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The M1 Carbine is a .30 caliber Carbine primarily used by the United States during the Second World War and Korean War. It is chambered in .30 Carbine.

Design[]

Unlike conventional carbines, which were generally a version of a parent rifle with a shorter barrel (like the earlier .30-40 US Krag rifle and carbine), the M1 carbine has no parts in common with the M1 Garand and fires a different cartridge. The M1 Carbine was based on the 7½lb M2 Winchester Rifle, an early G30 rifle project by Jonathan Edmund Browning who was the half-brother of John Moses Browning. It was designed to be issued to infantry such as heavy weapons teams to provide them a backup weapon more useful in combat than a sidearm, but lighter and handier than a full-size rifle.

Variants[]

The M1 had a few design variants.

M1[]

First production version with a full wood stock, 15 round magazine and original sights

M1A1[]

M1A1 Carbine tri army

M1A1 Carbine

Paratrooper model with wire side-folding stock. M1A1s were produced by the Inland division of General Motors. They were made side by side with full stock M1s and stocks were sometimes replaced by producers, making it hard to find an original M1A1 with folding stock. This variant was sometimes fielded with a vertical wooden foregrip.

M1A2[]

A proposed variant with new sights adjustable for windage and elevation.

M1A3[]

Named as standard against the M1A1, but may have not been issued. Came with a pantograph stock. The stock is more rigid than the A1's folding stock and folds flush.

M2[]

MARM2CAR

M2 Carbine

Select-fire version capable of full-auto fire. Usually issued with an extended 30-round magazine with three catch ribs and a third magazine retaining surface. The M2 also had an altered stock, a new rear sight, a round bolt, and other small changes.

M2A2[]

Refurbished M2.

T3/M3[]

An M2 fitted with an early active infrared night vision scope, powered by a hefty backpack power supply unit. A forward pistol grip was added to assist in aiming with the heavy infrared lamp fitted to the weapon. As the T3 (T for trial, an older version of the modern "XM" designation) it saw action in 1945 on Okinawa.

The Korean War-era M3 used the M3 scope and made several improvements: the scope's detector was improved, increasing the effective range from 76 yards to 125, a conical T23 flash hider was added so that firing would not cause blinding white flashes in the scope (some late WW2 models have this too), and the IR lamp was moved from under the weapon to on top of the scope tube, as the underslung mount had proved prone to damage while the weapon was being carried.

Stopping power[]

The .30 Carbine is a very potent round in the short/medium range personal defense role (which is what it was designed and intended for), when used at the proper effective range of 100 yards and under, the blunt tipped, low-power .30 Carbine, will not penetrate straight through a human target, but rather stop about 6 inches inside, and explode all its energy inside the body, resulting in an internal wound cavity about 6-8 inches in diameter, when compared to the high velocity, pointed 30-06, which will penetrate straight through the target and doesn't expend much energy inside the target, resulting in a wound cavity only about 3-5 inches in diameter, making the Carbine a more physically damaging round at close/medium range.

Triva[]

David Marshall Williams designed critical elements of the M1 Carbine (and several other firearms which incorporate a floating chamber and short-stroke piston) while in jail for the murder of a deputy during a raid on the illegal whiskey still that Williams operated with five other workers. Williams pleaded guilty to second degree murder and admitted to firing the first shot to scare off the deputy but 'without intent to kill,' after which one of his workers, Ham Dawson admitted to firing the other four shots with intent to kill.

Williams' prison records show that after demonstrating his trustworthiness and skill at weapons design and modification while in prison, and after serving 8 of the 30 years, he was granted a commutation of his sentence by the governor and released with the intent that his work should go to benefit the country. He went on to work as a designer for Remington, Colt and Winchester. While at Winchester he refined the short stroke gas piston which he had designed in prison and which (along with several other elements designed by him) was used in the version of the U.S. Carbine, Caliber .30 M1 which was accepted for production by the U.S. Ordnance Department.

The movie "Carbine Williams" starring James Stewart presents a fictionalized account of the above narrative in which Williams professes his innocence and strongly suggests that he is solely responsible for the design of the M1. This has led to a great deal of muddied history surrounding the weapon's origins.

The legendary soldier Audie Murphy used the M1 carbine himself (serial number, 110878)

See also[]

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