Mountain Doctor, we no longer produce steel in any volume. During the 1970s and 1980s the governments of Japan and South Korea massively subsidized their steel industries, thereby underpricing American steel and putting our foundries out of business. They also did the same thing in the ship building industry.

Here is a reality check for everyone. There will be NO replacement for the M4/M16A2 family of weapons in the foreseeable future. Depending how this election goes, there is an excellent possibility that the DoD will be facing massive budget cuts to pay for more financial bailouts, "free" health care, more government bureaucracies, etc..... If the generals and admirals have any money left in the Defense budget, it will go to strategic weapon development, not a new battle rifle. In the eyes of the the Pentagon's higher hierarchy (both military and civilian), the M16A2/M4s are "good enough for government work". Specialized units may get better small arms, but that will be a drop in the bucket.
Look at American history. The Great Depression put the brakes on American small arms procurement for over a decade. The M1 Garand was developed over a ten year time span (1926 - 1936), and although it was formally adopted in '36 the Marines still carrying M1903 Spgflds on Guadalcanal in late 1942. The M16 is the M1903 of the 21 Century....good enough until the USA faces a fight for it's national survival.

In my years in the military I have seen one M16 replacement after another appear with much fanfare, only to quietly disappear down the "memory hole". Starting in the mid-1980s different assault rifle prototypes were written up in glowing terms in publications like Army Times, Soldier Magazine, Popular Mechanics, American Rifleman, etc... I remember a HK assault rifle that fired caseless ammo. Then there was a modular weapon prototype that could be transformed from an assault rifle to a light machine gun, to a smg, or to a sniper rifle by swapping out components. Back around 2002 there was the "Land Warrior" contraption with video cameras, thermal sights, and every other gimmick that was supposed to be the future of small arms. I also remember an assault rifle that had a semiautomatic magazine fed rifle grenade barrel slung under the rifle barrel (it was 20mm IIRC). The reality was that I qualified in basic with a M16A1, and finished my career twenty years later carrying a M16A2.

I read an article in the latest Army Times about the new replacement for the M249 SAW. That is a good thing because I was never impressed with the durability or reliability of the old squad automatic weapon. IMO the parts were too small and fragile....FN downscaled the parts too much from their 7.62Nato squad weapons. The replacement of the SAW reminds me of the replacement of the ragged out old M60mg with the FN M240B......a change that was long needed.