User blog comment:Bovell/Lots of new Battlefield 3 details via Twitter, DreamHack festival, PSM3, and interview/@comment-3362918-20110623173111/@comment-1990578-20110623183241

I'm willing to bet they'll pul a MOH 2010 thing, and once you get a high enough rank, you can use whatever weapon you please.

I personally don't like faction-specific weapons, because it makes at least two weapons the same in performance, the way DICE seems to do things. Just look at BC1, there are three weapons for each class that are pretty much the same thing (except shotguns). and everyone trades 'em out for the more damaging/accurate of the unlockables later on.