Page:Machine-gun tactics (IA machineguntactic00appl).pdf/255

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trained as first-class machine gunners. Two non-commissioned officers and twelve men will be trained, as opportunity offers, as second-class machine gunners to replace casualties among first-class machine gunners.

2. A subaltern officer, other than the assistant adjutant, will be selected in each battalion to command and train the machine-gun section, under the orders of the commanding officer. Should a brigade commander desire to train the machine guns of his brigade to act together when massed, an officer, who is not the machine-gun officer of one of the battalions of the brigade, may be selected to supervise the firing practice and to conduct the brigade training of machine-gun sections.

3. Officers, non-commissioned officers, and men detailed for machine-gun training should be changed as little as possible; the two non-*commissioned officers and twelve men trained as first-class machine gunners will fire the practices prescribed in the Musketry Regulations with one of the companies of the battalion,[A] but will at other times be at the disposal of the machine-gun officer for instruction.

4. Details as to the mechanism of the gun, and the drill of machine-gun sections are contained in the handbook of the gun. Instructions as to the course of firing are contained in the Musketry Regulations.

[Footnote A: They should fire with their own companies if it can be arranged that they complete the various parts of the range practice on approximately