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In February of 1941, even while plans were underway to increase production of the Thompson submachine gun, the Ordnance Department began a search for a new submachine gun. Twenty foreign and domestic designs were tested at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds. Surprisingly, the highest rated foreign submachine gun was the British Sten. Indeed, the Sten scored higher than the Thompson in such areas as simplicity, accuracy, weight and reliability. In addition, the Sten also had the very large advantage of being cheaper and faster to produce than the Thompson.

The highest rated domestic design was submitted by George J. Hyde. The Hyde gun was not as easy to produce as the Sten but required markedly less production time and cost than the Thompson. Since the Hyde gun showed some promise, the Ordnance Department negotiated a contract with General Motor’s Inland Manufacturing Division to work with Hyde in refining the design. After several prototypes were completed, in April of 1942, the Hyde gun was adopted as the “U.S. Submachine Gun, Caliber .45, M-2” and was given the designation of Substitute Standard. Since GM was heavily involved in production of the M-1 carbine, the firm could not start production of the M-2. In July of 1942, a contract was awarded to the Marlin Firearms Company. However, due to a combination of problems including difficulties in acquiring the necessary raw materials and some inherent design bugs, the M-2 never made it into production and the project was scrapped in early 1943.