World War II and Later
The heavier water-cooled designs continued to be used throughout WWII and into the 1960s, but were gradually phased out in favor of air-cooled designs. The mediums were now used both as medium machine guns while mounted on tripods and as light machine guns while mounted on bipods. This was possible in part because a heavy, static MG position was not a very effective tactic in vehicle-centered warfare, and the significantly lighter air-cooled designs could nearly match the capabilities of the water-cooled versions.
Gatling-type machine guns such as the Minigun and GShG-7.62 reappeared after WWII. These are typically mounted on ships and helicopters because of their weight and large ammunition requirements (due to their extremely high rate of fire.) The need for sustained automatic fire on the ground, however, is now nearly entirely filled by air-cooled medium machine guns.
Read more about this topic: Heavy Machine Guns
Famous quotes containing the words world war, world and/or war:
“I date the end of the old republic and the birth of the empire to the invention, in the late thirties, of air conditioning. Before air conditioning, Washington was deserted from mid-June to September.... But after air conditioning and the Second World War arrived, more or less at the same time, Congress sits and sits while the presidents—or at least their staffs—never stop making mischief.”
—Gore Vidal (b. 1925)
““Must we burn Sade?” asks Mme de Beauvoir. Now that you mention it, why not? The world is littered with literature. And Sade teaches us little about human nature which we couldn’t gather from a few minutes of honest introspection.”
—D.J. Enright (b. 1920)
“Catholics are necessarily at war with this age. That we are not more conscious of the fact, that we so often endeavour to make an impossible peace with it—that is the tragedy. You cannot serve God and Mammon.”
—Eric Gill (1882–1940)