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Army to buy thousands more Mk19s, M2s

The Army is buying 4,600 Mk19 grenade launchers and 29,900 .50-caliber crew-served M2 machine guns, whose heavy-caliber rounds and high rate of fire have proven valuable in infantry counterinsurgency efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, service officials said.

Such weapons help target small groups of insurgents on the run or blended in with the local populations.

“Normally with a 7.62mm, you have a lot more difficulty when you have an enemy going behind a cinder block wall,” said Richard Audette, Army deputy project manager for soldier weapons at Picatinny Arsenal, N.J. “With a .50-caliber, you can take the wall out.”

“We always like to talk about scaleable effects, both lethal and nonlethal. When it comes to hitting a target with just enough force, I can’t drop a 5,000-pound bomb,” said Rickey Smith, who directs the U.S. Army Capabilities Integration Center-Forward.

Army-led competitions for new Mk19s and M2 .50-calibers are nearing production awards. General Dynamics Armament Technical Products has supplied both weapons since the 1980s, but the Army has opened the competition to other vendors, including Belgium’s FN Herstal.

“We should always have open competitions,” Smith said. “It is healthy as long as it does not slow down the process because it lowers the prices.”

The Army, which already owns more than 20,000 Mk19s, plans to award a contract for 4,600 new Mk19s by the end of September, Audette said.

Deliveries are slated to begin in April 2010.

Deliveries may take some time depending upon which materials need to be ordered.

“We have a lot of long-lead stuff for steel and specialty metals, which can take up to nine months,” Audette said. “If there is someone other than GD that wins, we have to completely qualify it and do qualification testing, endurance testing, hot/cold testing and other environmental tests.”

Mk19

Unlike the Army’s new single-shot M203 grenade launcher, the 72-pound, 40mm Mk19 fires 300 to 375 rounds per minute out to 2,000 meters.

“The Mk19 gives a military unit a heavy volume of close, accurate, continuous fire which can be used against hovering enemy aircraft and lightly armored vehicles by providing devastating fire into an engagement area,” Audette said.

Typically mounted on vehicles, the Mk19 is designed with an open-bolt firing mechanism so that rounds don’t overheat in the barrel and accidentally “cook off.”

“Humvees are the main use right now, and we’re seeing that a little more in Afghanistan than in Iraq,” Audette said. “In Iraq what you have is a lot of activity in close quarters, and when you are talking about a high-explosive grenade and you are always worried about collateral damage.”

GD ATP has built more than 37,000 Mk19s since 1984. The Army now has 23,313 Mk19s in its inventory. A fully loaded Mk19 costs roughly $21,500.

“The weapon’s [high explosive ammunition] has a safe-and-arm mechanism where it doesn’t arm until it gets about 18 meters from the gun,” said Jeffrey Gramse, GD ATP Mk19 program manager.

.50-caliber

Citing the need to procure large numbers of M2s quickly, the Army plans to award two M2 contracts and begin delivery in the first quarter of 2010.

Earlier this year, the Army bought 1,900 M2HB (heavy barrel) .50-caliber machine guns from GD ATP, in a deal worth up to $36.6 million.

The Army plans to deliver 6,000 or more .50-caliber machine guns per year through 2011 to Army units as well as all the other services, Audette said.

Overall, the Army now has 36,616 M2 .50-caliber machine guns priced at about $14,000 per weapon, Army officials said.

It gives you a lot more capability and range, a lot more firepower than some of your smaller weapons,” Audette said. “A key thing is force protection and convoy protection. It is a weapon that goes up on a ring-mount on vehicles such as Humvees and MRAPs.”

Often in Iraq and Afghanistan, the mere presence of a .50-caliber machine gun on vehicles serves as a deterrent.

“It is a signature that is easily recognizable as a devastating weapon that nobody wants to fool with,” Audette said.