Garand.

This is coolbert:

Continuing with the comments of General William Depuy: [all thanks to the Isegoria.net web site]

American riflemen NOT having trained to use their Garand rifles as a suppression fire weapon. Movement by fire not possible in the bocage, German troops making the U.S. soldier keep his head down and not the other way around.

"A Precision Weapon with No Precision Targets"

"In Normandy, American infantry units did not do a good job of overwatching from their own hedgerow as they attacked the next, Gen. DePuy explains"

"You see, one of our training deficiencies was that almost all suppression was done by indirect fire weapons. Very little suppression was done by small arms. Occasionally, we would use our heavy machine guns. People thought first about mortars and artillery, then heavy machine guns, and finally, light machine guns. Really, they didn’t think much about using riflemen for suppression"

"In the hedgerows of northern France — the infamous bocage — American troops felt outgunned"

NOT ONLY DID AMERICAN TROOPS FEEL THEY WERE OUTGUNNED, THEY WERE OUTGUNNED, AND BADLY SO!!

The German having a preponderance of automatic weaponry but also a preponderance of mortars. More mortars and of larger size than the American analog.

Presumably these were cast iron mortars, smoothbore, firing a cast iron mortar bomb. KEEP YOUR HEAD DOWN!

"In the wake of a bloody engagement on 8 June against German paratroopers, Spencer [American unit commander] called together his surviving officers to discuss what had taken place. One of their chief complaints centered on the relatively low number of automatic weapons in the infantry platoon. Whenever an American fired his M1 rifle, enemy paratroopers replied with a withering barrage from automatic weapons. In open terrain U.S. soldiers would have had a distinct advantage with their longer-ranged rifles, but the hedgerows frequently permitted German paratroopers armed with short-range automatic weapons to approach within yards of an American position without being detected."

See item # 1 from the previous blog entry for clarification.

Good German troops lavishly equipped with automatic weapons, knowing their fieldcraft, practicing camouflage and concealment with adeptness, "defense is the stronger form of combat", American units pinned down and even if taught to use their rifles as a suppression weapon, finding the task next to impossible.

coolbert.