Rifle Scopes

[Starmyth]

Has any military equipt rifle squads with scopes (WWII)? I'm talking about regular rifle squads, not snipers. Training infantry in the use of rifles with scopes is less demanding and less expensive than the training for smipers.

[Marek_Tucan]

AFAIK not. Prolly there wasn't enough industrial base for really mass (ie 1 rifle = 1 scope) manufacture of "good enough" scopes.

[iCaMpWiThAWP]

And also there would be a problem, to equip telescopic sights, iron sights had to be removed, in most cases, the rifle would become useless at close range(where the target is too close to aim with scope, but too far to simply point rifle and shoot)

[Marek_Tucan]

That might depend on the construction, have "classic" iron sights with protective ring around the front sight on my airgun and the optical sight (4x28) has no problem with it, even though the front sight is in the way, it isn't visible unlecc you concentrate on it very hard.

[Mobhack]

Originally Posted by Starmyth

Has any military equipt rifle squads with scopes (WWII)? I'm talking about regular rifle squads, not snipers. Training infantry in the use of rifles with scopes is less demanding and less expensive than the training for smipers.

Certainly not.

In WW2 precision optics were hugely expensive and rather delicate accessories. The light gathering properties were poor as well, so attaching them would make the weapons useless in the evening, night and dusk etc. They were also big and bulky.

It really was only in the 1980s that individual weapon sights such as on the SA-80 became cheap enough, rugged enough, light enough and small enough and also useful in poor light enough to justify mass adoption for some Western armies.

Cheers
Andy