NEW WEAPONS.

Taranaki Daily News, 5 June 1918, Page 6

NEW WEAPONS.

THE AMERICAN MACHINE OUNThere has been a good deal of contro : versy iu America over the relative merits of the Lewis and Browning machine guns. The inventor of the former claims tliat his gun has not received fair treatment sit the hands of the American military authorities. However that may be, the Browning gun has been adopted for the American forces, and the Scientific American publishes some interesting details. • There is a light type and a heavy typ e > the former being practically an automatic rifle. It is much lighter and handier than the Lewis gun, weighing only l&lfo, and it can he readily used for firing from the shoulder or the hip like a n ordinary rifle. Its magazine carries 20 shots, which can be discharged automatically with one pull of the trigger in 2 J /o seconds or each cartridge can he fired singly, the automatic action being used only to reload the weapon. It is air-cooled, and is said to cool very rapidly. As many as 350 shets may he fired from it without the necessity of stopping in order to allow the weapon to cool. Moreover, it is very simple in construction, having less than 20 principal parts, and the only tool needed to take it to pieces and set it up again is a small wrench. Thi3 simplicity of construction immensely facilitates standardisation and quantity production, and it is expected that the new weapon will soon he turned out on an enormous scale. With two assistants the gunner can take SOO rounds into action. It will he seen that, if the above details are reliable, the Browning light machine gun or automatic rifle is a weapon of tremendous potentiality in skilled hands. In unskilled hands it will be, like the ordinary magazine rifle, merely an ingenious device for wasting ammunition; but, given proper training, it is difficult to see how infantry attacks can stand any reasonable chance of success against positions lined with hundreds or thousands of such weapons, provided with abundant supplies of ammunition. Probably next year our troops will be attacking German positions so lined, and the problem will be a serious one.

The heavy Browning machine gun is essentially similar to -other machine guns, save that it is exceptionally light, weighing »nly 34i11b, and exceptionally simple in construction. Like the rifle, it lends itself readily to standardisation and quantity production, and its simplicity will render it much le«s likely to get out of action on active service.