M14 rifle

May 27, 2009

The M14 rifle, formally the United States Rifle, Caliber 7.62 mm, M14, is an American selective fire automatic rifle firing 7.62×51mm NATO ammunition. It was the standard issue US rifle until 1970.^[3] The M14 was used for US Army and Marine Corps basic and advanced individual training, and was the standard issue infantry rifle in CONUS, Europe, and South Korea, until replaced by the M16 rifle in 1970. It remains in limited front line service with the United States Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Air Force, and remains in use as a ceremonial weapon. The M14 also provides the basis for the M21 and M25 sniper rifles. It was the last so-called “battle rifle” (a term applied to weapons firing full-power rifle ammunition) issued in quantity to U.S. troops.

Development

The M14 was developed from a long line of experimental weapons based upon the M1 Garand. Although the Garand was among the most advanced infantry rifles of the 1940s, it was not a perfect weapon. Modifications were beginning to be made to the basic M1 rifle’s design since the twilight of the Second World War. Changes included adding fully automatic firing capability and replacing the 8-round “en bloc” clips with a detachable box magazine holding 20 rounds. Winchester, Remington, and Springfield Armory’s own John Garand offered different conversion designs. Garand’s design, the T20, was the most popular, and T20 prototypes served as the basis for a number of Springfield test rifles from 1945 through the early 1950s.

A U.S. soldier with an M14 looks at supplies being dropped during Operation Junction City, Republic of Vietnam.

Earle Harvey of Springfield Armory designed a completely different rifle, the T25, for the new .30 Light Rifle cartridge. The latter was based upon .30-06 cartridge case cut down to the length of the .300 Savage case. The .30 Light Rifle eventually evolved into the 7.62×51mm NATO and the commercial .308 Winchester round. Although shorter than the .30-06, the 7.62×51mm NATO round retained the same power due to the use of modern propellants.^[4] In the background, Lloyd Corbett was tasked with developing .30 Light Rifle conversions for the M1 rifle and later the T20 prototypes. After a series of prototype designs, the T44 surfaced. The earliest T44 prototypes used the T20 receivers rebarreled for 7.62 mm NATO, and replaced the long operating rod/piston of the M1 with the T25’s shorter “gas expansion and cut-off” system. Later T44 prototypes used newly fabricated receivers shorter than either the M1 or T20; the new action’s length was matched to the shorter 7.62 mm NATO cartridge instead of the longer .30-06. The T44 competed successfully against the T47 (a modified T25) and the FN FAL (T48). This led to the T44’s adoption by the U.S. military as the M14 in 1957. Springfield Armory began tooling a new production line in 1958 and delivered the first service rifles to the U.S. Army in July 1959. However, long production delays resulted in the 101st Airborne Division being the only unit in the Army fully equipped with the M14 by the end of 1961. The Fleet Marine Force finally completed the change from M1 Garand to M14 in late 1962. Springfield Armory records reflect that M14 manufacture ended as TRW, fulfilling its second contract, delivered its final production increment in Fiscal Year 1965 (1July ‘64 – 30June ‘65). The Springfield archive also indicates the 1.38 million rifles were acquired for just over $143 million, for a unit cost of about $104.^[1]^[2]

The rifle served adequately during its brief tour of duty in Vietnam.^{[citation needed]} Though it was unwieldy in the thick brush due to its length and weight, the power of the 7.62 mm NATO cartridge allowed it to penetrate cover quite well and reach out to extended range, developing 2,470 ft·lbf (3,350 J) of muzzle energy. However, there were several drawbacks to the M14. The traditional wood stock of the rifle had a tendency to swell and expand in the heavy moisture of the jungle, adversely affecting accuracy. Fiberglass stocks were produced to resolve this problem, but the rifle was discontinued before very many could be distributed for field use. Also, because of the M14’s powerful 7.62×51 mm cartridge, the weapon was virtually uncontrollable in fully automatic mode, so much so that most M14s were permanently set to semi-automatic fire only^[5] so as to avoid useless waste of ammunition in combat.^[6]^[7]

The M14 was developed as a means of taking the place of four different weapons systems — the M1 Garand, the M1 Carbine, the M3 “Grease Gun” and the M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR). It was thought that in this manner the M14 could simplify the logistical requirements of the troops if it took the place of four weapons. It proved to be an impossible task to replace all four, and the weapon was even deemed “completely inferior” to the World War II M1 Garand in a September 1962 report by the comptroller of the Department of Defense.^[8] The cartridge was too powerful for the submachine gun role and the weapon was simply too light to serve as a light machine gun replacement for the BAR. (The M60 machine gun better served this specific task.)

The M14 remained the primary infantry weapon in Vietnam until it was replaced by the M16 in 1966–1967. Further procurement of the M14 was abruptly halted in late 1963 due to the above mentioned Department of Defense report which had also stated that the AR-15 (soon to be M16) was superior to the M14 (DOD did not cancel FY 1963 orders not yet delivered). After the report, a series of tests and reports by the United States Department of the Army followed that resulted in the decision to cancel the M14.^[8] The M16 was then ordered as a replacement for the M14 by direction of Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in 1964, over the objection of those Army officers who had backed the M14 (other factions within the Army research and development community had opposed the M14 and the 7.62×51 mm round from the start). Though production of the M14 was officially discontinued, some disgruntled troops still managed to hang on to them while deriding the M16 as a frail and underpowered “Mattel toy” or “poodle shooter”. In January 1968 the U.S. Army designated the M16 as the “Standard A” rifle, and the M14 became a “Limited Standard” weapon. The M14 rifle remained the standard rifle for US Army Basic Training and troops stationed in Europe until 1970.

The U.S. Army also converted several M14s into the M21 sniper rifle, which remained standard issue for this purpose until the adoption of the M24 SWS in 1988.

M14 in U.S. service since replacement by M16

An Army marksman in Fallujah, Iraq, using a modified M14 with a Leupold LR/T 10×40 mm M3.

Although the M14 was phased out as the standard-issue rifle by 1970, M14 variants are still used by various branches of the US Military as well as other armed forces, especially as a sniper rifle and as a designated marksman rifle, due to its excellent accuracy and effectiveness at long range. Special active units such as the OPFOR units of the Joint Readiness Training Center use M14s. Few M14s were in use in the Army until the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars. Since the start of these conflicts, many M14s have been employed as designated marksman and sniper rifles. These are not M21 rifles, but original production M14s. Common modifications include scopes, fiberglass stocks, and other accessories.^[9] In the mid-1990s, the USMC chose a new rifle for DM use, an M14 modified by the Precision Weapons Shop in Marine Corps Base Quantico called the Designated Marksman Rifle (DMR). It is intended for use by security teams (SRTs, FAST companies), and USMC Scout Snipers in the cases where a semi-automatic rifle would be more appropriate than the standard bolt-action M40A1/A3 rifle. The USMC Rifle Team uses the M14 in shooting competitions.