The Browning “50-cal” has become the longest serving weapon in the US inventory. The “fifty” has been employed in every imaginable role for a machine gun. It is considered such an effective and reliable weapon that few countries ever attempted to develop an equivalent weapon. Even the Japanese created a copy of it during World War II when the US was producing literally thousands every month to use in every theater. This is a history of the development of this famous weapon, its most critical operational use and the variants that have been produced to keep it at the forefront of the action.
A “well-researched and very readable new biography” (The Wall Street Journal) of “the Thomas Edison of guns,” a visionary inventor who designed the modern handgun and whose awe-inspiring array of firearms helped ensure victory in numerous American wars and holds a crucial place in world history. Few people are aware that John Moses Browning—a tall, humble, cerebral man born in 1855 and raised as a Mormon in the American West—was the mind behind many of the world-changing firearms that dominated more than a century of conflict. He invented the design used in virtually all modern pistols, created the most popular hunting rifles and shotguns, and conceived the machine guns that proved decisive not just in World Wars I and II but nearly every major military action since. Yet few in America knew his name until he was into his sixties. Now, author Nathan Gorenstein brings firearms inventor John Moses Browning to vivid life in this riveting and revealing biography. Embodying the tradition of self-made, self-educated geniuses (like Lincoln and Edison), Browning was able to think in three dimensions (he never used blueprints) and his gifted mind produced everything from the famous Winchester “30-30” hunting rifle to the awesomely effective machine guns used by every American aircraft and infantry unit in World War II. The British credited Browning’s guns with helping to win the Battle of Britain. His inventions illustrate both the good and bad of weapons. Sweeping, lively, and brilliantly told, this fascinating book that “gun collectors and historians of armaments will cherish” (Kirkus Reviews) introduces a little-known legend whose impact on history ranks with that of the Wright Brothers, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford.
Ian Gooderson presents a study of close air support in World War II, with the analysis focusing on the use of tactical air power by British and American forces during the campaigns in Italy and northwestern Europe between 1943 and 1945.
With the MG 34, the German Wehrmacht introduced an entirely new concept in automatic firepower – the general-purpose machine gun (GPMG). In itself the MG 34 was an excellent weapon: an air-cooled, recoil-operated machine gun that could deliver killing firepower at ranges of more than 1,000m. Yet simply by changing its mount and feed mechanism, the operator could radically transform its function. On its standard bipod it was a light machine gun, ideal for infantry assaults; on a tripod it could serve as a sustained-fire medium machine gun. During World War II, the MG 34 was superseded by a new GPMG – the MG 42. More efficient to manufacture and more robust, it had a blistering 1,200rpm rate of fire. Nicknamed 'Hitler's buzzsaw' by Allied troops, it was arguably the finest all-round GPMG ever produced, and alongside the MG 34 it inflicted heavy casualties. Featuring specially commissioned full-colour artwork and drawing upon numerous technical manuals and first-hand accounts, this study explores the technological development, varied roles and lasting influence of the revolutionary MG 34 and MG 42 machine guns and their postwar successors.
First adopted in 1917, the rugged and reliable Browning .30-caliber machine gun remained in US service into the Vietnam era, and is still occasionally found in use elsewhere even today. Produced in both water-cooled and air-cooled versions, it has been employed in every imaginable role for a machine gun – antipersonnel, antiaircraft, mounted on aircraft as both defensive and offensive armament, defensive armament aboard vehicles (armored and soft-skin), mounted on watercraft, and others. Employing gripping first-hand testimony and featuring specially commissioned illustrations and detailed photographs, many in color, this lively study of the Browning .30-caliber machine gun reveals the origins, combat history and legacy of this versatile and dependable weapon.
George Washington insisted that his portrait be painted with one. Daniel Boone created a legend with one. Abraham Lincoln shot them on the White House lawn. And Teddy Roosevelt had his specially customized. In this first-of-its-kind book, historian Alexander Rose delivers a colorful, engrossing biography of an American icon: the rifle. Drawing on the words of foot soldiers, inventors, and presidents, based on extensive new research, and spanning from the Revolution to the present day, American Rifle is a balanced, wonderfully entertaining history of the rifle and its place in American culture.
"The series of books entitled "The machine gun" was begun with the belief that the next best thing to actual knowledge is knowing where to find it. The research summarized within the covers of these volumes has been compiled by the Bureau of Ordinance, Department of the Navy, in order to place in the hands of those rightfully interested in the art of automatic weapon design, the world's recorded progress in this field of endeavor."--Vol. II, p. v.
The US M60 General Purpose Machine Gun, known as “the Pig,” was developed in the years after World War II from two revolutionary German designs. Adopted in 1957, the M60 came into its own in the jungles, hamlets, and city streets of Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War. “Humping the Pig” became common in US military squads, with at least one soldier equipped with an M60 and every squad member carrying ammunition for it. The M60 design transformed infantry tactics as squads took advantage of the immediate volume of fire offered by the design. Although it has now been replaced by the M240 series of weapons in US infantry and mechanized units, the M60 is still in common use with the US armed forces. Meanwhile, its iconic status has been assured by its frequent appearance in many popular films and television shows, from Full Metal Jacket to The A Team. Featuring specially commissioned full-color artwork, this is the full story of the M60, the innovative squad base-of-fire weapon that has equipped the US military from the jungles of Vietnam to the deserts of Iraq.
The machine gun had a dramatic effect on the conduct of warfare; one or two men operating a single machine could produce the same weight of fire as a squadron of rifles, and when used against an inferior enemy, the effect could be devestating. During the First World War, the use of the machine gun in conjunction with massed barbed wire and other obstacles put an end to battlefield mobility until new weapons and tactics could be devised. This book describes the development of the machine gun from the earliest models to the present day. The focus is very much on portable infantry weapons used in the support role, so automatic cannon of 20mm and larger calibres are excluded. The categories of weapon included are, therefore, Light Machine Guns [LMGs], a term which includes the Squad Automatic Weapon [SAW] and Light Support Weapon [LSW]; Medium Machine Guns [MMGs]; Heavy Machine Guns [HMGs] and General Purpose Machine Guns [GPMGs]. One specialist variety of machine guns is included in a separate chapter: the grenade machine gun [GMG], also known as the automatic grenade launcher [AGL]. With a country-by-country breakdown of machine guns, including comprehensive appendices of gun and ammunition data, along with hundreds of photographs, this is a comprehensive study of a most effective battlefield weapon.
