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Was the M1 Garand En-Bloc Clip a Terrible Idea?

HansGruber said:
While I see your point…

I’m gonna take Eisenhower’s take on it.

It was the supply/logistics chain that the Allies/US could bring to the table that actually won the war.

Patton thought the M1 was the finest battle instrument;

Ike thought it was the deuce & a half truck.

Think about it…
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Oh I agree we outsupplied the hell out of them. But I don't think I ever heard a single vet complain about the M1 being a poor design. Heavy, ok, but nothing else. And I heard damn few that I personally knew that even complained about that. Lousy design, not hardly, best ever, well who's to say who gets to judge best ever...

And in the end no matter what they got supplied with the grunts in the dirt mud and blood pushed on and won the war with an M1 that seldom failed them. I have always said I am half the man my father, and his generation, were and I honestly believe that, tough SOBs to be sure.
 
Guys, watch the 1942 two-part training film produced by the army in post #31. You'll see why the M1 was ahead of everyone else's rifles.
 
Sld1959 said:
Oh I agree we outsupplied the hell out of them. But I don't think I ever heard a single vet complain about the M1 being a poor design. Heavy, ok, but nothing else. And I heard damn few that I personally knew that even complained about that. Lousy design, not hardly, best ever, well who's to say who gets to judge best ever...

And in the end no matter what they got supplied with the grunts in the dirt mud and blood pushed on and won the war with an M1 that seldom failed them. I have always said I am half the man my father, and his generation, were and I honestly believe that, tough SOBs to be sure.
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Funny thing: a friend of mine in high-schools grandfather was a Marine at Guadalcanal…he MUCH preferred his ‘03 over the M1; he said when they first got the Garands, they took them in the surf, mud, etc…and the Springfield was a lot more reliable. Didn’t give his ‘03 up until they made him…and then he like the M1 Carbine much more than the Garand for jungle fighting.
 
HansGruber said:
Funny thing: a friend of mine in high-schools grandfather was a Marine at Guadalcanal…he MUCH preferred his ‘03 over the M1; he said when they first got the Garands, they took them in the surf, mud, etc…and the Springfield was a lot more reliable. Didn’t give his ‘03 up until they made him…and then he like the M1 Carbine much more than the Garand for jungle fighting.
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Cannot blame him there, m1 Carbine is my favorite military rifle all time.
 
Steve in NH said:
In boot camp (Dec 1966 at P.I.) I had an M14. one feature was the ability to reload a magazine while in the rifle with a stripper clip. This apparently a carry over from the en-bloc clip used in the M1. In ITR (Camp Geiger) we were issued
M1's. Very similar to M14, of course. So, having had experience with the en-bloc in both rifles it was familiar and very usable. In staging at Pendleton before going to RVN we had M16's. Upon arrival in DaNang at 1st MAW I was given an M14 with a selector.... M16's being in short supply at the time. I was issued many extra mags for the M14 so did not have experience the the en-bloc design in country. All this being said, the en-bloc worked for me for the time that I had the M1 at Geiger and I did not hear of any problems. It was, after all a very good design... thank you Mr Browning!
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My heartfelt gratitude to you and all the other vets here for your service.
 
Lots of comparisons of the M1 to rifles that had yet to be invented for WW2... Shouldn't the discussion be about other rifles of the time that the M1 was up against (like the discussion most recently of the M1903 vs. the M1)?
 
HansGruber said:
While I see your point…

I’m gonna take Eisenhower’s take on it.

It was the supply/logistics chain that the Allies/US could bring to the table that actually won the war.

Patton thought the M1 was the finest battle instrument;

Ike thought it was the deuce & a half truck.

Think about it…
Click to expand...
Stalin thought so, too - our trucks across the Pacific made it possible for them to manage logistics at their Western front - one of the things that wrecked the Nazi's chances. The number of trucks we shipped was incredible. The USSR had a treaty with Japan (!) that let US ships supplying trucks to Russian ports pass unmolested. War is VERY odd.
 
Regarding the Garand Rifle. I fired one in competition for 6 plus years, about 12,000 rounds, mostly hand loads. As to the “problems” of it’s 8 round capacity, I wonder as to whether the things could have been made to take BAR magazines? Regarding supposed problems with a removable 20 magazine interfering with firing from the prone position, how far would a BAR magazine projected below the rifle?
 
Aside from combat use, the old Garand in 30-06, some were modified to fire the 7.62mm nato, made a pretty good target rifle.
 
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