How Effective is the MK12?

[C-grunt]

Correct.

If you're working against a time suspense from the time a project is approved, contracting cuts a check, vendors can manufacture and supply the parts, you can assemble, test, proof and ship, and then run pre-deployment training you have to work with proven suppliers.

From 9-11-01 go plus and minus 2 years and remember who could meet commercial-off-the-shelf rail, trigger, barrel, bipod and mount, and scope delivery time-lines.

These photos are just one example of a 500-unit order (this one for 3rd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division and attachments) for OIF in 2005. Same goes for any other order (such as USASOC) from the time a project is approved, contracting cuts a check, and now you have to wait for commercial bits and pieces. Meanwhile the unit is still in pre-deployment scheduling and they want to know when their rifles will be ready so they can schedule ranges and people to be in the right place at the right time in the correct uniform.

Hey one of those might have been mine!

2005 on FOB Normandy

[R0N]

As ridiculous as it sounds, where we were the most valuable part of the Mk12 was the optic on it - having a decent glass with some reach without having to rely on binos was great, the next most useful part was the can (deal with big-ass feral dogs without alerting every talifag for miles).

The smooth shooting and quiet nature of shooting of that system sold me on having suppressors on basically any semi-precision rifle, not to mention that spending some coin on glass really enhances the effective range when fed solid ammunition. I really wish I could have carried one in a-stan (our unit just didn't have any), since the times I was outside the wire I wound up being most useful as overwatch (since we were working I&W/comms, the math nerd with 20/8 eyesight who shoots fairly high expert is probably the guy you want on the Mk12).

The first point mirrors the AAR that I wrote for 24 MEU when we got them in AFG, the TB know the limits of the observations capability with the RCO, MGO and SDO and hang out in the shadows just beyond where you can PID them while the optics on the Mk11s and Mk12s could still PID them and engage.

The second point agree that the suppressor was a useful tool because it confused them at where they where being shot at from and at distance allowed 2-3 shots sometimes before they re-acted. But I remember when my MiTT first got suppressors in Iraq and one of my team member tried to shoot a dog thinking it would be like in the movies and it was pretty loud.

[n517rv]

one of my team member tried to shoot a dog thinking it would be like in the movies and it was pretty loud.

The sound of the shot, or the dog after being hit?


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[R0N]

The report of the firing is sort of 22 like, a suppressed 556 would not be my choice of weapon to silently do anything.

[HDHNTER]

The report of the firing is sort of 22 like, a suppressed 556 would not be my choice of weapon to silently do anything.

Agreed but FWIW, I ran across a thread awhile back where an end user mentioned 100gr subsonic ammo (that cycled) being used for quiet dog elimination. Looks like this commercial load that's no longer available. http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/201...-as-an-airgun/

[BigLarge]

The report of the firing is sort of 22 like, a suppressed 556 would not be my choice of weapon to silently do anything.

Not really on topic...

but what caliber would you suggest the military use that would be silent, and capable, at 600+ meters?

[TehLlama]

Not really on topic...

but what caliber would you suggest the military use that would be silent, and capable, at 600+ meters?

The super-simple answer would be to run 7.62NATO, and that's often what gets used when magazine/ammunition inter-compatibility isn't the requirement, since it's great at that in a precision system - same concept for a subsonic load that can be used for quiet one-off use even if it's non-ideal. It needn't be super-quiet (first round pop + sound of the action cycling is going to be fairly loud) to be an improvement, enough signature mitigation to make location identification of the shooter hard is helpful, and with really good optics again (3-18x or 5-25x from Leupold or S&B respectively) they can do more than just put rounds on target for COIN ops.

[BigLarge]

Not really on topic...

but what caliber would you suggest the military use that would be silent, and capable, at 600+ meters?

The super-simple answer would be to run 7.62NATO, and that's often what gets used when magazine/ammunition inter-compatibility isn't the requirement, since it's great at that in a precision system - same concept for a subsonic load that can be used for quiet one-off use even if it's non-ideal. It needn't be super-quiet (first round pop + sound of the action cycling is going to be fairly loud) to be an improvement, enough signature mitigation to make location identification of the shooter hard is helpful, and with really good optics again (3-18x or 5-25x from Leupold or S&B respectively) they can do more than just put rounds on target for COIN ops.

I was being sarcastic towards the other guy. Making the statement "a suppressed 556 would not be my choice of weapon to silently do anything" is off-topic and frankly offers no meaningful information. My point is, there is no round available (that i'm aware of) that allows you to quietly and effectively engage targets at 600+ meters.

[Koshinn]

I was being sarcastic towards the other guy. Making the statement "a suppressed 556 would not be my choice of weapon to silently do anything" is off-topic and frankly offers no meaningful information. My point is, there is no round available (that i'm aware of) that allows you to quietly and effectively engage targets at 600+ meters.

The "other guy" really should have a SME title and yellow name.

R0N was talking about eliminating a dog with a suppressed 5.56 not being ideal. Where are you getting 600m from?

[TehLlama]

My point is, there is no round available (that i'm aware of) that allows you to quietly and effectively engage targets at 600+ meters.

Back to the topic, the closest thing to doing exactly that is the Mk12, and that's why its use seems to have gone well beyond what a lot of people would have expected out of a light precision rifle - it was the quietest available to our squad sized patrols, had the most optics and effective range for the same role, and it's light/compact enough that that guy doesn't require another weapon system for MOUT/compound clearing/other nonsense. At distance 'quiet' and 'effective' are relative, putting a round on target anywhere against an unarmored jackass in a mandress is going to put that guy out of the fight for a while and dissuade his stupid buddies from emplacing IEDs in the same spot, being able to do so without completely telegraphing the location of an overwatch team is fantastic. A lot of the value of the Mk12 is that they became a squad or even fireteam level asset (which is why the STANAG magwell became so important), so a lot of the inherent limitations of that platform were at least mitigated by having more of them at the sharp end (meaning that the benefits went out with every patrol).

For my part, I was so enamored with the concept that I wound up with two SPR-format uppers (a CMMG M18 and Centurion Mk12 barreled upper with Leupold TS30A2). I have since started to work on a slightly more compact variant of that setup for my personal uses, and after a couple iterations I've wound up with a 16" High Caliber Sales Recce upper with an OPS 14th can - basically trimming 4" off the front in equal parts of suppressor and barrel, while running a more modernized KAC (URX3.1) handguard. My particular example is in that blurred line range of Recce Rifle more than Mk12, but if another contract went out for the same effective treatment of updating the Mk11/M110 to the M110-C then I think a rifle nearly identical to mine is what the result would be. This setup likely gives up some terminal performance, but given the sort of results MarkM and Pappabear are getting out of similar 16" uppers and Mk262-esque handloads I really think it would be a passable answer for a .civ application of a squad DM.