I came late to the .308 as a sporting cartridge because I shot up so much of it during my military years (1973-1999). I was a tanker, as in M60A1/M60A3/M1A1 and each of those tanks had a couple of 7.62 machine guns. We counted those rounds in belts, not individual cartridges and I'd suspect that over my career I fired several tons of linked 7.62 through my machine guns. It's a great light machine gun cartridge. Easily transported, the guns run fairly good, and it's lethal out to the end of its ballistic range. We got tracer burnout at about 800 meters and as long as we could see the tracers we knew that the bullets were having good effect.
But, because I fired so damned much of it in my career I came late to it as a sporting cartridge. I wanted to play with some of the others, like the .243, or the .30-06, or the .25-06 (which is a hell of a cartridge in it's own right). But, the .308, I never could feel much love for. It was like kissing your sister. Affection, yeah, but no passion.
Until I stumbled into a smoking-hot deal on a pawnshop .308. I bought dies and bullets and started tinkering with it on a one cartridge basis. Imagine, shooting single cartridges, and not running it by the belt? It's accurate, good power, doesn't beat you up with recoil. Did I mention accurate? Now I've got four .308 rifles and it's one of my go-to cartridges for the deer woods. Our season starts Saturday, and I'll be packing a Savage 11 in .308. Nothing special, just a deer rifle.
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Originally Posted by FairWarning
The hopelessly outdated .50 BMG is still alive and kicking
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Any soldier that doesn't love the Ma Deuce has never cradled the butterfly in his hands. When I didn't need the main gun, I went at it with the .50. That's one hell of a machine gun, and one hell of a cartridge.
But, to answer your question, the 7.62/.308 ain't going away. It fulfills a readily identified need for combat troops. It's one hell of a light machine gun cartridge and beloved of many countries.