QBZ-191 service rifle family

MwRYum said:

It can't be helped, until PLA fight some of US' vassal state(s) for real and embedded US "instructors" find out for themselves how their gear stand up against 5.8mm projectile and the QBZ-191 that fire them.

Like, Americans fascinates with AK-47 not just because it's "bad guy's guns" but because US troops came face-to-face with those who actually knows how to use them to good effects...

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tossing the politics away. It’s not likely to be that US gear would have any issue facing 5.8x42mm. It’s an intermediate caliber cartridge same as most others. Unless the PLA starts issuing Tungsten cored rounds as standard. Even then it’s iffy that modern military quality plates would fail without an entire magazine emptied into the wearer. In which case the spread is more likely to find an unprotected area of the body before the plate fails.
The “superior” penetration oft spoken of in steel cored ammunition is vs barrier cover. Cinder blocks (maybe), dry wall, wood, glass, sheet metal, brick and mortar. The stuff people getting shot at will dive behind. Lv4 equivalent armor is rated to a higher standard and designed specifically to defeat such ammunition.
It turns infantry small arms engagements into fair fights because with modernized 5.56x45mm NATO, 5.45x39mm Soviet or 5.8x42mm Chinese.
You are really just comparing equals, and it’s a question of trying to the other guy to panic stay still well you call in fire support.
The only stand outs would be enablers and support systems. Optics allowing clear identification of targets for shots, night vision making that all weather. Range finders to try and exploit the shots for fire support.
The only way to break that equivalence is to push to a battle rifle cartridges and magnified optic to try and gain overmatch. If you can very effectively take pot shots at the other guy at 700m well he is unable to do the same. You win.

As to the Ak cult. First remember that for decades in the US. AKs were collectors Holy Grails. It wasn’t until the early 1980s that a few Egyptian AKs made their way into the American market. Even then they didn’t last long. In AWB and import bans made them treasures as they became harder to find. Today not so much as US makers and legal imports are very widespread. However most shooters grabbing a rifle don’t grab an AK. They Grab an AR. The Ak is the collection rifle and the Hipster rifle. Why else are most AK offerings still lacking rails and sporting imitation Soviet furniture? It’s like the guy buying world war 2 German military gear and weapons. It’s a display piece. A conversation starter. Like why Krinkovs are popular in the the Pakistan and Afghanistan. The gun is a POS but to get one in the Soviet Afghan war required you to either know a certified bad ass or be one. Because they are only really used by Hind and Hip flight crews.

TerraN_EmpirE said:

tossing the politics away. It’s not likely to be that US gear would have any issue facing 5.8x42mm. It’s an intermediate caliber cartridge same as most others. Unless the PLA starts issuing Tungsten cored rounds as standard. Even then it’s iffy that modern military quality plates would fail without an entire magazine emptied into the wearer. In which case the spread is more likely to find an unprotected area of the body before the plate fails.
The “superior” penetration oft spoken of in steel cored ammunition is vs barrier cover. Cinder blocks (maybe), dry wall, wood, glass, sheet metal, brick and mortar. The stuff people getting shot at will dive behind. Lv4 equivalent armor is rated to a higher standard and designed specifically to defeat such ammunition.
It turns infantry small arms engagements into fair fights because with modernized 5.56x45mm NATO, 5.45x39mm Soviet or 5.8x42mm Chinese.
You are really just comparing equals, and it’s a question of trying to the other guy to panic stay still well you call in fire support.
The only stand outs would be enablers and support systems. Optics allowing clear identification of targets for shots, night vision making that all weather. Range finders to try and exploit the shots for fire support.
The only way to break that equivalence is to push to a battle rifle cartridges and magnified optic to try and gain overmatch. If you can very effectively take pot shots at the other guy at 700m well he is unable to do the same. You win.

As to the Ak cult. First remember that for decades in the US. AKs were collectors Holy Grails. It wasn’t until the early 1980s that a few Egyptian AKs made their way into the American market. Even then they didn’t last long. In AWB and import bans made them treasures as they became harder to find. Today not so much as US makers and legal imports are very widespread. However most shooters grabbing a rifle don’t grab an AK. They Grab an AR. The Ak is the collection rifle and the Hipster rifle. Why else are most AK offerings still lacking rails and sporting imitation Soviet furniture? It’s like the guy buying world war 2 German military gear and weapons. It’s a display piece. A conversation starter. Like why Krinkovs are popular in the the Pakistan and Afghanistan. The gun is a POS but to get one in the Soviet Afghan war required you to either know a certified bad ass or be one. Because they are only really used by Hind and Hip flight crews.

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So you're saying we gotta make a new battle rifle? /joking.

Any reasons for not developing a new battle rifle to counter body?

just curious, is it because the qbz191 has not matured enough yet?

it is one area where being able to penetrate body armor might have a relatively large impact compared to minor things like combat equipment, quality of optic etc

polati said:

Any reasons for not developing a new battle rifle to counter body?

just curious, is it because the qbz191 has not matured enough yet?

it is one area where being able to penetrate body armor might have a relatively large impact compared to minor things like combat equipment, quality of optic etc

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Fundamentally it is about what the role of a rifle is for a modern military, in high intensity conflict.

If infantry rifles are intended to be used as a suppression tools to be able to fix an enemy to destroy them with supporting fires, then is a more potent rifle round (whether it's a full powered cartridge or something like 6.8mm) if it ends up resulting in a lower ammo capacity per soldier and a heavier rifle?

(The other role of infantry rifles of course is in more close quarters/urban esque environments and the most close quarters aspect would be clearing rooms in which case the rifle is doing the killing, but the same balance of ammo load/capacity, weapon weight, come into play as well)


This video conveys some of the arguments that have been made about the XM7 which is worth a watch, and useful to think about for the PLA's emerging TOE as well

Blitzo said:

Fundamentally it is about what the role of a rifle is for a modern military, in high intensity conflict.

If infantry rifles are intended to be used as a suppression tools to be able to fix an enemy to destroy them with supporting fires, then is a more potent rifle round (whether it's a full powered cartridge or something like 6.8mm) if it ends up resulting in a lower ammo capacity per soldier and a heavier rifle?

(The other role of infantry rifles of course is in more close quarters/urban esque environments and the most close quarters aspect would be clearing rooms in which case the rifle is doing the killing, but the same balance of ammo load/capacity, weapon weight, come into play as well)


This video conveys some of the arguments that have been made about the XM7 which is worth a watch, and useful to think about for the PLA's emerging TOE as well

Click to expand...

In a military sense, going back to a battle rifle doesn't make that much sense in terms of doctrine and against near-pear or pear-to-pear adversaries. Seems the PLA also stands by this view although they could've made one as a DMR or marksman, hell maybe even a squad automatic weapon like the QBU 191 but in larger calibers. I'm surprised they didn't make a QBZ191 variant in 7.62 Nato or higher caliber. Even if not for PLA, then police or PAP would find it useful.

Blitzo said:

This video conveys some of the arguments that have been made about the XM7 which is worth a watch, and useful to think about for the PLA's emerging TOE as well

Click to expand...

The original idea was to replace the regular brass rounds with cased telescoped or caseless ammo. With that you keep the same weight and size of ammo clip but have a heavier bullet. But they decided to cheapen it out to get something into service earlier. If the US was still fighting in Afghanistan there would have been a point in making this 6.8mm XM7 rifle. But like he said against China or Russia it makes zero sense to waste so much money equipping the troops with a weapon which won't be of use in most situations.

Blitzo said:

Fundamentally it is about what the role of a rifle is for a modern military, in high intensity conflict.

If infantry rifles are intended to be used as a suppression tools to be able to fix an enemy to destroy them with supporting fires, then is a more potent rifle round (whether it's a full powered cartridge or something like 6.8mm) if it ends up resulting in a lower ammo capacity per soldier and a heavier rifle?

(The other role of infantry rifles of course is in more close quarters/urban esque environments and the most close quarters aspect would be clearing rooms in which case the rifle is doing the killing, but the same balance of ammo load/capacity, weapon weight, come into play as well)


This video conveys some of the arguments that have been made about the XM7 which is worth a watch, and useful to think about for the PLA's emerging TOE as well

Click to expand...

Pretty sure PLA infantry tactics use mortars on targets more than 300m away. Rifles play less of a role for distance targets.

gelgoog said:

The original idea was to replace the regular brass rounds with cased telescoped or caseless ammo. With that you keep the same weight and size of ammo clip but have a heavier bullet. But they decided to cheapen it out to get something into service earlier. If the US was still fighting in Afghanistan there would have been a point in making this 6.8mm XM7 rifle. But like he said against China or Russia it makes zero sense to waste so much money equipping the troops with a weapon which won't be of use in most situations.

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No it wasn’t. You are conflating programs.

The LSAT was a technical demonstration program of CTA and Caseless telescoped ammunition for potential in reducing the weight of ammunition and small arms after the failure of XM8 and XM29. Textron systems team led development of demonstrators based first around 5.56mm in cases and Caseless configurations as rifles and LMGs.
They wanted a significant weight reduction vs the M4A1 and M249. Something that the XM8 couldn’t achieve because despite its weight drop the second a loaded 30 round magazine was inserted the XM8 carbine matched the weight of an M4. Only difference being that XM8 had an optic and laser well M4 would have been in Irons.
So after scrapping OICW/XM8 the army launched LSAT.
Eventually this expanded and they started experimenting with other calibres including equivalents to 6.8SPC, 6.5 Grendel and 7.62NATO however that was not part of NGSW.

NGSW starts out with development of the 6.8 cartridge for the U.S. Army by NATIC independent of the CTA programs.

In 2017 the U.S. Army did its regular survey of its small arms. It found overall M4A1 was getting top marks with its previous feed and jamming issues resolved by replacement magazines and other updates. However by that point it was noted that Russian Ratnik and Chinese armored plates were proliferating and intermediate caliber ammunition even with a tungsten cores wasn’t enough to AP. As a rule said ammunition is rarely issued to general infantry anyway but it was a concern. Enough so that some recommendations included procurement of an interim battle rifle for issue to troops who may be deployed to combat zones where they may face near peer adversary.
Now where is the CTA? Textron enters bidding with HK and Winchester Odin. They use the LSAT data and technology modified to pack a 6.8 CTA round for the program and even get close to down select. However they don’t make it to final decision. That went to Sig v Lonestar future weapons (Frm GDLS, later True velocity) , Berretta, and True velocity.
NGSW drafts allowed bidding teams to using the U.S. Army’s 6.8mm projectile and perimeters dictated in the Army development create their own unique iteration of the 6.8mm cartridge so long as it was a third lighter per bullet vs conventional brass cased. Sig won the final giving M7 and M250.
That’s the facts.

As to useless in most combat situations or

vincent said:

Pretty sure PLA infantry tactics use mortars on targets more than 300m away. Rifles play less of a role for distance targets.

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First, Combat by western forces the last few conflicts showed more and more an emphasis on semiautomatic fire vs full automatic. This difference is often due to availability of optical sights and enablers.

Second just because most combat happens in less than 300m doesn’t mean that combat beyond that doesn’t happen. And the PLA has been vocal in asserting that the 5.8x42mm is effective well beyond 300m ranges. Like all armies the preferred solution would be to hammer a target with heavy fires. However rarely does you adversary put themselves in a convenient position for that. Weapons like Mortars and Artillery can be counted just look at the trenches in Ukraine.

However it’s all a question of doctrine and what the army’s in question feels is the most effective for them. The PLA is clearly embracing 5.8x42mm because that is their intended doctrine. The Russians are investigating 6.02x41mm among others. Though it’s highly doubtful they can move ahead with any real change. Due to practical and political reasons. A late number of armies the world over retained and even modernized battle rifles along side their assault rifles for practical purposes.

TerraN_EmpirE said:

First, Combat by western forces the last few conflicts showed more and more an emphasis on semiautomatic fire vs full automatic. This difference is often due to availability of optical sights and enablers.

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Western forces have been fighting insurgents for the last few conflicts. Was anybody complaining about lack of range for 5.56 when they where riding in a Bradley with 25mm cannon in Iraq war?

Right now Russia and Ukraine are fine with short range weapons as the just call in artillery otherwise.

Have there been any news on the new 5.8 cartridge? Like did they increase the pressure to 5.56 level?