I’d swap a couple of those around, myself. I’m also a vocal critic of the AK and I think the Mauser K98 gets a lot of credit because it’s the basis for most hunting rifles, which I don’t think should apply to its usefulness as a battle rifle, but I’m not sure what I’d put in its place.
The Mauser K98 gets far too much credit, IMO… as Bobtheoptimist says, just because it’s the basis of most hunting rifles doesn’t automatically make it a good battle rifle. However, it served the Germans and the Boers well, and they were accurate, so I think it does deserve to be on the list.
However, the Springfield M1903 rifle does not, IMHO… It’s really only a rechambered Mauser.
Martini Enfield’s Top Ten Battle Rifles:
Enfield 1853 Rifled Musket
Steyr AUG
Winchester M1873
Moisin-Nagant M91/30
Mauser K98
M-16
M1 Garand
L1A1 SLR/FN-FAL
Short Magazine Lee-Enfield Mk III/Lee-Enfield No. 4 Mk I
I’m not familiar w/ all the weapons on the list, but my favorite back in the day, was the M1 Carbine, light, decent firepower and I could put 'em where I wanted them w/ it. The Garand is a sweet rifle, but it’s heavy and has limited ammunition capacity. The early M16’s were not well received. They had lots of problems and most guys thought the were a POS. The AK earned respect over the years. They’re pretty damned reliable in some of the worst field conditions, something that wasn’t true of the eary M16’s.
I’d have to put the AK at number one.
I caught the show a while back and won some money off the person I was watching it with when I bet him before the show started that the AK would win. It was rather obvious, and I think it was the best choice for number one. Out of curiosity, Bobotheoptimist why would you disagree with the AK and what would you put in its place?
Also, Martini, that is an interesting list as well. Hard to argue with any of the guns you have placed. I really like the Mosin-Nagant (only one “i” in Mosin I believe) and I almost bought one, which in retrospect I wish I had. Luckily they are rather cheap and I’ve seen them for sale elsewhere, so its not like it was a once in a lifetime opportunity.
How do you both feel about the Sturmgewehr 44? I’ve seen widely varied opinions on the gun, and it seems like some of them are based on something other than the gun’s peformance.
The Steyr is a good-looking weapon, but has it ever been tested? For that matter, has any bullpup rifle been tested? I’d imagine the Galil got a workout with the Lebanon-Israeli war this past summer, so I’d be interested to hear some opinions from the field on that topic.
Other than that, it looks like a pretty solid list. At least they didn’t include the Chauchat.
I’ve seen it spelt both ways (especially in some of my older reference books), although I concede that the variant with only one “i” is probably correct.
I’ve never fired one (no semi/full auto guns in Australia!), but it’s a good design that may have helped the Germans immensely if it had been in general distribution around… 1941.
It’s arguably a descendent of the FG-42 (another German rifle which doesn’t get much credit), but the StG-44 never saw much combat use (issued too late, too little ammo), and the only people who ever used them post-war were East and West German border guards, AFAIK. Ultimately it’s been overshadowed by the AK-47, which isn’t actually related to the StG-44 in any more than a superficial way.
#1 M16 - Accurate, innovative, long life, reliable (but expensive) #2 Enfield SMLE - Long life, nice action #3 03 Springfield - Long life, accurate #4 M1 Garand - Accurate, innovative, long service life #5 Sturmgewehr 44 - Innovative, the basis for the AK IIRC #6 Spencer repeating rifle - Innovative #7 FN FAL #8 Steyr AUG #9 Mauser 98 - Nice hunting rifle, action is timeless. #10 AK47 - cheap, poorly made Sturmgewehr knockoff, but long life and in wide use.
Every time I’ve heard someone defend the AK, they mention that you can bury it in the sand for some period of time and pick it up and it’ll shoot. Pretty pointless for an organized army IMO, but great for guerrillas and peasants. A decent soldier should clean his gun occasionally.
Having an American mentality (and admittedly some German blood) I prefer a well made, accurate rifle.
Right, so: wade through swamp, crawl on belly for 200 yards through thick sloppy mud, pull out gun cleaning kit, clean rifle, open fire on enemy. Excellent plan.
The reason people talk about the reliability of the AK is that it (supposedly - I’m certainly no expert) always works when you need it to, regardless of what you’ve just been doing. Keeping your rifle clean is always a good idea I’m sure, but some battlefields aren’t exactly amenable to that.
No, the problem with the M16 was that they never cleaned it. Never. The swamp and muck and crap wasn’t the problem, as has been demonstrated in the 39 years since Colt and the Army fixed the early screw-ups, but that the rifles were issued without cleaning kits and with untested ammo that fouled the rifle. These problems are well documented and had nothing to do with wading through swamps or crawling on bellies.
I’ve seen AR15’s go a thousand rounds between running a swab down the barrel without a hiccup. The AK could maybe go longer between cleanings, but suffers dramatically when it comes to accuracy.
From all I’ve heard, the AK74 is a much nicer rifle than the '47, but I’d still take an AR any day.
Other opinions - here and here another here and the Lebanese Forces website (here) recommends cleaning your AK every day, much the same as an M16.
Yes, but not nearly as much as movies and computer games would like to make out. By the end of the war, there just wasn’t enough ammunition for them. The Battle For Berlin was fought by German Soldiers using anything they could get their hands on, including captured Lee-Enfields, MAS-36s, Carcanos, and Soviet arms.
The most popular of the “Captured” arms was the Belgian Mauser (7.65mm Mauser calibre), for which the ammunition could apparently be chambered and fired out of the general-issue Mauser K98 rifle. There was also more 7.65mm Mauser ammo floating around than any of the other “foreign” calibres, for some reason- Soldiers being issued Lee-Enfields, Carcanos, or MAS-36s got given 5 rounds apiece, the soldiers issued Belgian Mausers received 20 rounds. After that, they were on their own.
There wouldn’t have even been enough 7.92mm Kurz ammo (for the StG-44) to give most of the troops a full clip of ammunition, never mind having spare magazines. The SS certainly had access to StG-44s and ammo, but by April 1945 most of them (certainly, the more astute ones) would have been practicing their Spanish and seeing if someone in ODESSA could get them an Argentinean Passport in the name of “Senor Geraldo von Unterschnitzel”, as opposed to trying to find Das UberSturmGewehr unt Das Ammunition fur Der Pwnage ot der Russkie Hordes.
The reality is there just weren’t that many StG-44s in use during WWII, which is probably just as well for the Allied and Soviet armed forces…
It may not be the most elegant weapon in the world, but there’s millions of them floating about and they’re the worlds most common rifle (number 2 is the M91/30 and number three is the Lee-Enfield. The M-16 comes in at number four)- the reality is that they’re very good at what they were designed for, which was to be a cheap, no-maintenance rifle that could be issued en masse and be relied upon to work every time the user pulled the trigger.
There’s no SKS on that list? Shame shame. Sure, it was only a first issue weapon for a short period of time before the AK came about but it saw plenty of use in Korea and Vietnam and they’re still straggling around various places today I’m sure.
A.R. Cane, a General I know carried an M1 Carbine through some pretty harrowing adventures in SE Asia once upon a time, and I don’t think he would admit to there being “top 10 battle rifles” - There’s the M1 Carbine, and there’s everything else.
I’ve already admitted to some pretty strongly held prejudices - I prefer a few awesome fighters to a mass of mediocre planes, for instance (providing they have guns as well as missiles, not like the pre-E F4 Phantom)… where was I going with this? Um… H&K MP5? No, uh… Technology good! That’s it.
Martini-Henry
Everything else is either derivative, like the Springfield, or inconsequential, like the M1 Carbine and the Steyr AUG. The 6 above determined the outcomes of wars.
So THAT’s why the Allies won the war – their resolve was steeled by the possibility of Germany spreading pernicious Internet slang to the rest of the world.
