Large scale automatics use in WW1

  • Thread starter Deleted member 1487
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Deleted member 1487

How can we get large scale usage of automatic (assault) rifles and submachine guns by 1916 at the latest?
Initially I'd like to see the French and Germans sporting them, with later all powers producing them.
 
well, the austrians had a sub-mg, so if the germans and austrians move the development a little bit ahead, they have em... if the germans have em, the french will capture it. Learning how effective this weapon is, they will copy and improve it...

if the germans have them in larger numbers BEFORE 1914 it could be a war-winner, if they develop it in 1915, massproducing it in 1916 it still could change the war, but also the french could react fast....

automatic weapons will nihilate any mass attacks... if the defender as not only a lot mgs but also a lot sub-mg, the attacker can do nothing.

so either the tanks or new tactics will be developted much faster...

but not to early... or you change everything (germany wins fast, so france has not time to build em, germany forbid the french to have em, etc... you know the game) also it is moving to asb... such modern weapons need a basement, the trench war was the push... so you can push it for 2 years, say in 1916 the germans use em, they loose some in verdun, but only after the big british defeat at the somme, with losses around 100.000losses at the first day (cause the germans have gave the troops here such guns and they massacre even more tommies as the historically 57.000,) all combatants try to improve and build them...
 
well, the austrians had a sub-mg, so if the germans and austrians move the development a little bit ahead, they have em... if the germans have em, the french will capture it. Learning how effective this weapon is, they will copy and improve it...

if the germans have them in larger numbers BEFORE 1914 it could be a war-winner, if they develop it in 1915, massproducing it in 1916 it still could change the war, but also the french could react fast....

automatic weapons will nihilate any mass attacks... if the defender as not only a lot mgs but also a lot sub-mg, the attacker can do nothing.

so either the tanks or new tactics will be developted much faster...

but not to early... or you change everything (germany wins fast, so france has not time to build em, germany forbid the french to have em, etc... you know the game) also it is moving to asb... such modern weapons need a basement, the trench war was the push... so you can push it for 2 years, say in 1916 the germans use em, they loose some in verdun, but only after the big british defeat at the somme, with losses around 100.000losses at the first day (cause the germans have gave the troops here such guns and they massacre even more tommies as the historically 57.000,) all combatants try to improve and build them...
they annihilated mass attacks just fine with what they had, rifles, heavy machine guns and artillery
 

Deleted member 1487

Let's say this:
German has the MP18 and Mg08/15 in quantities in 1916. Maybe something like this by 1917: http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2010/07/16/vollmer-maschinenkarabiner-m35/
France has the Chauchat and the M1909 in 1915.
Britain the Lewis gun in 1915.
The Russians the Fedorov Automat in 1916.
The Austro-Hungarians their 'light pattern' Schwarzlose in quantities in 1915.

How does this affect tactics and the course of the war?
 
Stalemate comes about even quicker, since mass charges were still the only advancement tactic available (tanks would not have been any more developed since there were serious limits on the engines).
 
How can we get large scale usage of automatic (assault) rifles and submachine guns by 1916 at the latest?

The technology certainly existed. Mass introduction would require overcoming the hidebound attitudes of military planners and procurers of the day, so some sort of eye-catching demonstration, perhaps their use in some pre-WWI conflict, seems called for.
 
The technology certainly existed. Mass introduction would require overcoming the hidebound attitudes of military planners and procurers of the day, so some sort of eye-catching demonstration, perhaps their use in some pre-WWI conflict, seems called for.


That's the plan in my Kongo TL, during a brief war in the Congo River Valley, Germany needs a new gun to fight in the jungle conditions. After they buy some Mondragon rifles, they are hooked. During the first few moths of this Tl's WWI, the Germans decimate the Entente armies due to improved versions of these newfangled rifles. Leads to an earlier adoption of semi/auto rifles & smgs...
 
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Deleted member 1487

That's the plan in my Kongo TL, during a brief war in the Congo River Valley, Germany needs a new gun to fight in the jungle conditions. After they buy some Mondragon rifles, they are hooked. During the first few moths of this Tl's WWI, the Germans decimate the Entente armies due to improved versions of these newfangled rifles. Leads to an earlier adoption of semi/auto rifles & smgs...

http://www.cruffler.com/historic-february01.html
What about the Mondragon's notorious susceptibility to moisture? Wouldn't that problem be even worse in the jungle and turn the German army off to the rifle? OTL the Germans used it in WW1 and found it jammed in the mud and wet conditions of the trenches.

Plus OHL was pfennig-pinching and though they had their light machine gun and automatic rifle research going prewar, weren't interested in fully supporting it due to the high munition cost to these rifles. In fact it was feared accuracy would drop and ammunition usage would be unsustainable if semi-automatic rifles were issued to every rifleman. Instead the focus seemed to be on highly trained specialists in special formations to use automatic rifles, like the Musketen regiments formed around the Madsen OTL. The Madsen was well liked, but was too difficult to mass manufacture.

We need something that can stand up to mud and moisture, be heavy enough not to have too much recoil or inaccuracy, and be reliable enough to fire on full automatic sustainably. It would be something like a SAW, but probably early on only in special teams that are an elite corps within the army, like the machine gun scharf schütze units later in the OTL war.
I guess a German Chauchat or BAR is what I'm looking for and would also be much more acceptable to the German General Staff and Procurement than a mass-produced standard issue semi-automatic rifle would be, specifically because it would be much cheaper not to convert millions of battle rifles over to the semi-auto rifle, but much less costly to buy up several thousand auto-rifles.
 
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BlondieBC

Banned
You need an early success. At the start of the war, the Germans have an elite assault regiment using a submachine gun. The regiment is used in a critical attack in 1914, and is highly successful. Over the winter, the Germans equip two divisions this way, and they are also successful. By 1916, submachine guns battalion are in every division.
 

Deleted member 1487

You need an early success. At the start of the war, the Germans have an elite assault regiment using a submachine gun. The regiment is used in a critical attack in 1914, and is highly successful. Over the winter, the Germans equip two divisions this way, and they are also successful. By 1916, submachine guns battalion are in every division.

It would require more than that, as the SMG wouldn't even be in existence yet. The GGS would require something prewar to influence them to support creating an SMG. I like the colonial conflict in the jungle as a catalyst. A reliable SMG would be very useful in such close quarters fighting and it would need to be be made reliable against the environment enough to be useful in the trenches.

Looking at how the Germans used their Musketeen units, the MG08/15 is more useful than an autorifle for German doctrine. What they really needed in WW1 was an early SMG, so this is perfect.
 
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