03-13-2012, 02:35 PM
Tony Williams Wrote:To clarify - this is my understanding of the situation with regard to Germany and the FN FAL: the FAL was initially bought for the German Border Guard force (which has always been relatively large and well-equipped - very much a para-military force). Those guns were made by FN. The German Army decided to buy the FAL too, but because of the number of guns involved insisted on having a German production line. Either FN or the Belgian government (I'm not sure which) refused to allow this, and the rest is history. The G3 was adopted, which got HK established as a successful company and they and FN have been deadly rivals ever since.
Tony, that's my understanding, too. Belgium didn't want to grant Germany a license to produce their own copy of the G1, so the Germans tooled up and produced the G3 instead.
As to the whereabouts of those border guard (Bundesgrenzschutz) G1 FALs, Turkey bought a boatload of 'em. Several years ago my first FAL build was on one of the "well loved" G1 kits from Turkey. It was a little rough, but after some gas system tweaking to rectify a leaky gas tube, she ran swimmingly well.