NGSW follow up: What's worth keeping about NGSW and what sort of alternatives are there?

(Also, previously, I said NGSW was "frozen". It's not, last week I misread the title of an old article from 2019, while waiting for my wife and baby to get discharged from the hospital)

I want to start by talking about what is, in my opinion, worth keeping about NGSW. First, the ammunition technology, and specifically the open-ended nature of it within the program. You have three competitors, each with a different level of ambitiousness and risk, and that's a

very good place to be for a program that's trying to get the best possible improvement in ammunition technology. CT ammunition might end up being too ambitious, or much more effort for not that much benefit vs True Velocity ammunition. Or, True Velocity might have problems that

CT does not have, despite being a more radical concept. Or, both might not quite be there yet, and the SIG ammunition concept would offer a conservative alternative that still provides the high pressure benefits necessary for very high performance ammunition.

Second, the NGSW-FC program, which we've just seen awarded a prototype contract to Vortex for their FCU, is well worth keeping. Initially I was worried that the FCU would be far too complicated and error-prone, but what Vortex advertises is very close to what I was looking for.

Effectively, it integrates a laser rangefinder and other proven sensors, and couples those with a ballistic calculator and disturbed reticle to move the aiming point to coincide with a calculated point of impact, and packages this with what is effectively just a modern LPVO.

This seems much more useful for a generic soldier than more ambitious concepts which integrate with the trigger function of the weapon to automatically fire upon target acquisition. From a user standpoint, Vortex's FCU will be as simple as an LPVO to use, but will build in

functions behind the scenes that until now you needed separate devices to achieve. This is a good idea. It also looks like the Vortex does not integrate an aiming laser or flashlight, like the XM8's ISM did. I'm sort of agnostic as to whether these should be integrated or not,

but I lean towards "not" so I'm happy about that. I don't think everyone should get the FCU, probably 1 per fire team is plenty. It seems like that's the Army's plan, though, so that's good. Also, the openness of the Army to try new things (evidently) like the bullpup layout is

something I approve of. I haven't been much of an advocate of bullpups in general, but GDOTS's entry is very solid seeming, incorporating most of the innovations I had been advocating for in bullpup design, like ground up redesigned triggers (IIRC GDOTS's is electric), and a

rail-like, volume-saving layout (as opposed to wedges, which most bullpups approximate). Also, NGSW incorporates what's at least nominally a lowdrag projectile, which is obviously a good idea (although if SIG's commercial .277 Fury projectile is a ballistic match for the 6.8mm GP

EPR, then it's a lot more draggy than it should be). But all of those are good things, and I'm pleased to see them all being incorporated into the program in a rational way. My primary objections are what we saw in my previous thread, that NGSW will be heavier than current

weapons and ammunition, which will very negatively affect the soldier during a time when loads are already at crisis levels. Bad idea. Worse, I believe it's possible to meet the most important goals of NGSW at far lighter weight, while actually substantially *reducing* the load.

For an alternative to NGSW, I think the first priority needs to be reduced weight, or if absolutely necessary, no increase in weight. The second priority needs to be maintaining or augmenting capability in the close fight (<200m). It is reasonable to add a third priority:

Improving effectiveness in the distance fight (200m+). Now, let's justify these. I've written at length about how the load carried by the soldier is unsustainable. 100-130lb loads are causing units to become understrength, and sapping their most experienced members due to injury.

Also, a heavy load prevents the soldier from being as mobile as a more lightly laden one, which is a contributing factor to the effectiveness of opfor tactics like long distance ambushes. A 900m, GPMGs are not very accurate weapons. For soldiers that can move quickly under fire,

a kill corridor at that distance would be more difficult for the enemy to maintain. However, vs heavily laden troops, and especially those with sustained injuries (like sprains), machine guns can track much more easily, and a greater volume of fire will hit a given zone before

the target reaches cover. And in general, the more lightly laden unit is much better able to move quickly to flank and surprise the enemy. The basic fundamental of infantry combat is fire and maneuver, and currently maneuver is made almost as hard as possible for the US soldier.

Although the distance fight is not irrelevant (as mid-20th Century theory held), it is still the close fight that is the most important phase of infantry combat. Fundamentally, the infantry is an assaulting and infiltrating asset. In the words of US Army and Marine Corps manuals:

"The mission of the Infantry is to close with the enemy by means of fire and maneuver in order to destroy or capture him, or to repel his assault with fire, close combat, and counterattack. The Infantry will engage the enemy with combined arms in all operational environments to

bring about his defeat."

– FM 3-21.8 (FM 7-8), The Infantry Rifle Platoon and Squad

"The mission of the rifle squad is to locate, close with, and destroy the enemy by fire and maneuver, or repel the enemy’s assault by fire and close combat."

– MCWP 3-11.2, Marine Rifle Squad

That is, the *core* mission of the infantry is to seek out and engage in *close* combat. It follows that something like NGSW, which may compromise the close fight, is probably not the right solution for this asset. Instead, a new weapon should at least match current opfor close

weapons (e.g., AK-12, RPK-16), and ideally exceed them in the close fight. Additionally, the advent of computerized optics definitely hints at a renewed emphasis on the distance fight, but it does *not* imply the distance fight will supersede the close fight for the infantry.

So, it is a good thing for any new weapon system to add capability for the distance fight (as NGSW does), but not at the expense of the soldier's load (which NGSW impacts), and not if it compromises the capability needed for the close fight (which it is likely NGSW does).

I want to add that some have argued that there is not enough weight of weapons and ammunition to be worth trying to reduce it. First of all, that's not true, although achieving a significant weight savings requires a little bit of effort. And second, this argument is usually used

as an excuse to increase the weight of weapons and ammunition carried by the soldier, which is a non-starter for me. No increase is permissible, and as any decent engineer will tell you, you don't reduce the weight of any system by taking a bunch of weight out of one thing, you

do it by taking a little bit of weight out of everything you can. That "small" amount of weight you can save by lightening the weapons and ammunition is critical, if it comes as part of an overall program that squeezes out 15 pounds or more. 1 pound of savings achieved ten times

equals ten pounds, after all. It is up to the engineers responsible for each piece of the soldier's kit to reduce their weight as much as possible (while providing a good system), regardless of how "insignificant" that savings may seem to them. But, it turns out, there's a very

good way to decrease the soldier's ammunition load that is possible right now. And in fact, the USMC has already done it: Ditch the squad belt fed. Whatever you may believe about the necessity of the SAW, it's obvious that the soldier's load is a higher priority right now, and

if even most of the capability of the SAW can be reclaimed via an ammo-sipping magazine fed support weapon, then this tradeoff is obviously worth it. My view, though, is that a more accurate magazine-fed general support weapon will dramatically *improve* the effectiveness of the

infantry squad, even leaving out the improvement in mobility and fitness that comes with a lighter ammo load. This thesis is detailed in The First and Last SAW. Basically, a magazine-fed closed bolt weapon is more accurate, faster to employ, and has far less downtime than a

belt-fed quasi machine gun which does not routinely benefit from being tripod-mounted anyway. Therefore, the first change the US Army should make is moving away from a squad organization that uses the belt-fed as a base of fire, to one with, at least, a lightweight magazine-fed

support weapon, and ideally, a uniform squad which employs near-homogeneous select-fire, closed bolt rifle armament. This provides the best distribution of fires and coverage from all angles. The squad's superior mobility (according to the slowest buffalo principle) will allow it

to ready an assault much more quickly, its vastly reduced downtime will allow much greater responsiveness, and its universal base of fire (every member of the squad) will eliminate the need to "bring up" support weapons to hot spots, thus allowing much more fluid and dynamic fire

and maneuver. It is of course sometimes necessary to have belt feds attached to the squad, but there is no reason they need to be organic to them. The USMC model of attaching company belt fed assets to squads as needed is a much more flexible model, which will be much better

suited to 21st Century warfare which demands tremendous adaptability. The USMC model requires far less ammunition to be carried: 990 rounds per 4-man fireteam, versus 2,030 rounds carried by the US Army fireteam. That weight savings *alone* is equivalent to ditching 7.62mm rifles

for 5.56mm ones. This change BY ITSELF saves some 7.5 pounds per soldier in the rifle squad, and an additional 14 pounds for the automatic rifleman. That is a huge weight reduction for a simple organizational reshuffling that could be done with the stroke of a pen tomorrow.

The First and Last SAW: https://bit.ly/2XWOXNN