7.62×51mm NATO

The 7.62×51mm NATO (official NATO nomenclature 7.62 NATO) is a rimless, bottlenecked rifle cartridge. It is a standard for small arms among NATO countries.

First developed in the 1950s, the cartridge had first been introduced in U.S. service for the M14 rifle and M60 machine gun. Many other firearms that use the 7.62×51mm NATO remain in service today, especially various designated marksman rifles/sniper rifles and medium machine guns/general-purpose machine guns (i.e. M24 Sniper Rifle and M240 Medium Machine Gun). The cartridge is used by military personnel, on mounted and crew-served weapons that are mounted to vehicles, aircraft, and ships.