The only thing is those standing chaps are not aiming. Look a the muzzle at the moment of discharge. One has to see the targets to judge if is just so much sound and fury, signifying nothing or real firepower.
It would still be a bad idea to be standing downrange!
Originally Posted by Frederick303
real firepower.
Is, I think, the idea - a platoon of chaps firing like that is going to have the effect of a machine-gun.
Interesting that this technique developed in an army where the generals had thought for a long time that the magazine cut-off was a good idea to stop the troops firing off their ammo quickly!
You come from the land of the precision shooting Infantry. The German army in the last great international debate did not even teach rapid fire with the K98K, instead they were big into snap shooting based on their "battlemoments" (zeitbilder). In a similar manner the German concept of Striking power (Stosskraft) was based on the concept that in a firefight it was the hits that count, not the volume of fire directed in the general direction of the enemy. As such the ideal for their rifleman was to be a hunter of men, waiting for a target to appear, then making a rapid shot at the target, reloading and waiting for the next target to appear. Suppression fire was based on hits which would demoralize the enemy and keep his head down. The volume of fire instruments were the MGs, and in the final assault, the MP. There was a bifurcation between area fire weapons and precision fire weapons (until the release of the MP43). Interestingly the Germans, unlike most of the WWII movies I grew up on, depended on the rifle to a much higher extent than the MP, as the production of the MP 38/40 was never more than 20,000 per month, with the production of the K98K being 10~12 times as great. Both the US and Brits had much higher relative production of MP than the Germans, at least until late 1944.
This entire worldview of the firefight came about in the late 1916~1917 time period, indeed the entire German army was supposed to undergo a new musketry course in the winter of 1917/18 prior to the St. Michael offensive in March of 1918. Junger mentions it in his book "storm of steel" and my grandfather was instructed that way as well (he went through German instruction in early 1918, US rifle instruction in 1942). It seems from reading the Swiss and Swedish shooting manuals that post WWI this way of looking at the rifle fire fight was more or less universal in central/northern Europe.
In any case the US followed the French tactical model, which was the build up of a volume of fire against the enemy, which was thought to suppress the fire of the enemy and allow for the final 200 meter advance. Not sure exactly how the UK did it, so I cannot comment. While the US methods might have worked somewhat, the French were a flop as evidenced by the 1940 disparity in combat casualties during the battle of France (~ 3 to 1). Indeed the fact the Germans were able to , at least in direct battles continue to inflict something like 3 casualties for every 2 they took, at least through the late summer of 1944 against the UK and American forces, seems to indicate that there was some merit in the German tactical precepts.
Against such a foe, volume of fire without having a target is likely to draw fire on you to no real advantage. Growing up in the 1970s and listening to the American Vets and German vets when they got together (but frankly most likely my impressions are based on discussions with my fathers recollections of those conversations in the 1980s), it was apparent that at least in the US Army in the ETO, there was a distinct fear of giving away your position with the M1, as it was prone to excessive smoke and flash and marked hesitancy to fire. I do not recall the Germans vets response, if any, but I do recall that none seemed to feel their K98K rifles were outclassed by the more rapid fire M1 rifles or No 4 rifles.
It was on the above that my comments were made. I have great respect and affection for the Enfield Rifle (have more of them than any other rifle) but I think the rapid fire with no aim is , "so much sound and fury, indicating nothing".
apologies to Bill S. for stealing his words
---------- Post added at 01:23 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:15 PM ----------
Oh, by the way, this is relevant today. there was an article in the infantry magazine a few years ago on the very large difference between US casualties in firefights in Afghanistan and the insurgents. The US forces were suffering such low casualties relative to their foes that it was worth study. The conclusion was the insurgents were depending on the volume of fire of their AKs, putting them on auto and firing off large amounts of cartridges in the general direction of the US forces in said fire fights. They were not aiming. Most of there shots were going high. The US forces were aiming, their task made easier by the fact that the folks firing at them were, by their copious use of cartridges, giving the US infantry nice indications of where they were. the differential in casualties in these fights was something like 12 to 1 in favor of the US forces, in situations were they were outnumbered.
Not to say rapid firing rifles are not an advantage, simply that there is a trade-off in accuracy/aimed fire against volume of fire, volume of fire alone (without accuracy) is not quite what folks make it out to be.
It is quite surprising and I can well understand anyone's hesitancy to take this on any odd chaps statement on the internet. So here is the back up to my assertion(s):
1) If you read the US book Currahee!, which was written in the 1950s he makes reference tot his face that on D-Day that the K98K rifles could not be located by smoke, whereas the US rifles were quite smokey and showed flash, which made shooting a distinct risk unless you had a target to shoot at. He mentions that you had to shoot and move in the hedgerows, once your position was revealed by smoke, incoming shots would soon follow
2) In the 1954 book published "Wound Ballistics" they spend a lot of time on this issue and the complaints from the front line troops on the M2 ball cartridge, both in the pacific and the ETO. They say the issue did not come up until fighting in areas where there was dense vegetation, at which point the disadvantage showed up (not much of an issue in the desert or Sicily)
3) In the book "Return to Casino" written by a US army officer involved in the fighting in January to March 1944, he goes into some depth of the difficulties of night fighting against the Germans, due to the flashless powder they used, as well as night tracers they used that did not light for 150 M.
4) In a History of Modern US military Small arms ammunition, volume 2, 1940 to 1945, there is a fairly extensive discussion of the complaints on flash and smoke from the ETO and pacific theaters and the efforts' made to rectify the issues. As in the ETO the complaints did not really show up until the winter of 1943/44, little was accomplished by the end of the war. But the technical details involved are covered in that source. One of the issues was that the M1 Garand with its gas port 1 inch from the muzzle needed a high port pressure to ensure operation under all conditions. High port pressure makes flash difficult to suppress with out a lot of powder additives (to raise the self ignition temperature of the powder), which in turn results in smoke.
5) In the book "men under fire" S.L.A. Marschall asserts that US troops were hesitant to shoot at the enemy, but seems to assign that to excessive aimed fire training. Now I do not recall exactly, but when going through training as an officer at university in the early 1980s I recall discussing this with my father. This was around the time General Dupoy was publishing his studies on the relative effectiveness of armies in WWII, which made a big splash back in the late 1970s to early 1980s. My father recalled from his discussions with Vets from his time in service (he was in right after the war, never left the US Territories but was in until 1949) that one fellow who had the bronze star said he never fired his rifle unless he saw something, for fear of getting shot. We both mused there might be some contribution to the ability of the Germans to get along with a slow firing bolt action so late because of this smoke and flash. It was then that his recollections of discussions with vets from the 1970s, when the German vets seemed to open up a bit in social discussions, that he recalled they did not ever seem to have any feeing of being under-gunned with those rifles, indeed they all seemed to have an affinity for the K98K as a combat weapon.
6) After this and curious why the Germans seemed to do so well so late in the war I continued to follow this. In March 1989 there was an article in INSIGHT magazine on SLA Marshall somewhat debunking his studies (at least questioning them). The article was no so interesting as the letters back, published in the April 24 1989 issue. I will put down one that pretty much summarizes the issue:
"It was common knowledge in the European theater that our infantryman were reluctant to fire their rifles (Nation, march 27). The had a very good reason. Our Garand rifle put out smoke every time it fired. The Germans could concentrate their fire on our infantry positions, and that was not conducive to a long life span. German infantry rifles did not put smoke like ours and the German infantry was hard to locate. I was curious about this and talked to an ordnance officer as to why our ammunition could not be smokeless. .....Since this was common knowledge in the European theater, perhaps historian S.L.A. Marshall thought it was well known"
Col. Raymond S. Webster, Ret. Charlottesville, Va
7) When researching how armies trained with small arms I came across the different German rifle doctrine. Suddenly my Grandfathers comments made a lot of sense. Interestingly the Germans spent some time on the issue of flash, that had vexed them with the kar98 in WWI shooting the S cartridge. While not common, there was a flash-hider issued for the K98 that was not really a success. In any case the WWII low smoke and flash signature on with the SS and SME cartridges were not accidents, it was a carefully engineered feature. part of their efforts were to limit the ability of their troops to be seen when firing, hence the efforts to reduce signature. In fairness to the US the Germans task was made easier by the fact that the 7.92 x57 cartridge because of the large bore had a relatively low muzzle pressure compared to other cartridges such as the 30-06 M2 cartridge.
There are more details from various sources, but that is the essence of the information on the topic.
i think some of you are missing the point about the mad minute, it wasn't random fire, it was supposed to be aimed fire. in the newspaper articles they differentiate between aimed and purely speed runs.
i don't have the original documents myself, but at the end of this video are the "mad minute" specs as (i'm assuming) taken from the 1914 musketry reg's.
PM
Originally Posted by Frederick303
