Liberator FP-45
Guide Lamp Division, General Motors · Pistol · Out Of Production · 1942
Also known as: FP-45 Liberator, Flare Projector Caliber .45, FP-45, OSS Liberator, Woolworth Gun, Le Liberateur
Overview
The Liberator FP-45 was a crude, single-shot, smoothbore pistol mass-produced by the Guide Lamp Division of General Motors in Anderson, Indiana during World War II as an insurgency weapon to be air-dropped to resistance fighters in Axis-occupied territories. Designed by George Hyde of General Motors' Inland Manufacturing Division in 1942, the entire weapon consisted of only 23 stamped sheet-metal and turned-steel parts that could be assembled in roughly seven seconds. Chambered in standard U.S. military .45 ACP, the Liberator used a manually rotated breechblock to load a single cartridge through the rear of the unrifled barrel; after firing, the breechblock was rotated clear and the spent case was punched out using a wooden dowel supplied in the packaging. The cover-name 'Flare Projector, Caliber .45 (FP-45)' was stamped on shipping containers to disguise the program's true purpose. A production run of one million pistols was completed in approximately 11 weeks at a unit cost of USD 2.10 per weapon, each packaged in a waxed cardboard carton along with ten rounds of ammunition, a wooden extractor dowel, and a pictorial, wordless instruction sheet. The Liberator was intended as an assassination tool and weapon-of-opportunity - a resistance fighter or guerrilla would use it to kill an enemy soldier at point-blank range and take his firearm. While widely rumored to have been dropped in vast numbers over occupied Europe, post-war investigation suggests only a small fraction of the million pistols produced were ever actually distributed; the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) deployed meaningful numbers to the Philippines and to Chinese Nationalist forces, while the European theatre received relatively few, and enormous surpluses were scrapped or dumped at sea after the war.
Specifications
| Weight (empty) | 454 g (16.0 oz) |
| Weight (loaded) | 482 g (17.0 oz) |
| Overall Length | 141 mm (5.55") |
| Barrel Length | 102 mm (4.02") |
| Height | 114 mm (4.49") |
| Width | 38 mm (1.50") |
| Action Type | Bolt Action |
| Firing Mechanism | Striker Fired |
| Trigger Type | Single Stage |
| Magazine Capacity | 1 rounds |
| Magazine Type | Internal |
| Muzzle Velocity | 250 m/s (820 fps) |
| Muzzle Energy | 460 J (339 ft·lbf) |
| Effective Range | 7 m (8 yd) |
| Maximum Range | 25 m (27 yd) |
| Barrel Rifling | None |
| Number of Grooves | 0 |
| Frame Material | Steel |
| Barrel Material | Steel |
| Stock Material | Steel |
| Finish | Phosphate |
Calibers
- .45 ACP · primary — also known as .45 Auto, 45 ACP, 11.43x23mm
Features
- Firing modes: Manual
- Feed systems: Single Shot Manual Load
- Safety mechanisms: Rotating Breechblock Safety Notch
- Features: Stamped Sheet Metal Construction, Smoothbore Barrel, Single Shot, Rotating Breechblock, Hollow Pistol Grip Ammunition Storage, Wooden Dowel Case Extractor, Pictorial Instruction Sheet, Waxed Cardboard Packaging, Disposable Covert Weapon
Service history
Operators
- United States Office of Strategic Services (OSS) · adopted 1942 · as Flare Projector Caliber .45 (FP-45)
- French Resistance · adopted 1942 · as Le Liberateur
- Philippine Guerrillas · adopted 1943 · as Liberator
- Chinese Nationalist Army (National Revolutionary Army) · adopted 1943 · as Liberator
- Greek Resistance · adopted 1943 · as Liberator
Conflicts
- World War II (1942-1945)
- Philippine Resistance Against Japan (1942-1945)
- Second Sino-Japanese War (1942-1945)
Production
Estimated total produced: 1,000,000 · Production years: 1942
Approximately one million pistols produced at the Guide Lamp Division, Anderson, Indiana in an 11-week run (June-August 1942) at a unit cost of roughly USD 2.10. Only an estimated 2-10% of the total production was ever actually issued to resistance forces; most stocks were held in reserve, scrapped, dumped at sea, or destroyed after the war, making surviving original examples genuinely scarce.
Origin
Country of origin: United States
Designer: George Hyde (Inland Manufacturing Division, General Motors)
Discontinued: 1942
Notes
The Liberator was the brainchild of the U.S. Joint Psychological Warfare Committee in early 1942 as a cheap, disposable weapon to enable occupied populations to resist Axis forces. Development was assigned to the U.S. Army Ordnance Department's Inland Division of General Motors, where designer George Hyde (also responsible for the later M2 Hyde submachine gun) produced a working design in a matter of days; manufacture was then handed to GM's Guide Lamp Division, a stamping plant in Anderson, Indiana that normally produced automotive lamps and trim. Tooling, production and delivery of one million completed pistols took only 11 weeks between June and August 1942, at a unit cost variously reported as USD 1.72 to USD 2.10 - less than the cost of a single box of ammunition. The weapon has no rifling, no extractor, and no meaningful sights, and its effective range was generally estimated at only about 4 to 8 meters. Operation required the user to manually cock the striker, rotate the top cover/breechblock to expose the breech, insert a single .45 ACP cartridge, close and lock the breech, align the striker, aim and fire; to reload, the user retrieved the wooden dowel from the grip compartment and punched the spent case out from the muzzle end. The hollow stamped-steel grip held ten spare cartridges. Packaging consisted of a tarred or waxed cardboard box containing the pistol, ten rounds, the dowel, and a comic-strip-style graphic instruction sheet that avoided any language dependence. Post-war analysis by historians including Ralph Hagan and Leroy Thompson suggests that, contrary to popular belief, the weapon was never significantly distributed in the European Theater: General Eisenhower's command rejected the weapon, most European-bound stocks were held in Britain and later destroyed, and probably fewer than 25,000 were actually issued to OSS-supported partisans in Europe. Substantial numbers were delivered to MacArthur's Southwest Pacific Area for Filipino guerrillas, and around 100,000 were shipped to the China-Burma-India theatre for Chinese Nationalist forces. Large post-war surpluses were dumped at sea, buried, or scrapped, making original wartime examples genuinely rare collector's items today. The Liberator is widely regarded as the conceptual ancestor of the CIA's 1964 Deer Gun, a similarly crude single-shot 9mm pistol intended for air-drop to Viet Cong defectors and South Vietnamese irregulars, though the Deer Gun program was cancelled before operational use.
Background
Designed in days and built in weeks, the Liberator was an entire firearm stamped out of sheet metal for USD 2.10 a copy - cheaper than the box of ammunition it shipped with. Each waxed cardboard carton contained the pistol, ten rounds of .45 ACP stored in the hollow grip, a wooden dowel for punching out spent cases, and a wordless comic-strip instruction sheet, because the intended users spoke any of a dozen languages. The weapon's official purpose was stark and cynical: sneak up on an Axis soldier, fire one shot at arm's length, take his rifle, and discard the Liberator. Of the one million pistols churned out in 11 weeks, it is believed only a small fraction were ever actually airdropped - most were scrapped or dumped at sea after the war, turning an infamously cheap throwaway gun into one of the rarer collectible American firearms of WWII.