BAR/M1 Garand question

[eatatjoes]

i was watching the history channel some time ago with a friend who has little firearms knowledge/experience. the show we were viewing featured the infantry weapons of world war 2 and had an interesting piece on the Browning BAR. i believe they were shooting it through a brick wall to demonstrate the effectivness of the 30-06 cartridge in an automatic weapon.

the question raised by my friend was this: "man! why didn't they just give that thing [the BAR] to everyone instead of the M1?"

i don't know as much about general american world war 2 infantry as i would like (i only recently developed an interest in ground forces, i always found the fighting that took place in the skies up above to be much more romantic and interesting) and to be honest i wasn't really sure. i did speculate that it was most likely too heavy for the average infantryman to use, too expensive to make and equip an entire fighting army, and it didn't exactly fit into the american combat doctrine at the time (massed aimed rifle fire i believe).

so, why didn't the U.S. Army equip every infantryman with the BAR?

 

[jobu07]

I think the BAR was the SAW of the time, similar to the M60's today so to speak. But i'm no historian. Someone else most likely has the right info.

 

[dfariswheel]

Weight.

The BAR is NOT a rifle, it's a light machine gun.

The M1 weights 9.5 pounds.
The BAR weights 16 pounds.

With all the weight of the BAR was added the greater extra weight of the magazines and maintenance and repair equipment, PLUS all the other gear GI's carried.

That's just too much for an infantry assault squad member to carry.

The American battle method was known as fire and maneuver.
The infantry squad BAR man would pin the enemy down, while the riflemen would maneuver around the flanks and take them out.

You can't maneuver too quickly with a 16 pound rifle, the extra ammo, magazines, equipment, pack all the other gear they had to carry.

 

[MagKnightX]

I imagine size and cost, both production and ammo, not to mention weight (several 20-rd magazines of .30-06, plus a 19 1/2 lb. gun, plus more ammo necessary because waste is more common, compared to 40-80 rds and a 9 1/2 lb. gun).

 

[M2 Carbine]

When I enlisted in the USMC in 1955 we had 8 man squads. One BAR and seven M1's.

I was issued a new International Harvester M1 that I kept the three years I was on active duty. That thing would lay rounds in a 20 inch bull at 500 yards all day long. I wish I had it now.

The BAR man was the smallest man in the squad. The idea being he was the most important and should be the hardest to hit.
I really doubt a few inches in height would make that much difference.

Everyone carried magazines for the BAR man. He was your firepower. Everyone also helped carry the BAR.

It's a joy to shoot but the 20 round mags empty really fast.

The ones we had, had fast and slow rate of fire, no semi automatic.
But on slow rate it was easy to fire single well aimed shots and that thing is accurate.

A lot of shooters today don't realize the power of a 30/06 armour piercing round. Even a "ball" round will go through a 3/8 inch truck spring. (I did it)
The only 30/06 ammo I saw was tracer and armour piercing.
Shooting armour piercing at paper targets seemed like overkill.

 

[Mulliga]

it didn't exactly fit into the american combat doctrine at the time (massed aimed rifle fire i believe

I'm pretty sure this was Patton's philosophy. He believed in a "firestorm" of fire on enemy positions (sort of the assault rifle idea).

Like dfariswheel said, the official American infantry doctrine relied upon the rifle, with an emphasis on precision rifle fire. That's why, of all the nations in WWII, only Americans realized the benefits a shooting sling gave to the rifleman - my understanding is that the Germans and British treated the sling as a carrying strap, no more.

It seems like nearly all the weapons the Americans used in WWII were heavy - the BAR, the Garand, the Thompson, etc. Only the M1 Carbine could be called a lightweight, but it was supposed to replace a pistol...

 

[Stoker]

Infantry tactics are very much my interest. The idea of fire and movement was certainly a mature doctrine in the British Army by the time of WW1. By WW2, British infantry were manoeuvring a rifle group of 5-7 men with a bren gun group of 2-3, just as explained for the US Army above.

Now, of course, we have smaller fire team manoeuvre groups, with two light automatic weapons where we had one before, in both Brit and US infantry, I believe.

There is a lot to be said for giving each section (US = squad?) two proper machine guns and building your manoeuvre around two gun groups, as the Royal Marines did on occasion in the Falklands. Can anyone say if this is what the German army did with the MG38/42 in WW2?

So while a BAR (or Bren) for each man would have been too expensive and required too much ammunition (all the way back to the factory), I have no doubt that doubling the number of BAR/Bren would have been a very good idea.

Now I get on to dangerous ground for a Brit. My understanding of American doctrine after Normandy was that it was based on 'marching fire' rather than fire and manoeuvre - that is, heavy aimed fire from everyone in contact, all the time. Fire and movement is difficult to teach and to do - I believe marching fire was felt to be simpler and well suited to the heavier fire the M1 could provide compared to the bolt action rifles Brit forces had.

 

[M2 Carbine]

Stoker

One of the few things I remember from my infantry training in 56 was during 'marching fire' to fire your weapon. I don't remember if they called it "marching fire" then.

From earlier wars they found that very few troops, when attacking, fired their rifle.

We were told to constantly keep firing into the enemy position while moving forward.

This is really what the BAR was designed for.

On one, more or less, 'marching fire' exercise I dropped a clip while loading my M1. I stopped to pick it up.
That dumb trick cost me some pain after the excercise was over.

 

[VG]

Training doctrine took a while to catch up with actual practice. U.S. Infantrymen were trained for precision fire. Then, when they got to their units, they learned that it was common practice to fire on likely or known enemy locations to suppress their fire while another team advanced. While both U.S. ground services continued to emphasize long range aimed fire, more than 70% of all infantry combat is at 100 meters or less and 95% is at 200 meters or less, according to some studies posted at the U.S.A.I.S.

The BAR was a squad weapon. At the time light machine guns were organized into a weapons platoon. Later U.S. Army practice was to attach machine guns to each platoon, either two or three. They were often controlled directly by the Platoon Sergeant, but could be assigned to squads.

Squad and fire team sizes are changing based on equipment and mission. For example, a Stryker squad is nine men, because that's what each carrier will fit. Back in the 80's when I was running around in the woods, a squad was two five man fire teams plus a Squad Leader for a total of 11. USMC squads were organized differently - three three-man fire teams, a reporter, and a photographer.

 

[M2 Carbine]

"USMC squads were organized differently - three three-man fire teams, a reporter, and a photographer."


VG, I usually swapped the reporter for a Navy Corpsman.

I didn't really like a paper trail, you know.


Then with the Navy around you always had someone to dance with.

 

[Sleuth]

1. The BAR was expensive and time consuming to produce
2. There was a major concern that we would be unable to supply enough ammo. One of the arguments against adopting the M1 (and before it, the 1903), was that the men would waste their ammo, and run out at the critical moment during the battle. It would also require more shipping, trucks, truck drivers, etc., thus a longer logistic tail.
3. We were (and are returning to) focused on more aimed fire. One shot, on kill.
4. Experts worry about logistics, amateurs worry about tactics.