Originally Posted by
Frederick303
Oh, by the way, this is relevant today. there was an article in the infantry magazine a few years ago on the very large difference between US casualties in firefights in Afghanistan and the insurgents. The US forces were suffering such low casualties relative to their foes that it was worth study. The conclusion was the insurgents were depending on the volume of fire of their AKs, putting them on auto and firing off large amounts of cartridges in the general direction of the US forces in said fire fights. They were not aiming. Most of there shots were going high. The US forces were aiming, their task made easier by the fact that the folks firing at them were, by their copious use of cartridges, giving the US infantry nice indications of where they were. the differential in casualties in these fights was something like 12 to 1 in favor of the US forces, in situations were they were outnumbered.
Not to say rapid firing rifles are not an advantage, simply that there is a trade-off in accuracy/aimed fire against volume of fire, volume of fire alone (without accuracy) is not quite what folks make it out to be.
Nothing is new under the sun.