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Originally Posted by Rockwolf66
While yes the IRA did get a fair number of assault rifles and those two Barrets from american Sympathisers the bulk of their weapons came from Nations that were unfriendly to the US. I am talking about thousands of G-3A3 battle rifles from Lybia and according to the IRA itself surface to air missiles and metric tons of Semtex.
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Actually, the G3s in the IRA's possession were of Norwegian origin. They were stolen from a military base in Oslo, I believe. Some were sold to the IRA, the rest to the ETA (a group friendly to the Provos).
Qaddafi gave them thousands of East German and Romanian-made AKMs (in fact, I think the IRA received more AKs than they had guerrillas to use them), plus RPG-7s, DShKs, SA-7s, flamethrowers, FN MAGs, and a whole bunch of "Wonder Nines" (mostly Taurus PT92s).
But before Qaddafi started sending them weapons, the IRA relied upon Irish-Americans to buy them weapons. Some of the "Armalites" in the IRA's possession were actually M16A1s stolen from the U.S. Army (some M60s, too), but most were AR-15s and AR-18s from American gun stores. I think they may have also received some HK91s and Mini-14s (an IRA gun runner mentioned this in his interview, but the shipment he was referring to got intercepted, so maybe those didn't reach the Provos).
Note also that since the American and Libyan pipelines were closed down, the splinter IRA factions have had little luck buying more weaponry. They bought some stuff on the black market in the former Yugoslavia and Czech Republic, but it's been much harder without a source as steady as Qaddafi or the Irish-American community.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rockwolf66
The second Largest weapons dealer legitimatly and largest illegitamate arms dealer is China. Literally the Chinese have been caught trying to sneak entire semi-trucks filled with Military hardware into Mexico. I'm not talking underfolder AK varients and 100 round drums but Mortars, RPGs and the like.
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True. And perhaps China will step in to fill the gap, even if Obama decides to ban guns in this country.
But right now, it does seem that many of the guns being confiscated in Mexico are the same types that are available (in some cases, design for) on the American civilian market. Saying this does not mean endorsing gun control; it is simply a reality that it does us no good to deny.