A Warning From the Past
In both World War I and World War II, Great Britain found it necessary to obtain automatic pistols and revolvers abroad in order to meet their military requirements. Most of the weapons were procured from the U.S. although Spanish and Argentine weapons were used as well.
During World War I, Smith and Wesson and Colt made large quantities of caliber .455 revolvers for Britain. Although there were a number of models suppled, the most common models were the Colt New Service and the Smith and Wesson Mark II Hand Ejector, of which 73,650 were supplied to the U.K. and Canada.
Colt caliber .32, .38, .45, and .455 automatic pistols were also purchased by the U.K. and many of these weapons have come back with British proof and broad arrow marks (signifying government ownership), on all major components. Approximately 10,000 .455 M1911 Colt automatics were supplied to the U.K. during WWI. After the war, these were issued to the RAF.
During WWII, the U.S. supplied Great Britain with 20,000 Colt and Smith and Wesson caliber .45 model 1917 revolvers after Dunkirk. Large quantities of S&W .38/200 k200 revolvers and Colt .45 M1911A1 automatics were supplied under “lend-lease”. In 1940 the U.K. purchased every type of pistol with any military potential, as they also procured quantities of S&W K-38 target revolvers. Ballester Molina caliber .45 automatics were purchased from Argentina and Star among other automatics were purchased from Spain. Since WWII the U.K. has disposed of all of these non-standard weapons, mostly by sale to surplus dealers.
There is considerable significance to the fact that Great Britain, one of the greatest industrial powers in the world, and formerly one of the leading exporters of small arms, has had to become an importer of small arms in both world wars in order to meet military requirements. Extremely restrictive laws in the U.K. have, to a great extent, killed the initiative of the British Manufacturers and of course cut down on production during peace time.
The end result is the lack of adequate production facilities and a trained labor force ready to produce military arms in quantity when desired. Although the shortcoming has resulted in considerable profit to some American manufacturers, including the erection, at British Government expense, of some of the largest arms and ammunition plants in the U.S., it is not to the overall advantage of the U.S.A. that its most powerful ally be myopic about the production of basic weapons and their ammunition.
Accredited in whole to:
Page 244, “Small Arms of the World” Ninth edition, completely revised by Joseph Smith, Army Materiel Command copyright 1960 1962, 1966, and 1969.
This book is well considered an encyclopedic history of arms, and their impact and influence in the 20th century. If we face less than the confrontations of that century today, this fact is well hidden. All reason suggests we face far more than was even imagined, and we don’t have a hundredth part of the productive capacity we had a century ago, much less the capacity we had entering the inevitable second world war. It was guaranteed by the foolish notions of the diplomats who closed the first, with an iron fist. What we face now was guaranteed by capitulation to communism at the end of the Second world war. The world is already divided today, and America stands alone, the last bastion of an “armed Nation”. There is no “America” we can depend upon to supply us arms if we choose to allow our own be taken. 1969 was forty four years ago, this exact warning was meant for that time, not now, not after the almost complete disarmament of almost every other “free” nation.
