This pic is from the official Bundesarchiv and shows a Heer soldier in France waiting in ambush that appears to be armed with what looks like an old MP-18 machine-pistol. The soldier in the background is similarly armed. I didn’t think there were two left in the Wehrmacht by 1944. 
It doesn’t look altogether dissimilar to a PPD-34 though, which the Wehrmacht did use captured examples of.
In fact, I’m pretty sure it isn’t an MP-18, as the magazine feed on that is forward of the stock…
Ha! You’re right it’s probably not a MP-18. But it looks too long to be a PPD-34 though.
Italian Beretta MP 38/A submachine gun if I’m not mistaking. The Germans said “Grazie, Italia” in summer 1943 and called it Maschinenpistole 739 (i), a reliable but also a heavy weapon.
That was sort of my next guess after reviewing photos. But what the hell was it doing in Normandy? 
*Meh, I guess it’s not that far from Northern Italy though…
From an American point of view it isn’t, no.
Concerning the original photo…I was wondering about the German soldier’s helmet cover. It somewhat looks like the USMC pattern…and the soldier is wearing spurs! Now, that’s incongruous.
Perhaps they were mounted infantry trained for internal security/occupation duties prior to the invasion. That might also explain the secondary armament…
Looks rather like bocage.
Perhaps mounted troops were thought to be better suited to that terrain?
Or it could just be a ceremonial spur that has nothing to do with riding horses?
Any idea what rank that guy is? The Binos and odd leather thing around his waist suggest he might be some sort of FOO rather than just plain infantry. Did the German officers have a thing about spurs?
Secondary armament? Officially maybe. From “Ordnance up front” by Roy Dunlap:
“No one ever bothered with any other kind of submachine gun if he could get hold of a Beretta M38, and keep it. The New Zealand boys especially loved them. Even the Germans liked it, and they hated to admit anything was good except their own stuff.”
The original caption only says “officer”.
German infantry regiments had a cavalry platoon as part of their headquarters company, maybe that’s an explanation…
Hi, an interesting photo you’ve posted, i am not surprised the germans would have seized weapons from italian army depos as well as the well known camouflage fabric…many call italian camo.
Supplies were short at that time of the war…
I wonder if this might not be a Norman hedgerow/the bocage…
Maybe it’s northern Italy?
Impossible to tell, it is not a common hedgerow to be found in Italy at that time i guess, much better chance for it to be in France than in Italy.
Also the camouflage on the helmet appears to be US, and that would match the location as being Normandy soon after the landing, as it is known Gi’s would soon dismiss such camouflage being too similar to german’s.
This could also be “captured” material
So in the end i am biased towards the photo being shot in Normandy…
For what my guesses are worth 
Incongruous unit markings:
German 15th Panzergrenadier-Division, deployed on the western front (Sicily, Italian mainland, Southern France, Germany, Belgium, The Netherlands) against US troops mostly:
I’m not sure of the time-frame of the US Army using camo in Normandy, but it was VERY short lived. Camouflage was used on an experimental basis in response to both the effectiveness of German uniforms and the favorable battle experience of the USMC in the Pacific. But the effort was abandoned after numerous friendly-fire incidents in which unlucky US units were shot up by fellow Americans or Free/Commonwealth forces mistaking them for SS…
Some examples:
German Waffen SS
US Army “Leopard Spot” camo similar to the Marines:
Not only Waffen-SS, especially in Normandy German Heer units were oftenly equipped with marsh/tan pattern uniforms.
I read that mostly soldiers of US 2nd Armoured Division aw well as 2nd, 4th and 30th Infantry Divisions were equipped with these camo uniforms.
During the battles in Normandy there were indeed complaints by Waffen-SS commanders concerning several of their soldiers wearing captured US camo gear.