Originally Posted by
ABNAK
This cold weather thread got me thinking to the Korean War and specifically when the ChiComs first crossed the Yalu in the winter of 1950. It was supposedly the coldest winter they'd had in decades; shit was blowing straight down from Siberia. Our guys didn't have the variety of lubes we have available to us now. The vaunted M1 Garand and other battle-tested weapons basically froze up. I recall reading that some of them used after-shave because the alcohol wouldn't freeze. Essentially anything to keep the weapons "wet" (so to speak) but not frozen.
Think about it: these were probably not new out-of-the-box weapons. Likely leftovers from WWII, *maybe* (a big maybe) arsenal rebuilt between the wars. Weapons with loose tolerances, but none were DI, all "piston" of some sort. M1 Garand, BAR, 1919's, and carbines (although I don't think anyone was surprised with carbine issues as they were the most finicky of those I listed).
Post WWII the ordnance department did a massive rebuild of weapons bringing them up the latest specs and placing many into war emergency storage. Many were even "canned" in sealed steel drums. Some in theater Garand's and Carbines might have been earlier versions but I would bet most issued to troops on the way to Korea had the latest sights, op rods and good barrels etc. The problem with Garand's freezing up was a known issue from WWII, remember Lubriplate grease was lube for them in warmer temps. n colder weather they stripped the grease off and ran them dry, but also you had to keep checking the action for freeze up from ice build up, especially after heating them up from firing. There was a scene in Battleground where the Sargent tells his squad to check there actions for freeze up.
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