M2 Browning In Space — Astronaut firing M2 Browning machine gun in space with Mars copypasta screenshot overlay

M2 Browning In Space

2016copypastaclassic

Published September 11, 2026

M2 Browning In Space, also known as the Ma Deuce Mars Copypasta, is a 2016 4chan greentext about a soldier fighting rebels on Mars in 2066 with a WWII-era .50-caliber machine gun. The joke lands because the real M2 Browning, designed by John Browning in the 1910s, is still standard-issue across NATO militaries. The post grew into a long-running running gag on /k/ and Reddit gun boards through the 2020s.

copypasta memes 4chan memes gun memes military memes 2016 memes

Overview

M2 Browning In Space, sometimes called the Ma Deuce Mars Copypasta or simply the M2 Browning Copypasta, is a first-person greentext told by a soldier serving as a door gunner on an atmospheric dropship above Mars in the year 20663. He mows down rebels armed with plasma guns and compact rocket launchers, then glances down at his weapon and reads the receiver stamp: manufactured 1942, with the campaigns 'Tunisia,' 'Italy' and 'Germany' engraved on it3. He adds 'Mars' to the list. The joke works because the M2 Browning .50-cal, nicknamed the Ma Deuce, is a real-world heavy machine gun designed by John Browning during World War I and adopted in the 1930s, and it is still the primary heavy MG for the U.S. military and most NATO forces almost a century later1.

A follow-up 'part two' by another anonymous poster extended the same bit into a farther-future war against aliens, cementing the format as a template for 'the M2 will outlive us all' jokes3. Later variants swap the setting or the enemy but keep the punchline: whatever century the story is set in, the door gunner is still spraying .50 BMG from a piece of hardware older than his grandfather. The bit is a favorite on /k/ and adjacent weapons communities because it turns a real quirk of U.S. procurement, the M2's stubborn refusal to be replaced, into a science-fiction gag1.

Origin & Background

Platform
4chan /k/ (Weapons board)
Creator
Anonymous 4chan user
Date
2016

The copypasta was first posted on 4chan's /k/ (Weapons) board on July 13, 2016, by an anonymous user replying to a thread that asked 'What are guns 50 years from now gonna be like /k/?'3. The post was attached to a photograph of a U.S. Marine during Operation Desert Storm gripping a Ma Deuce mounted on a Humvee, which became the canonical image people pair with the text3. Because the original was posted anonymously and 4chan threads are ephemeral, no confirmed handle is attached to the writer, and later archives of the thread trace back through /k/ mirrors rather than a named author.

Shortly after the original dropped, another anonymous /k/ poster wrote a second installment placing the same weapon in a war against aliens, which spread alongside the first and often gets reposted as a combined pair3.

How It Spread

The copypasta made the jump off /k/ into the wider gun-meme ecosystem over the following years, showing up whenever a thread touched on the M2's absurd service life. On March 12, 2021, a r/NonCredibleDefense user asked where to find the 'Ma Deuce Mars Copypasta' and Redditor Dspacefear reposted the full text, which sat as the canonical Reddit copy for years afterward3. About a month later, on April 17, 2021, another NCD post used the same Desert Storm Marine photo to joke about the M2's service length, and the comment section filled up with copies of the greentext3.

Derivative versions kept the bit alive. On December 30, 2022, a r/greentext post shared a similar story set in 2201, this time featuring 'United States Planetary Expedition Forces' fighting a T-55 or Type 69 tank, riffing on the same 'obsolete hardware never dies' punchline but swapping the M2 for a Cold War tank3. On May 21, 2023, YouTuber burialgoods uploaded a voice-acted reading titled 'Be door gunner in 2066' that pulled in over 110,000 views and became the audio version most people share2.

The format got a big art push on October 23, 2024, when Japanese X artist konwashi_2 posted an illustration of an astronaut firing an M2 HB off a lunar rover with the caption 'It's an M2 Browning still in active service even in space' (translated from Japanese), pulling roughly 446,100 views and drawing dozens of copypasta reposts in the replies3. Two days later the artwork hit r/NonCredibleDefense and racked up around 8,800 upvotes, with the greentext showing up again in the comments3. A May 5, 2025 NCD post using a manga panel of an M2 under the title 'Still can't believe it's been in use for over 100 years' pulled about 5,100 upvotes and 'cue the Mars war copypasta' replies, and on July 12, 2026, Redditor CandyNecrosis reposted the original 4chan screenshot to r/greentext as 'The M2 is eternal'3.

Timeline

2022-12-30

A 'United States Planetary Expedition Forces' variant set in 2201, featuring a T-55 or Type 69 tank, is posted to r/greentext.

2023-05-21

YouTuber burialgoods uploads 'Be door gunner in 2066,' a voice-acted reading of the copypasta.

2025-05-05

Redditor SopmodTew's manga-panel M2 meme on r/NonCredibleDefense triggers another wave of copypasta reposts.

2026-07-12

Redditor CandyNecrosis reposts the original 4chan screenshot to r/greentext as 'The M2 is eternal.'

Frequently Asked Questions