They were successfully used by the Japanese as covering fire for infantry in the attack, as the following examples will show: “At Mukden on March 1st all the machine guns of a whole Japanese division (12 to 18 guns) were brought into action upon a Russian point d’appui. The Russian fire was silenced, but burst out again whenever the machine-gun fire slackened. The Japanese infantry used these pauses in the enemy’s fire to press forward to close range under cover of their machine-gun fire.”[19] On March 2nd the three machine guns of the 10th Japanese Infantry Regiment acted in the same way against a Russian fieldwork. This method of employing machine guns requires the closest co-operation with the infantry from the commencement of the attack.
Again, during the Japanese attack on Namako Yama the infantry were greatly assisted by covering fire from their machine guns directed on the Russian trenches. These guns were used from behind screens, and their success was largely due to their being well concealed.
It will rarely be advisable for machine guns to follow infantry into the firing line, where they present a conspicuous target which attracts fire and renders their withdrawal difficult.
We made this mistake in the South African War more than once. At Rietfontein the machine-gun detachment of the Gloucester Regiment, which had followed the battalion into the firing line, was almost annihilated. At Modder River the Scots Guards Maxim gun accompanied the firing line, and the detachment was annihilated by pom-pom fire, and the gun was left on the field alone all day.[20] In the attack on Cronje’s laager at Paardeberg, machine guns were used in the firing line on the left bank of the river, and when the attack failed the machine guns, having suffered severe losses, could not be withdrawn and had to be abandoned till nightfall.
When the covering fire of machine guns is no longer considered necessary, they should be withdrawn and concentrated in batteries in rear of the reserve or in such other convenient position as the G.O.C. may direct. They should take this opportunity of refilling belts, replenishing ammunition, water, etc., and if the guns have fired many thousand rounds, of exchanging barrels.[21] They are now at the immediate disposal of the G.O.C. and will be used by him as a mobile reserve. Circumstances vary so in war that it is impossible to particularize in their use at this stage, but their great mobility will render them extremely valuable in the following cases:
1. To assist a turning movement.
2. To reinforce a distant flank.
3. To repel a counter-attack.
4. To hold a captured position.