universal infantry cartridge possibilities/chatter/etc.......

Bullets must pass completely through the target to be effective.
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UH, WHAT!?
Penetration is key, but if it passes through, that's OVER penetration and wasted energy. You want as much kinetic energy transfer as possible. That means the bullet expends all of it's engery INSIDE the target, not behind it.

Let's not derail this thread further into "stopping power", "energy dump", and other gun magazine junk science.
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Stopping Power and Energy Dump/Transfer are completely relevant to this topic. Though, they are roughly the same thing with different names. The "perceived" stopping power comes from the Energy Dump into the target. You can't have a 100% effective combat bullet if it only passes through the target as then you have to rely on CNS shots to effectively stop the aggressor.
 
Well, let's talk about that for a moment from a historical perspective.

There have been two different developments, followed by another, in the period since metallic cartridges were introduced for infantry weapons in our service, which, for purposes of discussion, starts with the .50-70. Since then, the caliber has been reduced and range has increased. And beginning with the switch to the .45-70 in 1873, there (supposedly) have been complaints about the loss of stopping power. Strictly speaking, effective range has not really been increased all that much since the .45-70 but all later cartridges were much flatter shooting in comparison. Of course this ignores such details of smokeless powder, better brass cases, rimless cases, and non-corrosive primers.

The third development really started with the submachine gun and eventually developed into the assault rifle.

Now comes the thought that infantry combat with rifles is a 500-yard affair. Why limit it to 500 yards? There may or may not be a magic number here but the question is, is it 500 yards?
 
There is an excellent discussion of 1,000 yard rifle shooting over on the competition section. Most of it went over my head but shooting at 500 yards should be only half as difficult.

Keep this in mind: the cartridge is only one element in the equation and possibly not the most important one, which is more than likely the rifleman himself. But not everyone in an infantry platoon will be capable of making consistent hits at 500 yards, believe it or not. The best shots should, in theory, be the ones that get sent off to the designated marksman course and get something a little better, equipment wise. And speaking of equipment, the regular guys don't get sniper grade equipment, not that ordinary issue is so bad but everything can't be hand-picked and above average.

Another thing is that the best solution for the problem at hand, shooting-wise, might change from morning to evening, maybe even hour to hour, as conditions change as they move around. They might be in a village of stone houses, going house to house, then move on out into the open again. While individual soldiers might jump at the chance to pick whatever they think is best, you know it isn't going to work like that. You have to see the big picture--which may or may not be 500 yards away.
 
UH, WHAT!?
Penetration is key, but if it passes through, that's OVER penetration and wasted energy. You want as much kinetic energy transfer as possible. That means the bullet expends all of it's engery INSIDE the target, not behind it.
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I agree with you that a bullet doesn't have to pass trough to be effective. But there's no reason to want as much energy transfer as possible, because the energy of the bullet is marginal in proportions to the human body. Kinetic energy is important insofar it delivers the work to penetrate. If the bullet passes trough, this means that the bullet had more than enough energy (but not TOO much).
 
percision shooter, please keep your junk science to yourself.

If I want to hear about terminal ballistics, I'll seek out material by Dr. Gary Roberts and Martin Fackler.
 
My vote for a universal military cartridge...

50 BMG

If you hit the enemy combatant with it he is going to be in no shape to continue the fight. If they also line up a few deep you get more than one.
 
Tirade should write a book

As usual leave it to the expert to bring us back to reality cuz we all forgot that most MG's are crew-served weapons, the average infantry guy is only good to about 500 meter in the last century, etc. etc. etc.
:eek:
 
Yes - precisely that. It's not information generally available to gamers who's knowledge of the military is limited to what level Call of Duty they own.

I find it interesting that when called out to define "Universal," the application suddenly becomes limited to infantry rifle application only. Taking that extremely limited view - which some who carry the .44 in pistol and lever action share - it becomes basically a discussion over which rifle caliber.

So far, reading the content of posts, the objection seems to be intermediate caliber use. Considering the number of qualified engineers who have designed literally a hundred others, one posters view that a single cartridge can satisfy all applications for the soldier is what is really in question.

And those hundred other cartridges are spectacular evidence the world as a whole completely disagrees, and even staked their life on it.

Having served and trained in the Infantry and Military Police, it's obvious the trained professionals and experienced combat veterans disagree, too. They insisted I be equipped with a 9mm, 5.56, 40mm, and have a crew served MG using 5.56, 7.62x51, and 40mm automatic grenade launcher. I was given further training in TOW, Dragon, and the M2.

That's just what the soldier needs to know how to operate. Plenty of other stuff from the 60mm mortar to calling in fire from artillery,airstrikes, and naval guns gets put on our plate.

Insisting that there is a universal cartridge in the face of the mandatory use of a variety of different weapons the soldier can and will have available is ludicrous.

Insisting that the rifle can and should be powerful enough to reach out to 800m and also be useful in CQB or street patrol is ludicrous. The science of ballistics has been empirically and absolutely tested to show it cannot be done. Simply investigating the use of combat rifles back to WWI gave researchers a clue that .30 cal large cartridge guns hampered the average soldier. Regardless of the fact they COULD shoot to 800m, most WOULD NOT, and wouldn't do it accurately enough to trust themselves.

Insisting on a universal cartridge that can carry the light weight of 5.56 and still have the ballistic punch of .308 is a cruel joke. It's been decided by better educated, experienced, and proven men to avoid it, and the simplest reason of many is the actual physical use of the weapon - low recoiling intermediate cartridges are perceived as more useful by the soldier, who can shoot them more often, and do so, carrying more ammo.

Blindly ignoring the last 75 years of cartridge and weapons development could lead to the mistaken assumption it can be done, but in actual practice, experienced users know better. There is no universal cartridge the soldier depends on - because they can't. Not only does it not exist, it would mean giving up the advantages of other calibers that offer superior performance in their specific application.

There is no nation on the face of earth that depends on a universal cartridge. That's the reality. Continue to ignore the lone voice crying out "the emperor is not wearing any clothes!" and enjoy the fantasy. This is the one place it can prosper, as it doesn't really exist either. It's just a forum.

Not real life, and certainly not populated by those who actually do the work of serving in the Armed Forces.
 
Nothing stated about should make you think that no further progress is possible without something like a ray gun coming along. It is just that progress at any given moment is incremental and will probably will pass unnoticed to most people. It won't make the front page of the newspaper. There are examples.

The small bore (.30 caliber, that is) and smokless cartridge had been around longer than most people ever serve in the army when someone, no doubt a German, discovered that a boat-tail, sharp-pointed bullet traveled further with a flatter trajectory (that's where we came in) than the heavier, round-nose bullet that was mostly already commonly used. In our case, it did result in the standard cartridge going from .30-03 to .30-06, if I have the details correct. Earth shaking? Probably not. Progress? Undoubtedly.

There are always limitations to changes and at the moment, it seems like the limitation is that any new cartridge has to work in a suitably modified AR-15, which is fine and understandably. But the army's rifles have already been modified (that is, new ones as acquired have been modified). But newer sporting cartridges have been shorter than the older ones and lest your forget, the old ones were nothing like the ones before them. There has been progress.

I say all this to keep anyone from thinking there is nothing new under the sun--which is one of my favorite sayings.
 
The only problem with somes opinion is that there have been universal cartridges in US history. The 30-06 was used in everything from an m1 tanker carbine to a water cooled browing machine gun. Or the 45-70 which was used from a falling block carbine to a gatling gun. Also the British had the .303 which was used in most every gun they had from the enfield to the bren. Than the british had their fal 308 to 308 bren. The Germans had an 8mm that was used from the k98 to their water cooled heavy machine guns.

So yes there have been universal infantry cartridges.

Diversity in cartridge from service rifle to gpmg is a relatively recent thing that has happened over the last 50 years roughly.

It is really based on optimization which is the same with any product or technology. An idea comes along and the first product is high quality and performs above par. Over time in order to save money, time, weight research is conducted to take away the extra fat so that the product can only just do what it was designed for and nothing extra.

Even if a way were designed to greatly reduce the recoil of a 7.62 round in an individual assault rifle and somehow even lighten the weight it will not be done because due to the rules of optimization it would be much too expensive to eat up such huge amounts of 7.62 NATO in combat rifles. materials are more expensive and scarcer than they were during ww2.

It will more than likely not happen with a new cartridge either. Not saying it is impossible but unlikely for some time to come.

Remember we are talking about a government that sent us to the moon 40 years ago but is too tight to go back.

Anyway can you imagine actually passing out dpms 308 carbines with 14.5 inch barrels for individual combat? You might as well use a 7.62 x 39 because you wont get but a few hundred extra ft lbs more energy advantage. The 7.62 Russian was designed to be fired from a short barrel.

Which interestingly the Russian round is very close to a universal cartridge with about as much recoil as is reasonably comfortable to shoot by a small framed person. Even the 8mm short was a good cartridge. Sometimes the best products are the early ones because they havent fallen yet to the "2nd law of thermodynamics"
 
You're missing the point. And by the way, would you care to post a photo of a tanker carbine in .30-06? Tankers in the division I was in were issued with submachine guns.

In British service they actually used multiple cartridges. You have to include pistol and revolver ammuntion, too, you know, because it was used down to and including rifle section level. In fact, it was entirely possible and very probable that a British tank required four different small arms ammuntion for the weapons carried by the crew and on the tank. The standard tank machine gun was in 8mm Mauser for the Besa guns. If there was an externally mounted machine gun, which was not universal in British practice, it was in .303. If the crew had a submachine gun or two, it would have been in either .45 ACP or 9mm. And finally, the crew's sidearms were in .38-200. But most of the work was done by the machine guns and the main gun.

But you make some good points. The German 7.92mm short as used in their assault rifles towards the end of the war seem like it was a good cartridge for it's purpose. But they did not use it in any sort of squad automatic, although the Russians did for their 7.62x39 and still do, same as everyone else is doing with the 5.56 NATO. Perhaps one of the reasons the Germans used it was because of their experiences with the Soviets using a lot of submachine guns themselves (which they did because of their experiences in Finland, if what you read is true).

Supposedly some of the original FAL rifles were intended to be chambered in the German round but you know what happened with that. And as I mentioned, in the meantime submachine guns were widely used for infantry combat.

I'm not sure that materials are so much more expensive or scarcer than they were in WWII but there is not the demand for war materials like there was then, you know. If there is, it's all going into aircraft carriers.
 
Insisting that the rifle can and should be powerful enough to reach out to 800m and also be useful in CQB or street patrol is ludicrous
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one amongst many other examples.
Rifle_Room_13_full.jpg
 
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