptism, communion and other religious rituals. Some Protestants do not call them sacraments because they believe these rituals are outward expressions of faith, rather than impartations of God's grace. Also means rules passed by such as a town council, etc. "Ordnance" means military weapons and equipment, as in: "The ordnance was stored in bunkers near the airfield". One for your back pocket! :D A |
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22 May 09 - 10:05 PM (#2638994) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: artbrooks Hand-held automatic weapons are inherently inaccurate, since the muzzel climbs with each shot. This is less true with the smaller and less powerful 5.56 round than with the 7.62 fired by the AK-47 (Kalashnikov) and its variants and the various weapons firing the slightly different NATO cartridge, but this is the primary reason that the current M-16 variant used by the US military and its successor, the M-4, are limited to three-round bursts. With any automatic weapon, unless it is held in a clamp of some kind, the muzzle moves slightly. This, as well as the fact that the bullets are several feet apart as they travel downrange, pretty much eliminates any effect one round would have upon another. The M-16 and its variants are quite accurate, which would not be true if it had any tumble or wobble, accidental or engineered in. |
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22 May 09 - 11:54 PM (#2639027) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Peace No offence to anyone, but the word in this regard is ordnance. I only know that because I was once in the Ordnance Corp. |
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23 May 09 - 12:05 AM (#2639030) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Amos ANd you are lucky to have escaped the Ordinance Corps, too!! A |
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23 May 09 - 12:15 AM (#2639035) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Peace I HEAR that. |
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23 May 09 - 04:02 AM (#2639101) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Teribus Story about 7.62 v 5.56. During the action at Cap Malo Farmhouse in the Falklands RM Mountain & Arctic Warfare Cadre fought what was almost their direct equivalent in the Argentine armed forces. Normally in mounting such an attack the attacking force likes to have a numerical superiority of 3:1. Being "special forces" the RM troops involved carried AR-14's which were 5.56mm (Standard weapon of UK troops at that time was the L1A1 SLR firing 7.62mm rounds). The officer leading the attack talks of absolute horror in discovering that the enemy force occupying the farmhouse was far greater than was originally reported. He also vividly remembers an Argentinian officer armed with a Colt 0.45 pistol appearing in front of him shooting in his direction. The Royal Marine officer fires and hits the Argentinian officer five times hitting him in the wrist, arm, body, body and head. The Argentinian officer until hit in the head with the fifth shot remained on his feet and was still firing. Up until this point the Royal Marine had always had the utmost faith in their selection of weapons and the reasoning behind it. After Cap Malo he said that had he been carrying a 7.62mm SLR the shot to the wrist or arm would probably have killed his opponent (shock) it would have definitely have put him down. AK-47's are notoriously inaccurate, used as the Russians originally intented they didn't have to be. Much of the ammunition used and found in Afghanistan both AK rounds and RPG's are old and fortunately it does have a shelf life it does go "off", resulting in misfires, stoppages and grenades that fail to carry or explode. Not so much the calibre of round but the sights have meant that for UK forces shooting tests standards had to be revised upwards with the change from 7.62mm SLR to the 5.56mm SA80, the latter being easier to fire and much more accurate. |
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23 May 09 - 05:14 AM (#2639145) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: gnu 3: a prescribed usage, practice, or ceremony "...if the rules of fair engagement... have been compromised by this change." Yeah, that's what I meant. |
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23 May 09 - 01:53 PM (#2639397) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Q (Frank Staplin) Australia, Canada, UK and Germany use 5.56 x 45mm. The US basic was 55 grain, but there are specialized types inc. 77 grain long range, and an "environmentally friendly," lead-free 62 grain, originally for use in training in countries with strict lead disposal ordinances ("green ammo"), but variants now used in sport; U. S. and RUAG Armotec of Switzerland. |
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23 May 09 - 05:41 PM (#2639545) Subject: RE: BS: Military ordinance. Don't click unless.. From: Bonzo3legs So why aren't they being used against the taliban? |