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Show ! WAS TURNING OUT j GUNS BY MILLIONS United States Producing Arms at High Speed When Fighting Fight-ing Ended. WORK OF WINNING THE WAR History of Rifle Production Shows Great Record Many Tanks Under Construction When Armistice Came Pistols Efficient. Washington, I). C. Machine guns find small arms produced by the millions, mil-lions, ammunition turned out by the billions of rounds and tanks built by thousands when the armistice ended hostilities, furnish the subject of chapters chap-ters just made public of the war department's de-partment's history of the 'malerial" side of winning the war. In regard to machine gun production, about which such a hot controversy waged In congress as a result of the failure of the American army to adopt for standard general use the Lewis weapon used successfully abroad, the report savs mnnufnctnriiie ffieilities for machine guns in this country were much more limited in extent than the public had any notion of when the United States entered the war or today, to-day, and that there were at the outbreak out-break of the war only two factories which were actually producing machine ma-chine guns In any quantity at all. Dearth of Aircraft Guns. The report says there was great dearth of heavy machine guns for aircraft air-craft work, to he synchronized with propellers. The Browning aircraft gun would have met the requirements, but It would be a long time before it could be produced In quantity. In seeking a stop gap weapon until the Browning could be ready, the ordnance department, depart-ment, by "one of those surprising and almost accidental successes" sometimes some-times encountered, found that a modi-fled modi-fled Marlln gun which could be quickly quick-ly produced met all requirements. The work of the Brownings is declared de-clared to have been spectacular as compared with any existing weapons of this character. Up to November 11 the production of Browning rifles was 52,238, a majority of which were in France. In addition 29,000 Chauchat guns had been purchased, so that enough light automatic rifles were on hand to supply 100 divisions, or an army of 3,500,000 men. In the same time 41.804 heavy Brownings and enough VIckers guns had been produced pro-duced to make, with the Hotchklss weapons purchased from the French, a total of 54,627 of this type, or enough to equip 200 divisions, or an army of 7,000,000. Other production struggles described Include items varying In size from trench knives to the 45-ton Mark VIII tanks of British design, of which 1,500 were being constructed in co-operation with the British and 1,450 additional wholly by American enterprise. On November 11 04 tanks of the French six-ton type bad been delivered and by January 31 of this year 291. Of these six were shipped abroad. Orders for l.ixin Mark I light tanks J were canceled as were orders for 15,- 015 three-ton tanks, 15 of which had ; been completed on November 11. j The history of the rifle production. I including all of the considerations which led to the adoption of the standardized stand-ardized British Enfield weapon for American use. also is fully outlined. The department states that It sees no reason now to change its view that Ihe . wisest course was that which was fol- j lowed. The total rifle production In ! j the United Stales from the beginning ; of the war up to November 9. 1918. was 2.50(5.307. of which a little more than 300.000 were Springfield rifles. Pistols of U. S. Type Valuable. Considerable attention is devoted to the production of automatic pistols and revolvers for the troops. European Euro-pean countries failed to appreciate tile value of a large caliber, hard-hitting weapon of the American type and the chief use of pistols and revolvers In European armies had been as orna ments for ollicers' uniforms, it is said. With the standard urmy automatic it is stated, "liny average soldier with average training can hit what he sbtMits at. In almost the iirst skirmish it proved its superior usefulness in trench fighting. Such Incidents as that of the single American soldier who dispersed or killed a whole squad of (iennan bnyoneteers which had surrounded sur-rounded him struck the enemy with fear of Yankee prowess with the pistol." |