Talk:FP-45 Liberator

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Military history: Technology / Weaponry / North America / United States / World War II

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Additional Photos

The 'Additional Photos' link does not lead anywhere. Jokem (talk) 18:07, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Reason for lack of use in Europe

The Liberator was intended to be dropped over Occupied Europe but this was not done because the main service involved in such activities, SOE, considered that doing so would potentially jeopardize the lives of every man woman and child finding such a gun. The Germans would likely execute them, as civilians who were caught in possession of a firearm were summarily subject to the death penalty in occupied countries.

Dropping arms to people who were voluntarily risking their lives for freedom, and who knew and accepted this, was one thing, but randomly-dropping potentially life-risking objects that could be found by innocent civilians causing them to then lose their own lives, was another. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.144.50.176 (talk) 09:49, 12 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds rather dubious. 185.107.12.99 (talk) 00:07, 1 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Reference may be from a work of fiction

"French use of the FP-45 remains undocumented, however a first hand account of an assassination with an FP-45 exists from German military policeman Niklaus Lange. He claimed that there were thousands in circulation in occupied France." This is from a book "D Day Through German Eyes Book Two", but supposedly based on interviews in 1954. It may be a work of fiction. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2003:D9:BBEB:C32E:973:5131:60E:54A5 (talk) 00:10, 1 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Reasons for not using the Liberator

The explanation that OSS “didn’t want to risk innocent lives” sounds rather bogus.

1: A clean conscience certainly didn’t prevent OSS from delivering weapons to partisans, despite knowing that successful attacks against Axis forces would likely result in reprisals against civilians and/or hostages. (Reprisals were in fact legal under the rules of war according to the convention at the time.)

2: Why would civilians pick up these airdropped weapons, unless they were planning to use them?

As for why the OSS didn’t airdrop the FP42 in greater numbers has more to do with the war situation at the time. In 1944, an end to the war in Europe was clearly on the horizon, and the presence of millions (or even hundreds of thousands) of handguns in the hands of lord knows who, would hardly have improved the security situation in a post war Europe.

Also, communists had a large presence in the resistance, including in Western Europe. OSS knew in 1944 that the honeymoon with the Soviets wouldn’t last forever, and had no reason to want to help arm communists more than they already were.

185.107.12.99 (talk) 00:05, 1 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Nerf blaster

This may sound silly, but Nerf brand Jolt dart blaster seems to be based on FP-45 design. I've noticed 'in popular culture' sections on various pages, is this something that would fit as well? 109.249.179.186 (talk) 05:42, 17 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]