BR25241 U.S. Infantryman with Panzerfaust, 1944-45

It was not uncommon to use the enemy’s own weapons against them. Near the end of the war with supplies getting low, the Wehrmacht repurposed anything they could get their hands on and in German hands, captured M1 carbines became Selbstladekarabiner 455(a) – the “a” standing for Amerika. This GI has got his mitts on a Panzerfaust, one of the most successful anti-tank weapons of the war. Compared to the U.S. bazooka it made a larger hole and produced a massive killing effect from spalling (burns and shrapnel) inside the tank’s crew compartment. After the D-Day landings the number of British tanks taken out by Panzerfaust rose to 34%, and in the urban combat of the Eastern Front, about 70% of tanks destroyed were hit by Panzerfaust.

Scale 1/30.