The BAR is an automatic rifle designed in the United States in 1917. It was designed by John Browning and manufactured by a number of companies such as the Colt’s Patent Firearms Manufacturing Company, Winchester Repeating Arms Company, Marlin-Rockwell Corporation, FN Herstal and many others.

The BAR M1918 was chambered for the Springfield .30-06 and was fed from a 20-round box magazine. The rifle was designed mainly for the advancing U.S. Expeditionary Corps in Europe. The Expeditionary forces were earlier using the French Chauchat rifle whose performance was not so satisfactory. Thus attempts were made to design an alternative which led to the development of the BAR M1918.

The BAR could fire 350 to 550 rounds per minute. At this rate, the magazine would empty very fast. However, the BAR offered a much high stopping power and so was very popular with the troops. The rifle came with a bipod but in the later versions it was dropped to save weight.

The BAR saw widespread deployment in both the World Wars. It remained in mainstream service until 1957 after which it was withdrawn. However, it continued to be used for several years and saw limited action in the initial years of the Vietnam War.

The BAR was significant because it proved the effectiveness of the squad support weapon. It was observed that it was the squad support weapon that was the first to return fire in case of an enemy attack on the unit. Eve today, many militaries use a squad support weapon along with rifles in the unit.

The Browning Hi-Power is a 9 mm semiautomatic pistol that was designed by John Browning and Dieudonne Saive. The pistol is named “Hi-Power” for its 13-round magazine. The Browning Hi-Power is the first pistol to have a double-column magazine.

The Browning Hi-Power was developed in response to the French Military’s requirement for a weapon with extreme versatility, high magazine capacity, ease of cleaning and maintenance and high stopping power. Fabrique Nationale of Herstal, Belgium contracted John Browning to design the weapon and two prototypes were designed—one with a simple blowback design and the other using a locked-breech recoil mechanism. The prototype with locked-breech was finally chosen and many modifications were made to it. Production began in yea 1935 and so the model was designated P-35. However, the French Military didn’t adopt the pistol and instead opted for the similar Modele 1935 Pistol.The Hi-Power has two disadvantages. First, its trigger is very heavy to pull. This is because of the magazine’s safety design. It can be overcome by completely removing the magazine safety mechanism completely or by polishing the surfaces of the safety plunger and the magazine. Secondly, the Hi-Power causes injury to the shooters hands if not handled properly. This is overcome by replacing the hammer or by learning to hold the pistol properly while firing.

Despite these disadvantages, the Hi-Power’s thirteen round magazine capacity makes it a preferred weapon by many countries. During the Second World War, it was used widely by both the Axis and Allied militaries. In the recent years, many armies and police departments have adopted the Browning Hi-Power pistol. As of today, more than 50 countries such as Belgium, Britain, India, Australia, Argentina and Israel use it in active service.

The Browning M2HB or the Browning .50 Calibre Machine Gun, as it is also known, is heavy machine gun developed by the famed gun-designer John Browning in the United States towards the end of the First World War. The M2HB is highly effective against armoured vehicles, boats, small fortifications and low-flying aircraft.

The design of the Browning M2Hb is based on earlier machine gun model called the M1917. In other words, the M2HB is an upgraded version of the .30 M1917 which has been chambered for use with the .50 BMG. The M2 is an air-cooled gun which makes operates using the short-recoil mechanism. Different models of the M2 have different rates of fire. The M2HB can fire up to 450-600 rounds per minute. However, in actual practice it is rarely fired at that rate as doing so would cause wear and tear to the gun barrel.

The M2HB weighs approximately 38 Kg. Along with the tripod it weighs about 58 Kg. It measures approximately 1650 mm with the barrel being 1143 mm in length. The muzzle velocity of the M2 2,910 is feet per second. It has an effective range of 1.8 kilometres. The M2 saw widespread use during the Second World War. It was mainly used against aircraft and vehicles because of immense penetrating power. The M2 was capable of puncturing the plates and fuel tanks of armoured vehicles. In addition, a variant of it was also used in plane such as the P-47 Thunderbolt and the B-25 Mitchell Bomber.

During the Korean and Vietnam Wars, the M2 also found use as a long-range sniper rifle most notably by the famous US Marine Corps Sniper Carlos Hathcock.  In fact, Hathcock set a record for the longest sniper kill at 2,250 meters using the M2. This record broken was only in the recent years in 2002 in Afghanistan.Several variants of the M2 gun have been developed. Some of the notable ones are:>> M2 E-50: This is a variant of the M2HB that features a quick to replace barrel and several other improvements. This is a developmental version and is also referred under other designations such as “M2E2” or “M2A1”. >> AN/M2 and AN/M3: These are variants of the M2 that were designed to be fired from aircraft. These were designed during the Second World War and operated electrically using solenoid-triggers. The AN/M3 was a faster version of the AN/M2. Other variants in this class include the XM296/M296 which was designed to be fired from helicopters.>> XM213/M213, XM218, GAU-15/A, GAU-16/A and GAU-18/A: These variants are improvised versions of the M2 gun to be used as door mounted guns on helicopters.

The Browning M2HB has been in service with many nations and has been employed in a numbers of wars like World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War, Falklands War, and others. In the recent years, it saw widespread deployment in the Second Gulf war.

The Browning M1919 is a air-cooled medium machine gun that has been used in a number of conflicts of the World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. Several versions of the M1919 were produced of which model A4 was the most widely deployed.

The Browning M1919 is based on an earlier version—the Browning M1917. The gun was initially designed to fire the .30-06 M1 but later versions could also fire the M2 ball cartridge feed using woven cloth or metal link belts. Some versions of the gun could also fire other cartridge types such as the 7.62x51mm NATO, the .303 British and the 8 mm Mauser.

The Browning M1919 was a recoil-operated machine gun. It could fire at a rate of 400-600 rounds per minute and had an effective range of 1,500 yards. It had a muzzle velocity of 2,800 feet per second.

The M1919 was mainly employed as a company support weapon and needed four men to operate. The gun was initially designed with a light barrel and tripod with ease of transport as the main consideration. However, later revisions had a heavier barrel and tripod to enable sustained fire. The gun weighed 31 pounds.

The American Army employed the M1919 in large numbers in the Second World War. It was also mounted in tanks and armoured vehicles. Overall, it added to the firepower capabilities of the forces and played in pivotal role in many battles. During the war two additional variants were adopted by the American Army. These versions were the M37, which has a coaxial feed system and the M37F which featured special sighting equipment.

In the later years, the US Navy converted a large number of the earlier M1919s to use the 7.62 mm NATO cartridges. Designated as Mk21 Mod 0, these guns were used in the Vietnam War in river warfare patrols. In 1967, Israel used some of these converted guns in the Six Day War.

The Model 1919 was also used extensively as an aircraft mounted weapon. Machine guns mounted on aircraft have to be light weight and reliable with a high rate of firing. The Model 1919 was extensively modified and reengineered into the .30 calibre M2 AN aircraft machine gun by engineers from Fabrique Nationale de Herstal, Belgium. This modified version has thinner and thus lighter parts which makes its more effective as an aircraft mounted weapon.

The Browning M1919 was manufactured by a number of companies in the US during the Second World War. Some of these companies include General Motors, Buffalo Arms Corporation and the Rock Island Arsenal. The M1919 was also manufactured in the United Kingdom by the Birmingham Small Arms Company.

As newer weapons became more popular, the M1919 was gradually retired from service. Military scale production was stopped by 1945. However, it continued to be used until the 1970s after which it was completely phased out from use. Today, the M1919 and its variants are still used by many civilian enthusiasts.