Before the new year is upon us, here’s one more anniversary to note for 2006. </O:p Centenary of the .30-'06 Springfield Cartridge <O:p</O:p <O:p</O:p By Massad Ayoob <O:p</O:p <O:p</O:p In the long love affair between <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:pAmerica</ST1:p</st1:country-region> and the rifle, there has never been an interlude quite as intensive as the epoch of the .30-‘06. This cartridge celebrates its 100th anniversary in 2006. It is still going strong, a favorite of hunters and shooters. It was the primary military small-arm caliber of the United States Army for more than half a century. The Speer Reloading Manual noted many years ago, “No other smokeless powder rifle cartridge has achieved the popularity and wide use of the .30-‘06. It has been used with great success by big game hunters and target shooters for almost three quarters of a century. The <st1:country-region>U.S.</st1:country-region> and many other nations have used it as a standard rifle and machine gun cartridge.” <O:p</O:p Designed with a view to replacing the Krag rifle and its .30-40 round after the Spanish-American War, this cartridge actually began as the .30-‘03, with a 220-grain bullet loaded to a velocity of 2300 feet per second. New developments in European small arms and ballistics, however, quickly convinced the <st1:country-region>U.S.</st1:country-region> military’s ordnance experts to go to a lighter, faster bullet, loaded into a slightly shorter cartridge case. The new round was accordingly tweaked, and the result was the .30 caliber <st1:country-region>U.S.</st1:country-region> cartridge, Model of 1906. It had been designed for the <st1:City><ST1:pSpringfield</ST1:place</st1:City> bolt-action military rifle of 1903 (thus, the “30-‘03” designation for its original cartridge)</O:p This was the cartridge that <st1:country-region>America</st1:country-region> brought to World War I, the Springfield rifle augmented with the <st1:City>Enfield</st1:City> 1917 model. Both were rugged bolt-action guns that could quickly be reloaded through the top of their mechanism with five-round “stripper clips.” The same cartridge would be used for the magnificent BAR, the Browning Automatic Rifle, which hit the field at the very end of WWI and did noble service for the <st1:country-region>United States</st1:country-region> in the Second World War. Alongside the BAR in the Pacific and European Theaters alike was the fabulous M1 Garand, an eight-shot semiautomatic rifle, which gave American infantry a deadly edge against the slower bolt-action Mausers of the Germans and Arisakas of the Japanese. The .30-‘06 would march through Korea, too, as the standard U.S. cartridge, before giving way in the late 1950s to the M14 rifle and its 7.62mm NATO round, which in essence was simply a shortened .30-’06. The commercial designation of the 7.62mm NATO military round is the .308 W<st1:City>inchester</st1:City>. The .30-‘06 round was in service as late as the Vietnam war. Carlos Hathcock, the famously Marine sniper, used .30-‘06 there before being forced to switch to a .308.<O:p</O:p Though the M1 Garand and the BAR are now relegated to the museums as far as the U.S. military is concerned, back on the home front the .30-‘06 remains the most widely used sporting cartridge in the country. <O:p</O:p JT
Yes, the .30-06 is certainly emblematic of American firearms. It has brought many a deer and enemy soldier to his last account. When I see Captain Hook at Disney World this year, the .30-06 will be my advice to him in getting rid of Peter Pan!
