The Washington herald., 1918-04-13

respective merits of certain types Of
guns, particularly Of the Lewis gun,
which had proven most efficient under
British use, the Secretary of War. i'm
mediateIy following the passage by
Congress of the 81, 900. 600 machine gun
appropriation late in 1915. appointed A
special board to consider and make
recommendations as to whether a sin
gle type of machine rife, using small
arms ammunition, is needed for the
service, and the type or types that
should be procured"
On October "a, 1916, the board sub
mitted a preliminary report. 1t recon-
mended that available funds be spent
for 1900 Vickers guns and that further
tests should be conducted in May, 1917.
On the basis of this recommendation
all the funds at the disposal of the
ordnance department except about
81. $4,000 were used in placing an order
Tor Vickers guns. in December, 1916.
War was declared on April s, 1917.
No further competitive tests of ma
chine guns had been made by the War
Department board. but in the mean
time the Lewis gun, chambered for
American ammunition. had been sub
mitted (for the first time thus cham
bere6. to the Navy Department and
found to perform satisfactorily.
Orders Quickly Placed.
Instead of delaying until the army
board had completed it's tests, or
ders for machine guns. up to the
total productive capacity OF every
machine gun plant in the country.
were placed as fast as the funds
were made available by Congress-
The balance of $1.jOO,OOO available
when war was declared was utilized
in an order for Lewis guns made on
April 12-six days after the declara-
, ton of war.
Steps were Immediately taken,
also. to increase our capacity for
making machine guns. New plants
and additions to existing plants
were arranged for. In the case of
the Lewis gun, $1,000 900 was spent
in extending the savage arms plant.
this expenditure being provided for
, in the price to be paid for the guns
The tests of the special machine
nu board did not for one day de-
lay the placing of orders for ma
chine guns after the declaration of
war.
The selection of the Browning
heavy machine gun and the Brown
ing light automatic rife as the most
efficient guns of their types merely
! AIDED two new weapons on which
later production could be centered.
The extent to which We have ex-
panded our machine gun program is
shown by the recommenda ton OF War
College experts that the Browning
L
infantry at the rate of "at least eight
per company" in addition to each
regimental complement of heavy type
machine guns. whereas our old pro-
gram called for total of only four
per regiment.
Effective Rifles.
These light. highly portable ma
chine guns, which may be carried like
an ordinary rifle and fired either from
hip or s h ould er. tremendously
strengthen the attacking power Of in
.antry.
The ability of the Browning heavy
water-cooled gun to Withstand severe
nd long continued firing is shown by
he fact that under test it showed
such remarkable reliability of func-
ion during the firing of over 90
90 shots that a further test of 90
80 was fired by the same gun for en-
durance." The only stoppage resulted
| after $500 shots, and this was from
overheating.
In addition to machine guns for in
fantry work, many thousands will be
required to equip our fighting air
planes.
On recommendation OF Gen. Per-
shing, at least two heavy Vickers
, guns will be mounted on each plane,
synchronized so as to fire between the
propeller blades
An equal number of Lewis guns will
be carried, mounted to give greatest
; iieXibility of fire in any direction. To
provide adequate reserves, We are
scheduling three Vickers and three
Lewis guns for each plane.
Continued tomorrow.)