Bad ideas in war

[jimbob]

To say nothing of the resources that the campaign kept tied down in Germany rather than on the Eastern or Western fronts.

10,000 88mm flak weapons being kept in Germany was significant, for example

 

[Wudang]

10,000 88mm flak weapons being kept in Germany was significant, for example

I know the scale of WWII was massive but sometimes a single number like that hits home.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Also millions of tons of artillery shells lost to AA shell production, the training and resources for all the artillery crews manning the AA guns and resources put in to millions of tons of re-enforced concrete U-boat pens, deep shelters and bunkers
Not forgetting the production lost to air raid damage.
Before the war the Germans didn't distribute or diversify production. If a factory was hit and work stopped until it was repaired entire supply chains could be disrupted.*
In contrast , by the time the war started the British government had paid for the building and equipping of 'shadow' factories for production of vital weapons and equipment including aircraft and aero engines. Some were even underground, the most famous being the Merlin engine factory built under Box Hill and accessed via the existing railway tunnel.
It had its own underground railway station. Trains entering the tunnel with materials were timed to coincide with trains of finished engines leaving at the other end to help hide the factory.
German aircraft production never got close to British numbers.


*A good example is the Focke-Wulf Ta154. It was going to be the German equivalent of the Mosquito, a plywood nightfighter.
It's construction relied on a particular synthetic adhesive called Tego-Film. It was produced in one factory owned by A company called Goldschmidt and its production process was s trade secret. It's factory was destroyed in an RAF night raid in 1943. No other glue was available with enough strength so all the effort and resources put in to the Ta154 were wasted.

 

[jimbob]

Also millions of tons of artillery shells lost to AA shell production, the training and resources for all the artillery crews manning the AA guns and resources put in to millions of tons of re-enforced concrete U-boat pens, deep shelters and bunkers
Not forgetting the production lost to air raid damage.
Before the war the Germans didn't distribute or diversify production. If a factory was hit and work stopped until it was repaired entire supply chains could be disrupted.*
In contrast , by the time the war started the British government had paid for the building and equipping of 'shadow' factories for production of vital weapons and equipment including aircraft and aero engines. Some were even underground, the most famous being the Merlin engine factory built under Box Hill and accessed via the existing railway tunnel.
It had its own underground railway station. Trains entering the tunnel with materials were timed to coincide with trains of finished engines leaving at the other end to help hide the factory.
German aircraft production never got close to British numbers.


*A good example is the Focke-Wulf Ta154. It was going to be the German equivalent of the Mosquito, a plywood nightfighter.
It's construction relied on a particular synthetic adhesive called Tego-Film. It was produced in one factory owned by A company called Goldschmidt and its production process was s trade secret. It's factory was destroyed in an RAF night raid in 1943. No other glue was available with enough strength so all the effort and resources put in to the Ta154 were wasted.

Yup.

And the dispersal at that stage imposed far worse costs on production than the pre war prep that the British did. Often weapons don't directly cause too much harm, but that is because their existence and threat causes costly countermeasures that have an impact.

And as you said, there were many German weapons programmes that were delayed or abandoned when their engineering sites were hit.

Further to your point about aircraft production, they also weren't equivalent. No proper heavy bombers, for example. Also, if you are producing defensive night fighters, and manning them, you're not using those pilots to protect convoys between Italy and North Africa, or to interdict allied convoys in the same theatre for example.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Yup.

And the dispersal at that stage imposed far worse costs on production than the pre war prep that the British did. Often weapons don't directly cause too much harm, but that is because their existence and threat causes costly countermeasures that have an impact.

And as you said, there were many German weapons programmes that were delayed or abandoned when their engineering sites were hit.

Further to your point about aircraft production, they also weren't equivalent. No proper heavy bombers, for example. Also, if you are producing defensive night fighters, and manning them, you're not using those pilots to protect convoys between Italy and North Africa, or to interdict allied convoys in the same theatre for example.

Or supply close support of troops on the ground.
For example, Between December the 16th and January 1st The Luftwaffe flew 6421 sorties over the Ardennes battlefield to support their attack, the Americans flew 10,250. In addition the RAF diverted Typhoon and Tempest squadrons to provide 9,250 sorties.
Altogether in the full month 16 December to 16 January the Allies flew 63,741 sorties over the Ardennes battlefield, the Germans flew no more after the 1st of January.
January 1st was the day of operation Bodenplatte, the German all out attack on Allied airfields in Belgium to try and ease the pressure on the front. That accounted for over 1000 of their sorties in the battle.
They lost 300 aircraft shot down in a single morning, the allies lost 280 on the ground which were replaced in less than 2 weeks.
Altogether the Luftwaffe lost over 800 aircraft in two weeks, more than 10% of their total air force, mainly fighters. They took months to replace and build numbers up again.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

I've never seen anything like that.
Are you sure it wasn't supposed to be a safety device like a grip safety on a Luger or 1911?

View attachment 76137

Which actually brings me to another bad idea. The Soviet TT (Tokarev Tula) pistol had NO safety at all. Not grip, not a switch, nothing. The ONLY way to make it safe was to take out the magazine, rack the slide (and presumably retrieve the round), manually decock it, then put the magazine back in. There are records of officers shooting themselves when their car hit a pothole and they dropped it. One of them literally shot himself in the head. Probably more, but that's the only account I've read where it went THAT dramatically south.

And it's not like they were trying to invent some reliable safety, like was the case with early-ish SMGs. Their design literally copied the 1911, in a different calibre. They just wanted it as cheap as possible. So how do you make a milled steel pistol cheaper, while still having to mill it? Remove those silly safety features. D'oh.

And again, I'm not talking about some experimental prototype, which I'm willing to overook. Those things were issued by the millions, not only in the USSR, but all over the Eastern bloc.

 

[sackett]

The TT had a half-cock notch on the hammer. It was safe to carry the pistol
w/ a round in the chamber and the half-cock engaged -- not that I'd do it, but
I wouldn't carry any single action auto pistol locked and loaded with an external safety on
either.

I suspect that TT accidents occurred 1) to fools and 2) in rare cases where
the half-cock notch on the hammer was not quite engaged with the sear
-- as will happen with half-cock notches; always has & always will.

A few modern gun bugs (pistoleros, whom I regard with some nervousness) think
the TT was safe 'nuff for wartime. Okay. Let 'em go off to war packing one.
I'll chip in to buy flowers for their graves.

Not that the pistol is likely to do them harm, but enthusiasts who face modern
war with confidence in their sidearms justify that nervousness I mentioned.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

I suspect that TT accidents occurred 1) to fools and 2) in rare cases where
the half-cock notch on the hammer was not quite engaged with the sear
-- as will happen with half-cock notches; always has & always will.

I think that firearm design should be for fools. Doubly so those who just came out of a firefight, and have their brains marinated in adrenaline. Failing to engage a half cock sear is probably the least of your problems there.

But, nevertheless, there were officers who shot themselves with it. Were they fools? MAYBE. Nobody can dig them up and give them an IQ test

Were they insufficiently trained? PROBABLY. The Red Army was going through soldiers like crazy. Including officers. Sixteen year olds had their first combat or maybe second, and were given a promotion and a pistol. Nobody was going to send them back for officer training when they needed to stop the Wehrmacht RIGHT NAO,

Which brings me back to the original point: design your military weapons for idiots, because some of them will be. FSM knows I've seen some of the... intellectual proletar, even operating an AA autocannon

 

[Andy_Ross]

One of the reasons the British stayed with a revolver in WW2 was that they are safer and easier to shoot compared to an automatic for relatively untrained shooters.
Officers pistols are not important things, they are rarely going to be used and then probably only as a last resort, training in their use was a low priority.

Compared to the 1911 which was considered for service (and in WW1 was produced by Colt in the British standard .455 chambering for private purchase by officers) a revolver only drops one round from 7 to 6 and is much more simple and easier to clean and look after, it doesn't need to be stripped, plus revolvers are much cheaper and quicker to manufacture.

.38 Special was adopted as the new pistol cartridge in the 30s and a new, smaller and lighter version of the Webley was introduced as the standard pistol.
When the war started S&W .38s were ordered in large numbers as an alternative standard.

.38 Special is an easier round to shoot than the .45 Colt ACP and Webley .455 rounds It's higher velocity with a flatter trajectory and easier to score hits at anything but point blank range.

From the start of 1944 Browning Hi-Power automatic pistols made in Canada started to come in to service. They used the 9mm Parabellum round (now the most popular handgun round) which is more or less the equivalent of the revolver .38 Special.
It was never intended to be the standard pistol but it's high 15 round capacity and commonality of ammunition with the Sten and German pistols and sub machine guns made it ideal for use by Commandos and special forces.
After the war it was adapted as standard when NATO chose the 9mm as the standard pistol round and was in service until 2013 when it was replaced by the Glock 17.

I had a Hi-Power for years until the pistol ban came in.

 

[jimbob]

One of the reasons the British stayed with a revolver in WW2 was that they are safer and easier to shoot compared to an automatic for relatively untrained shooters.
Officers pistols are not important things, they are rarely going to be used and then probably only as a last resort, training in their use was a low priority.

Compared to the 1911 which was considered for service (and in WW1 was produced by Colt in the British standard .455 chambering for private purchase by officers) a revolver only drops one round from 7 to 6 and is much more simple and easier to clean and look after, it doesn't need to be stripped, plus revolvers are much cheaper and quicker to manufacture.

.38 Special was adopted as the new pistol cartridge in the 30s and a new, smaller and lighter version of the Webley was introduced as the standard pistol.
When the war started S&W .38s were ordered in large numbers as an alternative standard.

.38 Special is an easier round to shoot than the .45 Colt ACP and Webley .455 rounds It's higher velocity with a flatter trajectory and easier to score hits at anything but point blank range.

From the start of 1944 Browning Hi-Power automatic pistols made in Canada started to come in to service. They used the 9mm Parabellum round (now the most popular handgun round) which is more or less the equivalent of the revolver .38 Special.
It was never intended to be the standard pistol but it's high 15 round capacity and commonality of ammunition with the Sten and German pistols and sub machine guns made it ideal for use by Commandos and special forces.
After the war it was adapted as standard when NATO chose the 9mm as the standard pistol round and was in service until 2013 when it was replaced by the Glock 17.

I had a Hi-Power for years until the pistol ban came in.

That reasoning makes sense, which is why Mad Jack Churchill was probably more crazy like a fox than "mad" with his choice of weapons. Including his infamous ambush in France in 1940 which was initiated by him with a claimed "longbow" but immediately followed with conventional tactics including a bren gun.

 

[catsmate]

One of the reasons the British stayed with a revolver in WW2 was that they are safer and easier to shoot compared to an automatic for relatively untrained shooters.
Officers pistols are not important things, they are rarely going to be used and then probably only as a last resort, training in their use was a low priority.

Compared to the 1911 which was considered for service (and in WW1 was produced by Colt in the British standard .455 chambering for private purchase by officers) a revolver only drops one round from 7 to 6 and is much more simple and easier to clean and look after, it doesn't need to be stripped, plus revolvers are much cheaper and quicker to manufacture.

.38 Special was adopted as the new pistol cartridge in the 30s and a new, smaller and lighter version of the Webley was introduced as the standard pistol.
When the war started S&W .38s were ordered in large numbers as an alternative standard.

.38 Special is an easier round to shoot than the .45 Colt ACP and Webley .455 rounds It's higher velocity with a flatter trajectory and easier to score hits at anything but point blank range.

From the start of 1944 Browning Hi-Power automatic pistols made in Canada started to come in to service. They used the 9mm Parabellum round (now the most popular handgun round) which is more or less the equivalent of the revolver .38 Special.
It was never intended to be the standard pistol but it's high 15 round capacity and commonality of ammunition with the Sten and German pistols and sub machine guns made it ideal for use by Commandos and special forces.
After the war it was adapted as standard when NATO chose the 9mm as the standard pistol round and was in service until 2013 when it was replaced by the Glock 17.

I had a Hi-Power for years until the pistol ban came in.

A couple of nitpicks....
The Colt pistol was chambered for the .455SL cartridge, as used by the Webley semi-automatic pistol, not the revolver cartridge. It was used by the RFC a bit (the RNAS had used the Webley automatic).
Though Colt also chambered revolvers for the .455 revolver cartridge in WW1. As did Smith and Wesson.

The replacement.38 revolver was chambered for a version of the .38 Smith and Wesson cartridge (9x20mmR) with a heavy bullet, not the S&W Special (9x29mm). The Enfield model was supplemented by Webleys and S&W models.

 

[Andy_Ross]

The US introduced the M1 Carbine to replace the 1911 pistol because it was easier and far quicker to train someone to reliably hit things with it than it was with the pistol. It was also issued to support troops where a full size Garand would be too cumbersome, Bazooka teams, radio operators, airborne etc.
However, it's small size and 20 round magazine made it popular with combat troops in close quarter battle like street fighting, forests and jungle fighting.

It's reputation has suffered with all kinds of mythology about it being so weak bullets bounced off enemy overcoats in the Korea and unreliability.
Obviously rubbish as the .30 carbine round delivers the same energy as a .357 magnum with a higher velocity and flatter trajectory.
Reliability is down to the magazines being semi disposable and originals not performing very well after 80 years.

 

[Andy_Ross]

A couple of nitpicks....
The Colt pistol was chambered for the .455SL cartridge, as used by the Webley semi-automatic pistol, not the revolver cartridge. It was used by the RFC a bit (the RNAS had used the Webley automatic).
Though Colt also chambered revolvers for the .455 revolver cartridge in WW1. As did Smith and Wesson.

The replacement.38 revolver was chambered for a version of the .38 Smith and Wesson cartridge (9x20mmR) with a heavy bullet, not the S&W Special (9x29mm). The Enfield model was supplemented by Webleys and S&W models.

Yes, the .455 revolver round was rimmed and wouldn't work in an automatic.
I didn't know the RFC issued them, I thought they were only private purchase.

The armourers school at HMS Excellent had several Webley automatics, I've handled one and field stripped it. Impressive things.

I made a mistake with the .38 special, you are right the round used was the .38/200. It used a 200 grain lead bullet, that's almost the weight of a .45ACP bullet. I had .38 special on my mind as I was just watching a video on S&W revolver frame sizes, .38 special featured a lot lol.

Nitpick of the nitpick.
Webley had already designed the .38 version of their MkIV and tendered it to the WD, but the WD took the design to Enfield who changed a few dimensions and put it in to production as their own Enfield No. 2.
Webley sued the Government over it and were awarded compensation for their costs involved in the research and design of the revolver.
As it turned out Enfield couldn't meet production numbers and Webley were given contracts for their original MkIV.

Interestingly the Enfield revolvers were mostly produced without a hammer spur, and early guns were converted when they were serviced. This made them slightly cheaper to produce but also safer and easier to train with. British pistol doctrine was for rapid double action fire at close range. Removing the hammer spur forced double action on the shooter.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Yes, the .455 revolver round was rimmed and wouldn't work in an automatic.

Technically... actually, it can work. The Czech managed it with the rimmed .303 the round for the Bren gun. Desert Eagle managed it in .44 magnum. So did the Dragunov with their old rimmed 7.62×54mmR. So did Romania with their PSL, which looks just like a Dragunov, but is really their own scaled version of an AK-47, not really based on the Dragunov design, other than the general idea.

The trick is to have a magazine that physically prevents you from loading the rounds from the back to the front, which would cause rim-lock.

But yeah, going with a rimless cartridge is easier, cheaper (for the magazine) and more fool proof.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Contrary to modern belief the .303 didn't rim lock 'in period' it's a modern thing, part mythology and part modern ammo being slightly different to original loads which can lock.

As you mention it's possible to design a magazine that stacks the rounds correctly when loaded. In the case of the Lee-Enfield rifle pushing the rounds down and out of the stripper clip on to the magazines follower forces the bases of the cartridges down at an angle that sorts them in to the right stack, it's one of the reasons the magazine floor is angled.

Secondly modern .303 commercial ammunition is slightly different to original. On period cartridge cases the edges of the rim are slightly chamfered, if a round is stacked behind the one below it in the magazine there is enough force in closing the bolt to bump it over and feed.
Modern manufacture cartridge cases don't have the chamfer and won't 'bump over'.that's why period brass is sought after by reloaders.
Some rifles these days have problems with their magazines which after 80 years or so aren't working as they should.

If you do get a rim lock with modern commercial ammo, a quick push down on the top round in the magazine will pop things in to place.

In all the thousands of .303 I have shot from Lee-Enfields, including my own over the decades, I never had a rim lock. I have always been fortunate to use service ammunition or original brass reloads.

Bren Magazines are curved partially because of the tapered shape of the .303 case but also to force rounds to stack correctly


Bloke on the Range has a good video on Lee-Enfield rim jams.

 

[catsmate]

Yes, the .455 revolver round was rimmed and wouldn't work in an automatic.
I didn't know the RFC issued them, I thought they were only private purchase.

The armourers school at HMS Excellent had several Webley automatics, I've handled one and field stripped it. Impressive things.

I made a mistake with the .38 special, you are right the round used was the .38/200. It used a 200 grain lead bullet, that's almost the weight of a .45ACP bullet. I had .38 special on my mind as I was just watching a video on S&W revolver frame sizes, .38 special featured a lot lol.

Nitpick of the nitpick.
Webley had already designed the .38 version of their MkIV and tendered it to the WD, but the WD took the design to Enfield who changed a few dimensions and put it in to production as their own Enfield No. 2.
Webley sued the Government over it and were awarded compensation for their costs involved in the research and design of the revolver.
As it turned out Enfield couldn't meet production numbers and Webley were given contracts for their original MkIV.

Interestingly the Enfield revolvers were mostly produced without a hammer spur, and early guns were converted when they were serviced. This made them slightly cheaper to produce but also safer and easier to train with. British pistol doctrine was for rapid double action fire at close range. Removing the hammer spur forced double action on the shooter.

View attachment 76230

As a minor point, Evelyn Owen actually built working prototypes of the Owen machine carbine chambered for
the .38/200 and .455 revolver cartridges, as well as .455 SL. Sanity prevailed and the 9mm Parabellum round prevailed.
Dand clever engineer.

 

[sackett]

Speaking of bad ideas and .30 carbines.

There, I didn't even need a full sentence.

Andy, old sweat, I fear that the Thirsty Carbone was adopted to fill a need that only the US army perceived.
The cartridge was & still is potent SMG fodder IF you think you require such a thing. But the weapon
the army chose is and forever shall be unreliable too much of the time. That includes wartime make, high
number and still in the Cosmoline; these now & then turn up. Modern attempts to replicate it are no better.

Is it sexy and light? Sure is! Will even front line infantry liberate one to ease their load? Myep, sure will. War
photography shows them in doggos' hands increasingly after Normandy.

Did it soldier well in Korea? No, not really.

Is it in use anywhere in this bloody world today? Well, if "in use" includes Dad's arms cubby....

15 rounds, not 20. Nobody picks finer nits than the gunsmith's little boy.