As for 'aircrew arming' pre SLP. We had every type of revolver you could imagine. Very good at bird scaring but little else. Standing at about the 10 yard point we were luck to hit any target let alone the one we were aiming at.
First 9mms we used to fire at 25 yards. Now that was impressive. Then they wanted us to get nice little groups and brought us in to 15 metres.
Me, I thought the nest place for all the bullets was downrange just as fast as I could pull the trigger.