World War II Database

Country of Origin	Germany
Type	Machine Gun
Caliber	8.000 mm
Capacity	250 rounds
Length	1.175 m
Barrel Length	721.000 mm
Weight	26.500 kg
Rate of Fire	500 rounds/min
Range	2.500 km
Muzzle Velocity	900 m/s

Contributor: C. Peter Chen

ww2dbaseThe Maschinengewehr 08, or MG 08, machine guns were the standard machine guns of the German Army in WW1. Their design evolved from that of Hiram Maxim's original Maxim gun design of 1884. They made use of fabric belts each holding 250 rounds of ammunition, and they each required a crew of four men. They were manufactured in great numbers, a total of 12,000 being available in Aug 1914, and by 1916 German arsenals were building 14,400 examples each month. During the 1930s, thousands of surplus MG 08 machine guns were exported to China, along with the license to build additional units (most of them at the Hanyang Arsenal in Hubei Province, China) which were designated Type 24 by the Chinese; they were the standard machine guns for Nationalist, Communist, and local warlord forces in the early years of war against the Japanese. A number of them saw action in the European War, despite their age, with forces of Finland and Poland. In Germany, despite the availability of far superior machine guns, the demands of war meant MG 08 machine guns would remain in service, although largely with training and static defense units only. After WW2, MG 08 and Type 24 weapons would see further action in the Chinese Civil War, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War.

Source: Wikipedia ww2dbase

Last Major Revision: Jun 2015

MG 08 Machine Gun Interactive Map

Photographs

See all 18 photographs of MG 08 Machine Gun

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