Fishu

Thompson was less accurate than 9mm SMG's and quite heavy compared to others. 11 lbs versus 7-8lb of the other common SMG's, Sten being a bit less than 7lb However I'd take almost any other SMG over Sten... Thompson has cyclic rate of 600-725rpm I would probably prefer high cyclic rate with 9mm, for better accuracy over range.. thats where the infamous Suomi M/31 comes into the picture

v. Senger & Etterlin says that both the A3 in the 35(t) and the A7 variant in the 38(t) are 40 calibre length. Lexikon der Wehrmacht agrees with you. Interesting. </font>

38t has 37L47.8 It has heavier shell than III / Pak 36 and little less velocity, however penetrates more due to higher mass of the projectile. [ May 12, 2003, 12:44 PM: Message edited by: Fishu ]

Actually, dug in vehicles means theres been either built something around the vehicle or digged a hole for it, complete with a ramp. It doesnt immobilize the vehicles at all. Just needs a bigger hole than for a man :>

You DONT want to go into a craters with tank

I don't think even artillery barrage should become wide spread after the hit area is defined.

Since pioneers can remove minefields, I suppose they can also remove roadblocks.

Geocities is useless crap :I

Lumbergh, The tanks aren't all over. There is still german tanks and ATG's. However, infantry holds the ground, not the tanks.

Obviously some people still do have common sense not to make a lawsuit of every possible case... like microsoft, which makes up lawsuits if something just RESEMBLES their products name :>

I've noticed the 'hulldown' position being VERY effective, since you cannot hit the ATG's directly. Some Pak 40's front shield is about same size as some tanks turret when hulldown, so go figure

Dorosh, I think it's because US won the war by itself

Lakowski, I'm sure western powers and Hitler had something to do with russians winning Hitler was probably most notably reason. Stalingrad is probably most famous mistake that Hitler knewingly did in the war. Then there is a serie of other weird commands from Hitler in 1941-42, where he passed his adjutants and commanders opinion. Jasonc, I wouldn't think that 76mm HE would be fine against 50-60mm armour

Michael Dorosh, Remember.. its a question whether MP44 would been introduced earlier, had Hitler given full support for it. So we wouldn't be talking anymore about the late war, but how things would look if it would have reached combat earlier and would been in far larger quantities at the same time than it was in reality.

150mm IG guns are pure extacy for the price. On my 2000pts games, they often come up with 100-180 kills per gun :>

US Marines in the pacific used Springfields extensively till end of the world war. In europe Garands were about dominant US rifle type.

As Finnish, do I have a choice?

In Kurt Meyer's book he writes of an encounter with an armored train. It apparenty caused heavy casualties to his battalion. </font>

and it'll be easily stopped - cut the tracks up ahead I wonder how effective these armoured trains were. To me they sound like a juicy target, which has had alot of money spend into.

Coe, PPSh41 had almost double the ROF over MP40. Comes handy when you're supposed to kill alot of enemies at close ranges. If a drum was used, it also had double the ammo. Could been better in the freezing cold as well, not sure. Neither one really had bad unreliability problems. From what I know, MP40 was more accurate.

Sgtgoody, Thats pretty much US point of view about the battles. Germans had some problems with the artillery as the war went on. Then there is the russian front, where the life wasn't worth a dime, just because there were so many to care about some squads. Finns had even less artillery at their disposal and MG's weren't so common. However finns were still able to defend and even conduct succesful offensives with little or no artillery. This pretty much indicates that smallarms had their own significant part in the fights. Not just the artillery and MG's. Of course most casualties overall in the war were caused by explosives and MG's in a form or another, but theres still plentiful amounts of leftover troops. I believe that if StG44 would been produced from earlier and in somewhat larger amounts, it could've made attacking for infantry easier. Logistics obviously weren't too big of a problem either - there were SMG's and StG44 at least by the end of war was to replace MP40. In the eastern front logistic problems didn't exist even with PPSh 41, which germans used alot for its more than half higher rate of fire than MP40 and naturally captured ammo had to be used - but soviets had plentiful of those and they had plentiful amounts of delivers as well Fair amount were also rechambered to accept the common 9mm SMG round. If troops preferred PPSh 41 so much over the rifles and MP40's in eastern front, it's surely an indication of the need for high volume of fire invidual weapons. However SMGs naturally lacks firepower at any greater range. (Albeit finns used Suomi M/31's for sniping, even some better daily food than just the daily rations.. aka certain birds ) For an invidual weapon, StG44 is quite good one, fits for common ranges that SMG cannot and goes well in close combat as well.

well that is my belief, might not be yours.

Michael Dorosh, I believe that had Hitler authorized production of this whole new caliber weapon, it could been developed much earlier and produced in far larger quantities. In russia there were alot soviet troops and soldiers were expected to shoot at them with rifles as well. Not like there were MG42's put up in every corner and definately not like those soldiers with MP44 instead of MP40/Kar98 couldn't been more effective. I'd say you're underestimating the effect of MP44 versus SMG/Rifle and giving too much job to do for MGs. There hardly were units equipped with MP44's.. :> It was more of a replacement for MP40 at the time. and rifles are only one part of the fight, but sure, why the MP44 couldn't been more effective than a rifle, had it been wastly more numerous? Earlier you also mentioned Korean war and carbine vs. rifle issue. M1/M2 Carbine was less effective than MP44/StG44. [ May 06, 2003, 02:04 AM: Message edited by: Fishu ]

Michael dorosh, Honestly, I still really don't understand what you're after for. I've been all the time at loss what you're after. and I wonder why you've highlighted western front so much in here, when most of the battles were fought in east, the area where MP44 made itself very useful. [ May 06, 2003, 01:10 AM: Message edited by: Fishu ]

Michael dorosh, I'm not talking about great ranges. Good example is comparing an SMG, AR and rifle squads in assault and defense. Pretty surely AR's would be the best all around invidual weapon of the three. Why else would there been complaints of SMG being too inaccurate at range and rifle lacking the firepower at closer ranges?