What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project S54 of PE 0603827A. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
Will continue to assess advanced machine gun technologies, hardware and prototypes developed under previous efforts. Will continue to pilot and employ market research, acquire and further develop prototype hardware, and conduct evaluations for novel technologies and/or weapon systems that will apply to emerging future medium machine gun and precision grenadier system requirements. Technologies to address these capability needs may include, but are not limited to, counter unmanned aerial systems, counter-defilade systems, point area targets, recoil mitigation, thermal development, alternative materials and manufacturing techniques to reduce weight, barrel technologies, signature mitigation technologies, as well as mounting and fire control interfaces. Development of key technologies for the Precision Grenadier System program of record necessary to system integration will continue. Precision Grenadier System program will emphasize the maturation of contractor-developed Precision Grenadier System solutions in preparation for USG testing. Key efforts will include the research and development, along with integration of critical technologies related to weapon, family of ammunition, and fire control system. Additionally, the program will focus on the manufacturing of initial prototype systems and conducting comprehensive testing to validate the performance of these Precision Grenadier System solutions ahead of formal USG evaluation.
FY 2027 funding increase due to efforts aimed at progressing the development and prototyping for new weapons system frameworks emerging from precision grenadier system and counter unmanned aerial system capabilities.
FY2025–FY2026: what came before
Prior-year accomplishments and current-year plans from the same exhibit. Context for the FY2027 plan, not a series — an activity partitions its project exactly in the request year, but can under-cover it in earlier years.
Will continue to assess advanced machine gun technologies, hardware and prototypes developed under previous efforts. Will continue to conduct market research for novel technologies and/or weapon systems that will apply to emerging future medium machine gun and precision grenadier system requirements which include counter unmanned aerial system capabilities. Will acquire and develop prototype hardware and continue to conduct evaluations, trade studies, and assessments for new weapon and counter-defilade technologies to address capability needs. These technologies may include, but are not limited to, counter unmanned aerial system, recoil mitigation, thermal development, alternative lightweight materials, barrel technologies, signature mitigation technologies, mounting and fire control interfaces. Will assess technologies with counter unmanned aerial system (CUAS) functionalities and prototypes that provide direct fire capability to defeat defilade and point area targets while reducing collateral damage. Will continue to conduct market research for technologies and/or weapon systems that meet the emerging requirements.
Assessed advanced machine gun technologies, hardware and prototypes developed under previous efforts. Continued to conduct market research for novel technologies and/or weapon systems that could draft future medium machine gun requirements. Conducted efforts toward acquiring and developing prototype hardware for test and experimentation against emerging future medium machine gun and precision grenadier system requirements which include counter unmanned aerial system (C-UAS) capabilities. Continued to conduct evaluations, trade studies, and assessments for new machine gun and grenadier technologies to address capability needs. These technologies included, but were not limited to, recoil mitigation, alternative lightweight materials, barrel technologies, suppressor technologies, mounting and fire control interfaces. Completed efforts to increase competition among industry partners viable to compete in the Precision Grenadier System program of record through maturing key technologies necessary to system integration. New weapons and enabling technology evaluation and assessments: Continued to perform initial and follow-on evaluations, assessments, and integration of new weapon systems to include various new weapon system platforms. Assessed technologies associated with capability to defeat personnel in defilade, personnel in close quarters, and unmanned aerial systems.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2025 | Actual | 5.4 |
| FY2026 | Enacted | 16.3 |
| FY2027 | Request | 30.2 |
This activity is 96% of project S54's FY2027 request and 54% of PE 0603827A's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
5 activities in project S54
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the project page.