1920-1950: Alternative 'little' arms and ammo

[tomo pauk]

A 1980s YU company had much more firepower in total than a 1938-40 company in just about any army.
The support platoon/s could take over the long-range fire mission for the company/battalion.

Making decisions in peace time should take a lot of factors into account. In war time things can be over-looked,

No surprises there.

If there are fewer belt-fed MGs of tripods, no recoilless rifles and no 82mm mortars at company level what takes their place, however poorly?

Historically - instead of RLRs, infatry guns were used in most of the armies. The other two crew-served weapons were a known quantity even in ww1, so it was up to the armies of the 1930s to mix and match their gear.

What was the scale of issue of radios in YU infantry companies to call for artillery support for targets 1000-2000 meters away?
What was the transport situation? how many trucks or even tractors pulling trailers per company?

Incomparably better than what a big & typical 1930s army will have.

Germans also had training issues and not just with rifle training. They were running out of NCOs and junior officers that could plan offensive and defensive actions using different weapons in small groups. Just having a variety of weapons does not mean that commanders can use them in an integrated fashion.

It is not that I'm applauding the Germans and their decision that StG is for everyone, just to denote that sometimes the over-simplification might occur.
For the best number of armies/militaries, they will want a good mix of infantry weapons, just like they wanted the best mix of mortars, artillery, trucks, tanks and aircraft. 'Horses for courses' and all that.

The US Army has been rather schizophrenic over the last 80-90 years about small arms.

Might use that as a sig

Post WW II logistics are much better and that is at all levels. Even in the 1930s intermediate cartridges may have made sense but the doctrine needed to accommodate them.
If you are going to issue 400 meter rifles instead of 800 meter rifles what else are you going to give the platoon, company and battalion commanders to fight with in the 400-800meter range band? Even if it is just radios to call in regimental (4.2in/120mm) mortar fire. Such mortars could be 1000-2000 meters (more?) from the company commanders positions.

Mortars, infantry guns, full-power MGs, LMGs, snipers - all the usual suspects, and stuff known to work before 1920.

 

[Shortround6]

Mortars, infantry guns, full-power MGs, LMGs, snipers - all the usual suspects, and stuff known to work before 1920.

True. But we are looking at it from a very modern perspective.
It is 80 years since the end of WW II. It was about 75 years from the end of the American Civil war and the start of WW II.
Those 75 years saw the end of muzzle loading rifles and the start of cartridge firearms, but it took another 25-30 years for black power to really go away.
Leaving the Americans and their "armed mobs" aside the French and Germans were duking it out in 1870-71 with Chassepots and Dreyse needle guns that were both breechloaders with paper cartridges.
Before the Crimean war infantry weapons and artillery had remand static for around 200 years and so had the tactics. What worked when an officer was a young Lieutenant in his 20s still worked when he was general in his 60s. With Crimean war that changed and changed fairly rapidly. Before books could be written and widely distributed (and absorbed) some other invention/development made the existing book/s out of date. Practical ranges and rates of fire went up by leaps and bounds. Practical ranges were still governed by men lining up shoulder to shoulder, often in two ranks (more?) and shooting at other large masses of men. With smokeless powder, higher velocity and repeating rifles ranges got pushed out even further. in order to be "safe" field artillery had to pushed back even further. French 75 changed that somewhat. But now we are only 42 years from WW II. French 75 was one of the first guns it was worth putting a shield on because it didn't move 3-6ft with every shot and needed to be manhandled back into firing position. Gun crew could stay behind the bullet proof shield and fire shrapnel shells at the enemy direct fire.
Things slowed down somewhat from around 1900 to 1916-17. The tripod mounted machine gun really came into it's own and pretty much eliminated maneuver on the battlefield or at least maneuver in the 'classical' sense. See how long bayonet charges with closely spaced men took to finally go away. French were pushing "walking fire" or "marching fire in 1916-17.

Marching fire - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Apparently, some American officers were still pushing in much of WW II. Some were not.
But even the Americans were calling for support weapons like 81 mortars and heavy machine guns to provide suppressive fire.
Many armies did learn from WW I, it just took 10-15 years for some lessons to really sink in. Horse cavalry did not really end in many armies until the mid 1930s? Ceremonial use aside?

From Crimea and onward the 'rifle' was a very important part of the battlefield and no longer a convenient "thing" to hang a bayonet on after the artillery pounded the enemy position/s. Reducing the power and range of the rifle meant that other weapons (Mortars, infantry guns, heavy machine guns, snipers) would have to fill in or play a larger role.
Without battle experience will the lesser 'cost' of the smaller rifle/ammo balance the larger cost of the increased issue of support weapons?
It turns out that yes, better weapons are cheaper in the long run. For some reason the 'cost' of the soldiers did not seem to count for very much in some calculations.
Needing fewer soldiers to inflect the same number of casualties on the enemy (or loosing fewer of your own) doesn't come up as much.

Snipers/DMR are very effective per man. They also cost a lot to train, and not all men can actually do it. The heck with 1000 meter legendary kills. Just trying to hit at 600-800 meters with WW II equipment was not easy. Maybe 400-600 meters with any sort of regulatory.
British at times in WW II had 2-4 men per battalion or sometimes 2 per company. Trying for 2 per platoon or 1 per squad means a lot more rifles and a lot more training.
And again, this is for WW II standards and not even American/Viet Nam standards.

 

[tomo pauk]

True. But we are looking at it from a very modern perspective.

Infatry guns were a thing from the time of Gustav Adolphus and the 30 years war; the king was very keen to have these in his ranks. Sharpshooters were also a thing well before ww1, eg. soldiers issued with over-under guns - one barrel was more tight than another, for a more precise shot, another was a bit wider for easier reloading, or just the rifles with rifling in the US CW.
Mortars were all the rage alredy in the Great War, ditto the LMGs and heavy MGs. Gatling guns did the untold damage to the enemies of the US Army, as well as to these of the British collonial forces in the 19th century.
The semi- and full-automatic hand-held weapons - besides the LMGs - were also entering the service in 1918. The RSC rifles were made in about 90 thousand, the Mondragon rifles were also used. The almost assult rifle was made by Fedorov, that checks alls the boxes - can fire in bursts controlably while being hand-held, it has what can pass as an intermediate carridge, has a detatchable magazine. The SMGs were introduced, as well as stocked pistols, both semi-auto and full-auto. Ribeyrolles 1918 was in the works, the BAR was actually introduced (another weapon that would've been much more useful if tailored for a less powerful cartridge).
(granted, it was a bit too complicated, but that goes for every new machine in a category)
Italians almost introduced an intermediate cartridge & a weapon for it in the 1920s, while the Germans thikered with an intermediate 7mm.
Many countries have had 6.5mm cartridges, these woul'de been just fine in a semi-automatic and in a full-auto hand-held weapon. Either of these will make a better intermediate cartridge than the 7.92mm Kurz.

tl;dr - the dots were there, trick was to connect them

Without battle experience will the lesser 'cost' of the smaller rifle/ammo balance the larger cost of the increased issue of support weapons?
It turns out that yes, better weapons are cheaper in the long run. For some reason the 'cost' of the soldiers did not seem to count for very much in some calculations.
Needing fewer soldiers to inflect the same number of casualties on the enemy (or loosing fewer of your own) doesn't come up as much.

Sorta yes and no?
The cost in human lives was not fully lost on, at least, the British and French. It soured the taste of a peer war for the British for the next 20 years, and French were looking disfavorably at what they can mobilize in the 1930s vs. in the 1910s.
Granted, a lot of the painful lessons were forgotten, in all the countries.

 

[z42]

What might've been the alternatives to these developments, and was there some weapons and/or ammo that warranted a second look? Steal the idea from a friend or a fow? Double down with something that was, in perspective, an advantage? Granted, there will not be the 'one size fits all' to happen, nor everyone will have the resources to diverge a lot from what was made historically, but still.

I suppose the big thing would be to somehow invent the concept of the assault rifle earlier? The concept of gas operated self loading mechanisms was certainly well known by then. Then again, I suppose there was an entirely justified fear of whether the logistics could keep up if you gave each infantryman a semi or even full auto weapon. The US could do it with the Garand rifle (as an example of a semi-auto weapon, not an assault rifle as such), other combatants maybe not so much?

But if we're staying with bolt action rifles, the advantages of an intermediate cartridge may not be worth it?

I'd start out with two, IMO, obvious changes - Italians forget the 7.3mm and 8mm Breda, and go with existing 7.7mm and the spitzer bullet for the 6.5mm. Together with 9mm, that overs all the small arms needed, from rifles to thick-barreled MGs for vehicles. Saves them a lot of money and time, while improving the overall firepower. Of course, make something else instead of the good-awful 6.5mm LMG.

Adopting a Spitzer bullet for the 6.5 and forgetting the 7.35 adventure seems like such an obvious choice for the Italians that I wonder what we're missing when they decided to go for the 7.35 instead.

As for the 8mm Breda, instead of reinventing the wheel here, just adopt the 8x57 IS (also called 7.92x57 Mauser) that was already well established and widely used in the region by that point. Question then is do you want the squad LMG in 6.5 or 8mm?

7.7mm, while already in use, was AFAIU used only by the air force, so the volumes were way smaller than what the army needs. If anything, the air force should be thinking about moving to HMG's or even autocannons rather than spreading use of the 7.7mm wider.

For pistols and SMG's, 9x19 is certainly good enough, no need to reinvent the wheel here.

Oh, and for all combatants, realize a pistol or revolver is not a battlefield weapon, give frontline officers a SMG instead. Shooting a pistol accurately is surprisingly difficult, even more so when under the stress of combat. Might also help make officers a less conspicuous target when they're not waving a pistol around.

 

[tomo pauk]

I suppose the big thing would be to somehow invent the concept of the assault rifle earlier? The concept of gas operated self loading mechanisms was certainly well known by then. Then again, I suppose there was an entirely justified fear of whether the logistics could keep up if you gave each infantryman a semi or even full auto weapon. The US could do it with the Garand rifle (as an example of a semi-auto weapon, not an assault rifle as such), other combatants maybe not so much?

But if we're staying with bolt action rifles, the advantages of an intermediate cartridge may not be worth it?

Inter-war, at least the French, Germans, Soviets and Americans were not just looking beyond the bolt-action rifle, but were also investing good money to get to the mass produced - or at least series-produced - semi-automatic rifle. Soviets even tried with the full-automatic rifle with the AVS, that was not a good idea.
Taking a long, hard look at the Fedorov's Avtomat and making it simple should've brought the firepower of an infantyr unit as the end result.

Adopting a Spitzer bullet for the 6.5 and forgetting the 7.35 adventure seems like such an obvious choice for the Italians that I wonder what we're missing when they decided to go for the 7.35 instead.

+1 on that.

As for the 8mm Breda, instead of reinventing the wheel here, just adopt the 8x57 IS (also called 7.92x57 Mauser) that was already well established and widely used in the region by that point. Question then is do you want the squad LMG in 6.5 or 8mm?

7.7mm, while already in use, was AFAIU used only by the air force, so the volumes were way smaller than what the army needs. If anything, the air force should be thinking about moving to HMG's or even autocannons rather than spreading use of the 7.7mm wider.

Autocannons are needed, the Italians did a good job with their 20mm AA guns, apart from mass producing them /:
Anyway we cut it, the 8mm Breda was reinventing the whell - not good when the budgets are tight, and industrial might is lacking in the era of ever more expensive mil tech.

For pistols and SMG's, 9x19 is certainly good enough, no need to reinvent the wheel here.

Oh, and for all combatants, realize a pistol or revolver is not a battlefield weapon, give frontline officers a SMG instead. Shooting a pistol accurately is surprisingly difficult, even more so when under the stress of combat. Might also help make officers a less conspicuous target when they're not waving a pistol around.

Fine by me

 

[tomo pauk]

Case for the 'non-standard' ammo types, like the 10mm and ~15mm? Mostly for aircraft, but not limited to.

French necked-down the 11mm Lebel to 8mm, so it can take advantage of the new propellants and new, modern bullet. Necking out the 8mm to 10mm, obviously with even the newer materials and propellents, might've gave them a MG that carries a lot of incendiary material, perhaps twice that a current 8mm has. The resulting weapon will still be handy and practical, both as a defensive weapon (unlike the Hispano cannon), even as a twinned installation, or as a replacement for the LMGs in the fixed instalation.
Necked-down German MG 131 ammo, as well as the 11.35 Madsen ammo to 10mm might've been good to pierce the light armor on the aircraft and even the light vehicles. Germans were actually mooting the MG 131/8 and 131/10 for these purposes, but I'mnot sure this ever materialized.
The resulting guns will never equal the sinlge-shot power of full-power HMGs like the .50BMG or the Beresin, but will be handy, compact, and well suitable for hand-held positions and turret installations. For the German gun, this also removes the pipsqueek HE shell for the 13mm from being made, thus saving them a pretty penny.
Installation as the pintle guns on vehicles should be very easy.

15mm - I would not go with the very powerful historical types, but the more modest guns, talk ~750 m/s instead of ~950 m/s, since the historical 15mm guns were of size and weight of the 20mm cannons of the day. The 13mm round from the Great War will be a suitable candidate here as a parent cartridge, but a bespoke rimless catridge will also do. Action - Browning is fine, so is the API/Oerlikon and so are the newer developments. We might get a 25-30 kg gun for the aircraft use, and heavy-barreled 35-40 kg gun for ground use?
Usage case - aircraft, both as fixed and movable gun, but also as the light AA gun; firing the self-destructing HE shells instead of AP(I) ammo as on the HMGs will be much healthier to the friendly troops.