OT: Not a good place for a firefight

[perardua]

No (or very few) unofficial weapons in British units, as a rule - our lack of a gun culture makes it hard to do. It's just that new, additional weapons are issued out of a pool for ops - someone in the MoD decided everyone in the squadron needed a sidearm, so we all got pistols (which the majority of us chose not to carry). As soon as we came home, those weapons were handed over to the next squadron.