Re: Deployment timings/lifespans

----- Original Message -----
From: <kaladorn@magma.ca>
> We notice that in the 2180s, the NSL are using an SG-58, which
> suggests a 2158 deployment date (or perhaps design date?). What do we
> think is a likely length of time for someone like the NSL or NAC to
> issue a core piece of kit like a rifle to all of its forces? A year,
> ten years, twenty? And what do we expect rifle (or other small arm)
> service life to be before replacement with a newer design? Obviously
> the German weapon is over 20 years old.

Maybe, maybe not.

>From the Kaiser's time until the end of WWII, Germany used a small arms
nomenclature based on the official year of introduction. The Bundeswehr
uses
one based on sequential numbering, with some apparent gaps, possibly due
to
prototypes and even projects included in the sequence. E.g.the standard
7.62
mm NATO rifle is the G3, the futuristic caseless rifle project was the
G11,
the recently-introduced is the G36 - and don't ask me what the missing
numbers represent.

Given recent experience, 20 years doen't seem overly long for the
service
life of a successful family of small arms.It may well reach half a
century.
The standard WWII german rifle, the Karabiner 98k, was indeed introduced
in
1898 as a slight modification of an even earlier Mauser design. The G3
was
introduced in the late 1950's and is still used by many second-line
units.
The MG42/MG 3 machine gun is reaching 60 years now. Look at other
countries:
The M16, too, was introduced in the 1960's, the Kalashnikov AK47 lasted
so
30 years until superceded by the AK74. And designs replaced in their
homeland continue to soldier on in other countries.

Greetings