Warner Swazey M1903
Winchester A5 1903
Unertl 8X M1903
Winchester M70/Unertl 8X M1903
Dont just limit your self to new technology.
I am sure
@cplnorton knows others I missed.
1909 The first Warner Swaseys enter the Corps
-1911/12 The Marines trial some WRA A5's and steven's scopes. But never choose to accept the scopes.
- spring 1917 Niedner mounted 150 scopes on M1903's. The identify of the scopes is never confirmed, but it had to be either A5's, or Steven's scopes. Both are very possible. I actually could almost make a more compelling argument they were Steven's scopes, but it's impossible to say for sure either way. But anyways Niedner was fired after only completing 150 rifles.
-Summer 1917 After Niedner is fired, Winchester mounts 500 scopes on M1903 rifles. These shipped to France. They were A5 scopes that used a WRA mount, that WRA called the "Springfield Marine." This is not the Mann Niedner conversion we all know about. These rifles are not in the books, which is sort of funny because the Army had these sniper rifles as well. In fact these should be the most famous sniper rifle of the war, yet few know about them unless they have seen the research I've posted on them, or see what I put on Tim's website.
-1918 The Marine Philly Depot starts to mount their own scopes in house at Philly with A5's they bought loose off WRA. These use the Mann Niedner design that Niedner probably showed them how to do in 1917. But the Mann Niender as it's often called conversion, was done in house by the Marines at the Depot.
-the Marines bought some Fecker scopes about 1923 for the rifle team rifles. They were not snipers. In fact really after about 1919/20, the sniper rifles for the Marines were mostly in storage in between the wars and the only scopes they used were for the rifle teams.
-late 1930's, they bought a handful of some lyman targetspots for rifle team rifles.
-1940, the Marines bought a handful of the most common commercial scopes to use for the sniper trials. The Lyman 5A, the Weaver 330/440, the Noeske, the Unertl, etc... They choose the Unertl 8X.
-Note I did not list the lyman 5A as a sniper scope as books detail. This is incorrect. The Marines bought like 5 of them for sniper trials. But they used the term lyman 5A to describe the WRA A5 scope as well. So it's because the MArines incorrectly called the WRA A5 scopes the lyman 5A, or more correctly the guy typing up some repots did, it has caused a lot of confusion for prior authors. But its' quite clear the Marines did not use the lyman 5A at all past the trial scopes.
-1941/42 The Marines make some Mann Niedners for training, and build some for the Navy for minesweepers. Books don't detail this either. There are WWI Mann Niedner snipers, and there are WWII built Mann Niedner snipers. The Unertl snipers were not the only Marine sniper in WWII.
-Jan 1943, the Unertl Snipers start to be made. For sure 250 were built, and that very well might be all that were made.
-1943/44 The Marines acquire limited numbers of the 1903A4 off the Army and field them. But not many came in before the whole sniper program was cancelled in Feb 1944.
-Nov 1950, the Marines adopt the M1C sniper over the Unertl
-1951/1952 the Marines decide to get rid of the M81/82 scope on the M1C. They conduct trials and choose the Kollmorgen scope, but it seems very few scopes arrive before Korea ends. There is no evidence any ever reached Korea.
- 1953 to 1962 the M1952 sniper which was a M1C rifle with a Kollmorgen 4X scope was the sniper, but these sat in storage for the most part as there wasn't a sniper school to train snipers. So no one really knew how to use them.
-1962/63 the Marines decide to get rid of the M1952 sniper. There is a few mentions of the M1D about this time, but these seem to be extremely rare.
-1965 the Marines decide to start sniper schools again and order some M1D's off the Army and take some Model 70's from the Quantico rifle range and put some leftover Unertl 8X scopes from WWII on them, and ship them to Vietnam
-1966/67 The Remington 700 was chosen in the sniper trials as the Marines were converting over to 7.62 mm and wanted to get rid of all the 30:06 snipers. So the 700 was named the M40 and started to arrive in Country in 1967
- From 1967 I see only the M40. I don't hardly see any mentions at all on the M14 as a sniper rifle. It seems the Army was much more fixated on the M14 from the beginning, where the Marines wanted a bolt action rifle sniper.
- 1971 the Marines want to modify the M40. Basically all the shortcomings of the rifle were exposed in the jungle and the Marine's as early 1971 detail all the mods they want, which all the mods they want, are what you see on the M40A1. The Marines identified all the M40a1 revisions as early as 1971.
From then on, other's would be far better than me to detail. The New stuff I don't know much on.