I saw one last month at a shoot. French made, it is a 9mm Parabellum SMG that folds up into a 17" long package. it was expensive to make because of a lot of machining, and was only produced from 49 through the mid-fifties. It was made for para toopers and Clandestine purposes. This one was semi-auto only, but it was originally FA. It was in great shape and had what looked to be Bakelite grips. I had never heard of them, but it was a cool look into the past. It had about a 10-11" barrel that telescoped into itself, the magwell with mag in it, folded toward the front, and the stock folded up and a clasp engaged a catch in the magwell when all folded up. It was pretty hefty at about 7 1/2 lbs, and had a cool looking sling on it. I don't know how reliable they were, but the cool factor was way up there. It was hard for me to believe that the French had come up with something like that, but I guess they were more militant during the late forties.

I went looking for photos. Looks interesting, especially the compact folding.

http://world.guns.ru/smg/smg87-e.htm

http://www.militaryimages.net/photopost/showphoto.php/photo/24751

http://www.deactivated-guns.co.uk/d...d-hotchkiss-submachine-gun/prod_381.html

Bruce

Thanks for those pics. It's a rough looking thing, but if it ran well, I could see where one would have been handy in the trenches. Would have been nicer in 45ACP though.

kind of cool....in a very devo industrial Stennish way.

didn't do 'em much good at Dien Bien Phu.

What'd Briscoe call you? A Jewish Coonass?

what would that make Bristoe, other than just another anti semite that likes to read about dead Jews?

Damn Sam, you get a fresh load of them key limes? Your sounding even more bitter than usual. You okay?

So why is it semi-auto only now?

Can't fault the French soldat, parachutiste, Legionnaire or Coloniale at Dien Bien Phu. The vast majority fought and died with extreme valor against unsurmountable odds! The had some really sorry officers (Col. de Castre???) and no support back in Hanoi. And the Viet Minh had Giap, who in my opinion was nothing short of a genius. There wasn't enough air support in all of SE asia (not counting US in Phillipines. Japan, etc.) to assist them at DBP. There were some exceptional French officer who rose above the ordeal. Col. Langlade comes to mind as well as one Marcel Bigeard. The US would take a good lesson from Major (later General) Bigeard. He basically wrote the book we should be using on counter-insurgency warfare. He was VERY sucessful fighting the Felagas in Algeria! And basically had the battle of Algers won.

MAT 49 was the SMG the French decided to go with. The used them in Indochine from about 1951 thru "La Guerre Algerie", up until way past Operation Leopard (Kolwezi ,Zaire) in 1978 where the 2eme Regiment Etrangere Parachuitiste kicked Katanganese butt. Even some of US SF had a few of them in Viet Nam.

Hopefully this pic will come thru of me with a MAT 49 on the left.....


Kaywoodie

Saw quite a few Mat 49's in RVN. VC used them. Rebarrreled to 7,62 Russian pistol ammo. Compact little critters. I like how the mag well folded forward to make it more compact. With the Russian cartridge they were WAAAAY more noisy than in 9mm. Earsplittingly so. Almost as bad as the PPSH43.

Absolument!!!!!! The 7.62 x 25 is ear-splitting out of a SMG. I know of at least one SF officer that lost a VC cell leader because his MAT 49 smoke-stacked on him when he tried to take him out in an alley ambush!!! Never had done it before. Fate I guess.....

Kaywoodie

Here are several more pics you might enjoy. They are originals from the French Indochina war.

This is the precursor to the MAT 49. The MAT 48! Came right after your Hotchkiss!


This is one of my favorite photos. It shows several MAT 49's in use by members of the 1er Battalion Etrangere Parachutistes at Dien Bien Phu. These Legionnaires fought hard and sadly, it's pretty safe to say that none of the lads in this photo lived to see the end of the conflict. There is another cool rifle barely visible on the right a MAS49! They are wearing 47/51 "Tenue de Parachutiste" lizard camos. Most all the uniforms we used in Viet Nam was patterned after the French gear! Even the M47 "Tenue de Campaigne" uniform (all OD green) I was wearing in the earlier posted photo.


Kaywoodie

Ithought Sam was being rather cheerful.

actually I am in fine fettle Pat. It's a great day, and there are lots of stuff to analyze and dig into.

My partner and I were having a lukewarm Tiger Piss in a bar in Dalat when we met a guy with very empty eyes, a rather thick German accent (still) who spoke French to the Viets who ran the joint. Conversation turned up he was an old Legionairre who was currently one of the managers of a Michelin rubber plantation. Apparently after WWll he was one of those guys who was offered a career in the Legion or a firing squad. Something to do with the blood group tattoo under his left arm. Pics of the Legion in Indochina and those of the Provincial Paratroopers show many Mat49's and Mas rifles. Chatellerault (sp?) LMG's were much in evidence too.

An aquaintance of mine got off the train in Salzburg, Austria back in the mid 60's while in the US Army, only to have an Austrian gentleman walk up to him, look at his "tan" and ask him in perfect Vietnamese how he liked SE Asia. Then he turned around & walked away......

Kaywoodie

I didn't ask him, but I assume he didn't hold a class 3 FFL and could not have it in the original configuration. I had never seen one, but thought it was nifty the way it would fold up into such a small kit. I don't know if it was a reliable weapon, but it looked to have a lot of machine work rather than stamped steel, and there was definitely a lot of thought that went into it's development.

Unless it was a built on a semi-auto only receiver (usually along with various other mod's) it is still an NFA item.

Some guy got nailed for building M-14's via rewelding cut up M-14 receivers (and welding over the selector hole) due to a "once a machine gun, always a machine gun" rule. Google MKS M-14. You might want to pass that along to the person.

More bizarre guns. Several years ago we did a "Weaponology" series on the weapons of the Foreign Legion. Here's a pic from our Dien Bien Phu shoot. Legionnaire on my left has the MAT 49. I am holding a CR-39. Which is a MAS 36 retro-fitted with a folding aluminum stock and shorter barrel. Later the rifles were built from scratch! This was done for the easy transport by the Para regiments.

Sorry for the poor quality of the pic...


Kaywoodie

Kaywoodie,

Thanks for sharing the pics and history.

There are SO many lessons we could learn if we only would go back and really look at history. AND not repeat the same mistakes!

Ed