Army Contracting Command awarded Knight's Armament Co. from Titusville, Florida a $21,252,597 firm-fixed-price contract for production and delivery of the M110 SASS to be supplied to Ukraine. An estimated completion date for the contract is January 30, 2027.
The most interesting thing in this story is that, according to the Pentagon, the funding is being provided by the Ukraine Security Initiative/Building Partner Capacity funds, which were allocated back in 2024. That is, Ukraine is actually implementing the long-announced military aid package.
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This is a good reminder that sum in $7.7 billion in weapons purchases for Ukraine that have been announced but not yet contracted with manufacturers is still frozen. It seems that the U.S. has slowly begun to rectify this situation, but this will still delay the arrival of the necessary weapons to the front of the russia-Ukraine war.
The M110 SASS is a 7.62x51 mm semi-automatic sniper rifle developed by Knight's Armament Company based on the SR-25 designated marksman rifle, which is derived from the AR-10. This rifle has been in service with the U.S. Army since 2008.
In April 2008, U.S. Army soldiers from Task Force Fury in Afghanistan were the first in a combat zone to receive the M110. The troops rated the weapon very highly, noting the quality of the weapon and its semi-automatic capabilities compared to the bolt-action M24.
The weapon is based on a 20-inch Chromoly 5R Cut rifled barrel and uses an ambidextrous control system. The latter means symmetrical, or reconfigurable, controls that provide equal opportunities for use by both left and right hands.
The rifle uses an XM151 (Leupold Mark 4 3.5-10X LR/T) optical sight, which has a variable magnification of 3.5-10 times. It can also be equipped with a night sight, which is quite convenient and adds versatility.
The M110 SASS rifle is distinguished by its convenience, which is also provided by the wide range of mounting options on the rails, which is good for customization. It is also known that even a quick-change suppressor is included in the kit.
It should be noted that this contract is far from the first appearance of the M110 in Ukraine. This rifle was noticed in service with individual units of the Defense Forces of Ukraine back in 2022. Usually it was noticed in the hands of fighters of the Special Operations Forces, the Defense Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine as well as the Special Operations Center "A" of the Security Service of Ukraine.
It is unknown whether these supplies were part of military assistance from foreign countries, or assistance from volunteer funds, or were independently purchased by the units. It was estimated that this was a fairly small quantity, so the new supply from the U.S. could really strengthen the capabilities of Ukrainian snipers, who highly appreciated the M110 SASS.
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