Geth Reviews The Breda 30, A Mediocre Gun

 

Some weapons are truly terrible and badly designed from the start, and doomed to incur the historical derision of anyone competent to appreciate firearms. Some are well-designed masterpieces that continue to hold honor and esteem as they did when first used by soldiers in combat, and some are not overly elegant yet reasonably functional.

And then we have the Breda 30, a light machine gun that escapes being completely terrible, but sadly does not rise to the level of being of average performance, having to settle for being highly underwhelming.

As the name implies, the Breda 30 (Fucile Mitragliatore Breda Modello 30) was officially issued for service for the Kingdom of Italy in 1930. It was the standard light machine gun of Italy until the end of World War 2, and while it did prove an effective enough weapon to be combat-worthy, it was a mix of odd design decisions that made it rather poor in terms of performance and ergonomics.

* The magazine feed system was a fixed design, loading ammo from stripper clips on the side that held 20 rounds. Due to poor design, the feed system was easily damaged, which could render the weapon entirely unusable.

* The bolt was a rotating bolt design that locked closed when not in operation. It utilized a short recoil system in combination with these traits, and the combination led to some issues. The closed bolt aspect meant the barrels would retain a lot more heat and render the barrel too heat-distorted to be of use every few hundred rounds, which is not good for a light infantry weapon meant for regular intense combat. The short recoil system was another oddity, more commonly seen in pistols and lower caliber weapons, and did not work well in concert with the bolt locking closed when operations ceased. This caused the bolt a lot of wear and tear. 

* The ammunition used by the Breda 30 did not work properly without an integrated round oiler that lubricated rounds prior to use, and due to poor extractor design, case fragments could easily jam the weapon, rendering it useless and requiring skill and time to fix. Again, not a good thing in regular combat.

* Light machine guns tend to heat up quickly due to their need for sustained fire, and unfortunately, the barrel of the Breda 30 was lousy for discharging excess heat. Combine with a closed bolt system that trapped further heat in the barrel, and misfires were common.

* The standard round used was the 6.5mm Carcano. Some models were modified to use the larger 7.35mm round, but the former was more common.

* The firing rate was rather pathetic for an LMG. In theory, it could reach 500 rounds a minute, but practical use limited it to 150 rounds a minute, and even then that's a slower rate of fire than most equivalent SMGs of the lower calibers. Given the lack of use for sustained fire due to the other mentioned flaws, this was not a good solitary infantry defense weapon. Italian doctrine did note this, though, as it was meant to be deployed in pairs for mutual support.

* The sights were mounted on the receiver due to the frequent movement of the barrel, meaning the sights would need to be realigned every time the barrel was changed. Given the barrels needed changed every few hundred rounds, this meant frequent barrel changes and suboptimal at best accuracy.

* Extreme weather conditions did the Breda 30 no favors. Given its deployment in desert areas, sand would often get caught in the receiver and barrel, trapped there due to the gun oil system which gummed up barrels in no time flat. Again, Italian doctrine did account for this, with Breda teams well-drilled to do maintenance on their weapons to mitigate issues in the field.

* As opposed to far better-designed and produced weapons like the German MG34 and MG42, the Breda 30 was a complicated weapon in terms of design and thus costly to manufacture and repair.

Overall, this was a below-average weapon. With bad design decisions, a low fire rate for a weapon of its class, and how easily they could incur damage, this was barely above the Chauchat in terms of quality. In optimal conditions, it was acceptable if marginal, and Italian doctrine did stress the need for all of this weapon's users to be skilled in maintenance, which did mitigate some of the issues.

Given it was frequently the backbone of the Italian infantry assault arm alongside the Carcano rifle, I can't say it was completely ineffective, it did work albeit poorly. At the same time, given its time of use, the circumstances of deployment, and comparison to its contemporaries on the opposing sides, I can thus say it was overall a mediocre light machine gun both in its own time and in the contemporary day.