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That was the Army's case. After the Marines adopted the Garand, Under Secretary of War Robert Porter Patterson declared that the report completely vindicated the Garand. When the report first came out he showed only that portion which called the Garand the best of the semiautomatics. General Charles Macon Wesson, too, talked as though the report proved all that he and his Ordnance Department had claimed for their creation.
He also said that Ordnance tests had already and conclusively proved the Garand's efficiency.
Up to last week, $24,000,000 had been appropriated for Army Garands, and the Marines have $3,000,000 more to spend for them. Some 100,000 had been issued to troops, including a few to the Marine Corps.
Civilian Engineer John C. Garand and his co-workers at Springfield Armory had licked many of their worst production problems, still had a tough job, but were doing very well at it. Winchester Repeating Arms Co. has been trying to get into Garand production for 17 months, has a contract for 65,000 Garands, last week was edging into real production after 17 months of arduous effort. By next year the Army expects to have enough Garands (400,000) for its expanded force (not all soldiers are riflemen).
Wavell's Experience
In the light of the full report, released by the
Marines last week, another general's experience with small arms was
significant. The New York Times Magazine reprinted excerpts from three
lectures which General Sir Archibald Wavell, British commander in the
Middle East, delivered in 1939. In a discourse on good generals and how
they are made, he had evoked the mud, the blood, the guns of World War I:
"Rifles and automatic weapons submitted to the [British] small arms committee are, I believe, buried in mud for 48 hours or so before being tested for their rapid firing qualities. The necessity for such a test was very aptly illustrated in the late war, when the original Canadian contingent arrived in France armed with the Ross rifle, a weapon which had shown its superior qualities in target shooting ... in peace. In the mud of the trenches it was found to jam after a very few rounds; and after a short experience of the weapon under active service conditions the Canadian soldier refused to have anything to do with it and insisted on being armed with [another] rifle."