Chapter 172: Anti-aircraft Guns Laid Flat For A Military Court? No Such Thing!
“Develop a 12~13 millimeter large-caliber machine gun?”
Upon hearing Brigadier General Lelouch’s latest requirements, the DWM Company engineer in charge of machine gun weapons immediately began evaluating the needs.
“What’s wrong? Is there a big technical difficulty? I only require scaling up the existing heavy machine gun proportionally, which should be easy to do.”
The DWM Company engineer pondered for a moment: “However, will this large-caliber heavy machine gun be used exclusively to hit tanks in the future? As a machine gun, it will definitely be deployed widely to the grassroots level. If a unit never encounters enemy tanks and can only use the large-caliber machine gun against infantry, wouldn’t that be a huge waste of firepower?”
Lelouch immediately dispelled the other’s concern: “There is no waste of firepower! The current 7.92 heavy machine gun doesn’t guarantee instant death on hit either, and there are still so many enemy wounded soldiers on the battlefield. It’s just that previously neither side had efficient anti-infection wound medicine, so soldiers hit by 7.92 bullets with severe wounds would die from infection in more than half the cases, making that ammunition sufficient.
But in the future, the Empire’s sulfonamide will definitely leak out gradually, and the enemy will master it too. And the Empire’s IG Farben might also develop better drugs. On future battlefields, merely wounding enemies to render them combat-ineffective may no longer be enough.
Moreover, don’t you think it’s cruel to let someone live with severe lifelong disabilities? We should act in the spirit of humanity and end their suffering from the start. So developing a 13 millimeter machine gun that severs a person with one hit, allowing them to go painlessly, is just right.
As for even larger calibers, I won’t make requirements. If your DWM Company finds it difficult, hand the project to Scheisser to handle, and you provide some authorization and technical support. I’ll find other funding sources for the R&D costs and early orders. Of course, the key to this project is the ammunition, which still relies on you.”
The DWM Company side also seemed not very confident in this project, feeling the demand wouldn’t be large. After some consultation and high-level discussions, they only agreed to provide technical support for joint development.
If something is developed, DWM Company only needs production authorization. That is, the final patent rights might be held by Lelouch and Scheisser, but DWM Company can also manufacture this new weapon unrestrictedly, producing as much as it can sell, just without rights to sublicense to third parties.
After preliminary evaluation, this new large-caliber machine gun, as long as it doesn’t use soft-point bullets, can easily penetrate 10 millimeter homogeneous steel armor. Using steel-core bullets or even harder core bullets would further enhance penetration.
However, the firearm itself requires at least half a year or more for development and may not catch up with the Britannians’ future tanks at the first opportunity. Planning the bullet production line takes even longer, as it’s completely starting from scratch, and this technical difficulty will rest on DWM Company in the future.
Hugo Scheisser and the Bergmann Company originally behind him have no bullet production lines and no capability to start a new production line for a completely new caliber bullet.
Nowadays, almost all bullets within Germania are produced by DWM Company, even including the bullets for Mauser Company guns, which are actually DWM’s specified standards. Mauser generally only produces guns, at most running a line to manufacture for DWM.
So at the project’s inception, Lelouch had to definitively set the exact caliber for the future new gun’s needs, without ambiguity. All future development of the new gun must revolve around this fixed caliber, which absolutely cannot be adjusted. Because no such caliber exists in the world previously.
Ultimately due to the gravity of the matter, Lelouch had to call Marshal Rupprecht in Odessa for instructions, suggesting the future large-caliber heavy machine gun’s precise caliber be set exactly at 13 millimeters—
This era has no cloth-belt large-caliber machine guns yet; neither Britain nor Ugly Country has entered this field, so there’s no 12.7 caliber interference tailored to .50 inch. The German side can just go straight to exactly 13 millimeters.
After hearing Lelouch’s request over the phone, Marshal Rupprecht couldn’t help but chuckle: “This is rare. I didn’t expect someone as fearless as you to specifically seek instructions on such a matter.”
Lelouch didn’t dare slack off and said seriously: “Of course. Starting a new bullet production line is far more significant than starting a new gun production line. The country has at least hundreds of gun lines, but bullet lines are less than a tenth of that.
A completely new caliber bullet might initially only be used by one gun model—how could we not treat it solemnly? DWM Company people even hinted that to start a new line, the Baria Royal Family must guarantee purchasing at least 30 million rounds of this new caliber bullet annually during the future war, relaxable to 20 million in the first year on the market, for them to proceed.”
Duke Rupprecht was slightly startled but gritted his teeth and agreed: “You’re really capable at handling things, kid, and ruthless with spending—committing to 30 million rounds annually in one go! Fine, keep doing well, I trust your judgment—30 million it is each year!”
For DWM Company to start a new production line, the minimum annual capacity is at least 50 million; anything less would idle the line, causing fixed costs to raise the bullet unit price significantly.
If market demand is high, DWM can run workers in three shifts, optimize and speed up the line, expanding to over 100 million annually, which is possible. 50 million is just the minimum break-even output.
From DWM’s perspective, starting a line of at least 50 million while you commit to only 30 million sales leaves 20 million for them to figure out how to sell, which is already taking huge risk.
After negotiating the cooperation model of 50 million capacity with 30 million exclusive distribution, DWM Company finally relented, agreeing that the DWM Munich Factory under DWM Group would handle the new bullet’s R&D and production line manufacturing in the future.
DWM Group, as a national ammunition giant, has its own factories and R&D institutions in several major southern states, operating relatively independently. Baria State’s ammunition needs are handled by the DWM arsenals in Munich or Karlsruhe（ in Baden）.
Additionally, DWM Company promised that initial trial production ammunition could be launched together with trial production machine guns, requiring at least half a year, but this ammunition could only be a proportionally scaled-up version of existing Mauser ammunition, with ballistic characteristics and accuracy not guaranteed.
In the future, it may need adjustments to length and charge quantity based on testing and combat feedback to create a refined long-term stable version. But that could take one to two years or even three.
Additionally, DWM Company suggested setting the final bullet caliber at 13.2 millimeters instead of exactly 13 millimeters.
Lelouch was quite curious about this, feeling a sense of destiny. Because he knew that historically, the German emergency anti-tank rifle, a scaled-up Mauser, was 13.2 millimeter caliber.
He just hadn’t thought at first why it was such a strange number, assuming it was coincidence, and since 13.2 didn’t exist in this world, starting from scratch with exactly 13 millimeters seemed fine.
So, DWM Company’s professionals gave him a very serious explanation:
“We must consider ammunition R&D simplicity. Previously, the Empire’s Mauser ammunition was all 7.92 millimeters by 57 millimeters. Compared to British/Ugly Country’s 7.62 millimeter/.30 inch standard ammunition, the Empire’s bullets are 0.1 millimeter thicker per 0.1 inch, so .30 inch bullets are 0.3 millimeter thicker.
Now to make large-caliber anti-tank ammunition, the simplest way is to scale .30 inch scale ammunition to .50 inch scale. Dividing 7.92 by 3 and multiplying by 5 gives exactly 13.2. Thus, this caliber reduces geometric scaling complexity, speeding up R&D. Insisting on exactly 13 isn’t impossible, but it adds half to one year of development time.”
After this explanation, Lelouch immediately gave up. Waiting an extra year or so for 0.2 millimeter standardization would be asking for trouble. Since scaling to 13.2 is more convenient for the designers, just do that.
Moreover, this explanation resolved a long-standing doubt in Lelouch’s mind: no wonder the Ugly Country M2 Browning heavy machine gun ended up with 12.7 caliber—it’s exactly 5/3 times 7.62, while 13.2 is 5/3 times 7.92.
Of course, Lelouch could foresee that the final standardized ammunition wouldn’t be perfectly proportionally scaled in all three dimensions. Because cross-sectional area scales with the square of caliber, and charge quantity with volume, i.e., cube of caliber/case length.
So post-caliber scaling, the length scaling factor will be slightly shorter than the caliber factor, or else propellant overfill and incomplete burn would harm muzzle velocity and ballistics.
（Note: Historically, German 13.2 millimeter bullets scaled 5/3 from Mauser 7.92-57 millimeter should be 95 millimeter long, but actually 92 millimeter. Browning 12.7 millimeter from Springfield 7.62-63 millimeter scaled 5/3 should be 105 millimeter, actually 99 millimeter. But Lelouch doesn’t remember these exact dimensions.）
Lelouch knew that on Earth, Browning took 3 years to finalize bullet specs; the famous “M2 Old Lady” started in 1918 and finalized in 1921. So such things can’t be rushed.
During this great war, they could only use early bullet types with unperfected length and charge for now, with temporarily just one production line. After two or three years of combat data collection, finalize the perfect version.
……
After being tossed around by large-caliber machine gun specifications, Lelouch deeply realized some of his previous work was inadequate.
If he’d known designing and manufacturing a completely new caliber ammunition from scratch takes years, he should have laid out earlier—mainly he hadn’t due to leak fears.
Because new ammunition R&D and production involves many people over years; once project info leaks, enemies might get alert, impacting the Germania military industry tank project’s debut effect on future tank first battles.
So, Lelouch only seriously invested in anti-tank weapons after his side’s tanks were nearly developed, to counter enemy tanks possibly appearing in half a year.
Only after starting implementation did he learn ammunition R&D cycles are so long.
But fortunately, from now on, tank project secrecy isn’t an issue. With 13.2 millimeter heavy machine guns approved, might as well go all out and stockpile more tech reserves, developing 20 millimeter autocannons too.
Thus, Lelouch struck while the iron was hot and discussed with DWM Company people again, but they weren’t interested and suggested he seek experts elsewhere, directing him to Krupp Company people.
DWM has no technical accumulation in artillery shells, let alone making guns. And shells unlike bullets have the major feature of non-unified specifications.
7.92 millimeter caliber bullets are all 57 millimeter length. But 105 millimeter shells can have many lengths; cannon, howitzer, smoothbore shells differ in length, as do charge bags.
With no high standardization requirements, placing another order with Krupp for a new small-caliber artillery production line isn’t troublesome.
The day after finalizing the large-caliber machine gun project, Lelouch separately met Krupp’s technical person in charge remaining in Prague—the engineer who previously customized the 57 millimeter 16-caliber short-barrel gun for the tank project—to inquire about 20 millimeter autocannon development difficulty.
After hearing it, the other just thought briefly and said the difficulty wasn’t great, but the key was treaty and legal obstacles:
“Brigadier General Lelouch, you may not be familiar with relevant international treaties. All major global gun makers know that on December 11, 1868, major world powers signed the《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》, prohibiting explosive or incendiary charges in gun or cannon projectiles under 1 pound.
The treaty’s intent was to avoid inhumane consequences from explosive bullets killing personnel. So engineers calculated the minimum caliber for explosive charges at 37 millimeters. That’s the origin of the Empire’s 37 millimeter anti-tank gun; otherwise, who would choose such a strange caliber?
Now, to penetrate early enemy tanks with direct fire using ~20 millimeter shells would absolutely violate the《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》. Without Empire diplomacy departments’ approval, we dare not proceed.”
Lelouch was stunned; he hadn’t paid attention to these treaties before, only knowing bans on dum-dum bullets that expand and fragment in the body.
He hadn’t expected such a bizarre《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》 to exist.
But this thing probably became a dead letter naturally in later generations, right? Otherwise, how did all those post-WWI 20 millimeter autocannons appear?
Across the ocean, Ugly Country’s earliest medium-caliber multi-barrel anti-aircraft gun was the 28 millimeter “Chicago Piano,” which definitely violated the《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》 too.
So after serious thought, Lelouch boldly concluded: it must be because WWI brought airplanes and tanks; post-war, nations needed small-caliber guns for new fighters and thin-skinned tanks, gradually sweeping the《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》 into history’s trash heap.
Later online, half-knowledgeable netizens often mix treaties, saying things like “shooting paratroopers means military court” or “flatten AA gun, military court.”
Actually, no such clauses exist; treaties only prohibit shooting unarmed parachuting pilots, not paratroopers. Unarmed pilots count as quasi-POWs out of combat; shooting them is like killing POWs. But paratroopers are there to kill after landing—striking first in air is fine.
As for “flatten AA gun, military court” rumors, it’s just a variant from early nations effectively abandoning the《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》.
Because many nations followed “legislative intent” interpretation, viewing the《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》 prohibition on “explosive charges in sub-1-pound projectiles” as intending to avoid cruel explosive bullets on personnel, same purpose as《 1899 Hague Convention》 banning dum-dums.
So nations extended it: “Since now making sub-37 millimeter micro-cannons for tanks and planes, as long as not directly targeting personnel but focused on vehicles ground or air, it doesn’t violate treaty spirit.”
Understanding these twists, Lelouch suggested Krupp Company shed ideological burdens.
Of course he knew such a big matter involving treaty violation was pointless discussing with Krupp’s technical person in charge; they lack decision authority.
So Lelouch directly called Essen, having them get Gustav Krupp himself on the line.
Once connected, Lelouch stated his suggestion bluntly: “Mr. Gustav, I recall you previously discussed a cooperation with me: I provide Krupp ongoing high-quality electric furnace gun steel solutions,
your company joints with my steel mill to R&D and manufacture future 140 millimeter dual-purpose naval guns. Now I have an idea: hope your company injects more resources into our joint company and sends a dedicated R&D team to develop together 20 millimeter anti-air and anti-tank autocannons.
My requirements for this new weapon are best aiming/turning flexibility like heavy machine guns during firing; others don’t matter. Current 7.92 millimeter machine gun bullets have increasingly poor damage on enemy new aircraft; hard to down a plane by luck-hitting three to five small-caliber machine gun bullets.
With 20 millimeter autocannon shells, I believe one to two hits suffice to destroy all aircraft in coming years! And 20 millimeter cannons with armor-piercing shells can penetrate all tanks in coming years!”
Gustav already trusted Lelouch greatly; with his help, Krupp had produced the new “Baria-class” battleship’s 380 millimeter 48-caliber main guns using three-phase electric arc furnace steel, and prior cooperations with Lelouch’s family steel mill went smoothly.
So Gustav didn’t make it difficult, just re-explaining international treaty concerns.
But Lelouch told him: “I know all that; no issue. I believe in coming years, major world powers will sweep the《 Saint Petersburg Declaration》 into history’s trash. Everyone will need new guns for planes and tanks.
Moreover, initially we have two ways to circumvent: first, equip initial 20 millimeter autocannons only with solid armor-piercing shells—a full steel core lump, no explosives inside, seeking penetration not high-explosive. That absolutely complies.
Second, later gradually unban explosive shells but declare the weapon not for direct personnel fire, only specialized for ground or air vehicles—thus not violating core legislative spirit. Once nations follow, we can progressively unban usage methods.
This measure alone gives the Empire an extra one to two years’ first-mover advantage in this niche.”
“Alright, I trust your judgment, Lelouch—you’ve convinced me again. I’ll take responsibility; start R&D. I’ll send Krupp’s best high-velocity small-caliber gun designer Dr. Reinhart Beck and his team to our joint company to lead this project. Start with the no-explosive solid armor-piercing version.”
Gustav Krupp ultimately approved the project.
Thus, this Prague trip concluded successfully; Lelouch’s preparations before returning to the Southern Front were all arranged.
——
PS: Still 6,000 words today without splitting chapters……
Back to Southern Front plot tomorrow.
On the way out, arriving Hangzhou on the 4th.
