AHC: MP44 has significant impact on battlefield

Now, I am not looking for Axis war-winning PODs here. I'm more interested in seeing whether the MP44 was really a significant weapon in its own right when compared to contemporary rifles, light machine guns, and the future AK47. Was the MP44 a real good weapon too late in the war, not finding itself in the hands of enough experienced soldiers, or was it like the early M16 and prone to failures and such?

Is there anyway the MP44, without ASBs, can make such an impact that the West, along with the USSR, develops their own assault rifles for use by the time of the Korean War?
 

Redbeard

Banned
Now, I am not looking for Axis war-winning PODs here. I'm more interested in seeing whether the MP44 was really a significant weapon in its own right when compared to contemporary rifles, light machine guns, and the future AK47. Was the MP44 a real good weapon too late in the war, not finding itself in the hands of enough experienced soldiers, or was it like the early M16 and prone to failures and such?

Is there anyway the MP44, without ASBs, can make such an impact that the West, along with the USSR, develops their own assault rifles for use by the time of the Korean War?

IMHO individual weapons by WWII and later had/has a very limited influence on the battlefield. Very few soldiers are killed or hurt by bullets, most are by artillery and bombs.

The Germans used the introduction of weapons like MP44 late in the war as an "excuse" for including fewer combat units in their infantry Divisions (I.e. raising more Divisions). In theory you could maintain the same firepower with fewer men, but it also made the German units very fragile as they in no time were grinded down to a fraction of their original size and with frontline units increasingly manned by cooks and cleks as the original infantrymen were hurt or killed.

I'm not in doubt however, that if the Germans earlier issue a weapon like MP44others will follow earlier too. Even if not having significant battlefield impact, the rifle after all still was/is an important symbol.

Regards

Redbeard
 
General Eisenhower inspects a captured MP44. Having been damaged without the Allies realising, it explodes, and a shard of metal pierces the General's brain.

The Allies are still going to win, but it's going to look a bit different and more (or perhaps less) of Germany is going to be in Soviet hands. Pretty significant.
 
Obviously the field rifle meant something, as soldiers go to battle with something other than a sword ;)

Was the MP44 an effective force multiplier (before the guy holding it got blown up by a rocket or something).
 
Obviously the field rifle meant something, as soldiers go to battle with something other than a sword ;)

Was the MP44 an effective force multiplier (before the guy holding it got blown up by a rocket or something).

That probably depends on the tactics, too. AFAIK, Infantry in WW2 was largely organized around the machine guns, with the bolt action rifles used to protect the position. While the StG 44 is certainly superior to a bolt-action rifle, I cannot see it achieving all that much more in this role.

The biggest advantage is probably in fully mobile warfare, as it is not as unwieldy as a standard rifle and makes the infantry significantly more flexible, with one weapon for virtually all engagement ranges.

I'd say in order to really have an impact the weapon would have to have been available so early that a.) Infantry tactics can adjust to the new possibilities during the war and b.) the German infantry is still capable of large scale mobile operations when it's widely distributed. I don't think either was the case IOTL, and both are probably somewhat ASB.
 
I'd say in order to really have an impact the weapon would have to have been available so early that a.) Infantry tactics can adjust to the new possibilities during the war and b.) the German infantry is still capable of large scale mobile operations when it's widely distributed. I don't think either was the case IOTL, and both are probably somewhat ASB.

So, it would need to have been available in some numbers in 1942 (i.e. Kesserine Pass to affect US thinking, El Alemein for the British, Stalingrad and Kursk for the Russians.) I don't think it would literally take ASBs to make this happen. A WW1 POD might do it, as I am unsure if the Germans had a WW1 version of the BAR, which might have been useful in 1917 as the Eastern Front became much more fluid (and stormtrooper tactics were formed). With a Versailles-limited military, perhaps a rifle that was a theoretical force multiplier would have started slow development pretty early.
 
So, it would need to have been available in some numbers in 1942 (i.e. Kesserine Pass to affect US thinking, El Alemein for the British, Stalingrad and Kursk for the Russians.) I don't think it would literally take ASBs to make this happen. A WW1 POD might do it, as I am unsure if the Germans had a WW1 version of the BAR, which might have been useful in 1917 as the Eastern Front became much more fluid (and stormtrooper tactics were formed). With a Versailles-limited military, perhaps a rifle that was a theoretical force multiplier would have started slow development pretty early.
The FG 42 as the name suggests was developed in 1942 and had the capability to fire single shots or be used to give automatic fire with a similar rate of fire as the MG 42 using the standard 7.92 round. Obviously automatic fire was very limited because it only had a 20 round magazine but it did have telescopic sites and an extending bayonet.
FG42.jpg
 
What about a widespread use of the FG 42?

The problem with the FG 42 is the cartridge: it uses rifle ammo, so the recoil is too strong to really use it as an automatic weapon. It's still a good rifle, but doesn't have the same capabilities the StG 44 has.

Though that leads us to the fact that perhaps the only thing that prevents anyone from inventing an assault rifle type weapon is downsizing the cartridge to a calibre that makes the recoil manageable, but still offers more accuracy than the standard MP. I have no idea about the actual engineering challenges when building an assault rifle in the 40s, but that would seem to make a significantly earlier assault rifle plausible.
 
The problem with the FG 42 is the cartridge: it uses rifle ammo, so the recoil is too strong to really use it as an automatic weapon. It's still a good rifle, but doesn't have the same capabilities the StG 44 has.

Though that leads us to the fact that perhaps the only thing that prevents anyone from inventing an assault rifle type weapon is downsizing the cartridge to a calibre that makes the recoil manageable, but still offers more accuracy than the standard MP. I have no idea about the actual engineering challenges when building an assault rifle in the 40s, but that would seem to make a significantly earlier assault rifle plausible.

considering 6,5mm catridges were in rather widespread use by several country, how about a fg42 type rifle in one of those calbres (6,5 manlicher or 6,5 swedish), makes for a more manageable recoil
 
Well, being that the FG42 was developed after the Battle of Crete and in service a year later, it shows if the impetus to make the MP44 existed, then it was doable.
 

Deleted member 1487

I suppose you could have the German assault rifle program bear fruit pre-war so that the FJ and PzG units are equipped with them in 1939. The StG 44 was partly based on the captured Soviet SVT-40 rifle, as the Germans had trouble getting the gas ejection system for their automatic rifles working until they captured the Soviet one. Since 1918 the Germans were working on an intermediate caliber cartridge and semi-automatic rifle, so its possible they figure out how to get it all working pre-war and have it available in significant numbers in 1939-40. Like the Panzerfaust the idea just required someone to figure it out, so I guess it came down to someone having inspiration to get the design working. Have it available in significant numbers with specialist units like the FJ and mobile infantry and it would make an impact in terms of how those units were able to fight. By 1942 and on it would be available in pretty wide numbers and probably have a mass production model available like the StG 45 of OTL:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StG_45(M)

It ended up evolving into the HK G3 postwar, so in terms of the war it would be pretty effective. But as said before small arms weren't major casualty producing weapons. Having that plus something like an RPK, a light machine gun version of the AK47 for squad fire base, which would replace the MG42 at squad level, would also be pretty important and more effective than the MG42 for that role, while freeing up MG42s for platoon and above service (modern US platoons have autorifles at the squad level that use the same ammo as the assault rifles while having crew served MGs at the platoon level, 2 IIRC). That would have a fire team effect on German squads early on, which would be an improvement for smaller squads that motorized/mechanized/paratroopers used due to their smaller numbers. Ammo usage would go way up, but it would ensure that even when outnumbered the Germans would dominate fire fights with higher volumes of fire except when running into SMG companies in Russia.

Also it would totally negate the advantage of the Garand and make British platoons very outmatched in fire fights.
 
What about a widespread use of the FG 42?

The FG is a nice gun but its very expensive to make

Hence why only about 5000 were ever made!

It was intended to provide Automatic fire while the troops found their MG34s

The STG44 was designed with mass production in mind and while it was thought that it could replace an 'Machine gun' at Squad level it could not.

In answer to the op - a Battalions main fighting weapons are its Mortars and Machine guns

Rifles / SMG's are less important (in many respects self defence weapons)

Followed by Grenades then Pistols then Bayonets (with the last 2 being virtually useless)

All the Assault rifle does is give a soldier a Self loading rifle and an SMG in the same package - so individual 'Riflemen' become marginally more effective dependent on the situation but not decisively so.
 
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