MinnMooney said:
Hatterusguy said:
300 rounds of 5.56 is a heck of a lot lighter than 300 of 7.62.
And your point is?!? Most soldiers say that attackers take 3-4 shots of 5.56 in center-mass to stop them. That was rarely said while using the .308 or .30-06 in war.
Most? Where are you getting most from? And why should we believe them? Soldiers will always over-estimate both their own accuracy and the frequency with which they engage genuine targets, under estimate the time it takes a bullet to reach its target, perceive the time between pulling the trigger and the target falling to the floor to be longer than it is in reality, and exaggerate. Even when bodies are recovered, it's often the case that more than one guy was shooting at the recently deceased. Even when there is only one shooter, it's normal in combat for soldiers to fire off several rounds before the target has had a chance to fall; soldiers don't take a "fire one round - is he still standing? If so, fire another round and repeat," approach to combat. It's not evidence, it's hearsay.
THEREFORE, a soldier would use much less ammo to accomplish the same objectives - and that is to stop an enemy.
I'm going to go out on a limb and hazard that you've never been in combat.
99% of what comes out the front of your weapon hits nothing but dirt, brick, concrete, sand, and a bit of air on the way in. 95% of what comes out the front of your weapon is being aimed in a direction, like "that building over there," "that treeline," or "that way *broad hand sweep*" not at a target, like "that man with a gun looking right at me." 95% of those that get killed die from something other than getting shot with a rifle. Nobody really knows who killed 90% those that get killed with rifle bullets. Hitting somebody with a rifle and knowing you hit them for certain (not just guessing or wishful thinking) is not common for ordinary soldiers.
The stopping power of rifles has an influence close to zero on how much ammunition soldiers expend.
Consider what you're saying. Suppose 7.62mm would mean a combat load of 200 rounds instead of 300 (10x20rnd mags instead of 10x30rnd mags), which, as you claim, is the same thing because soldiers would need to use 1/3 less ammunition due to the increased stopping power. Or in other words, currently, for every 300 rounds a soldier fires, at least 200 of them are hitting an enemy (100 unnecessary rounds that the 7.62mm would negate, plus at least 100 necessary rounds, since you need to hit someone to begin with in order for there to be subsequent rounds) and kills 100 enemies. If this were the case, US forces would be killing six hundred million enemy soldiers each year from rifle fire alone.