Replies

“It’s hard for me to find any serious faults with the 30/06. It’s heavy and has a bit of recoil. That’s about it IMO. I like 308 win for most applications but, the fact remains, anything the .308 can do, the 30/06 can do a little bit better. ...”

Each nation cooked up its own bore diameter and cartridge design preferences in the period 1888-1903; tiny differences in size and shape were closely guarded military secrets but it is impossible in retrospect to assign clear advantages to one over another. None are “inherently” more accurate, more reliable, nor more effective than any other. National pride?

In the realm of sporting cartridges, the 30-06 has the edge over the 308 in capability to fire the heavier bullets, up to 220 gr weight. The 308 is generally recognized to top out with 180 gr bullets; beyond that weight, the bullet’s rear portion begins to intrude on the propellant charge space, limiting powder capacity.

It’s said that the 308 enjoys an edge in accuracy. My own experiments tend to confirm this; when I installed a 7.62x51 chamber sleeve in a very old, very rough, very tired 1917 Enfield, group size shrank by 50 percent at 50m, the only range I tested.

The late Jeff Cooper, USMC reservist, gun writer, tactical innovator, and sniper wannabe, asserted on paper in the early 1980s that the 30-06 was “15 percent better all around” than the 308. Very feasible when it comes to sporting rounds, but the military ammunition situation was an entirely different story.

Immediately after NATO was formed in 1949, all WWII combatant nations were still looking for more modern weapons and cartridges to issue to their ground forces. Many favored the approach the Nazis had taken nearly 20 years earlier: a cartridge of the same bore diameter and head size as the prior-standard “full power” round, with 1/3 less bullet weight, and a cartridge case just over half as long.

Everyone wanted a rifle-size arm (11 pounds or lighter, 40 inches or shorter) with a large capacity (20 rds plus) magazine, capable of full auto fire at need. During WWII istelf, demands from US front line forces (PAC theater especially) grew very loud for a rifle shorter than the M1 and lighter than the BAR, with a 20-shot magazine and full auto capability. Ordnance Corps designers made up several test pieces, but were still struggling when peace broke out in 1945.

The UK was notable in looking at smaller bullet diameters, but the US - then the biggest big dog in the Free World - insisted on 7.62mm, and a cartridge case just 1/2 inch (12.7mm) shorter than the admittedly admirable 30-06. MIL STD 7.62x51mm loads use a very slightly lighter bullet (officially 147-149 gr, most 7.62 NATO bullets tip scales at 145-144 gr, all boat tail) than the 30M2 (then still the current 30-06 rifle round, 152-153 gr flat base), but both at a muzzle velocity of 2750 ft/sec.

So the 7.62 NATO was still a “full power” cartridge; its size, weight, and energy pushed most early auto rifle designs to the very limit. The CETME 58, HK G3, and FAL all began as rifles sized to the 7.92x33 Kurz of StG44 infamy; when uprated to handle 7.62 NATO, all are strong and durable enough, but are gruesomely heavy, clunky in handling, and only marginally capable in full auto. Beretta’s BM59 - an M1 development - was the only rifle to deal with the handling headaches, thanks chiefly to the shorter 7.62 NATO cartridge and a much shorter barrel. It’s brawny but still quite heavy, muzzle blast from the stubby barrel is truly exciting, and full-auto fire is still pretty marginal.

Bumbling about longer than any other nation, the US Ordnance establishment was nevertheless unable to come up with anything more imaginative than the M14: a “product-improved” M1 tipping the scales at 11 pounds loaded, yet a little longer than the M1 despite a shorter barrel, and a shorter action made possible by the new shorter-than-30-06 cartridge. It never really measured up as a full-auto arm, and the weight limit was beaten (barely) by paring down the dimensions of many other components, to the point where it seems a little too spindly and fragile to some users. The wishes of the front-line forces of 1943-45 never came to much.

The half-inch shorter cartridge case of the 7.62 NATO compared to the 30-06 matters little to the average sporting rifle shooter, but it made entire universes of difference in the domain of military armaments: rifles and machine guns could all be made shorter, and lighter. Very, very important in cost and soldier battle loadouts - with no loss of effectiveness.

The 7.62 NATO round is great but I can still find no fault with the 30/06 other than the fact that it is slightly heavier and has slightly more recoil. Neither of those are an issue to me. In terms of advantage versus disadvantage: the ability to shoot the heavier bullets gives it an advantage; the extra case capacity gives it an advantage; the ability to stick a chamber insert into a 30/06 chamber and shoot the NATO round out of a 30/06 rifle gives it a big advantage in terms of ammo availability; the designation as a hunting round also gives it an advantage as far as ammo availability goes. There was no .308 win or components to be found anywhere during the recent panic but the hunting rounds could still be obtained which has me thinking that we need more AR10s/15s chambered in calibers like .243, 270, 22-250,25/06, 30/06, and 300 win mag for example.

I have shot plenty of 30/06 bullets. I have never noticed it to be inherently inaccurate. Same for the .308 win of course.