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01:11 – Was the Vickers .50 any good, and why did the British use 4 different heavy cartridges instead of consolidating?
07:35 – The Sten and its single-feed magazine design
10:27 – Owen versus Sten, and German use of the Owen.
14:38 – British wartime work on an “assault rifle” sort of weapon?
15:44 – Why no British semiauto rifle during WW2?
Jonathan Ferguson on British semiauto rifle trials:
18:04 – EM2’s automatic bolt closure system
20:46 – Did the British use other allied weapons besides American ones?
23:15 – Is the PIAT a Destrucitve Device under US law and why?
26:07 – Bren vs Degtyarev
27:50 – Why not make the Sten in .45 to use Thompson ammo?
29:37 – Did the British get M3 Grease Guns?
31:01 – British SMG in .455?
32:03 – Sten vs Lanchester
33:26 – Was there an LSW version of the EM1/EM2 planned?
EM1 Korsac: https://youtu.be/A8ygMDJQ0iY
34:25 – Why wasn’t the BESA in .303?
36:34 – Biggest British missed opportunity during the interwar period?
38:40 – British naval service small arms
41:45 – Did .280 cartridge development begin during the war?
43:24 – Impact of MP44 on British post-war small arms development?
44:25 – Gallilean sights on the Enfield
46:25 – Why is there a semiauto selector on the Sten?
49:17 – Did American soldiers use British small arms?
50:29 – Why did the British choose the Lee action over the Mauser action?
51:16 – Which was better, Sten or Grease Gun?
52:34 – Why did the whole Commonwealth not switch to the No4 Enfield?
[OFF-TOPIC so ignore if you wish]
Recently KELTEC unveiled new automatic pistol model, dubbed PR57
https://www.americanrifleman.org/content/the-pr57-keltec-s-stripper-clip-fed-ccw-pistol/
whilst externally it looks like typical 2020s compact automatic pistol, it does 2 things different way that most other 2020s automatic pistol.
It is recoil-operated (which is typical) but locking is through rotating, rather than tilt. This is uncommon, but was sometimes used, e.g. in Glock 46 and should not have greater effect at user.
It has fixed magazine. If I understand correctly what I saw in posted video, chargers are used for loading. I have never seen this in 21th century automatic pistol before. Now I am wondering what would happen if someone would attempt to use charger upside down? And why they did elected to use half-capacity charger, rather than full-capacity (like Repetierpistole M.7), which result in that you need to apply use-charger-action twice to load it fully?
It does use 5.7×28 cartridge, which is in reflected designation, and I found this choice puzzling for compact automatic pistol. Why they elected to use bottle-neck cartridge, often loaded with Spitzer bullet, rather than e.g. Patrone 08? Will have enough effect at target when fired from 4.64″ barrel?
I think a reason for a 10-round charger might be that a 20-round charger would be too long to carry around, as I’ve never seen a double-row charger before.
As for the 5.7×28, it’s finally getting traction in the US market and everyone’s hopping on board. Until now, the complaint had always been ammo availability and price. And generally, everyone is either making a small carbine or a compact pistol, just like FN originally did when it designed the cartridge. Others here are better qualified to discuss the short-barrel ballistics, but capacity seems to be a big attraction to Americans, enabled by the .313 inch case width.
“(…)never seen a double-row charger before.”
Then look at charger used with Breda Modello 30 https://youtu.be/C-D3nN4QycM?t=160
*Why no British semiauto rifle during WW2?
The real question: Why no rimless cartridge during WW2? Yes, yes: The Brits and Americans, aka. “Brother Jonathan” might have both fielded waxed-case .276 Pedersen-caliber Pedersen rifles… Didn’t happen.
The British might have had the SAFN/ FN-49? Maybe? Somehow? Had WWI not ended when it did, the UK might have had .303 caliber Farquahar-Hill rifles left over from the cancelled RAF contract, no?
* Why is there a semiauto selector on the Sten?
Because SMGs should properly be used as self-loading carbines for accuracy’s sake, and if used in full-auto, should fire short bursts. Spraying a whole mag looks cool and all, but as the old saying goes: ‘ya can’t miss fast enough to win a gunfight.’ Incidentally, the British tested Stens, No. 4 rifles, and Bren guns, and the report–which I have a copy of–shows that the Sten gun is surprisingly effective. The recommendations were for a more reliable magazine, a wooden stock, and…. Ya can’t make this stuff up! A bayonet!
* Which was better, Sten or Grease Gun?
For Great Britain in 1940/1941 the answer is overwhelmingly, clearly, unequivocally the STEN. Britain needed an SMG that was cheap and available and could be assembled from parts produced in dispersed work shops, and they needed it yesterday, when they didn’t have any… The Thompson was obtained. Expensive. Short supply. The Smith and Wesson 9mm light rifle was sought. It didn’t work very well, had all kinds of problems, and so the contact was cancelled and instead S&W cut the UK a deal on revolvers. The General Motors M3 Grease Gun was years away.
The real question, to my mind, is: Why didn’t the USA adopt 9mm SMGs, ditch “muh .45” and produce an M-3 Greasgun in 9mm with *reliable magazines* for the entire Allied war effort? Cheap stamped guns with reliable magazines from the “Arsenal of Democracy” in the war of industrial Fordism… Then again, the M-1 carbine contract cranked out fully 6 million from non-firearm factories, and finished up early. So there is that. And the Sherman tank. And the Jeep. And the Liberty Ship.
And of course the British had several million rounds of 9 x 19mm captured in North Africa along with the rest of Garibaldi & Co.’s kit.
As well as barrel-making machinery for .38 Colt Automatic, which is virtually identical to 9 x 19mm.
As for the U.S., we had the .45 ACP, and everything to go with it. If the Army wasn’t going to change rifle calibers (from .30-06 to .276) with the adoption of the M1 Garand before we were involved in the war, they certainly weren’t going to change pistol calibers after the balloon was well and truly up.
Look up the Italians with 6.5mm and 7.35mm Carcano and the Japanese with 6.5mm and 7.7mm Arisaka to see just how much trouble that can cause.
In peacetime, you can afford to experiment with even basic things like rifle and pistol calibers. Once it’s dropped in the pot, though, it’s time to fire the designers, get the production lines moving, and “run what you brung”.
As for the semi-auto selector on the Sten, one overlooked factor is the Sten MK IIs suppressed version. Full-auto fire through a suppressor generally wears out the baffles very quickly. Firing single shots is easier on the machinery, and more appropriate for the usual jobs like removing sentries and guard dogs without being noticed, anyway.
clear ether
eon
Yes. Interest in the 9x19mm cartridge in the UK surfaced during 1938 tests of the Suomi kp/1931. Prior to that, British pistol ammunition in the interwar period was limited to .380 revolver, .455 revolver, and .455 self-loading. According to P. Labbett’s 1996 history of British 9mm ammo, even two months in to WW2, in November 1939, the same month and year the No. 4 rifle was adopted and slated for production, additional tests of what must have been Bergmann SMGs or “machine carbines” in 7.63mm were tested at Enfield, and recommendation for 9mm examples was made. By December 1939, during the sitzkrieg/ phoney war/ drole de querre, again according to Labbett, 2 MP28,IIs were procured and tested with Belgian-made 9mm and trial runs by ICI, the only pre-war British manufacturer of the cartridge. Just before the “big [German] push” and the “Sichelschnitt” through the Ardennes, 2 Beretta “Machine Carbines” and 4k Italian 9mm rounds were procured and found to be excellent. Ordnance requested changes to ICI ammo, and the heads of ICI basically rejected them. ICI wouldn’t make 9mm for the UK military until the 1950s as a result. Finally, with the adoption of the failed Smith and Wesson 1940 light rifle and the Lanchester slated for adoption by early 1941, some 110 million 9mm cartridges were procured from the USA… For a price. How many survived the U-boats is anyone’s guess, I suppose. In any case, whiel the Lanchester by Sterling was being cranked out by January 1941, On 7 March 1941 the Sten Mk.I was introduced, produced by the Singer sewing machine company near Glasgow Clydeside. In June 1941 production drawings for 9mm were scaled up, but U.S. cartridges were Boxer primed (a British invention, but not used by the UK), while UK military cartridges were Berdan primed (a North American invention). Finally, by July 1941 Woolwich and the Ordnance Board came up with a Berdan-primed 9x19mm cartridge, which became the Mk. I.z. in December 1941. The UK even purchased something like 30 million 9mm cartridges from Bolivia, most of it German-made.
https://sites.google.com/site/britmilammo/9mm-parabellum/9mm-parabellum-ball
“Was the Vickers .50 any good(…)?”
.5 inch Vickers cartridge https://sites.google.com/site/britmilammo/-5-inch-vickers emerged in latter part of Great War, it had to be (among other things) be used in aircraft machine guns, due to limitations of then used flying machines, it was important to keep weight low.
“(…)German use of the Owen.(…)”
Germans did include it in https://www.scribd.com/document/220927290/D-50-1-Kennblatter-fremden-Gerats-Heft-1-Handwaffen-Unvollstandig-pdf as Maschine Pistole 752 (e), however considering that they only known cartridge used (9 mm), they likely have access to specimen. Note that merely being included into D.50-1 does not guarantee that given weapon type was actually used.
“(…)Did the British use other allied weapons besides American ones?(…)”
Technically yes, as they used https://www.forgottenweapons.com/british-ballester-molina-for-special-operations-executive/ with place-of-origin being Argentine, which does technically belong to Allies, as they declared war to Empire of Japan in March 1945.
@Daweo… Not an ally by any stretch of the imagination, but the British SOE did apparently also use the Astra M1921/ Modelo 400 9mm largo pistols from Spain to some extent?
Also, I have it that some handful or other of Mexican 7x57mm Mendoza LMGs were somehow used?
I might add that while the Home Guard was stood up, that eventually all .303 caliber rifles–even the Ross!–went to the *regulars* while all U.S. “.300-in.” .30-06 arms like the M1917, BARs, ex-aircraft Marlins/Lewises, etc. went to the HG. Thompsons for the commandoes and “auxiliary units.” There are HG manual descriptions of the old Japanese Type 38 Arisaka, which was acquired for training purposes during WWI. I had thought that all of these were sent to the Czar to keep Russia in the fight against Wilhelm II and the “shackled to a corpse” Austro-Hungarian Empire, but perhaps not?
As for Agentina, the only reason Argentine military leaders declared war on the Axis after Germany was as good as beaten was to ensure the nation would not be excluded from the UN in the immediate postwar. Very, very many Latin American army officers were pro-Axis. To the degree that the Brazilians were popping champagne corks when Paris fell to the Wehrmacht because the “right side” was winning the European War. The only nation that ultimately declared war against Japan *solely* was Ecuador.
SOE used a variety of Spanish-made handguns and even some SMGs in occupied France, as did OSS. Not to mention the Astra 600 9 x 19mm pistol made for the Luftwaffe, officially.
Franco may have been a neutral trending toward the Axis, but he was perfectly happy to play both ends against the middle. Much of the Texas oil, diesel fuel and etc. FDR sent him to persuade him to stay neutral (and not take Gibraltar away from the British) ended up in the Canary Islands- where it was used to refuel German U-boats attacking Allied convoys.
And there was already a tradition of “gray market” sales of Spanish arms in France, due to France’s even pre-1940 strict firearms laws. Never mind all those Poilus of 1914-18 who were issued .32 ACP “Ruby” and etc. Eibar blowback automatics and Spanish-made S&W M10 copies in 8mm Lebel revolver caliber for trench fighting, who never got around to turning them in when they demobbed in 1919.
Plus, if an SOE agent or OSS Jedburgh were caught with something like that, he’d be less likely to be identified as an agent, as opposed to “just” a local Resistance issue. Doubly so for women agents; yes, both groups had them and dropped them into Occupied Europe.
The movies and TV want you to think every SOE op or Jed had a suppressed Colt Woodsman or High Standard HD .22. But they would more likely have a .25 ACP or .32 ACP Ruby or etc., and it and its “silencer” would both be marked “Espana”.
clear ether
eon
Even if the Farquhar-Hill rifle was implausible for adoption in the interwar years, what with a repeat of WWI unthinkable, no public enthusiasm for military preparedness, highly restrictive defense budgets, with what money going toward aircraft and air defenses–sensibly–and toward the Royal Navy–perhaps much less sensibly, in hindsight… Why no movement on the so-called “.303 rimless?” This was taking the hoary-old Paul Mauser-designed 7.65x53mm Belgian/Argentine/Ottoman Mauser cartridge, necking it up a bit to accept the Mk.VII bullet, and “voila!” A ballistic twin of the .303 without the rimmed cartridge case! Why, I’d wager such a cartridge would have rendered the future U.S. infatuation with the 7.62x51mm moot… Or perhaps not.
Heck, even adoption of the 7.92x57mm rimless Mauser cartridge might have been a shrewd move.
“(…)Bren vs Degtyarev(…)”
Regarding magazine sticking from 1st, it should be noted that there existed drum magazines for Bren, with capacity 100, see photos https://www.forgottenweapons.com/bren-100-round-drum/ which would both lower silhouette and provide superior capacity.
Observe that 2nd is limited by poor spring placement, which was exposed to overheating.
USA was never going to adopt a foreign cartridge and stuck with 45 ACP through the 1970’s. The British during the “dark days” after Dunkirk, were less worried about logistics and more concerned about equipping the Army with anything that could go Bang!
I am a little amazed that the US adopted a new cartridge 30 Carbine and then because it was supposed to replace 45 ACP 1911’s and reduce the number of Garands. Have to keep in mind the pre-war mentality where MacArthur as the Chief of staff ordered the Garand be redesigned to use 30 06 because Congress would not approve a new cartridge while there were stacks of 30 06 piled up from WW1.
I would add to your list the LST. Over 1000 were built during the war and some served through Viet Nam. Many amphibious operations would not have been successful without the LST. It put the Western Allies on the offense, designed for the European theatre of operations but was first used in the Pacific.
I am not fully clear on the logic of the Light Rifle competition that led to the M1 carbine, but commenters here have discussed the idea that pistols were seen as too difficult to train conscripts to use effectively. But part of that is due to bullet drop, and the .45 ACP is quite the dropper even out of a carbine-length barrel.
The .30 Carbine round had the virtue of being the same caliber as the service rifle round, and being able to use the same machinery to produce bullets and barrels in the same caliber for both rifles and pistols was deliberate for France and Russia.
@ Gaston: “True that!” Yes, the .45 was foisted on the U.S. military because of Cowboy culture and the pseudo-scientific Thompson-LaGarde tests. Strangely, for those interested in shooting cadavers and barnyard animals to adduce “stopping power” effects, the notorious interwar “pig board” tests were mostly ignored.
The rifle shortage after Dunkirk is a source of great debate. I tend to side with those who argue that it really was quite serious. At first it was everything, literally, that could go bang, even fowling pieces for the “parashots.” But later, logistics did exert a great influence, hence the requirement to put all U.S.rifle-caliber weapons in the Home Guard, and reserve all .303 for the regular army, even Long Lees and Rosses and so on.
The M-1 carbine was a great idea insofar as the post-MacArthur .30-06 M-1 rifle as an excellent battle rifle–“the greatest battle implement ever devised” as far as Patton was concerned–but it was expensive and also quite heavy and cumbrous. So given that a draftee or volunteer can’t be taught to hit much with a pistol in a given training regiment, a lighter, handier shoulder arm was clearly required than the M1903 bolt-action rifle and the M-1. The cartridge was basically a rehash of the old 1905 .32 Winchester self-loading with a nod to industrial efficiency. A bolder or more innovative choice might have resulted in a more efficient “intermediate cartridge,” but at least it was better than a pistol round. As far as the “strategic reserve” of .30-06 cartridges is concerned, something like a quarter to a third of these were transported to New Jersey, signed over to U.S. Steel, and then sold to H Majesty’s gov’t. This is *before* Lend Lease, mind you. The whole thing was a work around of the isolationist sentiment of the U.S. public at the time. As it happened, the U.S. military was provided with rifle ammunition packed on 5-round stripper clips, packed loosely, packed on 8-round “en block” Garand rifle clips, in belts, and so on, .45 acp ammunition, and .30 M-1 carbine ammunition (I think the stripper clips for those are a post-WWII development). A bit of a logistical nightmare, perhaps?
Spot on about the LST for sure.
20:46 Perhaps the largest user of the French small arms in UK were the Polish troops, which were the only ones who seemed to have thought about taking weapons with them, evacuating to Britain. And so, for most of the 1940 there are photos showing guys in definitely British-style battledress uniforms, armed with FM24/29 or Berthier or MAS36 rifles. Perhaps the question was triggered by seeing such photos – but they are mostly the Poles.
The Polish Army in the UK built the anti-invasion defenses closest to my maternal grandmother’s home: Largo Bay in Fife in Scotland. The port of Methill was a major coal-export location, and at that time even had ferry service to Belgium.
The bunkers are still there.
26:30ish Why is Bren considered better than DP? [facepalm]
It’s in the practice of utilization, my dear boy. Comparing data sheets on computer screen or paper it’s just a waste of time – you don’t fight with a ruler or scale, you fight with guns. And if you do not know what guns are, you’d better sit tight and learn from these who do.
Take the Bren to the range, shoot a little and then take a Degtyarov and you’d know – it’s that simple. My physics teacher always told us: “You don’t have to believe my words, further down your life, your own ass would tell you I was right. One’s ass is the best teacher that is”.
(1) Just try to fire 50-ish rounds from one position and crawl 50 meters to another firing point, and you’ll know. Simply count the burns you suffered with either of the two.
(2) Then fire another 50 rds and try to advance 100 meters shooting on the go. You simply don’t have a place on the hot DP you can hold on to the gun and fire from the hip, holding onto it over the damned turntable on top, other than a free swinging bipod leg, because you have a reciprocating piston underneath. Bren you can handle easily, it is flat, you can fix the barrel handle outwards and hold onto it, you can fold the bipod and use it as the forend, hell, if you’re sturdy enough you can fire it from the shoulder, because why not?
As for the relative height: the relative heights of the guns are irrelevant. It’s the gunner’s head that counts as a target, and that one is at the exactly same height behind DP and Bren. And the enemy is aiming not at the magazine, but the head of shooter. The pan magazine gives no advantage at all. How’s that? Simple, just handle them, and you’ll know.
(3) Try to fill up the damn thing – not even at nighttime in the trench. Just effing load this damned shitty turntable with just two hands, then load the same amount of ammo into the Bren mags, with its two-position magazine lips. ZB26 was even better, and it had a special loading tool, stripping clips, five rounds per stroke. You may load 90 rds into three Bren magazines faster than you put 47 rds into the DP pan. What you need to load each effing cartridge is to (a) pull the ring on the upper table – mind you pull either with your left to right, or then load rounds with your left, because some idiot came with this cockamamie idea how to fill it. (b) drop round into the lips (facing outwards from you into a diagonal channel between the lips and the upper plate). (c) pull and release the ring to let the cartridge drop into its nest in the upper plate, (d) check if it lays flat – you’re fucked if you don’t, cause next round would jam, and you’ll have to unload it. Of course the lips are facing outwards from you, so that you won’t be able to see the whole process, unless your neck can stretch that long. The most efficient way to load the pan is to use at least two guys for it, one for yanking the ring left and right, the other for dropping rounds.
While for the Bren mag, you take a mag into one hand, place a round over the lips with the other and push. Click, it’s done, next round. Which means approx. 2x faster loading for the Bren magazines then with that Fyodorov’s ergonomic disaster on top of the DP.
Have you ever wondered why Dyegtyarov himself tested a Japanese horror-hopper or the Bren-style top mounted magazine feed for the DP, if that pan would be so wonderful? Get to know, then think, then practice – and only then paw the keys in a respectable forum such as this one.
30:25ish “Doubtful if the British got a significant number of M1 Thompsons”.
They sure did – there are 100s of photos showing British (and Polish, for that matter) troops in Italy fighting with M1/M1A1 Thompsons. They were scarce in the Northwestern Europe, maybe, but in Italy they were abundant. Have you ever noticed, that there are virtually no Stens in Italy (save for the Italian Communist partigiani)? That’s because the SMGs in the British 8th Army fighting there were mostly the Tommyguns.
On the other hand, I have a photo of Polish tank crew in Normandy, August 1944, wielding a Grease Gun – but whether it was an officialy supplied one, I’d rather doubt. Either it was found there, perhaps at the side of some US casualty or traded for booze (but whom from? The Polish 1st Armoured Div fought outside Caen, the furthest as possible from the American landing zone).