The loss of modern infantry weapons

[StainlessSteelCynic]

I'm of the impression that while the US government may have disposed of those weapons, some of the older designs (bolt-actions, semi-autos) where also sold to gunstores for civilian sales. What I'm trying to say is okay, so that's the number they destroyed but how many did they keep and what was the size of the original stockpile?

[chico20854]

Originally Posted by StainlessSteelCynic

I'm of the impression that while the US government may have disposed of those weapons, some of the older designs (bolt-actions, semi-autos) where also sold to gunstores for civilian sales. What I'm trying to say is okay, so that's the number they destroyed but how many did they keep and what was the size of the original stockpile?

The Army disposed of the firearms in three ways:

1) a large shredder at the Anniston Army depot, referred to as "Captain Crunch". Stocks were removed, weapons fed in, and scrap steel emerged.
2) foreign aid. The Estonian Army, for example, fielded M-16A1s marked "Property of US Government" in 2000. A lot of M-16s and M-14s went this way.
3) sales to individuals, through the Division/Directorate of Civilian Marksmanship (a part of the Army, which permitted a civilian to buy a single Garand after extensive marksmanship training & competition) until 1996, when it was spun off into a nonprofit organization, the Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP). CMP reports that it and DCM distributed over 400,000 Garands from 1968 to present. Lots of those, however, were returned to the US Army after retirement by foreign militaries - they had been given as military aid and upon retirement were required to be returned to the U.S. The three most recent batches were returned from Denmark, the Greek Army and, most recently, 18,000 from the Greek Air Force, including several hundred still in the original factory wrapping. How many would be available in a T2k setting is unknown...