7.62mm L1A1 SLR alive and well, thank you!
Milgeek
2 Comments
I was watching a excellent BBC report - by Frank Gardner - on protection squads aboard ships running the gauntlet of Somali pirates when I spotted an appearance of an old friend! It looks very much like the venerable 'Stupidly Long Rifle' still has life in it (as many of it's fans have quite rightly been saying for years).
Photo source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/
The report showed ex-Marine Brits who now work for one of the many marine protection companies using a variety of arms to 'deter' would be pirates. Apparently the long range of the L1A1 and it's 7.62 x 51mm round is very useful for putting one across the bow of any suspect skiff before it gets anywhere near a merchant vessel.
I should add the Frank Gardner is just a superb guy who I have no end of admiration for, and this is a particularly amazing report: BBC News - Dangerous waters: Running the gauntlet of Somali pirates
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Reader Comments (2)
Good article. Interesting stuff, especially of flag states and the grey area of law they operate in. But, as the skipper says "So far no ships have reported being hijacked having armed force onboard" says it all really.
Absolutely. It's funny how people are so slow to learn from history isn't it? What did the 18th Century merchant traders do to combat pirates - arm merchant ships. Even during the first and second world war merchant ships were armed to disuade raiders.
But really perhaps a few pirates swinging from a rope hung from the bow of a ship might get the message across? (Too much?)