The decision has been made: The Marine Corps will replace the venerable M249 Squad Automatic Weapon — long the bulwark of fire superiority in the Marine infantry squad — with the more accurate and reliable
M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle.Military.com has the exclusive breaking story this morning on how the Corps has made up its mind.Marine infantry squads will replace their M249 light machine gun with a highly accurate, auto rifle geared for fast-moving assaults. In late May, Gen. James Amos, commandant of the Marine Corps, approved a plan to field the
M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle to all Marine infantry battalions.
The lightweight auto rifle, made by Heckler & Koch, is a variant of the 5.56mm H&K 416. It weighs just under eight pounds unloaded — almost 10 pounds less than the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon.
The decision comes after the Corps fielded 458 M27s to five battalions as they prepared for upcoming deployments to Afghanistan.
“We wanted to get through the limited fielding and get the feedback before we moved ahead with the full fielding,” said Charles Clark III, who oversees infantry weapons requirements at the Corps’ Combat Development and Integration office in Quantico, Va.
