Bullpups rock! The SA80 is awesome!

[TR675]

My understanding of the Brit military is that it is a professional military rather than a volunteer military - by which distinction I mean that while most US troops sign up for limited stints, the Brits, both enlisted and officers, tend to view their service more as a career.

My understanding is based on "some thing I read somewhere sometime ago" which I believe was from a reliable-ish news source, but if anyone has real knowledge or experience to enlighten me further I would appreciate hearing it.

[Chuck Haggard]

those carrying it deserve the best that money can buy.

Word!

[Tamara]

The Brits had some kick-ass weapons in World War I and II. The Enfield rifles and Bren LMG, namely. They even supplied the Confederacy with a marksman rifle with effectiveness out to 1000 meters during the American Civil War.

One of the most fascinating weapons I own is a Webley autoloading pistol.

Bear in mind that this weapon was designed back during the day when magazine cutoffs in rifles were the norm, as rapid fire was something you held in reserve for final protective fire when the Fuzzy-Wuzzies were overrunning your positions.

With this pistol, the magazine has two catch holes. If you secure it via the upper one, so that the magazine is not all the way inserted, it locks back after every shot, with the slide catch being tripped, not by the follower of the empty mag, but by the absence of a loaded cartridge in the feedway. In other words, it knows when the gun is empty whether there's a magazine in the gun or not.

Apparently, while the heathen foe was some distance from your breastworks, you would drop individual rounds through the ejection port to inspire your men with your calmness and, when the wogs started climbing over the mealy-bag wall, you could seat the magazine fully and go to magazine-fed rapid fire.

The discipline of which that speaks is staggering.