American FAL?

You're right. The entire Kurz argument is pointless.

But you keep dodging the real point: try to back up your claim that 7.62x51mm is intermediate, in the same league as 7.62x39 or 5.56x45.

Because you can't. It's easily in the same league as .30-06, .303, 7.62x54, 7.92x57, etc. Which sure as hell are not intermediate. Or will you try to claim that .300 Winchester Short Magnum is an intermediate cartridge as well?
 
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Point XIII is interesting. It is the "don't listen to the soldiers who use the damned weapons, look at my spreadsheet" rule.

Actually, point XIII has references from soldiers who are perfectly happy with 5.56, so it would appear it's actually "don't listen to soldiers who disagree with me, listen to the ones who agree with me"

Regarding the Hague conventions, if you can show me where in the 5.56 design process it was decided to have it cause unnecessary suffering as a design goal, let me know. Also, considering that JAG has ruled that open tipped match ammo is legal; http://www.sadefensejournal.com/wp/?p=1262, more on fragmentation and Hague here http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2015/04/23/why-otm-≠-jhp/, I'm pretty sure solid 5.56 rounds are fine. Although it is true that smaller rounds (such as 5.56 compared to 7.62).
 

CalBear

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Actually, point XIII has references from soldiers who are perfectly happy with 5.56, so it would appear it's actually "don't listen to soldiers who disagree with me, listen to the ones who agree with me"

Regarding the Hague conventions, if you can show me where in the 5.56 design process it was decided to have it cause unnecessary suffering as a design goal, let me know. Also, considering that JAG has ruled that open tipped match ammo is legal; http://www.sadefensejournal.com/wp/?p=1262, more on fragmentation and Hague here http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2015/04/23/why-otm-≠-jhp/, I'm pretty sure solid 5.56 rounds are fine. Although it is true that smaller rounds (such as 5.56 compared to 7.62).
I DIDN'T SAY IT WAS DESIGNED THAT WAY!

...and with that, I am done.
 
Is it yours? I mean- really? You keep defending this.

I responded to you, explaining why you were mistaken. (Or perhaps just poorly stated.) I even tried to do it in a noncritical way with the [GUNSNOBBERY] joke. You seemed to let it go at that, which I can respect. Then when someone else (who evidently hadn't seen that it had already been addressed) popped up with the same correction you made it your hill, brother. And others- not just me- noted how you were conflating Kurz and intermediate.

So, instead of being passive-aggressive about this and just re-posting and re-re-posting what I said over and over again without supporting it, I'm bringing it into the open. To whit: we clearly disagree on this. I've supported my position. Robustly. Now support yours if you can. Is this not how discourse works?

I mean, I'm not up here spewing modern radical politics or anything. This is pretty damned straightforward.
 
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CalBear

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Is it yours? I mean- really? You keep defending this.

I responded to you, explaining why you were mistaken. (Or at perhaps just poorly stated.) You seemed to let it go at that, which was admirable. Then when someone else (who evidently hadn't seen that it had already been addressed) popped up with the same correction you made it your hill, brother. And others- not just me- noted how you were conflating Kurz and intermediate.

So, instead of being passive-aggressive about this and just re-posting and re-re-posting what I said over and over again, I'm bringing it into the open. To whit: we clearly disagree on this. I've supported my position. Robustly. Now defend yours if you can. Is this not how discourse works?
Here, I will make you happy.

You are right.

I am wrong.

'kay?
 
Hmm. Did I mention passive-aggressive...?

But, yes. That is clearly a concession. Though not the kind that you think it is.

Granted, I'm still learning what the community standards are on this board.
 
Here, I will make you happy.

You are right.

I am wrong.

'kay?

nallears.001.gif
 
Well, he does have a point. We have gotten hella off-topic. Is the OP Michandre still here? Any other questions? Frankly I don't think I know enough history to get into knock-down-drag-out arguments often on this board, but guns (and particularly wounding) is one area that I know, due to a mis-spent youth and some, er, exotic professional demands.

And, yes, clearly he and I disagree in the 7.62mmNATO vs 5.56mmNATO debate, too. You can see my position on THIS AH.COM THREAD. But I'm not a "7.62mmNATO hater" or anything- it's a pretty great cartridge. Just not for a mass-issued combat rifle.

And is it me or did Calbear delete a post, there? The one about "making this my hill"? I'm seriously wondering if I hallucinated that and owe him an apology. Maybe I shouldn't have jumped on that so fast. Lord knows, I do tend to edit and re-edit a lot myself...
 
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CalBear

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Well, he does have a point. We have gotten hella off-topic. Is the OP Michandre still here? Any other questions? Frankly I don't think I know enough history to get into knock-down-drag-out arguments often on this board, but guns (and particularly wounding) is one area that I know, due to a mis-spent youth and some, er, exotic professional demands.

And, yes, clearly he and I disagree in the 7.62mmNATO vs 5.56mmNATO debate, too. You can see my position on THIS AH.COM THREAD. But I'm not a "7.62mmNATO hater" or anything- it's a pretty great cartridge. Just not for a mass-issued combat rifle.

And is it me or did Calbear delete a post, there? The one about "making this my hill"? I'm seriously wondering if I hallucinated that and owe him an apology. Maybe I shouldn't have jumped on that so fast. Lord knows, I do tend to edit and re-edit a lot myself...
I posted it and deleted it.

Shouldn't have posted it at all.

Apologies to all.
 
Someone gave the figures above and they show the recoil is the same in both cartridges, my shoulder disagrees, but that is all my perception and that of my hunting buddies. I also have no issue with the recoil of a .45 pistol, so what do I know.
At the risk of flogging a dead horse here, the numbers I gave were for the US military rounds when introduced (1906 and IIRC 1926) - you will have been firing modern hunting rounds. Those can be a LOT more powerful than the military load - a modern 13g round might give 10.7 kg m/sec or more of recoil momentum, which is about a third more than the NATO round - you'd certainly feel that, but the relevant point is that it's also a lot more powerful than the standard "full power" military cartridges.
 
Y'know, it isn't just momentum. There is also the issue of what you shoot it through. Anecdotally at least, semi-automatics have less recoil than e.g. a bolt action- and as tiny as it might be, the energy to cycle the semi-automatic action does have to come from somewhere. Of course other factors matter even more, such as rifle mass. A heavier rifle is going to whack your shoulder less briskly than a lighter one because it is going to move slower even though the energy budget is the same. As someone who owns both an M1 Garand and a 1903A3 Springfield and who has fired an awful lot of M80 ball through both I'm inclined to believe all of this. I'd say that there is a "small but nontrivial" difference. I can shoot the Garand all day. I have to take a break from the Springfield, eventually. Though granted I haven't done either in a decade. I really should sell those.

Unfortunately, no one has ever really been able to define "felt" recoil. But thinking in terms of power rather than momentum probably has some value, if that helps to understand it. Power at the shoulder, mind you.
 
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No one seems to realise that it matters about 1 ounce of crap what calibre the soldiers carry. Rifles are basically for self protection and cause casualties that barely register on a spreadsheet. You could give all soldiers a Flintlock pistol and it would make next to zero difference to the result of a battle.
 
Have we been arguing the merits of one caliber over another? I must have missed that. In fact I thought we had tacitly agreed not to argue that subject in this thread.

But I would sort of disagree with you, anyway. An infrantryman's rifle has to at least be a credible threat to the enemy, or he's pointless. We'd be giving them handguns or Ruger 10/22s if it were otherwise.

Plus, it sort of depends upon what sort of war you're fighting:

There really is no good data that discriminates between rifle casualties and machine-gun casualties. But 51% of U.S. Army battle deaths and 35% of total battle casualties in Vietnam were by small arms, and you can't tell me that was all machine-guns. Half of French casualties in Mali were due to gunshot wounds. In one large meta-analysis almost a fifth of coalition casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan were from gunshot wounds- this despite the incredible preponderance of IED use in those theaters.

Seems nontrivial to me.
 
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Geurilla troops rarely have Artillery along with them so fighting a counter insurgency a lot of your casualties will be from IEDs and small arms. The casualties you cause amongst the insurgents will be mostly down to Artillery (counting as artillery anything bigger than a rifle or MG) and air munitions. In Afghanistan from what guys who were there tell me you could shoot all day with 5.56, 7.62, .338 and .50 at well dug in Taliban but what made the problem go away was a 155mm shell, 1000lb bomb or the best a guided missile like Brimstone. The most vital piece of kit the squaddies carried was the comms whether it was Sat phone, Radio or data link.
 
A lot of unspoken variables here ......
As for qid pro quo ... many NATO nations adopted American artillery ammo (e.g. 105mm howitzer) after WW2 and American factories had the potential to sell far more $$$$$$ of ammo than gun barrels.

Another factor is tradition. Most US WW2 veterans (including senior officers) loved Garand rifles and would only accept a slightly-modified Garand, wooden stock and all. In the long-run, I doubt if many M1 tools were suitable for manufacturing M14s.

"Not invented here" may sound like a shallow, political excuse, but when you are manufacturing millions of rifles, it can be a tremendous drain on the national treasury. Far better to pay American machinists than Belgiam machinists.
In time of war, it is important to have all the means of production (and documentation) in country. For example, when the USA adopted two Belgian-designed machine guns (7.62 GPMG and a 5.56mm LMG) they set up production lines in the USA to ensure supplies of spare parts.
Also to defend against losing manufacturing in Europe if the Soviets ever reached that far. In order to get an American FAL you have to kill off the ones in the selection committee that were so biased against the FAL to begin with, the whole thing was rigged.
 
... so fighting a counterinsurgency... you could shoot all day with 5.56, 7.62, .338 and .50 at well dug in Taliban ...
My emphasis, obviously.

Ah, but now you are moving the goalposts. You prior statement was much more absolute. :) And even in your example the small arms fire was still important, wasn't it? To fix the enemy until you could drop something on him.

And for obvious reasons we're never going to have good data on casualty generation for insurgents. I'll look around, but I'm not optimistic.

All I'm saying is "nontrivial." If I may indulge in a reductio- would you propose arming our infantry with revolvers? Obviously not. The rifle has to be a credible threat for infantry to fulfill it's function. Otherwise, why the hell does everyone still field infantry?

If OTOH you're trying to say that "absolute lethality is not as important as casualty generation", and that thus within certain minimal limits a truly powerful caliber is moot, well, yes there's an argument to be made, there. I can grant you that, if I had misunderstood your point until now. Because that argument is almost metaphysical, if for no other reason.

EDIT-- Just FYI, percentages of small arms casualties from other wars- some non insurgency, since you asked- though relevancy is questionable:

51% Germans in WWI
30% Germans Russian Front WWII
33% US Army Bougainville WWII (25% rifles, 8% machineguns)
31% British Normandy campaign WWII
33% US Army European Theater WWII
20% US Army Mediterranean Theater WWII
52% US Army SW Pacific Theater WWII
44% US Army Pacific Ocean Areas WWII
27% US Army Korea (there's a very large "unknown" fraction in that data for some reason)
42% US Army Vietnam on Search & Destroy missions
16% US Army Vietnam on Base Defense missions
24% British in Northern Ireland
23% Israelis in Lebanon 1982
55% US Army in Somalia

These are all battle casualties- i.e. including wounded, not just fatalities. The small arms fraction tends to be higher for killed than for wounded. (None of these data include noncombat casualties.)
 
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