Thanks for that link to the full Australian version of the Owen's development.
My previous education was lacking because British and American books describe the Owen as just another version in the whole Bergman, Schmeisser, Sten Austen, Owen, F1 SMG development sequence.
Whereas this Australian account says that the Owen SMG was a completely independant design that just happened to resemble a Sten because it was designed to do the same job.
It sounds like a case of Aussie ingenuity triumphing over Imperial ignorance. Only a red-neck engineer could triumph over that many government obstacles.
After reading that account, I now understand your fondness for the Owen, especially it's downwards ejection port.
The British War Office began WW2 the same way they began every other war with British industrialists scheming on how to turn the best profit by selling expensive arms to the colonies in exchange for cheap raw materials. It was only after the debacle at Dunkirk that British industry started to consider that they might need help from colonial factories.
Canada rapidly tooled-up to build British-pattern weapons. Despite the Nazi threat, it was still "politics as usual" in Ottawa. Opposition politicians tried to embarrass the government over the "Bren gun scandal." The government had rushed to sign a no-bid, single-source contract (with Inglis) to build Bren guns in Ontario. The fact that Inglis-built Bren guns performed well in combat was quietly forgotten before the next election!
Hah!
Now I don't want to bash the Sten - a good MkIII or V was as good as the MP40 - and you could build 5 for 1 MP40
But by the time they started building the MkIII and certainly the MkV the Owens was already established as a good weapon without any of the flaws of the Sten.
You bring up the Bren gun - a very expensive and complicated weapon to make - but you get what you pay for and it was the best LMG ever
The Mk4 No1 Rifle - superb bit of kit
Then we have the Sten........it did the job
Had Britain introduced a 'Gangster weapon' in the 30s I suspect that we would have ended up with a gloriously well made MP28.
But it wasn't so when wanting to equip Assault troops for D-Day and certainly airborne and commando troops the Owen's would have been perfect
and in my opinion should have become the Imperial Machine Carbine of choice.
Politicians are a funny lot - some are so anti opposition that they would happily their own soldiers die or their nation embarrassed in order to discredit them.....
