United States Department of Defense - M249 Squad Automatic Weapon

The M249 Squad Automatic Weapon (M249 SAW) is the United States military designation for a sub-family of the FN MINIMI squad automatic weapon (from Mini-mitrailleuse French: "mini-machine gun". Both are 5.56x45mm NATO light machine guns manufactured by Fabrique Nationale (FN) and its subsidiaries.

The MINIMI is manufactured by Fabrique Nationale in Belgium, while the M249 is made by FNH USA, the American subsidiary of FN. The M249 was the winner of a competition carried out by the U.S. military in the late 1970s–early 1980s for a new squad automatic weapon. The MINIMI has been adopted by many other countries since that time, especially among NATO members.

The M249 was one of many firearms fielded in the late 1970s, 1980s and 1990s that was part of the NATO adoption of a new smaller round. The Belgian cartridge (SS109), developed for use with the MINIMI, was the winner of the competition for the new, standardized 5.56 mm round. In the United States, the M16A2 was adopted following the M249 as part of the move to this compatible, although different, round — firearms intended to fire the SS109 cartridge use a different rifling twist rate (1:7 inches) from the previous U.S. standard M193 5.56 mm cartridge.

The MINIMI and the M249 are not exactly the same weapon — they weigh different amounts and have slightly different configurations; M249 variants can differ significantly. Although officially adopted in the early 1980s, some early production problems delayed full deployment until the turn of the decade. One thousand MINIMIs were purchased directly from FN for the Gulf War in 1991, as there were not enough M249 yet in service at the time. The M249 has undergone a number of variant and improvement programs, though it is scheduled to be replaced by a new lightweight machine gun — the AAI LMGA (2004 contract). In early 2005, U.S. Army ARDEC issued a solicitation for a new light machine gun; however, no selection was ever made. A possible replacement for the M249 is the LWRC Infantry Automatic Rifle, it has the mobility of the M4 but with the same firepower of the M249 SAW.