German Military Rifles - Sturmgewehr (assault Rifles)

Sturmgewehr (assault Rifles)

The Sturmgewehr was a series of assault rifles developed in Nazi Germany during World War II which were the first assault rifle to see major deployment. It is also known by the designations: Maschinenpistole 43, Maschinenpistole 44 (MP43 and MP44, respectively) which denotes earlier versions of the same weapon.

MP43, MP44, and StG44 were different names for what was essentially the same rifle, with minor differences in production and dates. The various names were a result of the complicated small arms nomenclature in Nazi Germany. Developed from the Mkb 42(H) "machine carbine", the 'StG44' combined traits of carbines, submachine guns and automatic rifles. StG is an abbreviation of Sturmgewehr. The name was chosen for propaganda reasons and literally means "storm rifle" as in "to storm a bunker" (Sturm also refers to the weather phenomenon, adding a second meaning). After the adoption of the StG44, the English translation "assault rifle" became a common class description of this type of infantry small arm.

The rifle was chambered for the 7.92×33 mm cartridge, also known as 7.92 mm Kurz (German for "short"). This shorter version of the German standard (7.92 × 57 mm) rifle round, in combination with the weapon's selective-fire design, provided most of the controllable firepower of a submachine gun at close quarters with much of the accuracy and power of a Karabiner 98k bolt action rifle at intermediate ranges. While the StG44 had less range and power than the more powerful infantry rifles of the day, Wehrmacht studies had shown that most combat engagements occurred at less than 300 meters with the majority within 200 meters.