Originally posted by jwcarroll60:
Accuracy is not required in small arms? The USMC would disagree vehemently on that point. Law enforcement agencies would disagree too, especially when you consider the fact that every round fired by an officer must be accounted for. Too much paperwork would result if you armed your officers with 'bullet hoses'. Consider the current passion for limiting collateral damage, maybe even a mania. Accuracy is still required.
What I said was the the kind of accuracy that the M-16 is capable of is not necessary, and I meant this in the context of military operations - police work is a different matter entirely and is more closely related to sniping.
But, to address the point directly, the obsession with accurate rifle fire, in particular accurate, long range rifle fire particularly at the expense of short range rifle combat training is a problem in the US military, particularly the USMC. It doesn't jibe with the realities of combat.
Any student of military small arms should be familiar with the two works I quoted above. In particular, "Operational requirements for an infantry hand weapon" by Hitchman. It is the only deayiled study of the effectiveness of infantry rifle fire based on actual battlefield data collected in WWII and Korea (and further supported by data collected in Vietnam and in several of the Arab-Israeli conflicts). The results of that study were so counter to the dearly held notions of rifle marksmanship held by the Army and Marine corps that many people just prefer to pretend it doesn't exist.
Some of the most telling blows to our commonly held beliefs about the importance of rifle fire:
Hitchman found that about 90% of all rifle fire occurs at ranges of less than 300 yards, regardless of terrain. 70% of all rifle fire occurs at less tha 100 yards. The probability of hitting a target drops to effectively zero at 500 meters. This was mainly due to intervening terrain, the targets use of cover and concealment and the inability of the shooter to see his target.
Further, the single most inportant factor in obtaining a hit at any range was the time and degree of exposure of the target.
Quoting Hitchman directly, the most telling blow:
"in combat, hits from bullets are incurred at random: the same for missile fragments, which are not 'aimed'...the comparison of hits from rifle bullets with those of fragments shows that the rifle bullet is not actually better directed against vulerable parts of the body."
Addressing the accuracy of the rifle, Hitchman noted that the problem is not with the weapon, but rather the man,
"at all significant ranges, weapon errors are without significance in the man-weapon system....the dispersion of the weapon could be more than double without materially affecting the probability of hitting the target...weapons design standards which seek perfection by making the rifle more accurate (approach zero dispersion)...are not supported by the analysis as genuine military requirements. Errors in aiming have been found to be the greates single factor contributing to the lack of effectiveness of the man-rifle system...[in combat] men who are graded as expert riflemen do not perform satisfactorily at common combat ranges"
Hitchman was not concerned with range shooting. His only interest was shooting under combat coniditions. It is interesting to note that his analysis was completely validated during the ACR tests of the 1980s. The army sought to create a test environment that simulated actual combat as closely as possible. They found the under thes conditions, even expert shooters were unable to shoot anywhere near the level of precision the rifle was capable of..
Hitchman further suggested the solution, addressing the failure of rifle accuracy and the fact that time and exposure were the chief factor in obtaining a hit. His suggestion:
"..either a simultaneous[salvo], or high rate cyclic burst, with the number of rounds per burst automatically set rather than dependant on trgger release. In the...(single barrel burst) design, controlled butation of the rifle muzzle would provide thedesired shot dispersion or pattern; in...(salvo), the scatter would be obtained and controlled by multiple barrels, a mother-daughter type projectile, or projection of missiles in the manner of a shotgun."
Futher studies, Particularly SALVO I&II substantiated Hitchman's concept and led to the specification for the next generation infantry weapon, the SPIW. Unfortunately, Military 'experts' relying on their undertsnding of the importance of long range, precision fire (the very concepts that Hitchman had shown to be false) burdened the SPIW with unrealistic requirements. Also, the technology of the day (1960s) was probably not up to the task.
However, some in the defense establishment were convinced by Hitchman's research. The later ACR program mentioned previously was yet another attempt to build a rifle around the realities of combat shooting. Several designs did very well, but none met the Army's requirement for a 100% inprovement in hit probability over the M-16. The Steyr ACR cam very closer, but the flechettes it fired could not meet the Armies standard for dispersion. The army was still demanding a degree of precision from it's rifles that was totally unnecessary.
The latest salvo to be fired is the XM-29 SABR (OICW). In this case, a computer controlled air bursting munition is used to compensate for aiming errors and to exploit the time and degree of exposure fator.
Combat is a unique environment. Training on the range has little or nothing to do with combat riflery. We should be designing our weapons for the environment they are actually going to be used in, and optimize them for that environment rather than make decisions based on tightly held beliefs that have nothing to do with reality.
