What .308 Batle rifle would have seen wide spred adoption if there was no "Big 3"

[spyder1911]

A BAR, Gewehr 43, or SKS/SVD in .308, or their respective caliber, would have taken over. A modern BAR or Gewehr would be really sweet

 

[Z-Michigan]

AR-10. An absolute standout. It was a few years late and lacking political connections, but had it shown up on time its capabilities would have just blown everything else away. It's probably the only .308 Winchester rifle that is light enough to be a viable infantry rifle (10lbs or less) and yet controllable in full auto fire.

 

[Vaarok]

There would have been no .308 with no M14, and we'd see the EXP in .280 British and the FAL in 8mm Kurtz vying against the good old AK.

 

[jpwilly]

Armalite AR-10

 

[Rifleman 173]

Probably an AR-10. Maybe a CETME of some sort...

 

[PercyShelley]

It's a little hard for me to wrap my head around the idea of the rifles just not ever happening, but supposing that they had encountered a few more bumps on the road during development, and had been delayed by several years, I think the Madsen Light Automatic Rifle:

Might be a bit better known.

If the post-war British economy wasn't such a wreck, and the FAL had hit a few more bumps, perhaps the EM-2 designers would have had enough time to get it chambered in .308.


And I've actually fired one of the original, select fire AR-10s. It was in no way controllable; it was noticeably easier to keep the select-fire FAL on target. Granted, this model lacked the large compensator seen on some models, but I doubt even that would have made it useful in the full auto role. It's just too freaking light.

 

[Click Click Boom]

I can see this playing out. If the US pushed the .308 round in a short action M1. There would have been a need for a newer MBR with a Box fed mag, pistol grip ect...

So, if they just altered the M1 and skipped the M14. What action/type rifle would the free world have standardized on?

FN could have made the choice to abort the FAL insted of scaling it up. Same goes for teh G3.

What were/have been some failed/forgotten .308/7.62x51 rifles thru the 90s?