3 Commando Brigade

German Army Guns

Well well well....

This is big news for Gun nuts...

http://ted.europa.eu/udl?uri=TED%3ANOTI ... ML&tabId=1

If I read right, that's an RFI for a new German Infantry weapon... They have finally thrown the towl in on the G36 !!?

heh, I was thinking of asking the Mod team what we can come up with.... No harm in having a punt eh ?!

I highly doubt the Bundeswehr will give the contract for the next standatd assault rifle to H&K. H&K and the Bundeswehr are right now bashing each other with lawsuits. Basically the Bundeswehr is saying that H&K did not deliver as agreed, while H&K is fighting that back with a lawsuit. While it is also not completly confirmed, there is a high chance that H&K tried to influence the german military intelligence office to start a investigation against a journalist who was working on that issue. All this is makes it relatively unlikely that H&K will really be considered when it comes to the next rifle.

The german ministry of defense has already stated today that want to have "a wide range of possible suppliers" and considering the position H&K had before, this is pretty much a punch in the face for H&K. They also want to have a new rifle "ready" for 2019 and beside the controversity about the G36 it is also time for something new. The G36 is basically a child of the post-cold war era and not really fit for a modern army anyway. However I wonder what they will get. Pretty much every project of the Bundeswehr in the last years have been a complete desaster (Eurohawk drone, Airbus, Ground Vehicles etc.).


MK 16 maybe?

For a DMR they still have the G27 (which is based on the HK417)

My Bet is on HK416.....

They won't like it but politics aside, keeping the business in Germany is better than nothing. And it could be worked in their favour with a tasty price to make the problem go away...

The service life of the G36 was only supposed to be until 2016 anyway. So looking for a replacement by 2019 puts the original tender over by a few years.

The smart money would be on the 416/417 family. It ticks all the NATO Stanag boxes, is a proven design with early issues ironed out and it more or less ready to go off the shelf. Cost would be brought down significantly by bulk purchase but as MeFirst highlights above, things are not always that easy when you bring politics into it.

The future of weapons lay in the bullpup layout but I don't see anything on the market that would appeal to Germany at the moment.

I've just had a quick look.

I was aware of the 417 not passing the Bundeswehr field tests as a DMR. The ongoing problems between HK and the powers that be would kind of rule them out.

The tender is for a European contract (although the legality of this may be brought up). Looking at what SIG Sauer are offering now, they seem to have stepped up massively and as a German company, could well win the contract.

SIG are highly regarded, well designed and well engineered. they have a lot of fans in the special forces community as well as police SWAT teams the world over. Just looking at what is available now, they could have something tucked away for just a situation as this.

You're having a laugh aint you?

For a start, the production run was completed over 20 years ago. The A2 was an upgrade of existing A1's.
Nobody wants the L85 despite how good it is.

Never going to happen.

Too heavy, too complex, relatively old fashioned...

SIG is a good call....

What's FN's assault rifle catalogue look like? Have they even got one ?

A lot of the German special units are using the SCAR

Scar L and H, f2000 plenty of options, I believe the us is looking at the fn45 as a replacement for the M9 too, but if they had a hard on to keep as much ad possible in Germany then they'd probably look at a glock for a sidearm since they come in every conceivable calibre

If I would have to guess I would say they try to get their hands on the Scar-L and maybe the Scar-H to replace the G27 in the long run.