P is for Poliezi, 7 German police pistols you should get to know
If you’re a handgun hound, chances are you’ve set eyes on a whole line of imported European 9mm cop guns over the years. You know the ones, the Walther p1, SIG P6, HK P7 etcetera. But what you may not pay much mind to is that all of these guns get their ‘P’ designation from being adopted by the West German police back in the bad old days and, for students of history, that’s more than enough to raise an eyebrow at.
What is the ‘P’ designation about?
At the end of World War 2, Germany was divided into two separate countries. The US and her allies occupied the Western two thirds of the country, which became the Federal Republic of Germany, commonly referred to as West Germany. The Soviets occupied the easternmost portion of the land, and formed the German Democratic Republic, or East Germany.
In 1950, the new Republic of Germany needed guns for their police forces and went about setting a standard for these guns to be acceptable for service. As such, each of the guns that passed the testing was classified with a P-designation.
Because of these standards these pistols, stretching from the Walther P-1 to the HK P-10, have shared a number of common attributes…
Read the rest in my column at Guns.com