Rival Rifles
Controversy continues to rumble, if not to rage, round the War Office decision to re-equip the British Army with the .280 rifle in place of the .303. The United States Army has, and apparently intends to stick to, a .300 rifle—the Garand—and it appears that the Canadian Army (at present using, like us, the .303) is going to switch to the Garand, top. The failure to achieve standardisation is unfortunate, but there is some reason to believe that the British (who must, in any case, discard their bolt-action rifle in favour of a roni-automatic carbine) are going to finish up with the best rifle, and that this is realised by experts in America. Tests carried out over there demonstrated the superiority of the .280 over the .300, and the ultimate rejection of the former by the Americans appears to have been due to ill.' informed objections in political circles, where the realisation that the. G.I. would be firing a smaller bullet than the Chinese and North Koreans were firing at him caused grave, though mis- placed, concern. Actually the .280 is superior to the .300 both in hitting power and accuracy, and though there is only a small. difference in weight and bulk between. one .280 bullet and one .300 bullet, a thousand of the former weigh a great deal less than a thousand of the latter, a circumstance materially affecting the problems of supplying ammunition to the forward troops. The British Army has got to get itself a new rifle, and the problem' which our authorities had to decide was: Did the advantages of standardisation outweigh the disadvantages of accepting the second-best, and not the best, weapon available ? It is difficult to say that they were wrong in plumping for the .280.
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