The KAC MRE didn't come out until well after the war in Yugoslavia. Maybe there were some MRE's prototyped during that time, but the rifle free-float tubes on R0727's pre-dates the M4A1. Those people have very well-sourced engineers and top-notch gunsmiths who are basically like Q when it comes to these things.

With a full coverage tube with a front sight pocket, including forward of the FSB, you can drop the gas tube down in there, then push it into place from the inside of the upper if necessary. You can also rotate the tube slightly on the threads once the FSB is already pinned, to give yourself access to the gas tube roll pin, then tighten the tube into its final top dead center index. It is really sick-looking with a reflex suppressor. The first one I saw was in a personal photo in a sniper section, along with a bunch of other 727's and a few SR25's. I suspect the photo was from around 1992. The guy it belonged to was in Super 61 on Oct. 3rd, when it went down, and he stated that they had actually received some of the first few M4A1's either just before or while they were in Mogadishu, and had pictures of those as well on the tarmac before kickoff of the infamous raid.

The R0727 mods were what I suspect to be one of the driving forces in the development of the KAC RAS, since the tubes had small sections of Weaver rail drilled and tapped for mounting lights, IR pointers, and grips, while the straight tubes with knurling didn't provide enough heat dissipation. The natural progression would be to ventilate a handguard, and provide the rails as part of a ground-up design in a newly-manufactured product.

In my first Scout Platoon in 1995, a guy from 2nd Ranger Battalion had tons of pictures of M4A1's in 2nd Bat they had recently adopted after the whole Mogadishu experience. Ranger Regiment basically looks at the unit they usually support, and adopts their tools, techniques, and procedures to the best of their ability and budget, which is substantial, when compared to conventional units. They got rid of the M16A2 after Somalia, and were using M4A1's with Aimpoints and KAC handguards shortly thereafter. One of the first "conventional" units to get the M4 was F Co, 51st Infantry Long-Range Surveillance at Bragg, and there was a Colt M4 poster floating around the Army at the time advertising the M4 with some LRS guys carrying them through the woods.

M4's had reached 1st Brigade of the 25th Infantry Division by 1997, since that is when my 3rd Scout Platoon there received them, and I think 82nd, 10th Mountain, and 101st had taken delivery of their 1st M4's around the same time. I actually had written numerous suggestions in unit sensing sessions for years suggesting that we adopt 727's for Scouts, Key leaders, RTO's, AG's, Ammo Bearers, M203 gunners, etc. Imagine my surprise when our Company Commander came walking down the street talking with our PL, with a tiny little M4 in his hand. I couldn't believe the Army actually did something that made sense once and for all...

To me, this whole carbine experience in the Military feels like they have been chasing the 605 all along. The new SOPMOD Block II has a lot of carbine uppers with rifle-length float tubes.