Could a US citizen obtain a MP28 or MG34 prior to WWII? Did it happen? Would they have mail ordered through a European dealer or what?

If not citizens, how about government entities?

Just curious, since all the imports I've heard of were after the war.

I assume there were some WWI captured MP18's around, but I'm talking about ordering brand new.

Probably not as the versillies prohibited them from mg development.

Surplus WWI stuff was available here and there, IIRC from what I was told.

I think Stoger was "the" importer of new Mausers/Lugers prior to WWII.  I don't recall seeing any MGs in the catalog reprints I have - a few Mauser/Star machine pistols.

I think most of the "surplus" German stuff was coming up from South America back then - and most of it was being stolen from/by shady governments trying to make a buck.

I think I have a 1922 surplus catalog reprint somewhere.  I'll pull it out and check for you.

Well the Bannerman catalog was from 1907 - however - that had state of the art artillery from Krupp (and several others) and several others (domestic and foreign). (Dynamite guns, "New" Springfields, they were working through "Spanish Wars" surplus Mausers and had all sorts of odd modern things).
I guess the thing there to remember is there were actual arms dealers pre WWII in the US who could literally get anything as it just wasn't illegal at the time.  Of course in many cases it had to be stolen/misdirected from a government - but that wasn't as unlikely as one might think.

well Dolf Goldsmith in an interview said his first machine gun was a Maxim belt fed he traded for a 22 rifle to a kid.   The kid's mom, aunt or grandma got a Maxim machine gun as trophy after contributing to the war effort (WWI), supposedly they pulled the Maxim thru town in a parade celebrating the war's end and it ended up at this lady's house.

They used to scrounge cartridges and shoot the gun behind the school, ah different times...    this was prewar because his 2nd machine gun he got by banging out the damaged armor to free a British coaxial gun from a tank in a scrap yard.  It was a great interview in SAR, wish I kept the magazine.

Interview links below.  And yes it is a great read!!

http://www.smallarmsreview.com/display.article.cfm?idarticles=125

http://www.smallarmsreview.com/display.article.cfm?idarticles=123

Yes.  Some were.  Many MG08s came in after WWII.  A couple people were even given MG08s as pay back for bonds and as gifts from the US government.  Very different times than now.

MG34s were definitely not available during the interwar period. They were German military technology. It's not something they handed out or allowed to be sold to anyone. I'm fairly certain they were actually state secrets due to both the vast technological superiority and the massive treaty violations involved in developing them. Prior to the '34 NFA act and '38 FFA act foreign machineguns could be brought in for sale on the open market, but I don't know how much of that was done. Most of the German guns were brought in through Stoeger in NY. Don't know what they did or didn't bring in regarding machineguns. I know that their were definitely papered and non-papered "Great War" bring backs. As others have pointed out, other ways to get MGs back then but not much of it was documented well or at least anywhere that I'm aware of.