OSS CBI Photobook 15 - Southwest China, 1945- Reconnaissance, Part 3, The Rifle Strap

Lingering still on the top half of Photobook page 15, we focus on this excellent view of gear.  The posed photo of our EJZ, showing how the OSS looks for bad guys in caves, also shows us that the unit is still in wait-and-prepare mode at this point.  So look at the items: rifle with strap, pistol in holster, either a US M3 fighting knife or US M4 bayonet with the hilt visible behind the holster, and a magazine pouch mounted on the stock. A 15-round magazine is visible just below the sight.

The rifle is a .30 Caliber M1  carbine.

What is that vertical thing on the side of the stock?

And, dangling down from our view of the holster, hence attached either to the holster, or to the bayonet or knife, is a strange thing with strings dangling off it. What is it?

The photo below, illustrating a US Army paratrooper's kit, is from Philip B. Sharp's 1938 The Rifle in America.  The paratrooper's M1 carbine is a little shorter than the standard M1 rifle that ground troops would carry, according to the text.  It does not look exactly the same as the carbine carried by Pfc Eugene Zdrojewski: the vertical thing on the stock looks different. It is an "M11903A1."

But look, you can see very well how the strap attaches to the rifle.

In the paratrooper's kit, above, from Sharp's book, it is clear that the knife is different; the ammunition pouch looks similar;  those two empty pouches (above the grenades and to the left of the gloves) look very familiar, don't they; the binoculars case looks exactly like the one on the kitchen windowsill of the Marilla house - how about that.

The holy Wikipedia article has a very clear photo of the M1 rifle and the M1 carbine:

Wikipedia:  "Carbine."

We have seen this type of carbine before, from Photobook Page 3, of training near U Chicago in the summer of 1944.  By the time our EJZ gets to China, he has been training with this rifle for a year and a half.

From Photobook Page 3.

Again from Photobook Page 3.

We have the strap from Dad's M1 carbine.

Marty and I - nosy kids - always knew it was there in his closet, way over on the right, by his neckties, looped around one of those skinny white coat hangers.  We thought nothing of it.

Then the day came when we emptied the Marilla house, and there it still was.  

When Gene came home, for the rest of his life he went to sleep with his rifle strap no more than 12 feet from his hand.

Z

OSS CBI Photobook 15 - Southwest China, 1945- Reconnaissance, Part 1

These scenes are still in or near the KMT HQ we have featured in recent posts.  We need to figure out  precisely where this is.

The style of photomontage used here, with no margins and with prints cut at various angles, is reminiscent of what we have seen in the Kensington High yearbook design and the St. Luke's youth group newsletter.  Apparently it was popular in the 1940s.  Who did all this cutting and pasting for this photobook?  Dad?  His father, our JPZ?  Mom?  Mom having done it would explain all the photos of Dad!

Detailed information about the terrain was vital to planning airstrips and a possible future land invasion, the latter a dreadful prospect.  The photo team does not appear to have wide-angle lenses.  They take a series, note the exposure numbers, and cut and paste prints together to produce a wide view of terrain.

Posed shots like the one below are hints that they have a lot of time on their hands. No doubt they also need to adapt their techniques to local conditions of light and dust, set up their darkroom facilities, and decide on the best developing and printing techniques.

They are also making contact with local Chinese, setting up training sessions, setting up reconnaissance missions and protocols for reporting, and recording terrain farther and farther out from base.

Who is this?  Who is this?