Rearm the British Infantry for WWII

[Mark1878]

Both Japan and Germany emerged from the war with a demolished industrial base. Both Japan and Germany created a new industrial base which was much more efficient than the Old or the New World. The cost of labour has little to do with what they achieved. Indeed, your swipe at Unionised labour is rather typical of the American view. In the UK, the Unions got out of control and that resulted in the Coal strike of the late 1970s. They were before that quite willing to fight management but not to the point where they would cut their own throats and anyway, that was very much post-war. Before the war, they were still organising. Unionised labour need not cost more than non-unionise labour. It is about conditions, rather than wages, that most workers become unionised. Fix the conditions and everybody is happy. Fuck the conditions and no one ends up happy.

Oh the British unions did cut their own throats. Look at shipbuilding and riveters must be kept when welding was better but in a different union. Agreed management was not that good either.

 

[naraic]

Well that gets you men but not really the cadre to build an army on. The ones you have exempted are probably the ones you need for Officers and NCOs

That fair. I was just looking at potentially the most politically acceptable path to partial conscription in the 1930s.

 

[ArtosStark]

The trigger. It’s pulleys and wheels.

True, but as mentioned "When approached, Kiraly agreed that if further interest was shown in the weapon, he could simplify the trigger mechanism" (http://firearms.96.lt/pages/BSA-Kiraly.html). That would likely be fixed before ever seeing service.

 

[ArtosStark]

Both Japan and Germany emerged from the war with a demolished industrial base. Both Japan and Germany created a new industrial base which was much more efficient than the Old or the New World. The cost of labour has little to do with what they achieved.

For starters, what I said was:

Seems to mostly be done when you are building up an industry or when it is profitable.

Germany and Japan were both building up a destroyed industry.

Indeed, your swipe at Unionised labour is rather typical of the American view

1. I am not American
2. It was not a swipe. Just an Observation. I have been in unions. I have dealt with unions. In both cases negotiation for working conditions was common but negotiations for pay raises and maintaining pay levels took up more time.

In the UK, the Unions got out of control and that resulted in the Coal strike of the late 1970s. They were before that quite willing to fight management but not to the point where they would cut their own throats and anyway, that was very much post-war. Before the war, they were still organising. Unionised labour need not cost more than non-unionise labour. It is about conditions, rather than wages, that most workers become unionised.

I would argue that there are many examples of unions causing more problems than they have solved going back to the 1920's. The General Strike of 1926 for instance. And improving conditions costs something as well. It is often money well spent, but not always.

Fix the conditions and everybody is happy. Fuck the conditions and no one ends up happy.

I think I am less optimistic of human nature in this area than you are. Unions exist to provide a unified voice to the workers needs. That can be very necessary. But their purpose is not to keep the company profitable or the industry competitive. So unless you have labour leaders far sighted enough to work with management to some extent (and can do so while keeping their position in the union) and management that is far-sighted enough to work with labour (and can do so while keeping their position in the company) the whole process can turn self destructive fairly quickly.

 

[McPherson]

the magistrate offered you a hard choice.

Solves the bullet stoppers, but where do the non-coms come? Motivated men are the desired leaders. The lazies (petty criminals) are not good for the role of leaders because the PoV and motivations and their morals are wrong. This was a MAJOR US problem as she mobilized for war. Draftees had to be trained to become squad leaders and then OJTed further to get the "quality" in the NCO corps up to a good standard. By 1943 they were just getting there.

Seems like that would make the Thompson even worse. But again, the Lanchester was basically a straight clone of an MP18. The engineering was basically German. Should they have come up with a good, cheap SMG prior to the war? Definitely. But it is hard to say British SMG’s were over engineered prior to the Sten when there is literally one of them and it is a copy of somebody else’s first efforts. And the Sten was built out of the Lanchester. Seems likely the Kiraly would be trimmed down as well when needed. Any word on why the Kiraly was hard to mass produce?

Lever delay blow back.

With all the fiddly bits and parts that are involved (See disassembly) that thing is as complex in operation and to manufacture as a Thompson.

Plus there are a lot of ergo nonos going on with that Rube Goldberg contraption that make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up when I think of Private Fumbles getting his hands on one.

If BSA manufactured something like that for 5 pounds, then I would like to see the documentation. The Hungarians, who were not slouches at gun manufacture, only made about 13,000. It was expensive for them to make.

The requirement is for "millions".

And getting it wrong.

Notice the delayed blowback action? (^^^)

 

[marathag]

But now one has the gas system and the soot problem.

Depending on the wax, woukd have no more soot than diesel fuel. And then there isn't exactly gallons of wax involved here.
Now do I think rhe M1 Garand was a better design?
Certainly.
But the Pedersen would have worked better than anyother semiauto rifle around in 1939, better than the Soviet AVS-36 or SVT-38 or any of the German examples.

 

[Gannt the chartist]

There are 4 lessons fromWW1.

1. Don't do it again.
2. Move things using the internal combustion engine.
3. Preferably under armour.
4. With as many radios as you can manage.


Aside from that there is a general lesson of Opportunity cost. If there is finite time and money which is to say always, then spending either on A) means its not available for B) so if you reequip the infantry with new weapons you cannot afford to buy Spitfires or Chain Home or Carriers or tanks or something.

As to the specifics. .276 pederson is - a crappy machine gun round. Its performance falls off after about 600m. Around 25% of the on hand ammunition in British infantry division is for the Vickers in the MG battalion. that has an effective range of 2000 - 4000m the latter using ammunition introduced for WW2. ( and would normally be firing in support of 1-2 inf BDE not all three.

This is an unresolved technological issue. The sort of round that works well at up to 600m and allows for semi or automatic fire is bad at long range automatic fire. Thats why today everyone uses two rounds. But today and post war generally everyone used something not an MMG for the indirect fire role at range. But then today at range people move around in bullet proof vehicles so inderdiction fire from MGs does not work ( and they move in vehicles initially because of NBC threat).

If you can get an infantry weapon that can fire semi or full auto out to 400-600m that may be useful but to do that you need to invent the assault rifle and ideally a smaller round so you can carry more.

The Infantry section generates its firepower from the BREN, not the rifle so improving the rate of fire of the rifleman is at best of marginal use. One trick possibly missed was issue of cheap scopes to riflemen, but the marksmanship training in the british armhy ( or US) was more rigorous than the german, so the marginal increase may not have been worthwhile.

As I and other have said - Start rearmament at the same time as Germany you end up with an expeditionary force of between 32 and 55 divisions. All motorised. Now the kit wont be as good, maybe, because a lot of the kit actually used is available but either not confirmed or ordered at scale early.

The Kiraly is heavier than the SMLE. 4.4kg vs 3.9kg. its 1.049m long vs 1.132m for the SMLE and 3.2kg and ,63m for the sten. ( M1 carbine is 2.9kg and .9m) As most of the firepower comes from the Bren which is issued at a rate of 1 per 12 men in the rifle battalion or 1per 8 men in the rifle section in combat ( but 3 of the 8 fire the Bren and 1 is the section commander one may be a rifle grenadier and early on there may be scoped rifles) and at platoon level you add commander, radio man, Mortar team.) Plus an additional company worth of Bren in the carrier platoon plus more 2'' adding a short range automatic in most circumstances, is pointless.

Also WW2 ( and WW1) shows the key issue on making small arms is not slightly less complicated its capable of being made by unskilled labour using hammers, or as close to that as possible.

SMG are useful for airborne, special forces and when you don't have enough LMG. They are also useful for rear area troops who are doing something else as their main job and don't need to carry a big heavy weapon they can't use properly and just gets in the way. But they do need to carry an effective weapon because of airborne, special forces, sudden breakthrough etc. The reason for the panic is not its utility in front line service but lack of LMG and fear of Parachutists dressed as nuns in 1940.

In terms of utility the Red army famous for SMG everywhere has 86 SMG in the 41 infantry bn but when they reduce the strength during 41 that goes down to 18 ( and the LMG component from 36 to 18.) And they lose. By 44 this has gone up to 165 smg and 54 lmg ( but note the soviets usually have 1/3 - 1/2 the LMG ammo on hand compared to the UK) at which point the brits have more of both.

In 1940 the German infantry has 40 smg per bn given to the platoon and squad leaders whose job is to command not fire. And I suspect then the smarter ones then pass them off to AN Other on the grounds that MP = leader = sniper target.

The Lesson of Gallipoli is you can evacuate off a beach using ships boats. But that its really hard to build up supplies in that way. Unless you want to make the assumption that the French army will collapse at the first blow this is not a priority. Hence the 1926 Motor landing craft and 1938 Landing craft mechanised being developed by the British, And used in Norway and Dunkirk - and lost there. With LST and LCT following in 1940 but not being built and fielded in large numbers.

 

[McPherson]

There are 4 lessons fromWW1.

1. Don't do it again.
2. Move things using the internal combustion engine.
3. Preferably under armour.
4. With as many radios as you can manage.

a. But they did it again.
b. Without horses, that becomes a necessity.
c. Armor seems to have been something of a short-cut, a good short-cut, but the British did not put the work in pre-war to figure out motorized combined arms tactics. Even the Americans seem to have done more in their own 1930s exercises and that army did not even have tanks. OJT in the desert took a long time and was costly. The British army continued to make mistakes in France 1944 that by this date, they should not have.
d. The lesson learned was a technology hobbled one.
=============================================================

Aside from that there is a general lesson of Opportunity cost. If there is finite time and money which is to say always, then spending either on A) means its not available for B) so if you reequip the infantry with new weapons you cannot afford to buy Spitfires or Chain Home or Carriers or tanks or something.

That comes down to the people who are the ones who have to use the limited time and money they were given. The example I use constantly is; "Do the sailors need ice cream for morale, or do they need torpedoes that swim as they are intended and go bang when they hit targets? Spend the money given and time available... wisely.

As to the specifics. .276 pederson is - a crappy machine gun round. Its performance falls off after about 600m. Around 25% of the on hand ammunition in British infantry division is for the Vickers in the MG battalion. that has an effective range of 2000 - 4000m the latter using ammunition introduced for WW2. ( and would normally be firing in support of 1-2 inf BDE not all three.

MacArthur argument. He was right, you know?

This is an unresolved technological issue. The sort of round that works well at up to 600m and allows for semi or automatic fire is bad at long range automatic fire. That's why today everyone uses two rounds. But today and post war generally everyone used something not an MMG for the indirect fire role at range. But then today at range people move around in bullet proof vehicles so interdiction fire from MGs does not work ( and they move in vehicles initially because of NBC threat).

Ehh. The type of war fought these days has brought back the reach out and touch them with direct fires logic and necessity. There is a lot of terrain and light infantry that needs long distance direct fire ground denial and servicing. Not a lot of the present type target matrices are riding around in BMPs. They are skulking about as light infantry. Mortars are good, but MMG and HMG weapons are good too.

If you can get an infantry weapon that can fire semi or full auto out to 400-600m that may be useful but to do that you need to invent the assault rifle and ideally a smaller round so you can carry more.

Settle for infantry brawl distance and let the machine guns do their work.

The Infantry section generates its firepower from the BREN, not the rifle so improving the rate of fire of the rifleman is at best of marginal use. One trick possibly missed was issue of cheap scopes to riflemen, but the marksmanship training in the british armhy ( or US) was more rigorous than the german, so the marginal increase may not have been worthwhile.

British army, maybe. US Army training was wrong. Marksmanship on the range was not snap shots at fleeting targets or cover fire for effect. Better sights help, but the right kind of target identification and service with the equipment to hand would have helped the American infantry. OJT is the wrong time to unlearn stateside training mistakes.

As I and other have said - Start rearmament at the same time as Germany you end up with an expeditionary force of between 32 and 55 divisions. All motorised. Now the kit wont be as good, maybe, because a lot of the kit actually used is available but either not confirmed or ordered at scale early.

Simplify down to the basics. Rifle, machine gun, mortar, grenades, uniform and field kit. Train, train, train, train. Practice mock war with the territorials so everyone is on the same script. The kit only has to be good enough. The men have to know its use and they have to be confident that they can do the job. No magic bullets to this. It goes back to Julius Caesar.

The Kiraly is heavier than the SMLE. 4.4kg vs 3.9kg. its 1.049m long vs 1.132m for the SMLE and 3.2kg and ,63m for the sten. ( M1 carbine is 2.9kg and .9m) As most of the firepower comes from the Bren which is issued at a rate of 1 per 12 men in the rifle battalion or 1per 8 men in the rifle section in combat ( but 3 of the 8 fire the Bren and 1 is the section commander one may be a rifle grenadier and early on there may be scoped rifles) and at platoon level you add commander, radio man, Mortar team.) Plus an additional company worth of Bren in the carrier platoon plus more 2'' adding a short range automatic in most circumstances, is pointless.

The Brens work as teams. Might want to train the entire section on how to use the thing. Might want to give section leaders SMGs for local security and close in firepower. I like the ZK383 as COTS or steal the Baretta M39 for pre-war.

Also WW2 ( and WW1) shows the key issue on making small arms is not slightly less complicated its capable of being made by unskilled labour using hammers, or as close to that as possible.

Illustrated with the examples compared in the SMGs that have been proposed as candidates.

SMG are useful for airborne, special forces and when you don't have enough LMG. They are also useful for rear area troops who are doing something else as their main job and don't need to carry a big heavy weapon they can't use properly and just gets in the way. But they do need to carry an effective weapon because of airborne, special forces, sudden breakthrough etc. The reason for the panic is not its utility in front line service but lack of LMG and fear of Parachutists dressed as nuns in 1940.

I respectfully disagree about giving amateurs something as dangerous as SMGs. I prefer men of good judgment.

In terms of utility the Red army famous for SMG everywhere has 86 SMG in the 41 infantry bn but when they reduce the strength during 41 that goes down to 18 ( and the LMG component from 36 to 18.) And they lose. By 44 this has gone up to 165 smg and 54 lmg ( but note the soviets usually have 1/3 - 1/2 the LMG ammo on hand compared to the UK) at which point the brits have more of both.

The SU RA also was more comfortable with red on red. See previous comment about SMGs and Private Fumbles

In 1940 the German infantry has 40 smg per bn given to the platoon and squad leaders whose job is to command not fire. And I suspect then the smarter ones then pass them off to AN Other on the grounds that MP = leader = sniper target.

Downside. That is what corporals are for.

The Lesson of Gallipoli is you can evacuate off a beach using ships boats. But that its really hard to build up supplies in that way. Unless you want to make the assumption that the French army will collapse at the first blow this is not a priority. Hence the 1926 Motor landing craft and 1938 Landing craft mechanised being developed by the British, And used in Norway and Dunkirk - and lost there. With LST and LCT following in 1940 but not being built and fielded in large numbers.

The lesson of Vera Cruz is that you design to the operations or one does not do the operations.

"You need ramps for your prams , and plankboard to walk horses and roll guns onto and off the beach, you misbegotten cretins."

Winfield Scott to the people who criticized his delays in mounting his amphibious assault.

 

[marathag]

MacArthur argument. He was right, you know?

Other than not a round of all that warehoused 30-06 was ever used in a Garand during the War.
The .276 was never positioned to be used in BARs or M1917/M1919 guns, rifles only.

 

[McPherson]

Other than not a round of all that warehoused 30-06 was ever used in a Garand during the War.
The .276 was never positioned to be used in BARs or M1917/M1919 guns, rifles only.

Missed the logistics and tactics points, MacArthur made. MGs have to carry out to at least 1 km. Rifles and MGs that share common ammunition simplify the bullet train.

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

c. Armor seems to have been something of a short-cut, a good short-cut, but the British did not put the work in pre-war to figure out motorized combined arms tactics. Even the Americans seem to have done more in their own 1930s exercises and that army did not even have tanks. OJT in the desert took a long time and was costly. The British army continued to make mistakes in France 1944 that by this date, they should not have.

I blame the people at Horseguards who at the end of WWI breathed a sigh of relief and said "Thank God that's over now we can forget all about this new fangled nonsense and get back to some proper soldiering on the North West Frontier".

 

[marathag]

Rifles and MGs that share common ammunition simplify the bullet train.

M1 ammo was shipped loaded into clips, and MG in belts.
It's still packed in the US Factories and then shipped to storage and then out to the supply dumps and then the enduser on the front line. The simplification ends at the Lake City armory, or Federal or Winchester where some cartridges to the MG department, other for BAR and the others to M1 Rifle to be put into belts, mags and clips, respectively.

 

[McPherson]

Standard ammo can be shared among platforms.

 

[marathag]

I blame the people at Horseguards who at the end of WWI breathed a sigh of relief and said "Thank God that's over now we can forget all about this new fangled nonsense and get back to some proper soldiering on the North West Frontier".

Isn't that 'soldiering' actually a game of Whist at the Officer's Club while drinking fine Brandy?

 

[Peg Leg Pom]

Isn't that 'soldiering' actually a game of Whist at the Officer's Club while drinking fine Brandy?

Pimm's, Pig Sticking and Polo with the local Maharajah.

 

[marathag]

Standard ammo can be shared among platforms.

So why not go full Japanesr and have big hopper on the MG where any nearby infantryman can toss clips into?

 

[McPherson]

Because Private Fumbles can transfer bullets from clips to belts and mags and Brownings work better that way with:

a. Private Fumbles doing what he is qualified to do...
b. Joe Infantry doing his things...
c. All those factories shipping out 30.06 to feed Garands and Brownings.

Now before one remarks that the .30 Carbine resulted in another bullet line, that happened when the Americans decided they needed a REMF rifle that even Fumbles could safely operate. It happened as a result of the realization that giving Fumbles a Thompson or even an M1911 was a BAD idea.

 

[marathag]

Because Private Fumbles can transfer bullets from clips to belts and mags and Brownings work better that way with:

How often do you think grunts were popping rounds out of garand clips and trying to put the Browning links back together with the Garand cartridges on the battlefield?

 

[McPherson]

First: disintegrating link is midwar.
Second: The bullets were issued LOOSE for refill for the cloth belts still in use, and the non-disintegrating metal belts, or in stripper clips to feed all those Springfields still in use. And for BAR mags.

 

[HPM]

I make no claim that the PIAT was perfect. Far from it but within the ability of the day. It was certainly heavy. Evolution and many years or decades has given us today the 1950s Charlie G and a plethora of rocket beyond the technology of pre WW2 industry. The PIAT is to be cocked before contact and carried cocked. You can see the rapid rate of fire possible in the video. The presenter say that it is nothing more than a spigot mortar. As if that is something objectionable in itself. It most certainly is and none the worse for it. I have carried and fired the Charlie G, PIAT and Boys AT Rifle (obviously not in service with the latter two). They are all comparably heavy and cumbersome. The Boys has little use (being brought in just before AT rifles became useless). The PIAT and Charlie G are comparable except for the huge back blast of the latter although that does now have far better sights but the earlier ones not vastly better than the PIAT. The PIAT and Boys both have reputations for heavy recoil and not without truth but you don't fire them in strings of rounds and if one takes proper charge of them the recoil is manageable, The rocket alternatives open to pre WW2 were long and slow to reload. Their smoke, flame and blast showed the position of the firer unlike the PIAT which would only reveal the firer by observing his person. It had the versatility to be used as a short range mortar. The round did not fall off the trough so easily as imagined being a slack but snug fit and the weight of the bomb set on the trough and spigot kept it in place. In the indirect fire role it could range beyond 300 yards and reach over tall walls. In practical terms the Panzer Fausts (absent for half the war) were little better in range accuracy and effectiveness, the WW2 Bazooka had a weaker HEAT head and was long and slow to reload. Shoulder fired infantry weapons that can deliver a 1,3 kg HEAT round of substantial diameter even today are heavy and cumbersome. Not as much as the PIAT and with far better sights. It is interesting to see the US forces becoming enamoured of the Charlie G with fancy sights and ammunition with the heavy ammunition of a recoilless gun.

I saw a photograph of the result of PIRA deciding to fire an RPG out of a van window. Darwin comes to mind.

My point is that the PIAT was easily within the industry of the day without impacting upon the normal arms industry except the warhead itself. It is a versatile weapon which can perform many tasks other than lobbing bombs at tanks. Robust and simple based upon known technology. It's big brother, the Blacker Bombard, was even issued and used in the Western Desert as an emplaced anti tank gun. It would benefit today from less weight and better sights and ammunition and maybe a ratchet cocking assist. At the extreme it could replace platoon and company level mortars to give them both short range mortars and anti tank weapons plus short range HE all in the same weapon. Crude and lacks high tech 'cool' but it would work.

This is the Swiss take on the task in the Cold War:

I bet the users loved firing these! Note the special rubber butt stocks to absorb(ish) some of the recoil and the tendency to break the users fingers unless you use the 'winter' trigger. and people claim the PIAT had a bad recoil.......................

I am not putting one of those on my lovely Stg 57.....