Aim, Illuminate, Fire – MFALS Deliveries to US Troops Continue

The U.S. Army Research, Development, and Engineering Command at Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD has issued $1.37 billion in contracts for Multi-Functioning Aiming Laser Systems. What’s that, you ask? It’s a dual-use ‘flashlight’/ laser pointer that can make “point and shoot” more of a standardized reality, especially in the close-quarters battles that often characterize the Global War on Terror. A few years ago, Laser Devices, Inc. notes that the U.S. Naval Surface Warfare Center and the U.S. Army Special Operations Command conducted a joint Operational Test on the effectiveness of visible laser aiming systems in low light and night-time environments. The results were eye-opening. Representatives from the Army, Navy and Air Force Special Operations units evaluated laser aiming systems with the stated goal of determining the versatility and possible increases in operational shooting effectiveness in Close Quarter Battle (“CQB”) conditions to 300 meters. Conducted on the M-4 rifle (modern M-16 variant), the tests indicated that: * The increase in operational effectiveness of military personnel using a visible laser mounted on a carbine over and above the use of a baseline iron sights with a flashlight [DID: attached to the gun, not held in the hand) was over 43% on average using […]