October 2017 – SOC Adopts 6.5 Creedmoor to Replace 7.62 x 51mm Nato in Semi Auto Sniper Rifles

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At New Hampshire Rifleman we have written over 30 articles since April of 2015, extolling the virtues of the 6.5 Creedmoor as both a world class hunting cartridge and a competitive long range target cartridge that is great on barrel life, less recoil, more accurate and delivers deep often full penetration on big game with Sectional Densities of .280 and .290 at long ranges of 600 yards and over. It crosses the CXP2 and CXP3 boundary for game classification it can handle. I am going to hunt Texas Whitetails (CXP2) with it next week in a Weatherby Vanguard topped with a Leupold VX-6 3x18x44mm with Nosler AB’s.

Guess the Military looked at the Creedmoor too!

Late this past year US Special Operations Command tested the 7.62 Nato Round against the 6.5 Creedmoor and the.260 Remington. Both the .260 Remington(6.5mm) and the 6.5 Creedmoor outshot the 7.62 Nato round. SoCOMM determined that the 6.5 Creedmoor shot the best according to Wikipedia below.

See Wikipedia article. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/6.5mm_Creedmoor

“Military use[edit]

“In October 2017, U.S. Special Operations Command tested the performance of 7.62×51mm NATO, .260 Remington, and 6.5mm Creedmoor cartridges out of SR-25, M110A1, and Mk 20 sniper rifles. SOCOM determined that 6.5 Creedmoor performed the best, doubling hit probability at 1,000 m (1,094 yd), increasing effective range by nearly half, reducing wind drift by a third and having less recoil than 7.62×51mm NATO rounds. Tests showed the .260 Remington and 6.5mm Creedmoor cartridges were similarly accurate and reliable and the external ballistic behavior was also very similar. The prevailing attitude is that there was more room with the 6.5mm Creedmoor to further develop projectiles and loads.[27] Because the two cartridges have similar dimensions, the same magazines can be used and a rifle can be converted with a barrel change. This led to its adoption and fielding by special operations snipers to replace the 7.62×51mm NATO cartridge in their semi-automatic sniper rifles, planned in early 2019. In response to SOCOM’s adoption, the Department of Homeland Security also decided to adopt the round.”

End Quote

But we hunters discovered that a while back.

Good Hunting!

 

This entry was posted in Big Game Hunting, Hunting thoughts, Rifle Tests by Ed Hale. Bookmark the permalink.

About Ed Hale

I am an avid hunter with rifle and Bow and have been hunting for more than 50 years. I have taken big game such as whitetail deer, red deer, elk, Moose and African Plains game such as Kudu, Gemsbok, Springbok, Blesbok, and Impala and wrote an ebook entitled African Safari -Rifle and Bow and Arrow on how to prepare for a first safari. Ed is a serious cartridge reloader and ballistics student. He has earned two degrees in science and has written hundreds of outdoor article on hunting with both bow and rifle.