Service Use
Battlefield usage of the weapon was significant, but not to the extent of the Maxim weapons. The Bergmann MG-15nA was an important weapon in that it filled a gap in the German armory between the rifle and the heavy machine gun. The only other light machine gun the Imperial German Army fielded before the Bergmann was adopted were the various Madsen light machine guns used by the Musketen battalions. In the Battle of the Somme, the German Army found that they desperately needed a weapon to counter the British Army's Lewis Gun. The limited quantities of the Madsen gun (Germany did not produce any Madsens in the First World War and relied almost entirely on captured weaponry) only added to the need for a contemporary to the Lewis. The German Army, reeling from the Battle of the Somme, ordered some 6,000 MG-15nAs in November 1916. These weapons were distributed to Musketen and other infantry battalions before enough troops could be trained upon the new MG-08/15 in the winter/spring of 1917. The majority of MG-15nA weapons were actually delivered to the Eastern and Palestine fronts where the German Asia Korps made the most significant use of the gun. The German Leichtmaschinengewehr Truppen (referred to as LMGt for short) were formed specifically for the weapon. The MG15Na was a generally reliable gun which served until the manufacture of automatic weaponry was ceased in 1919 under the Treaty of Versailles, but the dominance of the Maxim '08 during the war meant it never acquired much enthusiasm from military officials. The weapon had faded into obscurity by the time the Second World War came about.
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