Poland has finally retired its AK platform. For quite some time, it had one of the best, if not the best, AKs in 5.56. Hell, with an adapter, it even took STANAG magazines. With the retirement of the Beryl, the Polish military is moving to a more modern platform known as the FB MSBS Grot. I speak Polish as well as Portuguese. So, not at all. So I can’t pronounce this, but thank God I can write it: Modułowy System Broni Strzeleckiej.
That stands for Modular Firearm System. Grot was added to memorialize Polish General Stefan “Grot” Rowecki. The firearm was developed by FB Radom, which is in the Polish military arms industry. At its core, it’s a modern firearm system that can be easily modified to fit various mission sets. Like most modern rifles, the MSBS GROT uses a short-stroke gas piston system lifted from the AR-18.
Since Poland is a NATO member, the rifle predictably comes in 5.56 mm, but the Polish also produced a 7.62x39mm variant.
What Makes the MSBS Different?
You could take a cursory look at the MSBS system and think it’s a fairly plain rifle. There is nothing spectacular about it. It looks cool but has a modular feature that most guns would never dream of. As far as I can tell, the MSBS Grot is the only modern military rifle designed to be easily alternated between a standard and a bullpup format.
Much like the SCAR, the BREN, and various other AR-18-derived guns, the upper is the serialized portion. With the MSBS, the user can remove the upper and swap it for a bullpup lower to make it a bit more compact. The MSBS Grot C FB-M2 is the standard series assault rifle with a standard layout.
A user can easily remove the upper and drop it onto the MSBS Grot B, a bullpup or bezkolbowy format. From a military perspective, this design can be useful. Your normal infantry and general-purpose troops can use the standard-format rifle and all its benefits.
The bullpup format would be quite handy when we get to mechanized infantry, armor units, and even pilots. It’s largely the same rifle, but drastically different formats. It bears mentioning that I can’t find an example of the Polish Armed Forces doing that. The Polish sell the rifle, so it might be an option for export sales.
Speaking of which, the Poles have donated 10,000 rifles to Ukraine and sold them in Rwanda. According to one interview with an employee of FB Radom, the USSOCOM purchased an unknown quantity. They won’t say how many or why, but the Green Beret weapons sergeant course is probably fun.
Besides Bullpup
Besides being able to convert to and from a bullpup format, the MSBS Grot is a fairly standard modern assault rifle. It is a selective-fire design with a 700-900 rounds per minute rate of fire. The barrel lengths vary quite a bit, and models with barrels as long as 20 inches and as short as 10 inches are in production.
The MSBS uses fully ambidextrous controls. The standard model has a folding and collapsing stock. The gun has a SCAR-like cheek riser for optics. The handguard has a bevy of M-LOK slots for accessory mounting and a long optics rail across the top of the gun that’s part of the monolithic top rail.
The controls on the lower receiver are very AR-like, with a top-mounted charging handle. Overall, there is nothing truly new, but it’s a thoroughly modern rifle. This rifle series is a family of firearms that fulfill multiple roles.
The MSBS Family
The MSBS is a family of weapons. Let’s briefly dig into each of these guns.
Assault Rifle – The standard assault rifle with a 16-inch barrel that can carry an optional 40mm grenade launcher.
Carbine – The carbine variant doesn’t play games with keeping things short. It has a ten-inch barrel and can also be fitted with a 40mm grenade launcher.
DMR – A designated marksman rifle fit with a precision-oriented 16 or 20-inch barrel and two-stage trigger group.
Automatic Rifle – An automatic rifle variant is also designed for squad suppression capabilities. It has a heavier barrel and flash hider with the bayonet lug removed.
Sniper Rifle – The Grot 762N is a semi-auto-only sniper variant that chambers the 7.62 NATO cartridge. It has either a 16- or 20-inch barrel and a two-stage trigger.
The S – The S is a semi-auto only model designed for civilian sales of the rifle. Maybe one day we’ll see one in the United States.
The Polish Paper Puncher
The MSBS Grot is a seemingly awesome rifle series. It’s tough to say if it is as reliable and accurate as it should be, but if so, the Polish have a very modern and capable rifle. It’s replacing one of the most legendary systems out there, so it has a big expectation to live up to. I hope we get our hands on a variant of the MSBS Grot one day.
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