Philippine Army Expecting Delivery of Sniper Rifles from Barrett USA

The Philippine Army's commanding general, LGen. Glorioso Miranda, and the Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana recently announced that the Philippine Army will be receiving sniper rifles from US arms manufacturer Barrett.

MaxDefense Philippines readers and community members may have already heard of such acquisition plan before, which is actually called the "Long Range Sniper Rifle" acquisition project which is among those included in the list of projects that replaced the Shore Based Missile System (SBMS) during the time of former Philippine Army and AFP Chief of Staff Gen. Hernando Iriberri (ret.).

It is still unclear which model did the Philippine Army choose to acquire from Barrett, although MaxDefense believes that it could either be the original M82A1 / M107 (top) already in service with the Philippine Army, or the more compact M95 (bottom) in service with the Philippine Marine Corps. Barrett also as a newer version of the M107 called the M107A1 which is lighter and better used with a suppressor.

Quantity & Delivery Date:

Based on our previous blog entry "Philippine Army's Horizon 1 Reprioritized List Explained" dated October 10, 2016, the Philippine Army is to procure 60 Long Range Sniper Rifles with an Approved Budget for Contract (ABC) worth Php 32.822 million.

Also coming from the CGPA and SND's statements, the long range sniper rifles will be arriving by May this year, and MaxDefense believes that units from the Army's Special Operations Command will be receiving these specialized rifles.



Model:

The Philippine Army already operates a number of 50-caliber sniper rifles from Barrett, specifically the M82 anti-materiel sniper rifle, and the addition of 60 more rifles, which MaxDefense is still determining which exact Barrett rifle model, is something to look forward to.

MaxDefense is not yet sure which model was chosen to be acquired by the Philippine Army, but based on Barrett's current line-up and the Philippine Army's own requirements, they could have either picked the M82 / M107 which it currently has, or the compact M95 which the Philippine Marine Corps and the Philippine Air Force's 710th Special Operations Wing uses.

Both the Philippine Marine Corps (above) and Philippine Air Force 710th Special Operations Wing (below) uses the compact Barrett M95 sniper rifle.

It is also highly possible that they picked the newest version of the M82 / M107 called the M107A1, which is lighter than the original model, and is better used with a suppressor. But it would be best to see first from sources what they really got.


Relations to Other Projects:

The Philippine Army and Department of National Defense mentioned before that they are also looking for sniper rifles from Russia and other sources. These projects are separate projects that the Philippine Army will be acquiring as part of the Horizon 2 phase of their Modernization Program. As Defense Sec. Delfin Lorenzana mentioned in his recent statements, the acquisition of sniper rifles will still undergo the usual acquisition progress, including undergoing evaluation and price negotiation, as well as comparing it to other sniper rifle products and offers. This process will take several months, or even a year or more especially if budget approval becomes an issue.

Another project that might be confused with the Long Range Sniper Rifle project is the 7.62mm Designated Marksman Rifle (DMR) project which is also ongoing and among the projects that were given priority in exchange with the SBMS. As previously mentioned in MaxDefense's older blog entries and notes, 832 units will be acquired.


MaxDefense will be updating this blog entry as more information becomes available.


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