RED DIAMOND: Light Machine Guns

Continuing our look at threat weapons and comparing them to friendly systems, we step up from the basic infantry rifle to the light machine gun, focusing on equivalents to the US M-249 Squad Automatic Weapon. We also compare other friendly nation's systems.

To take a deeper dive on weapons doctrine, check out the WEG here. To learn more about the DDOD Red Diamond Academy, scroll down of click here.

Weapon		Effective Range	Max Range	Sust. Rate of Fire	Rapid ROF	Ammo
M-249 SAW		500m	1000m	50 RPM	100 RPM	5.56mm
​F89 (Australia)		300m	1000m	N/A	680-1150 RPM	5.56mm or 7.62mm
Type 73 (NORK)		N/A	N/A	N/A	600-700RPM	7.62x54mm
RPK (Russia)		1000m	3150m	700 RPM	700 rds/min	7.62x39mm
QBB95 (China)		800m	800m	N/A	N/A	5.8x42mm

About The DDOD's Red Diamond Academy:

Threat capabilities: It’s something we don’t look at enough in the Army, and especially in the reserve components. We first noticed this gap at Maneuver Captain’s Career Course. The MCCC entrance exam puts a lot of emphasis on threat weapons. But, students quickly find just how little exposure they get to these concepts on drill weekends. In fact, that knowledge gap created the first kernel of an idea that became the DDOD.

Our analysis focuses on the key battlefield characteristics, such as Range, rate of fire, and ammunition. Much more than that is a lot to remember in an "over lunch read" that the DDOD is set-up for. Also, we're limiting our comments to what matters on the battlefield. That your opponent has a folding stock is less important than the effective range.

We’re using data pulled from the WEG – The World Wide Equipment Guide. That resource is hosted by TRADOC, thus falls generally into the concept of doctrine. Per our policy, it is not CAC restricted, and is available to the public.

We call this, the Red Diamond Academy (see FM 1-02.2 if you don’t know why). US equivalent weapons are in blue, threat weapons, appropriately, are in red. As always, italics added for our emphasis, and […] indicates we cut out stuff we thought was fluff. And, as always: you’re smarter reading the pub (or web site, in this case) yourself to be exactly sure.