TheBritish Brown Bess muskethelped spread the Pax Britannia around the globe.
In the 1930s, the Germans secretly contrived a gun that changed absolutely everything about infantry combat.
The MG 34 started a revolution that burns brightly even today.
Root Causes
Before the MG 34, the infantry was organized around the rifle.
Warfare would never be the same.
Origin Story
The MG 34 was developed in 1934 and issued to combat troops in 1936.
A recoil-operated, air-cooled design, the MG 34 was an absolute nightmare to build.
Everything about the gun is meticulously machined out of big chunks of forged steel.
However, in theEinheitsmaschinengewehr(or Universal Machine Gun) we see the face of the future.
During World War I, the world received its rude awakening to total war in the Industrial Age.
Before it was finally over in 1918, some 16 million people perished.
These heavy machine guns fired from fixed positions and were water-cooled to facilitate protracted firing.
They burned through 100 barrels but purportedly did not have a single stoppage.
As devastating as these revolutionary weapons were, however, they were just not portable.
TheGerman MG08/15was a legitimate effort, but at nearly 40 lbs.
Details
The MG 34 weighs 26.7 lbs.
empty and fires the German standard 7.92x57mm round at a cyclic rate of around 900 rounds per minute.
Dual two-gun antiaircraft mounts were also used to enhance firepower.
The gun is selective fire via a novel two-stage trigger.
Pressure on the top part of the trigger produces semi-auto fire.
Pulling the bottom bit is full-auto.
The gun typically feeds from 50-round non-disintegrating reusable steel belts that can be hooked together as needed.
The MG 34 featured a novel quick-change barrel mechanism as well.
Rotate the receiver assembly clear and the barrel can be removed from the rear.
Care must be exercised when the barrel is hot lest you roast your fingers.
The Lafette tripod weighs 44 lbs.
and is more complicated than the space shuttle.
But, it was undeniably effective.
The Lafette system included an optical sight and a cool spring-loaded soft mount that helped dampen the guns recoil.
American M1919-series machine guns cycled at a sedate 500 rounds per minute to facilitate sustained searching fire.
The end result is that the MG 34 can seem a bit of a handful.
The bipod on the MG 34 has an annoying tendency to collapse backwards under recoil.
Lean into the gun and this can be avoided.
However, that is one more thing to attempt to remember when folks are shooting at you.
Every MG 34 I have encountered has been relatively finicky.
They are all at least 75 years old nowadays and were originally built like sewing machines.
After the advent of the MG 34, infantry operations orbited around the portable machine gun.
Individual riflemen, therefore, existed to support and defend the machine gun team.
So it remains today.
Conclusion
The MG 34 was expensive to produce, difficult to maintain and a bear to hump.
However, it also changed the way the world fought wars.
To paw over a vintage copy today is to touch a piece of history.
Special thanks towww.worldwarsupply.comfor the vintage reproduction gear used in the preparation of this article.