The M60 (formally the United States Machine Gun, Caliber 7.62 mm, M60) is a family of Americangeneral purpose machine guns firing 7.62x51mm NATOcartridges from a disintegrating belt of M13 links. There are several types of live ammunition approved for use in the M60, including ball, tracer, and armor-piercing rounds.[1] The M60 was referred to as "The Pig" during the Vietnam War.[citation needed]
Introduced in 1957, it has served with every branch of the U.S. military and still serves with other armed forces. Its manufacture and continued upgrade for military and commercial purchase continues into the 21st century though it has been replaced or supplemented in most roles by other designs, notably the M240 in U.S. service.
M249 SAW
The M249 light machine gun (LMG), previously designated the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon (SAW), and formally written as Light Machine Gun, 5.56 mm, M249, is an American version of the Belgian FN Minimi, a light machine gun manufactured by the Belgian company FN Herstal (FN). The M249 is manufactured in the United States and is widely used by the U.S. Armed Forces. The gun was introduced in 1984 after being judged the most effective of a number of candidate weapons to address the lack of automaticfirepower in small units. The gun provides infantry squads with the heavy volume of fire of a machine gun combined with accuracy and portability approaching that of a rifle.
The M249 is gas-operated and air-cooled. It has a quick-change barrel, allowing the gunner to rapidly replace an overheated or jammed barrel. A folding bipod is attached near the front of the gun, though an M192 LGM tripod is also available. It can be fed from both linked ammunition and STANAG magazines, like those used in the M16 and M4. This allows the SAW gunner to use rifleman's magazines as an emergency source of ammunition in the event that he runs out of linked rounds. However, this will often cause malfunctions because the magazine spring has difficulty feeding rounds quickly enough to match the SAW's high cyclic rate.
Browning M2HB
The M2 Machine Gun, Browning .50 Caliber Machine Gun, is a heavy machine gun designed towards the end of World War I by John Browning. It is very similar in design to John Browning's earlier M1919 Browning machine gun, which was chambered for the .30-06 cartridge. The M2 uses the larger and more powerful .50 BMG cartridge, which was named for the gun itself (BMG standing for Browning Machine Gun). The M2 has been referred to as "Ma Deuce",[4] or "the fifty" in reference to its caliber. The design has had many specific designations; the official designation for the current infantry type is Browning Machine Gun, Cal. .50, M2, HB, Flexible. It is effective against infantry, unarmored or lightly-armored vehicles and boats, light fortifications, and low-flying aircraft.
The Browning .50 caliber machine gun has been used extensively as a vehicle weapon and for aircraft armament by the United States from the 1920s to the present day. It was heavily used during World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, as well as during operations in Iraq in the 1990s and 2000s. It is the primary heavy machine gun of NATO countries, and has been used by many other countries as well. With the exception of the M1911.45 automatic pistol, the M2 has been in use longer than any other small arm in U.S. inventory.
M134 Minigun
The Minigun is a 7.62 mm, multi-barrel machine gun with a high rate of fire (2,000 to 6,000 rounds per minute), employingGatling-style rotating barrels with an external power source. In popular culture, the term "Minigun" has come to refer to any externally-powered Gatling gun of rifle caliber, though the term is sometimes used to refer to guns of similar rates of fire and configuration, regardless of power source and caliber. Specifically, minigun refers to a single weapon, originally produced by General Electric. The "Mini" of the name is in comparison to designs that use a similar firing mechanism but larger shells, such as General Electric's earlier 20 mmM61 Vulcan.
RPK
The RPK (Ruchnoy Pulemyot Kalashnikova, Russian: Ручной пулемёт Калашникова or "hand-held machine gun of Kalashnikov") is a 7.62x39mmlight machine gun of Soviet design, developed by Mikhail Kalashnikov in the late 1950s, parallel with the AKMassault rifle. It was created as part of a program designed to standardize the small arms inventory of the Red Army, where it replaced the 7.62x39mm RPD light machine gun. The RPK continues to be used by the armed forces of countries of the former Soviet Union and certain African and Asian nations. The RPK was also manufactured in Bulgaria and Romania.
Bren Light machine gun
The Bren, usually called the Bren Gun, was a series of light machine guns adopted by Britain in the 1930s and used in various roles until 1991. While best known for its role as the British and Commonwealth forces' primary infantry light machine gun (LMG) in World War II, it was also used in the Korean War and saw service throughout the latter half of the 20th century, including the 1982 Falklands War and the 1991 Gulf War. Although fitted with a bipod, it could also be mounted on a tripod or vehicle-mounted.
The Bren was a modified version of Czechoslovak-designed light machine guns, the ZB vz. 26 and its descendants, which British Army officials had tested during a firearms service competition in the 1930s. The later Bren featured a distinctive curved box magazine, conical flash hider and quick change barrel. The name Bren was derived from Brno, the Czechoslovak city where the Zb vz. 26 was originally designed, and Enfield, site of the British Royal Small Arms Factory.
In the 1950s the Bren was rebarrelled to accept the 7.62x51mm NATO cartridge. It was replaced in the British Army as the section LMG by the L7general purpose machine gun (GPMG), a heavier belt-fed weapon. This was in turn supplemented in the 1980s by the L86 Light Support Weapon firing the 5.56x45mm NATO round, leaving the Bren in use only as a pintle mount on some vehicles.
The PK is a 7.62 mmgeneral purpose machine gun designed in the Soviet Union and currently in production in Russia. The PK machine gun was introduced in the 1960s and replaced the SGM and RPD machine guns in Soviet service. It remains in use as a front-line infantry and vehicle-mounted weapon with Russia's armed forces, and has been exported extensively.
It is manufactured by Fabrique Nationale Manufacturing, Inc., a division of FN Herstal based in the United States. The Mk 48 has been developed in conjunction with the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), which has adopted the weapon and started its fielding process, starting with special operations units.
Fn Minimi
The Minimi (short for French: Mini Mitrailleuse; "mini machine gun") is a Belgian5.56mmlight machine gun developed byFabrique Nationale (FN) in Herstal by Ernest Vervier. First introduced in 1974, it has entered service with the armed forces of several countries. The weapon is currently manufactured at the FN facility in Herstal and their US subsidiary FN Manufacturing LLC, as well as being licence-built in Australia, Italy, Japan and Greece.
The Minimi is configured in several variants, the Standard model as a platoon or squad support weapon, the Para version for paratroopers and the Vehicle model as secondary armament for fighting vehicles.
M1919 Browning machine gun
The M1919 Browning is a .30 calibermedium machine gun that was widely used during the 20th century. It was used as a light infantry, coaxial, mounted, aircraft, and anti-aircraft machine gun by the U.S. and many other countries, especially during World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. Although it began to be superseded by newer designs in the later half of the century (such as by the M60 machine gun), it remained in use in many North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries and elsewhere for much longer. It is very similar in design to the larger .50 in (12.7 mm) M2 Machine Gun, which is also a Browning-designed weapon and is still in NATO service.
Many M1919s were rechambered for the new 7.62 × 51 mm NATO round and served into the 1990s, as well as up to the present day in some countries. The United States Navy also converted many to 7.62 mm NATO, and designated them Mk 21 Mod 0; they were commonly used on river craft in the 1960s and 1970s in Vietnam.