During the first year of the
Korean War, some CCF units used the .792mm Bren
Mark I, captured from the Nationalist Chinese, as
well as .303mm Brens probably captured from the
Japanese, who had earlier taken them from British
forces at Singapore and Hong Kong.
Properly designated as a Light
Machine gun, the Bren was considered one of the
finest such weapons developed in WWII.
Gas-operated, its mechanical components are
simple and easily understood; it can be stripped
and assembled by a trained soldier in a very
short time. There are only a few possible
stoppages, and the Bren earned an enviable
reputation for accuracy and reliability. The
Chinese used the Bren much as US forces used our
BAR, in support of squad-sized assaults and
defense. The Mark I had an aperture rear sight
controlled by a radial drum, with a shoulder
support, and early models had a pistol grip
beneath the butt for the non-firing hand. These
augmentations went away quickly.
The Mark IV was standard United
Kingdom issue during the KW, with a simplified
butt design, leaf rear sight, shorter barrel, and
was also lighter.
The following comments are from
Sherro:
As a bit more info, the Red
Chinese had quite a large quantity of 7.92mm Bren
Guns made by Inglis in Canada. (That's 7.92mm
German not 7.62mm NATO). They were mainly
captured from the Nationalist Chinese.
A lot of their soldiers also used
7.92mm Mauser rifles, many manufactured by the
Nationalists and also the Communists in their
armouries. They had a penchant for German things,
which wasn't a bad way to go. They also made
lovely full auto and semi-auto Mauser Machine
pistols in 7.63mmand 9mm.
It was a fairly simple matter for
the British to change over to 7.62mm Nato in the
60s, all they did was change barrels, bolts and
magazine wells and add a 30 round magazine. The
bolts were almost identical to the 7.92mm bolts
from Inglis.
The original BRNO weapons were
also in 7.92mm, then the British altered them to
use the .303 British Mk VII cartridge and a
curved magazine to accomodate the rimmed
cartridge. This was a curse and a source of feed
checks and annoyance for soldiers who used them
when the flanged rims on the .303 cartridges got
into the wrong position overlapping behind the
next cartridge in the magazine.
The following comments are from
Brock Dittrick:
Please take note on your comments
on the BREN MKI. The Chinese were also supplied
with these LMG's during the WW2 by Canada. As
well as the STEN. The Chinese Bren's made by
John Inglis was in 7.62 and also had the CH
serial number range like the Inglis Browning Hi
Power's
You mention that they probably
obtained them through Brit capture in Singapore
etc,. Yes the BREN was captured no doubt in some
quantity but not nearly as much as Lend Lease
from Canada.
The STEN's are marked in
Chinese on the mag well.
STEN MKII
Handy Gun Machine
Made In Canada
Here is a short history on the
BREN as it pertains to the Chinese.
The British government purchased
189 Czech Zbv30 LMGs in 7.92 X 57 mm for 50
pounds sterling each for an engineering
benchmarking study in Canada. These LMGs were
copied and the initial production was some 13 000
units in 7.92 X 57 ( 8 MM Mauser) for the
Nationalist Chinese government. In all approx 43
000 7.92 mm BRENs were manufactured for the
Chinese contract by John Inglis of Canada.
Mass production began in 1944 and
ended in 1945 using the MKII Bren as a base to
work by. Along with the LMG's , there were 20
000 spare barrels and 169 000 magazines produced
as well. The magazines were of exact copies of
the Czech 20 rd magazine for the Zbv30 ( the
standard magazine held 32. 100 rd drums were also
to be made, but were found obsolete in the early
part of WW2. The 100 rd drum was only used when
the BREN was in its anti aircraft role. The
regular sights cannot be used with the 100 rd
drum and it is extremely unlikely that ANY were
used in the Korean War)
There was also a modification of
the 7.92mm Inglis BREN that was made by the
Peoples Republic of China . They converted the
Bren to 7.62 X 39 mm and shared the same
magazines as the AK 47. The same modification was
made to Czech Zbv26 type guns of Chinese
manufacture.
Thank you for your time and I
really enjoyed your web site.
Brock Dittrick
Enfield Research Assoc.