hunting arms as their weight usually exceeds . Use in war During World War I, both the British and Germans deployed elephant guns obtained from their African colonies in an attempt to break the stalemate in the trenches. The British used elephant guns as a means of countering the German tactic of having their snipers advance towards Allied lines under the cover of a large, 6–10 millimeter (0.24–0.4 inch) thick steel plate. Though normal small arms were ineffective against the plate, the elephant guns of the era had enough force to punch through it. In addition, to penetrate steel plate loopholes, large caliber firearms, such as elephant guns, were deployed to eliminate snipers. During the African campaigns of World War II in 1941, the commander of the Italian forces, the Duke of Aosta, gave his personal collection of elephant guns to his soldiers to aid in armor penetration of British armored cars, as Italian AT guns were in short supply. The Finnish 20 mm anti-tank gun Lahti L-39 gained the nickname meaning "Elephant Gun" during the Continuation War because of its stopping power, as did the British Boys anti-tank rifle of World War II. These are not elephant guns, however, since they were designed as purely military weapons. See also Express rifle Java arquebus Jiaozhi arquebus Wall gun References Further reading * Boddington, Craig (1990), Safari Rifles, Long Beach, California: Safari Press. ISBN 0-940143-49-6 Elephants Hunting equipment Rifles Hunting rifles Elephant hunting Livestock