2nd Lt. Val Browning, son of John Browning, the legendary firearms designer. By the wars end three out of four of the standard small arms weapons in the infantry would be Browning designs.
On this day in 1918 the Browning M1918 Automatic rifle was first used in combat.
It certainly wouldn't be the last time. Probably nobody knows the date that occurred, if it has, but the last time the US used it in action was probably in the 1960s, as it remained in front line service in the Marine Corps well into the Vietnam War. National Guard units were still being issued the BAR in the mid 1970s. Armies equipped by the United States no doubt had it that long as well, and perhaps somewhere around the world its still seeing some use today.
Which is because it was such a fantastic weapon. . . or maybe it was in spite of it being an awful one.
Saying something like that, of course, really requires an explanation. And to explain it requires a context.
The BAR was designed to be an automatic rifle. In the photos immediately above we see it as it was designed to be, a selective fire (originally) rifle that could be used as an individual weapon to put down a barrage of walking fire. And it was very good in that role. The role, that is, of being an "automatic rifle". It was so good at that role, in fact, that soldiers defeated its later role as a light machinegun by reconverting it back to its original sans bipod configuration.
And, if you've kept up on this blog, or otherwise are familiar with the US's combat experience in World War One, you can see why a weapon like that would have made a lot of sense. The US was trying to sprint over the deadly space of "No Man's Land" and take enemy trenches, ultimately at close quarter. An automatic rifle would be really ideal for a role like that, even if it meant, in the case of the BAR, issuing one that was extremely heavy.
US infantrymen in heavy pack. Soldier on left carries a Chauchat, by all accounts one of the worst automatic weapons any fielded to any army. He is also wearing his garrison cap under his helmet, which can be seen near the back of his head. The soldier on the right carries a M1903 Springfield rifle, the barrel of which is barely visible on his right.
But that role was a short one in the U.S. military, and indeed in most militaries that had a similar weapon. And there were other weapons in that role. Indeed one of the worst weapons of World War One, the Chauchat, was designed for the same role. But even at that time a competing series of weapons, light machineguns, were on the battlefield and were rapidly supplanting automatic rifles. The British, for example, never fielded an automatic rifle but rather fielded two separate light machineguns, the Lewis and the Vickers. The Germans fielded a "light", but not very light, version of their MG08. Those crew served weapons were better able to lay down a barrage of sustained fire than any automatic rifle.
So after World War One the U.S. Army, pleased with the M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle, had the selective fire option eliminated from production and had the weapon retrofitted with a bipod. It was re-classed, at that time, as a light machinegun, tactics having moved in the direction of a lmg being a squad support weapon. For cavalrymen, however, a separate version, ostensibly somewhat lighter, and featuring a bipod at the muzzle and a monpod on the butt, was introduced as a "machine rifle", with it being given the designation of the M1922. In 1937 the gun was redesigned slightly and became the M1918A1. Improvments continued as World War Two loomed with the eye towards making the weapon a better light machinegun and it on June 30, 1938, the M1918 A2 was introduced, with there being orders to upgrade all existing stocks of the M1918 and M1918A1 to that configuration. The M1922 was declared obsolete before World War Two began, but none the less stocks of them remained and during the war they were issued to Merrell's Marauders as light alternatives, to the M1918A2.
Soldiers of the U.S. Army training with the M1918 A2 BAR (and without hearing protection) during World War Two.
The BAR in both versions were in service when the US entered World War Two, as noted, with the M1922 on the way out. The M1918A2 BAR as a light machinegun remained, but quite rapidly soldiers assigned to the weapon instinctively reverted it to its original role and configuration as an automatic rifle. Typically they removed its bipod and flash hinder as weight adding unnecessary elements. The Marine Corps, huge fans of the BAR, began to issue it two per squad as well, anticipating the latter modern issuance of the current M249 "automatic rifle".
Heavily laden Marine with BAR during World War Two. This is almost certainly a M1918A2 but it has had its bipod and flash hinder removed.
By World War Two it was pretty obvious that the BAR was not the best light machinegun in the world. It was hindered in ammunition capacity from being a bottom loading weapon, unlike the top loading Brno light machinegun that is arguably the best lmg ever designed. Like most light machineguns it also had a permanently affixed barrel which is something that designers began to reconsider in that role with the German introduction of the dual purpose MG34 and MG42 machineguns. Nonetheless, it soldiered through the war and on into the next one, the Korean War and the service found itself ordering additional supplies of them, reflecting wartime losses and post wartime disposals of existing M1918A2s. The Royal McBee Typewriter Company supplied the last BARs to the military during this time frame.
Helmet-less U.S. Army soldier firing M1918A2 BAR in Korea. This soldier has removed his bipod from the BAR. He's also in distinctive Korean War era winter gear, including the L. L. Bean designed "shoe packs" that came in during World War Two.
Following the Korean War the US planned on replacing the BAR as the US went to the GPMG concept introduced by the Germans during World War Two. The US had no plans to put the US GPMG, the M60, in the BAR's role but rather planned to place a heavy barreled M14 rifle in that role, as the M14 began to replace the M1 Garand. And in fact the Army started to do that before problems with the concept, which should have been obvious from the onset, prevented it from being completed. That light machinegun, the M15, was practically stillborn although it was in fact adopted.
The M14 Rifle, the intended replacement for the M1 Garand which did in fact replace it in the active duty branches of the Army and Marine Corps, and the M14A1 which had already replaced the M15 and which was replacing the BAR when the Vietnam War broke out and production of M14 rifles was stopped. The M14 was an excellent rifle. The M14A1 was a pretty bad light machinegun.
Nonetheless, when the Army deployed to Vietnam in the early 1960s it was the M14A1 that went with it, not the BAR. BAR's, however, were supplied to the ARVN.
South Vietnamese soldiers equipped with a BAR and a M2 carbine.
And the Marines retained the BAR. They liked it so much that they kept the BAR well into the Vietnam War where it served alongside the M16A1 and the M60. I'm not aware of whether the Marines were ever equipped with M14A1s, but if they were, they didn't use them. They liked the BAR so much they kept using it, even after the M14, which they also greatly loved, was taken from them.
In the Army, the introduction of the M60 and the M14A! did not actually mean that the BAR completely disappeared, even if the Army did not use the BAR in Vietnam (or at least not much), and instead attempted to use the M14A1 and then went to a designated M16A1 (which was particularly bad in that role). In the Army Reserve and the National Guard the BAR continued to serve into the mid to late 1970s (it was in service at least as late as 1976 in the Guard). This reflected the fact that small arms in the military were in a real state of flux from 1960s forward. The M15 was never made in sufficient quantities to replace the BAR and it self was replaced by a heavy stocked version of the M14 which was never made in large quantities either. The M14 was soon challenged in the rifle role by the M16 and the M16A1 in Vietnam, and production of the it was stopped before there were adequate numbers for the reserves. The M1 Garand therefore carried on into the early 70s when, in the Guard and Reserve, the Garand was replaced with the M16, which now existed in large quantities. The BAR kept on until it was basically replaced, at first, with the M60 in the late 1970s. In the early 1980s the M249 5.56 machinegun was introduced at the squad level in the Army and it ultimately supplanted the M60 in that role, making its way into the Guard in the late 1980s.
Which of course doesn't mean that the BAR disappeared everywhere overnight. BARs were supplied to a lot of American allies and clients, and they were manufactured by other nations. Belgium's FN, for example, introduced the last variant of it, one with a detachable barrel, some of which went to Middle Easter nations.
By that time they were well obsolete. But maybe they were by the late 1920s for that matter. As a light machinegun, it was never ideal. As an automatic rifle, it excelled. Its record was quite mixed.
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