Alle Armi!

Hello and welcome back to another update of Forgotten Hope. Today we will be showing you what we have in store for the Italian army in our upcoming 2.15 patch. As you may know, we already had some Italian equipment in previous versions, but in 2.15 we hope to give the Italian army a more complete arsenal of small arms.

In the first render we have the two Carcano rifles, ported for FH 0.7, which were made by Mc Gibs - The bayonets for the Carcano rifles and the M39 combat knife, made by Seth Soldier and - The Bomba a Mano 35 O.T.O, made by Knoffhoff. In the second render we have the Breda 30 light machinegun, made by Seth Soldier.

The main rifle of the Italian army in the Second World War was the Carcano rifle. There were many variations on this rifle, but the most common were the old M91 (from 1891) and the newer M91/38 (from 1938). Interestingly these rifles use different calibers. The old 6.5mm caliber as used in the M91 was considered to be too weak and was to be replaced with the larger 7.35mm caliber. When the war started though, the adoption of the new caliber was not complete, in fact, even during the war it proved impossible to completely replace the old 6.5mm caliber, so both were used. The M91/38 Carcano is perhaps better known for another role it played in history, as it was the rifle used to assassinate US president John F Kennedy in 1963.

The Breda 30 was the standard light machinegun of the Italian army in World War 2, although production of the weapon had already ceased in 1937. It is widely regarded as an extremely poor machinegun. Its magazine capacity was only 20 rounds (of the weak 6.5mm type) and it fired at a low 500 rounds per minute. Its design was complex, leading to high production costs and due to the blowback system it used it was highly prone to jamming, especially in the African desert.

The Bomba a Mano (hand grenade) 35 O.T.O. is an Italian offensive grenade that exploded on impact. To use the grenade, you would have to pull out the safety strip by the leather handle, unlocking the black safety lever (the cap). When thrown, the safety lever would catch air and be separated from the body, thus unlocking the safety bar between the firing pin and the primer. This mechanism had a tendency not to work however and the grenades were extremely dangerous in their unexploded state, leading to the British giving them the nickname "Red Devils".

That's all for this week, but be sure to come back next time for another update. Until then, feel free to visit our IRC channel and our public forums to discuss this update and other news.