Somali Pirate Gun Locker: An Oddball Assault Rifle, at Sea
January 25, 2012, 10:45 pm
By C. J. CHIVERS
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The news today, however, provided a jumping-off point from which to examine how the pirates arm themselves. Yesterday, not knowing that the United States Navy Seals were midraid, I posted a teaser on my personal blog, noting that when Tyler Hicks, a Times photographer, and I recently examined a set of pirate weapons on a hijacked vessel in the Gulf of Oman, we had found an unusual assault rifle — a weapon compatible with NATO-standard ammunition. We asked for guesses as to what it might have been. I had a prize handy for anyone who called it right. But the many replies that flooded my inbox did not quite hit the mark. That is not exactly unexpected, and I would have been amazed if someone called it with the little information the teaser post provided. You’ll see why as you read on.
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You are looking at a weapon I had not seen before in the field — a SAR 80 — that was underneath the stack, and had evaded view.
SAR 80 is the acronym for the Singapore Assault Rifle introduced in 1980. The rifle is something of a curio from the edges of the cold war. Back then, Washington and Moscow were eager for nations to adopt their respective firearm patterns and cartridges, both for business and so that in the event of war, the arms produced in different quarters of the world might be compatible with one or another superpower. Singapore opted to adopt the Western and NATO-standard 5.56×45 round, and produced its own ammunition and its own line of assault rifles to fire it. Thus the SAR 80, one of the products offered by a defense firm then known as Chartered Industries of Singapore. Like early versions of the M-16, it can be fired a single round at a time, or automatically, as its selector lever shows.
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This served as a reminder of one of this blog’s chords: modern assault rifles tend to last and last, and even lawful exports can lead to consequences decades later. Did anyone in Singapore think, as these rifles were exported, that some might be used by high-seas hostage takers a quarter-century later? No one can predict such things precisely, but time has proven that such outcomes can be predicted generally. Send arms to a weak nation, intending perhaps to make the nation stronger, and you might actually make it weaker over time.
http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/25/somali-pirate-gun-locker-an-oddball-assault-rifle-at-sea/
Still think the answer is to flood the world with guns? 
= new reply since forum marked as read
Are you saying C.J. Chivers is incorrect in saying: "modern assault rifles tend to last and last, and even lawful exports can lead to consequences decades later...No one can predict such things precisely, but time has proven that such outcomes can be predicted generally. Send arms to a weak nation, intending perhaps to make the nation stronger, and you might actually make it weaker over time."
I think it's an interesting comment - where does it all end? You should check out the links to the Taliban arsenal articles in the story. All these guns aren't going to just disappear - they're going to spread through globalization like every other commercial item. 
For quite awhile governments have done business along the lines of "my enemy's enemy is my friend". Which is just crap.
Selling/giving/allowing arms to some mostly unstable group just because the two governments share a common foe has armed numerous groups that should never have been armed. The taliban is one example. Folks like Hillary and Reagan advocate that stuff and we end up arming little talibans here and there and then spend even more money investigating the dealer/facilitator du jour.
I will leave you a quote from Andrew Niccol's Lord of War:
WHILE PRIVATE GUNRUNNERS CONTINUE TO THRIVE, THE WORLD'S BIGGEST
ARMS SUPPLIERS ARE THE U.S., U.K., RUSSIA, FRANCE AND CHINA.
THEY ARE ALSO THE FIVE PERMANENT MEMBERS OF THE U.N. SECURITY COUNCIL.
...condemning the international arms trade to promote the sale of guns period.
That's some deep denial:
at such posts. 
...indeed....is hardly the only weaponry going into Mexico. Why do you think Fast and Furious was conducted in the first place?
but they still are not getting machine guns and RPGs from Gander Mountain or Wolfe's.
We do know that our guns go South in significant numbers...
You don't believe the ATF that they thought they were going to try and track the guns to provide intelligence to our allies to the South?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fast_and_Furious
If I had to wager, I would say we're not getting the complete story and that the CIA/NSA are probably involved.
Check the photos of seized caches- you'll find rocket launchers, full-auto M16's, short barreled rifles, m203 grenades, hand grenades- things that you cannot get from your local gun show on a weekend, but that the Mexican government gets every couple of months via state department approved direct export sales.
http://www.pmddtc.state.gov/
...between the arms trade and smuggling in general. If you make them, they will be sold and used...
It's all economics
Finally you concede I'm perfectly capable of reading, understanding, and rejecting. Allow me to Tom Cruise 
A bit to preachy for my taste.
...search "guns reduce crime" and see how many results you get that either make that claim or imply it.
Alrighty then.
...that I'm safer than ever and generally that defensive gun uses make for a safer society.
I have a Spanish Mauser that pre-dates World War Two (probably) and a .22 that's older than me. Both are a lot older than the rifle in that picture.
Steel and wood. Keep'em dry, keep'em oiled, and they'll last forever.
It really seems that people think guns should have some kind of expiration date on them, to prevent "proliferation". Of course, if that was reality, people would have to routinely upgrade their guns by purchasing the latest and greatest guns.
"Gee, my steel-and-wood bolt-action expired yesterday. Ooo, look, an aluminum-and-plastic semi-automatic!"
And then, due the sharp increase of Evil Black Gun sales, we'd have to ban those, too.
and helped fight WWI and WWII, in addition to Finland's desperate fight for national survival in 1939-1940. It is also the most powerful gun I own, and one of the most accurate. I suppose that if my descendants take very good care of it, it could still be functional a thousand years from now.
My dad has my great-grandparents' concealed-carry revolvers (a matching his-n-hers set) that they received as a wedding gift in 1900, which would make them about 113 years old this year.
With your bayonet mount and assault magazine and quick-reloading clip system, this high-powered military weapon only has one purpose... to kill and and all people within a third of a mile of where you stand. And it's mostly made of wood... perfect for smuggling past airport metal detectors.
This is obviously unacceptable....
Last edited Fri Jan 27, 2012, 03:39 PM - Edit history (2)
