The market here doesn't always make sense. If one could boil down the available rounds to only those that provided a range of useful calibers, we'd have two things here: probably less than 10 cartridges available and a lot of angry gun people. Really, the 7.62x39 makes very little sense for any kind of American shooting, but an awful lot of it is sold.I personally do not see the point of this caliber. For Varmint shooting, shooters are already spoilt for choice. With everything ranging from 17 HMR through to .50 BMG dependent on how deep your pockets are, and what your aspirations are.
New cartridges are introduced by gunmakers just like new models of cars are introduced by carmakers to gin up interest in their products. It's not necessarily rational, but it is very rational to the folks who are selling stuff.
Over here, the .22 Hornet keeps on selling year after year. People like the idea of a lightly powered round that can be chambered in a light, handy gun similar to a .22 LR, but with much more power.
I can't defend the logic or the need of such a round, but only say that it could have market potential in the right circumstances.
-- Sat Sep 05, 2009 10:23 --
I would also note that the comments about the quality of ammo are spot-on. Any market here based on surplus ammo would certainly depend on the ammo being of reasonable quality, and earlier "episodes" with IOF wouldn't be a selling point.