"Display of weapons" Topic

A local festival occurred today and a military re-enactment group had this display:

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Nice. I appreciate that the business ends all point the same direction.

For the Thompsons and M3 .45 ACP or 10mm. 10mm? wot?

.45 ACP

One of these days, Forgotten Weapons will probably show us an experimental Thompson converted to 10mm in order to save .45 stocks…

Was there a FG42?

When I reported to Korea, our tank crews were still carrying M3 grease guns. I got to fire two magazine's worth of ammo through one when we did NATO/Soviet weapons familiarization. Holy cow! That weapon is equally dangerous to the people around you as the ones you're trying to shoot. Ours were so inaccurate that they didn't even have a rear sight. It was the epitome of "spray and pray".

Someone needs to help these poor blokes out. They jump directly from an Enfield No.4 Mk.1 to an STG-44. Nothing in-between? No Garand, no AVT-36 or SVT-40, no M1 Carbine?

Was there a FG42?

Quite right. I mean there's no Mosin, so they clearly are not interested in volume of production or longevity of service. So the FG-42 should be right up their alley!

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

For the Thompsons and M3 .45 ACP or 10mm. 10mm?

I'm wondering if that was just a not-too-fussed-about-the-details attempt at an imperial-to-metric conversion.

As in: "Well .50cal is 12.7mm, and .30cal is 7.62mm, so I guess .45cal is between them. That must be what 10mm is!"
(Because 11.45mm just doesn't have that same ring to it?)

… our tank crews were still carrying M3 grease guns…. Holy cow! That weapon is equally dangerous to the people around you as the ones you're trying to shoot. Ours were so inaccurate that they didn't even have a rear sight.

Clearly you have never used an Uzi.

It was the epitome of "spray and pray".

Actually rather the opposite, at least as far as I understand.

It was perfectly hopeless in "spray and pray" mode, as it only fired at about 300 – 350 rpm. It had just about the slowest cyclic rate of any major SMG. More of a tok-tok-tok than a ratatatat or brrrap! This was a deliberate design decision, as it was thought that the lower rate of fire would make the gun more controllable, and hence more accurate.

When I fired an M3 I found it quite controllable. Much (MUCH) more so than an Uzi. And yes it had sights, just not of the type or quality you might have expected after using other service weapons.

There was a fixed peep sight on the rear of the receiver, and a fixed blade sight on the front of the receiver. A very short angle-of-sight, but the original spec only called for hitting a man-sized target at 50 yards, and this arrangement seemed fully adequate to that task.

From what I understand (and saw, as I tried to operate one), the main danger was to the user's finger, one of which had to be volunteered for hazardous duty just to operate the bolt. That and the fact that the safety was also the ejector-port cover, so any time you tried to inspect the action you had to take the gun off of safe.

At least that's how I remember it. Could have gotten some of it wrong. Been known to happen.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

At least the rifles with bayonets are pointing toward the inner display. A much less chance of someone stumbling and falling into them if they were facing the other way… ;-)

The Luftwaffe and Wehrmacht each separately developing their own assault rifle is up there with the Japanese army and navy both having aircraft carriers and using screws that turned the opposite way to each other.

They get what weapons/replicas they can get. There's no more reason they would have any of those things than there is that they wouldn't.

FG42 was not an 'assault rifle'. Different role, different specs.

Now – Nazi Germany DID do a lot of silly things in R&D so the point is valid – but the example is not 100% fitting.

I thought the "Grease Gun" was M4 not M3.

I recently read a very comprehensive book on Pacific War but found no reference to Japanese Army aircraft carriers? Is there a citation?

I recently read a very comprehensive book on Pacific War but found no reference to Japanese Army aircraft carriers? Is there a citation?

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As Javelin pointed out in the ROK. Our Armored Recovery Vehicles[M88 & M578] Crew had a least one M3 Grease Gun organic to their track. IIRC … And that was in the mid-'80s …

Steve, thanks. So strange. Would have been excellent for kamikaze launches: take off but no landing. Live and learn something every day!

My Dad carried the M3 grease gun as an Army aviator in Vietnam along with a .45 pistol. This way he only had to carry one type of ammunition. He fired the M3 out the back of a CV-7 Caribou. Said it wasn't accurate but it would still fire after being dropped and dragged through the mud.

Midway USA Importing A Large Batch Of WW2 Era M1 Carbines

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Armand

The fun thing with the M3 is the very heavy bolt as the main part of the blow-back operation. The gun will very noticeably fire slower when firing near vertical upwards and much faster when shooting down.

A trucking company National Guard in the 2003 Iraqi invasion was issued m3 grease guns.
no really. when I asked about the picture of the unit all with m3 the Gent stated that is what we got. our leadership forbade us to fire and each day the enemy got closer to the route until we opened up after that they shot at the other truck units and left our unit alone.

Japanese army aircraft carriers were really ferries to bring planes to newly-captured airfields. No need to land because they'd be landing on shore. US used CVE's for that purpose.

Didn't the Japanese get a new CV ? Or ?

They call them destroyers but they look remarkably like carriers…

Yes, I knew there was something "novel" about them … 🤔

Thanks !