The machine gun
had a dramatic effect on the conduct of warfare; one or two men
operating a single machine could produce the same weight of fire as a
squadron of rifles, and when used against an inferior enemy, the effect
could be devestating. During the First World War, the use of the
machine gun in conjunction with massed barbed wire and other obstacles
put an end to battlefield mobility until new weapons and tactics could
be devised. This book describes the development of the machine gun from
the earliest models to the present day. The focus is very much on
portable infantry weapons used in the support role, so automatic cannon
of 20mm and larger calibres are excluded. The categories of weapon
included are, therefore, Light Machine Guns [LMGs], a term which
includes the Squad Automatic Weapon [SAW] and Light Support Weapon
[LSW]; Medium Machine Guns [MMGs]; Heavy Machine Guns [HMGs] and
General Purpose Machine Guns [GPMGs]. One specialist variety of machine
guns is included in a separate chapter: the grenade machine gun [GMG],
also known as the automatic grenade launcher [AGL]. With a
country-by-country breakdown of machine guns, including comprehensive
appendices of gun and ammunition data, along with hundreds of
photographs, this is a comprehensive study of a most effective
battlefield weapon.