Garage gunsmith Royal Nonesuch revisited a tiny revolver project of his and, with simple hand tools, produced a triggerless two-shot handgun in .22WMR.
The gun isn’t made for long range precision work, and it can best be described as a two-shot single action pepper box sans trigger, but the aesthetic of the brass grip kind of sets off the neat little (legal) zip gun.
But don’t expect any accuracy on a gun with no sights and a thimble-length barrel.
In a world in which over two million of Ruger’s handy .223 caliber rifle has been made since 1973, there were bound to be dozens of variants and subvariants. Sure you know about the Ranch rifle, the full-auto AC556, and the Mini-30, but what about the GB? What makes the GB so special? And what do they have to do with Bermuda?
Ruger’s attempt at government sales
Styled after an amalgam of pre-1968 US combat rifles including the M1 Garand, M1 Carbine and M14 rifle, the Mini-14 had features drawn from almost all of these guns. Although the gun went on to sell many more copies in its standard form on the US civilian market, it was sales to law enforcement and the military that Ruger wanted a slice of. In the late 1970s, the company made a Mini-14 with a longer receiver and selector switch to change the gun from semi-auto to 3-round burst to full auto at 700 rounds per minute! One big overseas sale of these guns was to the French National Gendarmes (as the Mousqueton AMD).
This model, the AC556, and its chopped down little brother the AC556K were sold for two decades in small numbers. The thing is, while this was a good model for military use, many law enforcement agencies were leery of full-auto weapons or could get free M16A1s from the US government. What they wanted was a more tactical Mini-14 but still in semi-auto. This led to the GB variant.
Differences in the GB
These guns were simply standard Ruger Mini-14’s that were given a list of extra accessories and without the fun button of the AC model. This included a flash hider that adorned the muzzle crown of the rifle. The muzzle attachment allowed for use with a line of CS (tear gas) and smoke grenades, which were launched by blank 5.56mm rounds. This hider doubled as a recoil reducer as it ported the gases out and away from the muzzle. About five inches being the muzzle was a bolted on bayonet lug. This would accommodate any M16 style bayonet (the M7, M9, OKC-3S, or others).
This made the gun good for riot/crowd control scenarios for paramilitary forces overseas and was key in selling the gun to such groups as the Bermuda defense forces. After all, nothing says “keep off the grass” around a government building than a line of guys with rifles with fixed bayonets. This feature gave the gun its “GB” moniker, which stood for Government Bayonet.
The Royal Bermuda Regiment is a territorial defense unit for the British Overseas Territory of Bermuda.
Being closer to North Carolina than the UK geographically, Ruger scored in the early 1980s by selling the colonial government a stack of Mini-14GBs for a song that included the crest of the regiment in their wooden stocks (since replaced by a Butler Creek style polymer one without the embellishment).
They have seen hard use in both ceremonial and training duties.
Now, with the drawdown of the British Army, it seems the Crown has found a boatload of arms to send round to Bermuda to put the Rugers out to pasture.
In late 2016, it was decided to send the colony 400 L98A2 (SA80A2) rifles with bayonets, 1,600 magazines, 440 TA31 optical weapons sights (Trijcon ACOGs), and four collimator-type weapons sights. The gear is valued at $1.4 million and was donated.
As noted by the local paper, the Regiment will divest themselves of the Rugers but retain its small stock of Heckler & Koch G36s, which are issued to members of the spec-ops oriented Boat Troop and the Operational Support Unit.
The Enfields look much different compared to the Mini-14s.
New and old compared
In training at Warwick Camp
And on parade
But do they have the RBR crest? Didn’t think so.
Over the past eight years, there has been a mad rush for gun makers to crank out ARs and AK variants as well as import exotic counterparts in from overseas (Tavor, anyone?). Well, now, with the change in the political wind so to speak, no one is buying as they already have a closet full and the market is flush. This means it is defiantly a bargain shopper’s dream these days when it comes to black rifles.
Take this recent screengrab from my email box yesterday. Now Ruger AR-556s generally MSRP for $799~ meaning you can expect the price at your local FFL to be about 10-15 percent less, or roughly $675-$700.
How about this:
Give it six months and see where the prices are then…and who is still in business or not.
Below we see a series of three really great shots of what the French label as TF Wagram, shown showing ISIS/ISIL/Daesh west of Mosul in support of the Iraqi troops engaged on the ground there. The force consists of just 150 gunners, security and supply troops and four truck-mounted 155mm guns. They arrived in Iraq last September and have been proving fire missions directed by forward observers embedded with Kurd and Iraqi troops.
The GIAT CAESAR (CAmion Equipé d’un Système d’ARtillerie; French: Truck equipped with an artillery system) is a self-propelled 155 mm/52-calibre howitzer, installed on a Renault Sherpa 10 6×6 chassis. Adopted by the French in 2000 for rapidly deployable troops, the set up is pretty light (17~ tons) when compared with the U.S. M109A6 Paladin which weighs 28 tons and monstrous German Panzerhaubitze 2000 which tips the scales at 55-tons.
Caesar was just adopted by the Danish Army last week and is in service with Indonesia, Lebanon (via French military aid) and Thailand who used them against the Cambodian army in a 2011 border dispute to good effect against 190-era Soviet-supplied Grad rocket trucks which they outranged.
During WWII, Uncle Sam ordered nearly two million Model 1911A1 GI .45ACPs, and the Union Switch & Signal company of Swissvale, Pennsylvania made one of the rarest and most sought-after variants. Now, at least seven have popped up at the upcoming auction
These include an “EXP” marked version– one of approximately 100 pistols made by US&S using preproduction slides, receivers and other components that were presented to company officers and employees and coated in a bright blue DuLite finish.
Another prized example is a factory cutaway or “skeletonized” 1911 used for demonstration purposes. Few of these guns were so modified.
There are lots of reasons why someone should not mess around with Norway. One is the Norwegian Home Guard (Norwegian: Heimevernet – “HV”) which today consists of some 45,000 part time soldiers.
Here is one of their rapid-reaction forces at work:
Norwegian Home Guard QRF soldiers from Vestfold on a recent training mission. Note the HV shoulder flashes and general “Most interesting man in the world” vibe of its troopers. These guys could ski circles around potential invaders and, when operating with home field advantage, bring the pain.
SOF has an interesting article from a few months back about these guys from a 1980s encounter in which the author bumped into hardlegs still armed with German WWII weaponry but ready to use it.
Norwegian reserve engineers in the 1980s with a P08 Luger and MP40 SMG. Via SOF
This jibes with my own personal Norwegian buddy, a fellow by the name of Kim that I have known for years. Back in the early 1990s he did his national service in Brigade South (also known then as 4th Brigade) and has shown me fading Kodaks of a skinnier/hairier version of him using everything from 1940s vintage M1 Carbines and Walther P-38s to HK G3s and MP5s. He said they learned to use it all and stacked it deep, just in case.
At the time, the Land Home Guard had 470 platoon-sized units stippled across Norway equipped with small arms and man-portable anti-tank weapons such as the Carl Gustav 84mm and L-18 57mm recoilless rifle– a nice addition to any choke point.
At the end of the Cold War, with a population of 4.2 million, Norway could put up the following numbers:
Army: 19,000 (plus 146,000 reserves)
Navy: 5,300 (plus about 26,000 reserves)
Air Force: 9,100 (plus about 28,000 reserves)
Home Guard: 85,000 reserves.
In short, over 300,000 ready when the balloon went up. Those aren’t rookie numbers.
Today it seems the HV is half the size it was in the tail-end of the Cold War, but you can bet there are probably well-maintained WWII stocks still housed in a warehouse somewhere, ready if needed.
Image via National Naval Aviation Museum
30 years ago, March 29, 1987, Light Photographic Squadron (VFP) 206, the last squadron of its type in the Navy, disestablished. It also marked the end of F-8 Crusader operations in Naval Aviation. In this photograph, a pair of VFP-206 RF-8G Crusaders flies over Monument Valley, the backdrop for many a John Wayne western.
Here at LSOZI, we are going to take off every Wednesday for a look at the old steam/diesel navies of the 1859-1946 time period and will profile a different ship each week. These ships have a life, a tale all of their own, which sometimes takes them to the strangest places. – Christopher Eger
Warship Wednesday, Mar. 29, 2017: The first into Kure
Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205142565
Here we see the Black Swan-class sloop, His Majesty’s Indian Ship Sutlej (U95), off the coast of Burma while on a coastal patrol in March 1942 just weeks after the Japanese entered WWII. She is as seen from the boarding whaler as the sloop goes alongside a native Sampan for a closer look.
With its roots hailing back to the East India Company in 1612, the modern Indian Navy was formed in 1830 under the aegis of the Royal Navy and, after over a century of name changes and rebranding became the Royal Indian Navy in 1934. Based in Bombay, this impressive-sounding force only had a handful of ships by the time the Commonwealth found itself in World War II.
The war sparked a huge expansion of the RIN, with a pair of Black Swans ordered in 1939 followed by four more of the same types in subsequent years. The Swans were an improvement of the Bittern-class sloop and were hardy 1,250-ton ships of 299 feet overall and, armed with half-dozen high angle 4-inch guns and some AAA pieces, also carried more than enough depth charges to scratch the paint on German U-boats and Japanese I-boats. They weren’t very fast (19 knots) but had long legs (7,000nm@12kts).
The hero of our tale, Sutej, is named after one of the major rivers that flow through India and carries the name of a previous 50-gun Ship of the Royal Navy as well as a Cressy-class armored cruiser who served in the Great War.
Named after one of the five great rivers of Punjab, HMS Sutlej was a Cressy-class armored cruiser in the Royal Navy
She and sistership Jumna were laid down at William Denny and Brothers Limited, Dunbarton, Scotland in early 1940. Sutlej was commissioned on 23 April 1941 and rushed into combat with her Indian crew under the command of Capt. J. E. N. Coope, R.I.N.
By July 1941 she was deployed in the Irish Sea for convoy defense and between May of that year when she joined HX 127 and August 1944, she escorted no less than 50 convoys in virtually all theaters of the conflict.
But convoy work was almost a sideshow for Sutej, who transited to the Pacific on the entry of Japan into the war, escorting some of the last troops and supplies into Singapore in January 1942. She then worked the coastal patrol off Burma, inspecting local traffic.
Royal Indian Navy Sloop Sutlej on Burma coastal patrol 26 March to 9 April, off Ceylon. The ship’s whaler returned after the inspection of a Sampan. HMIS Sutlej is in the background. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205142566
Royal Indian Navy Sloop Sutlej on Burma coastal patrol 26 March to 9 April, off Ceylon. HMIS Sutlej investigating Sampans while on patrol. In the foreground, the ship’s officer is carefully scrutinizing the craft through his binoculars. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205142564
ROYAL INDIAN NAVY SLOOP HMIS SUTLEJ ON BURMA COAST PATROL. 26 MARCH TO 9 APRIL 1942, OFF CEYLON. The gun is a quad Vickers .50 (more on that here). Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205142570
Loading the twin 4″ High Angle, guns during exercise stations on board HMIS Sutlej while escorting merchantmen from Colombo to Calcutta. March 1942. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205142569
She then shepherded merchantmen from Bombay to the Persian Gulf, and in the Eastern Mediterranean. This brought her to Operation “Husky” the invasion of Sicily. There, alongside her Indian sister Swan Jumna, she covered the Acid North beaches.
“The Sutlej was senior officer of A/S patrol and as such had a roving commission as general ‘Whipper in’ to the patrol ships and managed to make quick dashes inshore to have a ‘decco’ at the landings at close quarters. The sight was amazing. Landing Craft of all descriptions pouring their loads ashore with very little congestion on the beaches as the troops and vehicles very rapidly pushed inland to capture their objectives.
“By 1100, five hours after initial assault, Admiral Troubridge was able to signal to the Supreme Naval Commander—Admiral of the Fleet Sir Andrew Cunningham ‘Landings at Acid Beaches successfully carried out, bridgehead secured.’ Landings on the southern and western coasts of Sicily were also successfully accomplished.
In late 1943 Sutlej was tasked with rushing a detachment of the Queen’s Own Royal West Kents from Haifa– trucked across Iraq by lorry– to beaches in the Aegean where they tried to shore up the campaign there. The year 1944 saw her again in the Indian Ocean, providing convoy defense in the Bay of Bengal between Chittagong and Calcutta. There, she took part in the search for German submarine U-181, a Type IXD2 U-boat hunting in the Indian Ocean.
These days were quiet in this almost forgotten corner of the war. War photographer Cecil Beaton visited the ship during this period.
Wrestling, boxing, and Physical Training during the dog watches. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205142572
Indian ratings hoisting a depth charge onto the thrower. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205142571
Cecil Beaton portrait of an Indian naval rating operating a signal lamp on the sloop SUTLEJ at the Royal Indian Naval Station at Calcutta, 1944. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205125435
India 1944: Three stokers of the Royal Indian Navy on the mess deck of the sloop HMIS SUTLEJ. Cecil Beaton portrait. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205193623
In April 1945, Sutlej was relieved of her vital but monotonous convoy work and attached to Operation Dracula– the amphibious assault on Rangoon. Joining the sloop HMIS Cauver, she sailed from Akyab for Rangoon, merging with the massive Allied Dracula force on the way. During the operation, the two sloops stood at the mouth of the Rangoon river ready to bombard shore positions if required.
After the capture of Rangoon, the army in the south of Burma was reinforced from India and Sutlej, along with the fellow H.M.I. Ships Cauvery, Narbada, Godavari, Kistna, and Hindustan were assigned “anti-escape” patrols along with the remote islands in the Mergui Archipelago, Forrest Strait, and the Moscos and Bentinck Group, to prevent Japanese forces bottled up there from being evacuated.
With a long war behind her and a lengthy campaign to take the Japanese Home Islands believed to be ahead, Sutlej was in refit at Bombay on VJ Day.
Then came the endgame.
Sutlej was given the honor of being the first Allied ship to reach the former Japanese naval bastion at Kure after negotiating the shallows, wrecks, minefields, and obstacles.
Indian warship HMIS Sutlej leaves Hong Kong for Japan as part of the Allied forces of occupation.” She was the first Allied warship to reach the former Japanese naval base at Kure. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205208273
HMIS Sutlej, the first Allied warship to reach the former Japanese naval base at Kure, lies in the harbor at Kuchi on Shikoku Island, after negotiating the difficult shallow waters. Date February 1946. (Photo courtesy of the Imperial War Museum with photo credit to ‘Number 9 Army Film & Photographic Unit’). Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205208272
Among the tasks given by Sutlej was that of “smasher” duty– coupled with the Royal Australian Navy destroyer HMAS Quiberon she sank several captured Japanese warships and submarines in the Inland Sea in May 1946 via naval gunfire as part of Operation Bottom. One batch of 17 submarines was sunk in 800 feet of water on the same day and included I-153, 154, 155, Ro-59, 62, 63, and Ha-205.
Scenes aboard the Indian sloop HMIS Sutlej show the views of preparations before the sinking of the Japanese submarine I-155, built-in Kure, 1929, and which apparently was not used during the war. The following scenes show the effect of 4″ shells on the sub and 20mm Oerlikon shells. After 238 rounds of 4″ shells and 4 depth charges, and after 4 hours of firing and closing the range from 4,000 yards to 200 yards, the sub was sunk:
Her sailors were courteous in victory. According to one report:
Many sailors/officers from other ships were seen removing Emperor Hirohito’s portraits, fancy-looking barometers, decorated chinaware, and even zinc bars from a battleship and a submarine. Although the act entailed no criminal offense, none of the Indian sailors or officers brought any Japanese trophies aboard the Indian ship, Sutlej, out of regard for the Indian people’s sensitivity on this subject.
By the end of the war, the RIN had swollen from eight ships and 3,500 personnel of all ranks to over 100 vessels and 30,000 men (as well as the newly established RIN WRENs corps of female sailors) commanded by Vice Adm. Sir Geoffrey Miles, K.C.B. This was soon to change as ships were scrapped and sailors demobilized.
With funds tight and the Empire close to insolvency, the RIN spent much of its postwar period swaying at anchor. By 1947, with India’s and Pakistan’s independence, the Navy was split by each side with Sutlej going to the new Indian Navy along with her Black Swan-class sisters Jumna, Cauvery, and Kistna while three others; Narbada, Godavari, and Hindustan went to Pakistan.
Redesignated Indian Naval Ship (INS) Sutlej was reclassified as a frigate and was one of just a handful of oceangoing warships operated by the fleet of the new republic, forming the 12th Frigate Squadron with her sisters.
SUTLEJ at anchor in Bombay harbor, 1947.
LCDR BA. Samson, R.I.N., Commanding Officer of the SUTLEJ photographed with a group of Bombay Journalists who visited the Sloop in May 1948. Indian Navy archives #3632
Officers of the R.I.N. Sloop SUTLEJ on the deck (May 1948). Indian Navy archives #3633
In 1955, Sutlej was disarmed and converted to a survey ship.
By the late 1970s, the Indian Swans were showing their age. INS Kaveri was the first decommissioned, in 1977, followed by our hero in 1978, INS Jumna in 1980, and INS Krisna in 1981.
Sutlej, however, was apparently scrapped last, going to the breakers in 1983.
A few pieces of her were saved and are in circulation.
Such as this tread plate that appeared for sale in 2015
Only one of the 37 Black Swans, HMS Mermaid (U30)/FGS Scharnhorst, lasted longer than Sutlej did, going to the scrappers in 1990 after a decade as a damage control training hulk.
Our Indian navy’s ship name was handed down to the new survey ship INS Sutlej (J17), commissioned in 1993.
Specs:
Displacement: 1,250 tons
Length: 299 ft 6 in (91.29 m)
Beam: 37 ft 6 in (11.43 m)
Draught: 11 ft (3.4 m)
Propulsion:
Geared turbines, 2 shafts:
3,600 hp (2,700 kW)
Speed: 19 knots (35 km/h)
Range: 7,500 nmi (13,900 km) at 12 kn (22 km/h)
Complement:
180
Armament:
6 × QF 4 in (102 mm) Mk XVI AA guns (3 × 2)
4 × 2-pounder AA pom-pom
4 × 0.5-inch (12.7 mm) AA machine guns, later augmented in 1945 by 20mm guns
40 depth charges
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The milled receiver C39V2 AK pistol
Century Arms announced last week that the latest addition to their AK-style pistol line, abbreviated variants of their popular C39v2 and RAS47 rifles, are now available.
While both U.S.-made models offer a number of similarities– such as a receiver-mounted side rail, Magpul furniture, and RAK-1 trigger packs– the big difference between the two is that the more entry-level RAS uses a stamped receiver while the C39 incorporates a receiver milled from 4140 ordnance grade steel.
Another handy feature is that the pistols have QD attachment points at the rear of the receiver for attaching a sling, a departure from imported AK-style pistols such as the Zastava M85/92 series which require an aftermarket adapter.
MSRP is $909.99 for the C39v2 model and $749.99 for the RAS47 model, which go well past the typical ~$500 range that the M92/85 and I/O Hellpup guns go for and less than the K-VAR variants. Still, the M92/85s have a milled trunnion, and I understand the RAS47 at least is cast. When I drop in on Century next month in Atlanta I shall find out!
Anyway, if you want more info and pics, head on over to my column at Guns.com
Elbit just scored a contract for 126 Helmet Display Tracker Systems to be used by the Navy on MH-60s to help integrate point of impact for onboard weapons systems, which is very nice. The HDTS has been fielded by some Army units on the UH-60 and CH-47 and has been used on the USMC’s AH-1W Super Cobra, so at least it’s already in the supply chain.
The announcement:
Elbit Systems of America, Fort Worth, Texas, is being awarded a $49,884,371 firm-fixed-price, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract for a maximum quantity of 126 helmet display tracker systems (HDTS) and associated line items for the Navy on the MH-60 aircraft. The HDTS provides situational awareness and targeting enhancements via pilot/copilot line-of-sight capability; continuously computed impact point for the 20mm automatic gun helicopter armament subsystem; 2.75-inch unguided rockets (LAU-61C/A); and precision guided rockets (digital rocket launcher (DRL, LAU-61G/A)). Work will be performed in Fort Worth, Texas, and is expected to be completed by June 2021