Impact if all the major WW2 powers went with semi-auto rifles as standard arms

Almost all the major powers had developed or were in the process of developing semi-auto rifles between the World Wars however only the US went ahead and actually made their semi-auto rifle their standard issue (M1 Garand).

What if the Russians went ahead with their SVT-40's, the Germans with the Gewehr 43, British with a Howell Automatic Rifle etc.?

Small arms were not the decision makers in WW2 but I'm still curious on the impact.
 
Okay I'm not an expert on this by any means

Long strategic answer not much, the British army would make their version more streamlined and less ugly and clunky though.

A german or British platoon could put up a lot of fire with semi automatics but in general tend to be more complicated, on the field to fix problems and the environment effecting the rifle jams and such. Bolt action are tad more accurate and reliable plus cheaper.
 
I’m not the most knowledgeable on guns, but I think the biggest impact would be on the United States. With every other power equipped with semi auto rifles, it would throw the weakness of the US machine gun arsenal into stark relief. The BAR can’t keep up sustained fire and the M1919 is too heavy to keep up, so the US now has a big hole at the squad/platoon automatic weapon slot. Without being able to tell itself that everyone has a Garand, so it’s fine, US small arms would look much weaker.
 
....only the US went ahead and actually made their semi-auto rifle their standard issue ....
What if the Russians went ahead with their SVT-40's, the Germans with the Gewehr 43, British with a Howell Automatic Rifle etc.?
....but I'm still curious on the impact.
The Russian would try but they need numbers so will go for SMGs anyway due to cost.
The Germans will do likewise until they go to shorter 8mm rounds in select fire weapons.
British will not go for such a conversion they would go for something developed from the ZH-29 or they go in partnership with France and the MAS series?

As to impact not much rifles are not that important and the extra cost would mean delays and many of the forces would end up with substitute standard weapons to compensate.
 
I’m not the most knowledgeable on guns, but I think the biggest impact would be on the United States. With every other power equipped with semi auto rifles, it would throw the weakness of the US machine gun arsenal into stark relief. The BAR can’t keep up sustained fire and the M1919 is too heavy to keep up, so the US now has a big hole at the squad/platoon automatic weapon slot. Without being able to tell itself that everyone has a Garand, so it’s fine, US small arms would look much weaker.

A belt fed BAR or the US version of the German 34/42?
 
British will not go for such a conversion they would go for something developed from the ZH-29 or they go in partnership with France and the MAS series?

Fabrique National of Belgium had a semi auto rifle which was due to go into Belgian service in late 1940 but on the declaration of war it was decided they needed bolt rifles now rather than a new rifle due to come into service later so production was delayed. Apparently the British Army was very interested in the new FN rifle so it might have been the British service rifle probably in service 3 or 4 years after the Belgian army.
 
Ok, so America has the Garand, Soviets have the SVT-40, the Italians have the Fucile Armaguerra Mod. 39, the Chinese could have the General Liu rifle, and the french could have the MAS-40. What does the rest of the world adopt? I'm not familiar with Japanese, German, and British developments in this field.

edit: on the topic of non-major powers, maybe the Hungarians and Bulgarians try something like this
 
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Almost all the major powers had developed or were in the process of developing semi-auto rifles between the World Wars however only the US went ahead and actually made their semi-auto rifle their standard issue (M1 Garand).

What if the Russians went ahead with their SVT-40's, the Germans with the Gewehr 43, British with a Howell Automatic Rifle etc.?

Small arms were not the decision makers in WW2 but I'm still curious on the impact.
The Germans tried to with the Gewehr 41, but since it relied on the gas trap system at the muzzle it worked like crap. The Germans then copied captured SVT-40s and made the Gewehr 43, but it was too late to mass produce it and it was somewhat expensive to do so. If you were going to go for a German semi-auto rifle it would have to be the final version of the Vollmer M35 pre-war.
 

Zen9

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Almost all the major powers had developed or were in the process of developing semi-auto rifles between the World Wars however only the US went ahead and actually made their semi-auto rifle their standard issue (M1 Garand).

What if the Russians went ahead with their SVT-40's, the Germans with the Gewehr 43, British with a Howell Automatic Rifle etc.?

Small arms were not the decision makers in WW2 but I'm still curious on the impact.

The British Army had been looking at semi-auto rifles since before WWI.
They actually ordered a batch of Farquahar-Hill in 1918.....

They certainly were interested in Pedersen's Toggle-Locked design, Vickers built a batch for trials.

Arguably a move to a semi-auto is likely to be in line with a move to a rimless cartridge, and sometyhing in 7mm territory has been the focus since the .276 Enfield.
There was just such a ammunition effort during the interbellum period.
 
Fabrique National of Belgium had a semi auto rifle which was due to go into Belgian service in late 1940 but on the declaration of war it was decided they needed bolt rifles now rather than a new rifle due to come into service later so production was delayed. Apparently the British Army was very interested in the new FN rifle so it might have been the British service rifle probably in service 3 or 4 years after the Belgian army.
It was further developed in Britain during the war, and as the SLEM 1 was ordered for troop trials at the end of the war. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SLEM-1

Now if RSAF Enfield had been working with FN from the start it's not beyond the realm of possibility that it could have been an alternative to the No 4 mk 1 when it went into mass production in 1941 even if like the Pattern 13 it was adapted to take the .303. The Soviet SVT 40 proves the use of the rimmed round is feasible.

 
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