Top 5 Military Guns & Rifles of All Time

By Christian Orr, Former Air Force Security Officer

In no particular rank or order, I give you the five best U.S. military firearms of all time. Disagree? Let me know in the comments what you would have picked.

The M1 Garand

You dear readers undoubtedly saw this one coming a mile away. When no less a historic icon of military leadership than Gen. George S. Patton himself calls the M1 Garand “the greatest battle implement ever devised,” that oughta tell you something. Named for its inventor, John C. Garand, this weapon was officially adopted as the standard U.S. infantry rifle in 1936, thus becoming America’s first standard-issue autoloading rifle. The M1 replaced the bolt-action M1903 Springfield, but it retained the powerful .30-06 cartridge. The Garand served official duty for 22 years, during which time more than 5.4 million units were produced. In WWII and the Korean War alike, this battle rifle earned an unrivaled reputation for accuracy, power, ruggedness, and reliability.

The M1911 .45 ACP Pistol

Another no-brainer here, right? Yes, I know, I penned a recent article questioning the hit-or-miss reliability of non-customized M1911s produced in the last few decades. But the military-issue M1911 and M1911-A1 .45s of the first half of the 20th century were indeed reliable pieces of hardware, which goes a long way in explaining why they remained the standard-issue U.S. Armed Forces pistol for 75 years (!!) before finally being superseded by the Beretta M9, an excellent firearm in its own right.

Legendary gunmaker John Moses Browning developed the pistol and the .45 ACP (Automatic Colt Pistol) cartridge in response to the Army’s desire for a semiautomatic handgun that offered greater stopping power than the M1892 .38 Long Colt revolver, which had been deemed inadequate against fanatical Moro warriors during the Philippine Insurrection of 1899-1902.

Mr. Browning’s invention first had to survive a grueling 6,000-round torture test. The gun did so with nary a single malfunction, and upon triggering that final shot of the field test, the firer is reported to have shouted out, “She made it, by God!” From there, arguably the single most famous wartime usage of “The Army Automatic” occurred during WWI, when Sgt. Alvin York used his .45 auto to drop seven charging German soldiers with seven shots.

Kimber LAPD SIS M1911-A1 .45 Caliber Pistol. Image Credit: YouTube Screenshot.

As a postscript, even though the M1911 is no longer the U.S. military’s general-issue sidearm, she remains in service to this very day with the door-kickers of the Marine Expeditionary Unit Special Operations Command (MEUSOC).