5 Military Guns That Revolutionized Modern Infantry Combat

[longknife]

For any who've served, the individual rifle is probably the most important thing in your life when you're in combat. I've fired 3 of them and certainly heard a lot of the 4th. The 5 in the article are certainly impressive and details on each is @ 5 Military Firearms That Revolutionized Modern Infantry Combat

Sturmgewehr 44 - the German staple in WWII.

AK-47 - developed in 1947 and still in use today as it lasts forever and is easy to keep up

M16 developed in 1956 and still in use today by the Army and Marines

MG34/42 machine gun built and used by the Germans

M-1 Garand. My first military rifle and still in use by The Old Guard for ceremonial purposes. A side note, the Guardsmen have M16s but still qualify with their M-1s.

To read more, go to 5 Military Firearms That Revolutionized Modern Infantry Combat

 

[westwall]

For any who've served, the individual rifle is probably the most important thing in your life when you're in combat. I've fired 3 of them and certainly heard a lot of the 4th. The 5 in the article are certainly impressive and details on each is @ 5 Military Firearms That Revolutionized Modern Infantry Combat

Sturmgewehr 44 - the German staple in WWII.

AK-47 - developed in 1947 and still in use today as it lasts forever and is easy to keep up

M16 developed in 1956 and still in use today by the Army and Marines

MG34/42 machine gun built and used by the Germans

M-1 Garand. My first military rifle and still in use by The Old Guard for ceremonial purposes. A side note, the Guardsmen have M16s but still qualify with their M-1s.

To read more, go to 5 Military Firearms That Revolutionized Modern Infantry Combat

The Germans wish the Stg-44 were a staple. They had far too few of them to go around. The MG34 is vastly different from the MG42. The '42 is still in use today as the MG3 but the '34 was far too complex, and costly to produce.

My list would be the Maxim machinegun which absolutely changed the way wars were fought at the beginning of the last century.

The MG08/15 which introduced the modern style of warfare we use today, namely having a machinegun that could advance with the troops to provide cover fire in the assault.
The French Chauchat is a close second place, but its box magazine hurts it in the long run.

The Garand for sure as it and the SVT-40 were the first mass produced self loading rifles to be used in any numbers in combat.

The aforementioned MG 42

And the Stg44 which paved the way for all modern assault rifles, and once again changed the combat paradigm.

 

[Ridgerunner]

The last time the Army adopted a submachine gun was 75 years ago.

The U.S. Army is Looking for Its First New Submachine Gun Since WWII

 

[Pilot1]

I would probably add the P-08, and M1911 to the list somewhere.

 

[harmonica]

''past eighty years''?..just as I am looking at this thread, I picked up History of the World in 100 Weapons from my end table a few minutes ago
...I got this as a gift last Christmas and read it now and then
...it gives brief details/history on all of these weapons

..the MG34/42 were innovative and the US M60 used some of their designs
...I remember a book Firing the War Weapons [ something like that ].....I seem to recall the author firing the 34 or 42 [ I think the 42 ] for a very long time....thousands of rounds with no malfunctions
MG42:
...barrel change in seconds
...''new roller-locked operating mechanism which gave it a blistering rate of fire''
..developed as a cheaper, more easily produced MG than the 34

..the Garand of course gave the US a firepower advantage--especially over the Japanese--especially night fighting in the jungle where the bolt action was highly disadvantageous
..certainly the Garand was instrumental in saving lives/attacks/combat/etc

..the AK47, Garand, M14, etc used the bigger cartridges .....where as the M16 uses the smaller---more can be carried ...and M16 less weight ...so we have the ''big'', ''heavy'' rifles and cartridges ---then we go to the smaller sizes of the M16......I thought a good portion of combat encounters were said to be 300m and under, so the M16 is well designed for this......you don't need the ''big'' rifles

the Germans have always been innovators and great industrialists....

 

[whitehall]

The word "revolutionized" is often misused. The M-1 Garand developed in the 30's was truly revolutionary at the time. It was a hard hitting 30.06 semi-automatic 8 shot rifle while the basic rifle of the enemy was bolt action. General Patton said the M-1 was "the greatest implement of war ever devised". The AK was a well engineered reliable weapon but hardly revolutionary in an era of automatic weapons.

 

[miketx]

The word "revolutionized" is often misused. The M-1 Garand developed in the 30's was truly revolutionary at the time. It was a hard hitting 30.06 semi-automatic 8 shot rifle while the basic rifle of the enemy was bolt action. General Patton said the M-1 was "the greatest implement of war ever devised". The AK was a well engineered reliable weapon but hardly revolutionary in an era of automatic weapons.

The 30.06 was adopted as the US army standard cartridge based on the fact that is was capable of dropping a horse at 600 meters.