Once in practice, the MG34 was quickly well-received by the various elements of the German Army - from specialist troops to general infantry. A minimum team of two personnel typically equipped a single machine gun section. One served as the firer and carried the weapon into battle while the other served as the ammunition handler and carried ammunition while also helping to feed the belts in and clear any stoppages occurring. Additional members were committed as needed - some carried extra barrels while others carried tripods or extra ammunition.
The design of the MG34 proved so tactically flexible that it quickly pushed into all conceivable battlefield roles - its primary purpose being that of infantry squad-level support weapon. In this form, it was fielded with a bipod and troopers typically utilized the 50-round belt for the role. Rate-of-fire was always a strong point of the weapon but control was such that operators favored single-shot fire or very short bursts for more accuracy. The heightened rate-of-fire did, however, play well into the role of Anti-Aircraft (AA) machine gun to which the MG34 was sat upon a spiked tripod with applicable equipment (including a large iron targeting device over the jacket) added for engaging low-flying enemy aircraft. For the Heavy Machine Gun (HMG) role - that is purposeful sustained fire in volume - the weapon was affixed to the "Lafette 34" series heavy tripod. This assembly included an integrated buffering mechanism that stabled the gun during firing. For the role, optics could be fitted over the receiver to better track and engage targets at range.
The MG34 held a quick-field-stripping capability to allow it to be cleaned, maintained, and repaired in short order. Its implementation of plastics helped to control its operating weight and these additions proved robust despite the abuses that would be inflicted upon the gun in the field. Given the MG34s precision engineering, it was prone to picking up all manner of battlefield debris which could lead to stoppages of the action/feed. As such, it was important for its caretaker to exercise a strict maintenance regimen to keep the gun free of anything that could potentially cause it to function to falter at the worst possible moment.
Another failing point of the MG34 - through no fault of its operation - was what plagued other prewar firearms: it was simply made to a high-quality standard that required much time, expense, and effort to produce. These qualities did not play well into the supply-and-demand nature of warfare once the war ramped up for Germany and the MG34 was constantly in short supply throughout the war as it was requested by every German service branch on every front. This eventually forced some five German factories to be committed just for the production of MG34 guns and additional resources, time, and energy were spent on manufacturing the various accessories and equipment fittings required of the gun to fulfill its various roles. The end result became an excellent weapon that was actually "too fine" for the rigors of war and this is what led to the development of a simplified version in the equally-storied MG42 line of 1942 (detailed elsewhere on this site).
Engineers did work on evolving the MG34 some during the war years. The MG34m featured a heavy barrel jacket as its intended use was as an anti-infantry weapon installed on the myriad of German armored vehicles in circulation. The prototype MG34s (note small "s") and its finalized form, the MG34/41, were both given shortened barrel assemblies (approximately 22 inches long) to help elevate their inherent rate-of-fire - useful in AA role - and were restricted to full-automatic fire only. The MG34/41 was intended to succeed the original MG34 model but this never occurred - curtailed largely by the arrival of the more streamlined and equally-effective MG42 series. The MG34/41 was never officially adopted into service though it appeared in some numbers.
The MG34 "Panzerlauf" was a German tank machine gun variant of the MG34. A heavier barrel jacket was used on these models with far fewer perforation apparent along its length. The shoulder stock was also removed to make for a more compact profile within the confined of German armored vehicles. However, a conversion kit was carried aboard to quickly make the Panzerlauf into the ground-based light machine gun form in the event the vehicle had to be abandoned. The kit contained the necessary bipod, shoulder stock, and sighting assembly to make the change possible.
One final MG34 form to make an appearance before the end of the war was the MG81 defensive aircraft machine gun for the Luftwaffe, replacing its aging MG15 line. The MG81Z ("Zwilling") was an offshoot of this line which essentially mated two MG34s side-by-side, their action connected by way of a single trigger unit. The breech was also modified to allow for feeding from both sides of the guns and rate-of-fire was an impressive 2,800 to 3,200rpm. Production of this series was limited as MG34s were needed along more valuable ground fronts of the war.
Despite the arrival of the MG34's successor during 1942 through the MG42, the MG34 was continually produced through the end of the war in Europe which arrived in May of 1945. While the MG42 was intended to replace the MG34 as a frontline weapon, it never reached its rather lofty goal and ended up only really supplementing the classic and excellent 1930s design throughout the conflict - although it rightly had its own story to tell by war's end.
The history of the MG34 is not restricted to German use in World War 2 for the type was widely used throughout the world during and after the period. Operators included Algeria, Angola, Bulgaria, China, Croatia, Finland, Guinea-Bissau, Hungary, Israel, the Koreas, North Vietnam, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, and Turkey. It therefore saw service in conflicts such as the Chinese Civil War (1946-1950), the Arab-Israeli War (1948), the Korean War (1950-1953), the Vietnam War (1955-1975), and can still be found in faraway places still doing battle today (2014).
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