Glock Lodges Protest Over Army’s New Gun

We reported a month ago that the Army announced that Sig Sauer would be its replacement gun maker. We also predicted that Glock would not be happy about the decision. The Army announced in January that it would replace the M9 Beretta, its soldiers’ sidearm for more than 30 years, with a modified Sig Sauer P320.

Unsurprisingly perhaps, Glock filed a formal protest with the U.S. Government Accountability Office on February 24. The protest puts on hold the Army’s plans to test its XM17 Handgun System. They can’t proceed with testing until the protest is resolved. The GAO is the independent, non-partisan “Watchdog” agency that investigates how the federal government spends taxpayer dollars.

The contract was worth a heck of a lot of money–$580 million–so what company wouldn’t want to protest that money being taken out of its pocket? Still, Sig Sauer won the contract an Glock didn’t. Let the testing go on so the soldiers can get a new gun, which is long overdue. The Army has until June 5 to respond to Glock’s complaint, according to the GAO website.