SURPLUS, CLASSIC & TACTICAL

While the Thompson was a sub-optimal infantry tool, the argument could be made it was the finest criminal implement ever devised. Even today, little can...

In the late 1980’s, the name Blue Sky became famous among American military arms enthusiasts when the company began buying and importing M1 rifles from...

In the early third of the 20th century we Americans really did embrace small government. The nation nearly starved during the Great Depression, and citizens...

Somewhere along the line during the past 40 years, the 9mm auto became “coin of the realm” in LE, military and, yes, civilian use. They’ve been...

In the 129 years Savage Arms has been in business, the company has produced more than its share of iconic firearms — the Model 99 lever-action rifle, the...

When it comes to handguns, the name, “Nagant,” in Russia carries with it the same weight and immediate recognition as “Colt” does in the United States.

If you’re going to make a case for the 1950s as being the Golden Age of double-action revolvers, it’s going to be a fairly easy task because you’re...

No less a gunfighter than Bat Masterson said this about the Savage 1907: “A tenderfoot with a Savage Automatic and the nerve to stand his ground, could...

Today, let’s consider the Polish P-64 pistol. It was designed in the 1950s and finally adopted in 1965, but such is the nature of government-managed...

Used primarily by Austria-Hungary and Bulgaria, the M95 rifle proved itself one of the finest battle rifles of the First World War.

The M1 carbine was the most-produced American military firearm of World War II. In 1938 the Chief of Infantry asked the Ordnance Department to develop a...

Throughout the first half of the 20th Century, it seems virtually every American gunmaker offered at least one “boy’s rifle.”

When it comes to the absolute embodiment of cool, Germany’s .30 Luger has been at the top of the heap since its adoption.

These nifty little rifles were first built in Accokeek, Md., in 1967. Those early examples bore neither markings nor serial numbers and sported an MSRP of...

As the United States service rifle, the Norwegian-designed Krag-Jorgensen was produced at the Springfield Armory from 1894 to 1904.

With those 10 simple words in 1977, an obscure 33-year-old filmmaker named George Lucas legitimately changed the world.

Sound suppressors make you a better neighbor, help preserve your hearing, enhance accuracy and look cool.

1929 was a pivotal year in modern human history. The 1929 stock market crash triggered the Great Depression, fundamentally altering the fabric of life on earth.

Bill Ruger’s Standard Model pistol (1949) and the Single-Six revolver (1953) pretty much set the rimfire handgun market on its ear.

The canteen likely does more to sustain a soldier’s life in combat but a soldier’s individual weapon is his most cherished possession.

In 1982 British and Argentine forces faced off across some of the most desolate terrain on earth.

Like cats, people seem to dislike Carcanos for no good reason. Unfortunately, the weapon’s main claim to fame among Americans is forever tied

“We’re about to find out what 1944 air smelled like,” Thomas Mackie said jokingly as he started turning the key to open our sealed WWII vintage...

In the 1970s West Berlin stood 100 miles inside communist-controlled territory, a tragically flawed testament to post-World War II geopolitical acrimony.

“This is quite a gun. Quite a gun. I did a lot of choppin’ in the war with a gun like this.”

My first experience with the rifle was watching my Dad use it on a marauding skunk who’d busted into our pigeon coop in the mid-1950s. I was an awestruck...

There is a curious institutional intimacy associated with the practice of medicine. As a physician I am frequently called upon to get fairly deeply into...

I’ve never regretted money spent on a military surplus gun. However, the 1945 Canadian No. 4 Mk 1 Lee-Enfield in this story was one of the best deals of...

France’s role in the design and development of cutting-edge small arms often gets overlooked, often by those casting a jaundiced eye toward the...

Born and bred in World War II, over six million M1-, M1A1-, M2- and M3-carbines were made in total from 1942 to 1945.