Standard amount of ammo carried?

Don't quote me on this but I sort of, kind of remember reading somewhere sometime that in War World 2 the "basic load" of ammunition for the German rifleman was 90 rounds in two three pocket ammo pouches of the belt and another 15 rounds in their pack. All on 5 round stripper clips. I always wonder how useful those German ammo pouches really were. Everyone I came across it was difficult to insert the ammo and even harder to remove it. I can see in combat it would be an impossible task.
 
WWI soldiers were not expected to shoot very much. Their fire orders were to be given by an officer, who would have carefully read the manuals and memorized the official rate of fire per minute. The thought that the troops would fire at will was impossible - they would waste their ammunition. This is why Krag and early Lee Enfields have a magazine cut-off. Single load each one, and only feed from the magazine when the enemy was quite close and numerous.

There is another issue closely related to this, and that is aiming. Every early milsurp I've encountered has a huge tall front sight. If the soldier aims where he wants to hit, virtually every shot will be high. Somewhere someone decided that a hit between the belt buckle and the eyebrows was good enough. The staff officers expected infantry would engage at long range, and generously interpreted the fall of shot for designing sights. Not only was the average soldier not capable of hitting at long range (average does not include highly trained pre-war regulars on either side) but the cone of dispersion means only one segment would coincide with the target. If they had only given soldiers a little more credit for thought than sticking to a theoretical battle ...
 
larrysmith said:
Russians would carry a mosin with 5 rounds and another soldier would carry 5 rounds according to enemy at the gate.
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this varied based on ammo availability for everyone, i doubt many volksturm would have carried much load

the british p08 has 10 ammo pockets, if they are 10 rounds each that would be 100 rounds without any bandoliers. the german 90 round amount is similar.
 
maple_leaf_eh said:
WWI soldiers were not expected to shoot very much. Their fire orders were to be given by an officer, who would have carefully read the manuals and memorized the official rate of fire per minute. The thought that the troops would fire at will was impossible - they would waste their ammunition. This is why Krag and early Lee Enfields have a magazine cut-off. Single load each one, and only feed from the magazine when the enemy was quite close and numerous.

There is another issue closely related to this, and that is aiming. Every early milsurp I've encountered has a huge tall front sight. If the soldier aims where he wants to hit, virtually every shot will be high. Somewhere someone decided that a hit between the belt buckle and the eyebrows was good enough. The staff officers expected infantry would engage at long range, and generously interpreted the fall of shot for designing sights. Not only was the average soldier not capable of hitting at long range (average does not include highly trained pre-war regulars on either side) but the cone of dispersion means only one segment would coincide with the target. If they had only given soldiers a little more credit for thought than sticking to a theoretical battle ...
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Trust me when I say I'm not picking a fight, but after the German and British troops were "sharing" Christmas pleasantries in each others trenches and no man's land all along various spots on the front line, the standing orders of the day changed. (can't remember the year, but it would have been early on after entrenchments became a strategy). British standing order of the day was that all troops were to fire 10 rounds at enemy positions daily, how that was accomplished was up to front line command. Many instances it was free fire. (NCO/Lance Corp hands you two chargers and says by dinner call he wants them fired off at position...xyz...)

Also, this position "xyz" was often not hundreds of yards off. If you study old maps of the trench lines you will see that is wasn't uncommon for opposing trenches to be 50 yards or closer (yea, like hand grenade range). To your point on the sights, although I've never seen a milsurp that is target rifle accurate (not to say they aren't out there, just I've never shot one {WW1 vintage}) Having said that, I've never had a problem making hits to area's that would size in as "vital vascular" hits at 100m and "Torso" hits at 300m. (incidentally, I believe a lot of milsurp accuracy issues can be resolved with proper ammo).

To the OP's question, I believe its hard to answer as the ammo carried would vary depending on the ask/task. Artillery barrage not available, yet the ask is to charge a hill, take that hill, then hold that hill against the inevitable counter attack? Bet your britches the troops were loaded with bombs and ammo. Conversely, when British and ANZAC troops charged the Turkish emplacements at Gallipoli..."fix swords!" not a .303 round to be found amongst the advancing fodder for fear of blue on blue FF. (insane BS in my mind, some half retarded inbreed "Lard" trying to make a name for himself imho.)
I think it would be safe to say that the average well kitted infantryman would have had a full compliment in his cartridge box...depending on the Nation, this "cartridge box" varied slightly.
 
GunsNotPuns said:
I wouldn't exactly consider any part of Enemy at the Gate to be considered a reliable source of information, except for perhaps the desirability of Rachel Weisz.
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Read the book, don't watch the movie. :)

http://www.amazon.com/Enemy-Gates-Battle-Stalingrad-Tie-In/dp/0142000000

Grizz
 
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