Indirect Machine Gun Fire - Effective?

Just a quick addendum to what has been said. I understand that the Japanese used the indirect fire technique to good effect on Iwo Jima.--Harold

 

Photos of the atlantic wall show all the german MGs set up for indirect fire, with the remote trigger and telescope. Seems to be the standard way they were used unless employed as an LMG.

 

Just because you see a MG34/42 mounted on a Lafette 34/42 with a MGZ telescopic sight doesn't mean that it's set up to be employed as an indirect fire weapon. As it happens the Lafette and MGZ made an outstanding platform for doing so but indirect fire is generally only used when the gunner or target is in a defilade or partial defilade, such as a reverse slope or entrenched position. The machine-gun nests and bunkers on the Atlantic Wall were pre-sighted to provide direct fire to pre-plotted avenues of approach and natural and man-made funnels on the beach, mostly within 1000m or so. Indirect fire is most often effective as suppression and deterring fire from extreme long-range because you are, in effect, lobbing bullets down onto the area and from my sojourns along the defenses of Omaha Beach, the majority of strongpoints weren't in a position to do this.

What those machine guns you saw were set up for was a heavy-machine gun configuration. The difference between a HMG and LMG is that the HMG is used at the platoon or company-level as a support weapon to deliver suppressing fire, often from range, and they're mounted on sturdy tripods with traverse and elevation mechanisms to allow for accurate fire and quick adjustments in that situation. They're most commonly used in defensive positions but also moved up and placed in lanes with good fields of fire to support advances. The LMG, on the other hand, utilizes a bipod for stabilization and is easily man-portable so as to be used in the SAW (Squad Automatic Weapon) role at the squad-level. In a German infantry squad the SAW was a MG34 or 42 and doctrine taught that the riflemen were to protect the flanks of the gunner, suppress the enemy so as to allow the gunner to move into an enfilade or other tactically superior position, and eliminate the target. American doctrine was to use the SAW, in this case a B.A.R., to provide suppressing fire to fix the target so that the riflemen could flank and eliminate it.

 

Indirect fire refers to the relationship of the machine gun to the target not the operator to the machine gun

 

I picked this up from the very successful attack by Plummer 3rd Ypres on Messine Ridge 7th June 1917.

"Front line troops (German) were harassed and exhausted by constant indirect machine gun fire (from 700 british machine guns) on all communication routes". This was of course in conjunction with counter battery and creeping barrage.

The indirect creeping barrage was also seems to have been used successfully in North Africa. It demanded a lot of the gunners, manhandling their Vickers, to keep up with the Infantry but "anecdotally" just judging by the number of times the Infantry Commander thanks his opposite number in the MMG company, it does to have been successful.

 

My impression is that in a WWI attack, the machine guns was most effectively deployed as a kind of light mobile artillery, because of the difficulties involved in bringing up machine guns under enemy observation.

 

This book gives a fairly good example of the use of machine guns in WW1, it is written referencing the US Army in France but the employment was the same for all sides. It includes actual examples of the differing ways they were used to support attacks.

The Infantry in Battle - Case Studies of the AEF Put Together Under Geo. Marshall's Supervision, Chapter XVII Fire of Machine Guns.

Infantry in Battle

 

I recently read "The Last Stand of Fox Company," the story of an American Marine Corps company defending a hill against Chinese Communist forces during the retreat from the Korea's Chosin Reservoir in late November 1950.

An American officer on the crest of the hill observed a large formation of Chinese infantry moving in the distance to the sheltered lea of an adjacent hill that was serving as a staging area for Chinese attacks at night. The officer directed 2 heavy machine guns (water cooled Browning 1917's) positioned further down the slope of the hill to swing their guns around and fire over the crest of the hill at the Chinese. He was able to adjust the machine gun fire by observing the reactions of the Chinese troops; when they started running, stumbling, and falling he could tell the machine guns were on target.

Supposedly the indirect fire of the machine guns had great effect.

I highly recommend this book, by the way.

 

Even in the 1970's there was some reference to using the M.G in an indirect mode. The only time I am certain that I have read of them being used in this role in WW2 was by the Japanese on Iwo Jima. Of course they could have been used any time the battle lines stayed in one place for any space of time, such as at Cassino.

 

In George's "A Rifleman Went to War", he was pretty critical of using machine guns in this matter. Thought that a great deal of pre-war training was wasted on this technique which, in his post-war opinion, was of limited effectiveness in actuality, was beyond the capability of the typical infantryman in actual combat situations, and a waste of ammunition. Most of his combat experiences invoved jungle combat at close range, and this probably colored his opinion however.

 

This is all very fascinating and this old sailor has learned a lot!

 

Not sure I understand the context of this comment. Delivering a creeping barrage should not normally mean moving the guns, just changing their point of aim to allow the infantry to advance. However, if the barrage is mainly provided by artillery, which has two to three times the range of a medium machine gun, then the machine guns are likely to be moved forwards partway through the barrage in order to fire the depth serials. That raises some questions:-.

-How quickly can the guns be moved and set up?
- How quickly and safely can the guns be registered on targets from new previously unsurveyed positions?
- How quickly can ammunition be brought forward? This sounds like a job for MMG on universal carriers rather than manhandling them.

 

When I was in my infantry officer's course back in the 70s I remember them mentioning this technique but not really going into it very much. I don't remember us actually practicing it. When you think about it, it takes a rather discrete set of circumstances for it to work. Basically, one needs a fixed defensive line with a hill in front that can hide enemy soldiers but can also be reached with MG fire. That means a rather gently rolling hill which is usually not available. Again, look at the Japanese use of it on Iwo Jima. The terrain was right and the defenses set up before hand. In my readings, it caused the Marines quite a few casualties and pinned them down.

 

Are you American by any chance? The US Army was never really into the barrage as a fire-plan. The idea, which you know, is to put a moving curtain of fire just in front of the advancing infantry, supported by an intensive counter battery programme. Within reason it was largely independent of the terrain configuration. An enemy attempting to engage the machine guns probably had its head down.

 

I'm not familiar with the book, but would say that you are correct when you say the type of battles he was involved in (Jungle Fighting) colored his opinion. I would also argue that the training is not a waste if you know how to use the technique when the right set of circumstances dictate that this would be the most effective method to employ.
I would also point out that the answer to your question; as to the techniques utility, effectiveness, and the ability of an average machine gunner to utilize it in a combat situation has been answered in one of your own previous posts:

Fox 2/7 was holding a hill at Toktong Pass, a natural choke point where they could cut off 5th and 7th Marines (themselves surrounded), located up the road at Yudam-ni from the main 1st Marine Division logistical and support point back at Hagaru-ri (at the time being defended by two companies and 2/3d's of the weapons company of 3/1, plus support troops). So Hagaru-ri lacked the strength to rescue Fox/2/7 or fight south to Koto-Ri.
The Chinese threw a regiment plus at Fox company and it was touch and go for the five days and six nights they held the pass. Portions of their perimeter was over run on at least three seperate occasions. Who's to say that the Chinese attack that was broken up by the timely use of indirect machine gun fire wouldn't have been the one that destroyed Fox Company? The fact that the PLA troops forming for the attack reacted as you described should prove its effectiveness in this case. It should also prove that it can be employed, spur of the moment, without advance preparation, in a combat environment (some of the worst combat and climatic conditions a US force has ever experienced).
If Fox company didn't hold out, 5th and 7th Marines would not have been able to fight their way back to Hagaru-ri, or would have been much more beaten up. With no 5th and 7th Marines, the 3/1 Marines, Marine artillery and the Marine and US Army support troops at Hagaru-ri, plus the US Army survivors from Task Force Faith which had been destroyed east of the reservoir (these troops had been rescued by escaped to the relative saftey of the Marine perimeter at Hagaru-ri) would have lacked the strength to fight their way back to Koto-ri. So, IMHO, it was a good thing those gunners had trained in the technique.

 

By chance, I am, but to do this don't you need range tables for the MG similar to arty or mortars? Such things weren't around when I was in the Army but I seem to remember our instructor saying that the U.S. Army did use this technique around WW1 and thereafter.

 

Harold,

You can download range tables for Vickers medium machine guns here showing ranges up to 4500 yards
Range Tables

 

Thank you Sheldrake. Very similar to the arty tables I used in the Army. Delving deeper into the murky recesses of my memory, I think the Browning M2 may have had similar tables too but the technique was out of favor when I was in.