My limited military experience did include firing the excellent FN C1/C1A1:
This was a Canadian-made version of the Belgian FN FAL (Fusil Automatique Léger), a gas-operated, magazine-fed rifle.
7.62mm NATO:
The C1 was chambered for the 7.62mm NATO cartridge, which was the standard cartridge for NATO forces at the time. Murphy was issued the M1 Garand automatic rifle which uses 30.06 calibre bullets, very close to 7.62 mm. Interestingly, Garand was an American-Canadian inventor.
I revise this post accordingly: While the British issued Bren gun was technically equivalent to the American Browning Automatic Rifle, Audie Murphy most likely took from a disabled American tank a .30 caliber M1919 Browning machine gun. During my brief military training (1958-60) with the Canadian army I missed a chance to fire the Bren gun unfortunately.
In the movie clip attached to the post Murphy is firing the 50 calibre tank-mounted Browning Heavy machine gun
My limited military experience did include firing the excellent FN C1/C1A1:
This was a Canadian-made version of the Belgian FN FAL (Fusil Automatique Léger), a gas-operated, magazine-fed rifle.
7.62mm NATO:
The C1 was chambered for the 7.62mm NATO cartridge, which was the standard cartridge for NATO forces at the time. Murphy was issued the M1 Garand automatic rifle which uses 30.06 calibre bullets, very close to 7.62 mm. Interestingly, Garand was an American-Canadian inventor.
I revise this post accordingly: While the British issued Bren gun was technically equivalent to the American Browning Automatic Rifle, Audie Murphy most likely took from a disabled American tank a .30 caliber M1919 Browning machine gun. During my brief military training (1958-60) with the Canadian army I missed a chance to fire the Bren gun unfortunately.