The Thompson M1923 Automatic Rifle. It fired the .45 Remington cartridge. Could be an excellent AR for the US at BR V to give the T20 Rifle some competition. Just imagine the Thompson .30 caliber but it is 10 times stronger. The bayonet and the bipod would be extra helpful in managing the recoil. It could be either a 30 or a 50 round variant.
ooo this will encourage me to grind the smg line
World War I saw a need for small, rapid-firing weapons, and the arms industry responded. Thompson’s answer, built in 1917, was the Persuader prototype. This was the company’s first SMG and one of the first SMGs in general.
The Persuader
The Persuader looks like something out of the Fallout video games. It used a tape-feed mechanism, something more akin to a belt than your traditional spring-loaded magazine. The loaded tape would drop into a special magazine for protection and retainment.
Sadly, the feature that made the Thompson Persuader weird was also its fatal flaw and the Persuader’s tape feed couldn’t keep up with its rate of fire causing numerous stoppages and failures. Thus, the Persuader’s tape-feed design was abandoned. The weapon is currently at the West Point Military Museum.
I’ve cheated on my last entry: this isn’t a Thompson SMG, but a special ammo for the Thompson SMG. The Peters .45 Auto-Shot Riot Cartridge gave the Thompson gunner a close-range, less lethal option. This cartridge allowed you to use a standard Thompson SMG but required a special magazine.
The .45 Auto-Shot was a .45 ACP cartridge with a double crimp that held 120 pellets of #8 birdshot in a cardboard container. The round wasn’t powerful enough to cycle the action, so it created a straight pull shotgun out of the Thompson. It fired real projectiles and was an interesting approach to less lethal technology. I guess there is a reason it never became standard!
The Thompson SMG would go on to be quite successful during World War II and even after. It was a robust, well-made, and reliable weapon. Sure, it was heavy and expensive, but it’s an American cultural icon. Auto-Ordnance’s business acumen and the Thompson’s easily adjustable design led to some really weird variants along the way, and while they might not have been successful, they are most certainly interesting.
my two cents
AYO THE FRICK? When did Remington make a .45?
That’s an old weapon, and the .45 Remington has a higher muzzle velocity. if I remember correctly, Somewhere around 450-550?
Thompson 1923, solid Tech Tree choice
