Army Dropping M4 for .308 Battle Rifle - Thoughts?

[GHOS7]

Articles:
Army Officially Launches Competition For A New 7.62mm Combat Rifle
7.62mm Rifle to REPLACE M4 Carbine

"The Army is looking for weapons that are fully developed, currently available, and suitable for their needs."

Friends and I had a pretty interesting discussion regarding this subject earlier. Most of us seemed to agree that it's a bad move on the Army's part. We're all combat veterans and all currently PSCs and the one thing we all did agree on is that the 'regular' Army doesn't allow soldiers to shoot enough to become as efficient as possible with 5.56 as it is. We all recalled going to the range every 4-5months just to shoot pop-up targets on a square ranges in our days with limited ammo. With that being said, I don't really see the transition from 5.56 to .308 battle rifles being very smooth. This is the same Army that throws money at 'user friendly'.

With the latest advancements in the industry, weapon systems have become lighter and lighter without compromising firepower. This seems to be a bit of a regression to me. Not to mention this is more weight on the back of our soldiers and possibly a lower amount of ammo being carried.

That's only a fraction of what makes the decision questionable:

"The logic goes that the Army’s new 5.56mm M855A1 round cannot penetrate these new armors, and therefore the service must switch to a new round. However, this is misleading, as current 7.62mm M80A1 is incapable of penetrating these body armors either – and specialty tungsten cored ammunition in both 5.56mm and 7.62mm calibers are capable of penetrating armor of this type."

Seems to be bit of a contradiction here. Thoughts?

[SteyrAUG]

https://www.m4carbine.net/showthread...e-RFP-releases