Rifles were a widely used type of weapon during the Second World War. A nation would field one or more types of infantry rifles. While some were more specifically identified with particular nations, others were used by various countries more randomly with no apparent partialities.
We have sampled a list of five of what we consider the best infantry rifles that served in World War II. If it wasn’t used then, it isn’t on the list. And if it’s anything like a machine gun or submachine gun, it isn’t here either. Not even assault rifles have featured in this classification.
7. Arisaka Type 99
A Type 99 Short rifle, also known as the “last-ditch” Type 99 rifle is widely identified with the Japanese. The Type 99 bolt rifle is one of the sturdiest military-grade rifles ever made. There are however a lot of late-war rifles that used lower quality parts, entirely lacked a finish- basically suffered lots of shortcuts to ease production for purposes of the war.
These late-war “last-ditch” rifles are often identified by their wood butt plate, poorly finished stock, noticeable tooling marks in their metal, unfinished bolt knobs and handle and rudimentary sights- all of which speak of crudeness. They may as such be unsafe to fire. The Type 99 rifle Arisaka has no monopod nor flip-up anti-aircraft rear sight. The rifle has the Arisaka design. It’s the bolt-action rifle that the Imperial Japanese Army used during the 2nd World War.
Unlike its prototypes, it had a unique disadvantage. The Type 99 had an increased recoil caused by its fairly heavier cartridge on a lighter-weight rifle.