Future soldier technology (modified thread)

www.bloomberg.com

Microsoft Job Cuts Hit HoloLens Unit After Setback on Army Goggles

Microsoft Corp., which is eliminating 10,000 jobs and trimming some of its hardware lineup, will reduce its HoloLens goggles business as it scales back work on a headset for the US Army that Congress declined to fund this year, according to people familiar with the matter.
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Can someone (maybe @Blitzo?) explain why the PLA developed the QBZ-191?

From what I've read, the QBZ-95-1 fixed most of the problems with the earlier QBZ-95. If the reason has to due with the lack of rails, I don't see why they couldn't just have introduced a QBZ-95-2 especially since there have been numerous photos of special forces equipped QBZ-95-1s with aftermarket rails.
 
Whopper said:
Can someone (maybe @Blitzo?) explain why the PLA developed the QBZ-191?

From what I've read, the QBZ-95-1 fixed most of the problems with the earlier QBZ-95. If the reason has to due with the lack of rails, I don't see why they couldn't just have introduced a QBZ-95-2 especially since there have been numerous photos of special forces equipped QBZ-95-1s with aftermarket rails.
Click to expand...

A combination of wanting a more modular family of rifles that are more easily upgradeable, being designed from the outset to accommodate optics with a flat top receiver, possibly judgment of some inherent benefits of a conventional arrangement versus bullpup arrangement that they now value more, and also taking advantage of Chinese design and new manufacturing capabilities that emerged by mid/late 2010s.

I suspect another QBZ-95 upgrade program would have been considered and probably would've been a serious contender, but on balance they went for a new rifle design.
 
Forest Green said:
Military should recruit anyone who passes the required tests, whatever that means more of.
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That would require the government to do things like increase wages and expand the military manpower budget. Most nations don't want to do that, I'm sad to state.

In addition, we're going back to pre-industrial 'military caste' military setups due to just how complex war has gotten. It's gotten to the point that one study by the Army stated that something on the order of 10% of the US population is invalid for military service. Billy Joe of some random town can't make the cut because he isn't smart enough.
 
Blitzo said:
A combination of wanting a more modular family of rifles that are more easily upgradeable, being designed from the outset to accommodate optics with a flat top receiver, possibly judgment of some inherent benefits of a conventional arrangement versus bullpup arrangement that they now value more, and also taking advantage of Chinese design and new manufacturing capabilities that emerged by mid/late 2010s.

I suspect another QBZ-95 upgrade program would have been considered and probably would've been a serious contender, but on balance they went for a new rifle design.
Click to expand...
I have some familitarity with the firearms industry, and from the best of my understanding, the the modularity of rifles and handguns usually just ends up being empty jargon. Since the QBZ-95-1 is a bullpup design, there is a less of a need for two mass-issued variants (rifle and carbine) or modularity. A lot of the disgust surrounding bullpup rifles online stems from US competition shooters and US veterans who were trained on conventional rifles and are unable to "deprogram" themselves when using bullpups. For the most part, bullpups are perfectly adequate. The only shortcoming when it comes to the QBZ-95-1 that I see would be the way the sights mount on the barrel and receiver, but I don't think this necessarily justifies a replacement instead of a QBZ-95-2 that would reuse some of the currently existing tooling.

I also don't think it has anything to do with manufacturing either. Norinco managed to reverse engineer M16s decades ago and still offers them today to potential customers. I have looked at QBZ-191 photos and schematics, and I don't see anything (aluminum receiver, AR-18-inspired bolt-carrier/trunion, etc.) that would've prevented Chinese industry from manufacturing the design two or three decades ago.

I have theories on why the PLA went with a conventional layout for the new rifle design:

The QBZ-95-1 was one among many designs that came from the Chinese firearms experimental phase back in the 90s, which was spurred by the need to modernize after two decades of technological stagnation. While many unique firearm designs reached the prototype stage, only a few reached widespread adoption (and often with undesirable quirks). I read that there was backlash to the QBZ-95 due to its teething issue and bullpup layout, especially from those who had a fondness for the Type 81. Even with the improved variant that fixed most of the glaring problems, it was too late with the reputation of the QBZ-95 family tarnished. Therefore, the QBZ-191 or the adoption of any conventional rifle was inevitable. This would explain the fixed-charging handle and would open export oppertunities to militaries who currently use Type 56s/81s.

During the next couple of years, the PLA started to divert itself from Russian influence and hired private Western contractors to train its personal to make up for the lost time. (We have been seeing this trend with Western ex-fighter pilots being hired as instructors.) These contractors would've had experience with Colt 723s/M4A1s/H&K 416s (and occasionally AKs) with the tactics used by Western special forces having been developed around these rifles. The PLA wasn't in the mood to waste more time with more experimenting, so they would need a rifle compatiable with already existing doctrine that involves conventional rifles instead of slowly developing similar doctrine for bullpups. This would also explain why the QBZ-191 has eerily similar erogonomics (fire-control selector, telescoping stock, ACOG-like sight, etc.) to Colt rifles.

Your thoughts, @Blitzo?
 
Whopper said:
Blitzo said:
A combination of wanting a more modular family of rifles that are more easily upgradeable, being designed from the outset to accommodate optics with a flat top receiver, possibly judgment of some inherent benefits of a conventional arrangement versus bullpup arrangement that they now value more, and also taking advantage of Chinese design and new manufacturing capabilities that emerged by mid/late 2010s.

I suspect another QBZ-95 upgrade program would have been considered and probably would've been a serious contender, but on balance they went for a new rifle design.
Click to expand...
I have some familitarity with the firearms industry, and from the best of my understanding, the the modularity of rifles and handguns usually just ends up being empty jargon. Since the QBZ-95-1 is a bullpup design, there is a less of a need for two mass-issued variants (rifle and carbine) or modularity. A lot of the disgust surrounding bullpup rifles online stems from US competition shooters and US veterans who were trained on conventional rifles and are unable to "deprogram" themselves when using bullpups. For the most part, bullpups are perfectly adequate. The only shortcoming when it comes to the QBZ-95-1 that I see would be the way the sights mount on the barrel and receiver, but I don't think this necessarily justifies a replacement instead of a QBZ-95-2 that would reuse some of the currently existing tooling.

I also don't think it has anything to do with manufacturing either. Norinco managed to reverse engineer M16s decades ago and still offers them today to potential customers. I have looked at QBZ-191 photos and schematics, and I don't see anything (aluminum receiver, AR-18-inspired bolt-carrier/trunion, etc.) that would've prevented Chinese industry from manufacturing the design two or three decades ago.
Click to expand...

From the rumours about QBZ-191 leading up to its revelation, among the manufacturing advances made for it was materials, tolerances -- things that are not significantly visible from the naked eye.

WRT QBZ-95 family; I agree in principle that there's no need for a rifle and carbine variant, but they do have a rifle and carbine variant of the QBZ-95 family regardless.


Whopper said:
I have theories on why the PLA went with a conventional layout for the new rifle design:

The QBZ-95-1 was one among many designs that came from the Chinese firearms experimental phase back in the 90s, which was spurred by the need to modernize after two decades of technological stagnation. While many unique firearm designs reached the prototype stage, only a few reached widespread adoption (and often with undesirable quirks). I read that there was backlash to the QBZ-95 due to its teething issue and bullpup layout, especially from those who had a fondness for the Type 81. Even with the improved variant that fixed most of the glaring problems, it was too late with the reputation of the QBZ-95 family tarnished. Therefore, the QBZ-191 or the adoption of any conventional rifle was inevitable. This would explain the fixed-charging handle and would open export oppertunities to militaries who currently use Type 56s/81s.

During the next couple of years, the PLA started to divert itself from Russian influence and hired private Western contractors to train its personal to make up for the lost time. (We have been seeing this trend with Western ex-fighter pilots being hired as instructors.) These contractors would've had experience with Colt 723s/M4A1s/H&K 416s (and occasionally AKs) with the tactics used by Western special forces having been developed around these rifles. The PLA wasn't in the mood to waste more time with more experimenting, so they would need a rifle compatiable with already existing doctrine that involves conventional rifles instead of slowly developing similar doctrine for bullpups. This would also explain why the QBZ-191 has eerily similar erogonomics (fire-control selector, telescoping stock, ACOG-like sight, etc.) to Colt rifles.

Your thoughts, @Blitzo?
Click to expand...

I don't think the change from 95 to 191 would have been primarily a result of reputational issues, but rather a result of a number of competing requirements which made them have to choose between a clean sheet design versus a highly redesigned 95, and in the end they went for a clean sheet design.

The PLA itself of course has fairly extensive experience with conventional rifles as you noted -- Type 56, Type 81 and Type 03 as well. Type 191 incorporates some elements of AR series rifles that IMO are now ubiquitous enough to be called simply "normal design features" -- things like a bolt release on the side of the receiver, an upper/lower receiver design that holds zero and which allows for easy maintenance and changes of the upper receiver if needed, telescoping stock etc.

But it also retains some quintessential PLA favoured features like a reciprocating charging handle on the right side, and its fire selector is actually more reminiscent of Type 81 and Type 03 and Type 95-1 than anything, and same goes for its magazine release.


My feeling with the 95 family is that when it was designed, its primary goal was to aim to have a compact rifle that could serve as a mass issued assault rifle for mechanized infantry (where rifle length is a major factor) of concern. They pursued compactness, reliability/function, while ergonomics and ability to mount optics were secondary and tertiary concerns (the optics thing being reasonable given at the time the idea of mass issuing optics was a pipe dream for the PLA).
With the 191 family, its development was partially spurred by the fact that they could now get assault rifle performance in a lower barrel length thanks to newer ammunition being developed (e.g.: see barrel length of the rifle 191 variant versus rifle 95 variant) allowing them to retain decent compactness but in a conventional configuration. Then they also wanted the ergonomics and optic mounting capability of a logical upper/lower receiver design (which takes AR cues but also has some type 03 cues), because now they were finally in a spot where mass issuing of optics was more of a possibility.
And given they were now a few decades after 95 was first conceived, they would naturally use more modern manufacturing and better materials given they're now available, for these mass issue rifles.

So based on that, the question is essentially one of "clean sheet new design" versus "highly redesigned Type 95". I expect it was probably a close call, but I think the greater modularity, ease of upgrade and ergonomics of the a conventional design outweighed a repeat of the Type 95 bullpup.
 
Though, to be honest, metallurgy will probably force everyone to go to bullpups anyway, despite reputation and whatnot. With how armor is going, you're probably going to need to go back to full barrels until infantry-capable ETC guns are deployed.
 
www.defensenews.com

Alone and unafraid: How to prepare to fight and win the next war

As policymakers and war planners prepare for a potential of near-peer conflict — the biggest fight of modern times — two imperatives must be considered.
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A key to the success of distributed operations could be a new concept using multicapable warfighters defined as individual effects teams, or IET.

These basic combat skills trained two-person teams — sourced from across the ranks of the Army, Marine Corps and Air Force — that could be deployed with discrete mission tasks all designed to deceive, disrupt, deny and defeat the enemy. A radical approach to the IET is that the ideal candidate would not be an infantry professional at all; an Army finance clerk could be tasked to join up with an Air Force Security Forces airman, or a Marine cook could join an Army admin troop.

Armed with combat skills training, leading-edge technology and discrete mission orders, nontraditional front-line combatants could provide critical effects enabling deceive-campaign effects.

IETs would not just shoot, move and communicate; in fact, they might not directly engage the enemy at all. Each team could be strategically deployed alone but unafraid and armed with cutting-edge technology. IETs could deploy in mass, creating a “swarm effect.” Thousands of IETs operating in front of, behind and next to the enemy’s line would be designed to prep and shape the battle space by overwhelming the adversary’s battlefield situational awareness, providing gaps for conventional forces and supporting fires to make strategic advances.


In effect the enemy would die a death of a thousand cuts as IETs — along with conventional and special forces — focus on defeating key centers of gravity.

IETs could be tasked with a single mission: to simply deploy to an area and do nothing as part of a larger mission effects profile. Alternatively, an IET could deploy disruptive technology the size of a backpack and return to base.

A more involved mission for an IET might involve setting up an austere landing field, which could include flying onto a deserted island as a passenger on an automated, low-signature, all-electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing aircraft. Once on the ground the IET could set up a pocket-sized communication node, and generate water from the air and aircraft fuel from sea water hours before the first aircraft landing.
 
www.insidehighered.com

Higher ed and the military must collaborate (opinion)

With their challenges well aligned, higher ed and the military should work together to reduce the opportunity costs of volunteering for military service, Mike Haynie writes.
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At the same time, even a sympathetic critique of the degree to which America’s best colleges and universities have meaningfully engaged the post–Sept. 11 generation of military-connected students would suggest indifference at best. At worst, that critique would describe an implicit rejection of any responsibility to contribute to enacting the promise of the GI Bill. For more than 10 years Wick Sloane has conducted an annual survey for Inside Higher Ed focused on capturing the extent to which the nation’s selective colleges and universities engage and enroll veterans. He declared his 2021 survey “a disaster,” noting that “the undergraduate veteran enrollment remains stalled at near zero.” His 2022 survey found some progress, even as many selective institutions remained inattentive to the issue.

“All I want,” Sloane wrote, “is for the self-proclaimed top colleges and universities in the world to educate graduates who can solve problems without sending other people’s children to war.”
 
breakingdefense.com

Marines teaming with Army on 3-year software factory pilot - Breaking Defense

“The Marine Corps Software Factory is about outcomes, creating advantage for Marines at the tactical edge, today,” Deputy Commandant for Information Lt. Gen. Matthew Glavy, said. “The MCSWF will provide viable capabilities to enhance mission readiness through the power of information.”
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