Mambo Italiano

After seeing this gun posted at The Firearm Blog, I rushed to contact Beretta to find out more about it. Thankfully, Beretta was very helpful filling in some details about this very cool looking firearm.

Vice President of Tactical Product Development Gabriele de Plano was kind enough to spend a good deal of time on the phone with me. He let me know that the rifle’s name is actually the ARX 160, not NRX as reported (UPDATE: An easy mistake to make based on this photo, and one I probably would have made too!). It is Beretta’s entry into the Italian Army’s Soldato Futuro (Future Soldier) program, and has been delivered to Italy’s Special Forces for testing. Chambered in 5.56x45 NATO, the company hopes to include larger-caliber offerings in the future. The rifle accepts STANAG magazines, though de Plano said polymer mags might not function as well as steel. To remedy this relatively common issue, Beretta is working with polymer magazine manufacturers to design mags that work flawlessly with the ARX 160.

The gun has some unique features, including quick, tool-free barrel takedown; just operate two levers, and the barrel assembly comes free of the action with the gas system attached. This makes the rifle easy to configure to almost any mission by quickly swapping a longer barrel for a close-quarters-length pipe. It also has 100 percent tool-free disassembly to the field strip level, including a lack of pins or screws to lose in the field (if you’ve ever misplaced your AR’s firing pin retaining pin, you know what an awesome feature this is).

With reversible controls, the gun is ambidextrous, but more importantly, users can switch ejection direction using a round of ammo to slide the port from side to side. Beyond allowing lefties to avoid getting hit in the face with hot brass, this enables operators to fire around corners using visor-mounted cameras as aiming devices without getting burned.

Beretta’s GLX 160 grenade launcher mounts to the integral handguard rail, furthering the gun’s utility for multiple missions. De Plano also mentioned that the gun shown at the AUSA convention (where The Firearm Blog’s photos were taken, I believe) is an early prototype and the rifles currently in testing have a more finished look, including texturing and other improvements.

Currently, the gun is only available in select-fire mode, so civilians can’t get their hands on one just yet. Hopefully, Beretta will have success with the ARX 160 in the military and law enforcement market so they can work on a civilian-legal variant for us to try out. Either way, the Italian Special Forces are going to have a real nice standard-issue rifle/carbine in 2009!