The first Estonian sniper rifle built on the M14 was the “TP” – a very poorly done model with a lousy scope, worse mount, and unhelpful stock. These were made in 2000, and in 2008 a new iteration came out. This was the TP2, which now used a B&T mount, standard stock (with cheek riser), and excellent Schmidt & Bender PMII scope. The TP2 was still a rifle limited by the basic capabilities of the M14 platform, but it was far more effective than the original TP. It did see combat use with the Estonian forces deployed to NATO missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, most of Estonia’s M14 rifles have been sent to Ukraine, and the TP2 has been replaced by the R20L; the 7.62x51mm LMT precision rifles Estonia purchased from the United States.
Bolt Action Rifles
Improving Mosins: The Estonian M1935
When Estonia declared independence from Russia in 1918, it had no formal military. After winning a 2-year War of Independence, the nation needed to set up its own armed forces. The rifles available in Estonia […]
Select-fire Rifles
Leaning Westward: Galils for Estonia
When Estonia regained its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, it was initially armed with a wide variety of miscellaneous small arms. They clearly needed a primary standardized rifle for the new armed forces. […]
Semiauto Rifles
Estonian R20L DMR Clone at the Range
Today we are out at the range with a semiauto clone of the Estonian R20L “Rahe” designated marksman’s rifle. These rifles are based on the LMT MARS-H platform, with a few tweaks requested by the […]
The really interesting interview to be had here would be with the presumably unbiased armorers that had the job of keeping these rifles going… And, accurizing them.
When they brought back the M14 for the US Army/Marines during the GWOT, there was still a modicum of institutional knowledge, residual though it may have been. You had guys who knew the system from civilian marksmanship stuff, and a (very) few small arms technicians who’d been around back at the very end of the M14 era. There were also some few parts hanging around out in the hinterlands of the depots and warehouses…
Inside the US system, the M14 had been gone for over a decade when I started my military career. You still had a very few weapons hanging around, mostly as M21 Sniper rifles, and the Marksmanship Training Units had them. What little personal experience and lore there was belonged to the old-timers, and they’d fall into one of two camps: The M14 was either a total POS, or it was the Greatest Thing Evah™. No in-between opinions; any experience I had with them was strictly civilian-based with the M1A rifles that belonged to friends and acquaintances, and those were universally “Meh”. I’ve a friend that must have spent $20,000.00 over the years trying to build himself a match-winning rifle, and the frustrations he went through were instructive to observe.
Never heard anything good from the guys who got issued those things during the GWOT; all of them wound up leaving it behind and taking out M16A2 or M4 carbines on actual missions. The M14 was reduced to doing things like EOD missions, and I don’t think I met anyone who took one out more than a few times for anything other than “Look Cool” effects.
The perspective of the Estonians would be interesting to hear, if only because they came to the rifle unbiased and without any real axe to grind. I mean, yeah, they got gifted the things, but…? How’d they actually feel about them, and what was their experience keeping them running? I can’t imagine that finding parts for them around the Baltic Sea was a walk in the park… Honestly, I think I’d have said “Thanks, but no thanks… We’d really prefer some of that nice Lake City 7.62X39, and maybe you could talk to the Bulgarians about some Arsenal AK variants for us…?”
There have to be some epic stories involved, about how they kept those things running in the absence of any real logistics base. I mean, wow… The problems we had, with full access to the civilian US market for parts, and whatever was left over in the depots? It was like Indiana Jones and the Lost Temple of 7.62, for a lot of the units deploying with the M14 on their books. One of the outfits at Fort Lewis went down to one of the local gunshows with credit cards in hand, and raped the place and any vendor with even vaguely M14-related goods. They were sending guys up to the Navy bases on scrounging missions, just on rumor that the Navy still had stocks of parts and stuff like magazines…