Hinderikus (Henk) Lucas Visser was born in the City of Groningen, the capital of Groningen Province in the northeast of the Netherlands, on 5 August 1923. Henk was very involved in the CETME rifle project, the original HK G3, Stoner’s projects (most notably the Stoner 63A1), Oerlikon, Mauser, and many other historical events that impact on the small arms community today. Smallarmsreview.com is pleased to bring this lengthy and comprehensive interview to our readers from our 2006 issue and will be presented in two parts. – Dan Shea, SAR Editor-in-Chief

SAR: Thanks for joining us, Henk. I guess the readers would like to know what got you started with firearms – what was your first gun?

Visser: My first gun was an old pinfire revolver, which you could buy for about two bucks in those days. I was maybe fifteen years old. Pinfire ammunition was very rare so I just collected these and enjoyed looking at them and I would hide them from my mother who did not approve. My father had died when I was ten years old. Later in life my mother would complain about my gun collecting habits, but I would say, “Mother, it’s your own fault. You never bought me an air rifle.”

SAR: And your interest in military firearms?

Visser: I had wanted to be in the military, so as soon as I could ride my bicycle, I was always around the barracks in Groningen and the nearby airfield. After the German occupation of Holland, May 10, 1940, there wasn’t much hope for me to join the Dutch army. I was still in high school, and was definitely not a Nazi sympathizer. With friends, we harassed the occupying military units, and I was arrested by the Germans but managed to talk my way out of it several times. I was eighteen years old when the SD (German Sicherheitsdienst) finally arrested me.

SAR: What were the charges? And, I suppose, were you actually guilty?

Visser: Guilty as charged. Sabotage, gun possession, those were the main charges. It was May 5th, 1942 when the German SD arrested me. It was in the classroom, in front of all the other kids. (Laughs) It was quite something! On one occasion I had broken into the German barracks and put a match to a wooden building that the Germans were setting up for storing radio transmitters. It was at the airfield next to our town that the Germans had expanded and made into a bigger airfield. They held me, because the last thing I did was to break into the Navy officers’ mess, and I stole a K98, a machine pistol, a pistol, ammo and some of their papers. We had a small group of people that had gotten together to do this, and there was one man who was a traitor, he tried to blackmail me. Anyway, the Dutch police got involved, and I got arrested. Then in July I had a Navy court-martial in the town of Utrecht.

SAR: So, your first machine gun involved getting a Navy court-martial from the Germans while you were in high school?

Visser: (Laughs) Yes, and they condemned me to death and also three years for another break-in in a Dutch Nazi gunsmith shop in town.

SAR: An additional three years?

Visser: With the Germans, you were condemned separately for each crime and punished that way as well. I had a friend in jail, a cadet from the Dutch military academy, who was condemned separately to death three times, plus ten years, and four months. His father was very rich, and he started paying people off, so the Germans took off two of the death sentences and shot him for the third. My uncle, who was a director of the Dutch Philips electronic company, knew one of the German supervisors of the factory and tried to get me off. He told the supervisor, “You have to go and see if you can get the boy pardoned since his mother is a widow and only has one other younger son.” The supervisor went to see Seis Inquart, the German ruler of Holland, who said that this was a job only for the military. He suggested that my uncle should talk to General Christiansen, who was the military commander in Holland…but he also said no, and he said that Dutch high school boys who think that they can make a joke out of the German Army will be shot. So my mother was quite desperate, and she went with our lawyer to see the German Navy commander herself. Just to let you know how these Germans were; he lived in a big villa…my mother and our lawyer passed the guards at the gate, rang the bell, and a Navy sailor opened the door. He took the letter that my mother had brought asking for a pardon, and left my mother and the lawyer standing outside in the rain for half an hour. Then the door opened again and the same sailor gave the letter back to my mother, torn in half.

My mother was very desperate at this point. Her father had a butcher shop in town, and next to that was a vegetable shop…our two families were good friends. One of the children of the vegetable shop owner, Kees Veening, had gone to live in Berlin to be a speech therapist, teaching them how to breathe, etc. Kees Veening had a neighbor, and they became good friends. The neighbor was a historian, a reservist in the German army and was called up for duty in 1938. He had become a general and was responsible for the daily historical facts in Hitler’s headquarters, the “Wolfschanze.” This man had an idea: if he could get a hold of my file from the Dutch prison and keep it, the Germans in Holland would not be able to shoot me. So I sat for three months in the section of the prison where they kept the prisoners who were condemned to die, and oftentimes at 5 in the morning you would hear the Germans with the steel-toed boots coming up to take one or two of us out to be shot. So the question was always, “Who’s next?” I was there for three months.

SAR: On a German death row cellblock for three months, waiting to be shot every day?

Visser: Yes. You had to take all of your clothes off at night, so that if you escaped during the night you’d be naked. One night, there was a tremendous row and shouting and a group of drunken German guards came knocking on my door. I was sleeping on a straw bale, so I got up and ran to the window, stood at attention, reported myself and my punishment. The Germans shouted “Visser, who was condemned to death…You swine, our Führer has pardoned you!” After repeating this several times they threw my door closed, and I thought, “Oh, this is wonderful,” and went back to sleep on my straw bale. The next morning I realized that I had made it, and had gotten 15 years in a German prison instead. Later I learned that the German historian had waited until the Germans were throwing a party for their successes in Russia. They had taken over a million prisoners at that occasion and were celebrating. They were extremely pleased and were drinking champagne in Hitler’s headquarters. As Hitler was sitting at the table, the historian, General Scherff, approached with the letter from my mother and explained the story. Hitler looked up and said, “A friend of yours, eh?” and Hitler himself crossed out “Death Penalty” and wrote “15 years Zuchthaus” instead. When the people at my prison got the telex message from the Wolfschanze, they got drunk and came to my door at 2 or 3 in the morning to tell me that I had made it.

SAR: Well, there’s a project for some of our better connected readers. Somewhere, there is a piece of paper with Adolf Hitler’s handwriting on it that freed Henk Visser from a death sentence.

Visser: Yes, yes, I would pay $10,000 for that piece of paper! I was then transported to prison in Germany, a prison with small factories inside. There I had to work very hard, we had to make little aluminum cylinders. After the war, while taking apart a 20mm shell, I found one of those little cylinders. It was an aluminum detonator. We had to fashion them and drill a hole through them and of course thread them. We would make 5,000 of these per day and if you didn’t make 5,000 then you only got a liter of cabbage soup instead of 1.5 liters. Cabbage soup may not sound very special, but in the prison, an extra 0.5 liter of soup was important! So we made 5,000 per day.

We were in a very old prison called Zuchthaus Reinbach, near Bonn. Then I was moved to another prison called Zuchthaus Siegburg, on the other side of Bonn, and there I also worked for my dinner. I repaired military uniforms, and worked in a tool making shop. We worked about twelve hours a day in shifts, sometimes during the day and sometimes during the night. I must say I was lucky; in a concentration camp I would have died. In these prisons you had a roof over your head. It was a big building with thick walls, and if it was 20 degrees below zero outside it was only just freezing inside, which was cold but you didn’t freeze to death. We had guards who had been guards for all of their lives, they were professionals and so there were not many beatings or much abuse. We had some new guards who came in from the Eastern front missing an arm or something, and since they really couldn’t do a good job they would sometimes beat us to take revenge.

Anyway, I got very ill. I had tuberculosis in my lungs, intestines, on my vocal cords, and on a heart valve. I was dying and my weight was 100 pounds. Still, I was always treated a little differently from the other prisoners.

SAR: You must have had some pull from somewhere.

Visser: They knew I had received a pardon from Hitler himself, and the General Scherff sometimes inquired about how I was doing, so yes, they were careful with me. I was taken to the prison hospital. It was unbelievable, there were 3,000 prisoners with half of them sick and there were only 14 beds in the hospital. I got one of those beds, and I was dying. My uncle, who’s company Philips also owned a lot of factories in Germany, started inquiring about how I was doing. He was told that I was ill, but treated very well, and that I was cared for by nuns and that every day I would get an egg, but my uncle didn’t trust them. He sent someone who talked to the director of the Zuchthaus who reported that I couldn’t talk anymore and that I was dying. So he had his lawyers look over the German law regarding prisoners, and they found an old law that said if you were incarcerated and dying, you could go home to die. All of the judges that condemned me would have to sign off for my release, so my uncle went to see all five of the judges, at that time they were dispersed all over Germany because of fear for an invasion in Holland. When all of them signed I was sent home, but because of my contagious disease, I wasn’t allowed to go back by train. They didn’t want me infecting anybody else. The Phillips people had an ambulance that ran on propane, but since the gas stations were so far apart in Germany, they put the ambulance on top of a truck and trailer which ran on a wood burning gas generator. They came with a nurse to the prison, and through my uncle managed to rescue my hospital cellmate as well, another Dutch student from Groningen. We drove back through Germany and I was very happy to see buildings still on fire from Allied bombings. We got back to Holland and they hid me in a Roman Catholic sanatorium in Bilthoven. I was there for two and a half years, recovering.

SAR: Was that the end of the war?

Visser: On the 18th of May, 1944 I got out of Germany. The liberation of Europe happened while I was convalescing, and at the end of 1946 I went home.

SAR: It must have taken a long time to build your strength back.

Visser: I felt ok, I did what I had to do, and I could even bicycle a little bit. My mother made me go back to high school; she said I needed a high school diploma. (laughs) Of course the military was out of the question for me, because of my weak lungs. I wanted to go to the police academy, but was offered a job as a sales inspector in Java, in the East Indies – formerly the Dutch East Indies – and I accepted. The company had me tested to make sure that my health was alright, it was, and I was approved to go and work in the tropics.

SAR: Was this a firearms related job you were looking for in the tropics?

Visser: No, it was in the tobacco industry. I was in Java for five years where I worked and hunted; wild boar, mostly. I had a German 7mm rifle with a 12 gauge shotgun barrel. My job was inspecting the cigarettes sold by our company in Java. We manufactured the cigarettes, and wanted to make sure that the cigarettes weren’t being sold or bought on the black market. There were many Chinese sales outlets all over Indonesia and the islands that needed to be inspected. I traveled a lot, all over Java, and for a while I lived in Jakarta, Malang and Semarang. There were about five Europeans running the factory, and for a year and a half I was the chief purchasing agent. This was from 1950 until 1955. (Dolf mentions that he was there at the same time, too bad they hadn’t met at that point.) It was a fantastic time; the company was really well run. The Dutch people who were running it were no-nonsense and everything was always ok. Holland had given up Indonesia in December of 1949, and the bad thing was (and I’m very pro-American) that under American pressure, they pushed the Dutch out and threatened to stop the Marshall Plan for Holland. There were millions of dollars going into rebuilding the Netherlands. So you can understand that our government gave in.

SAR: (Dolf) The Americans pushed the Dutch into giving up the country. My father was very bitter about that, too.

Visser: Yes, yes, the Americans had the idea of instituting liberty and democracy and everything Western, but we were not ready for it! Our Queen Wilhelmina had already said in 1942 that Indonesia would be a free country in the future; the process would have only taken about 15 years to complete.

SAR (Dan): In America we tend to think that there’s a magic wand for those who’ve been under colonial control or subjugation or despotic control, that they can suddenly handle freedom. I don’t want to get too far off the subject, but I’ve seen it too many times in too many places. Often we think we can touch a country and suddenly it’s free. It’s certainly not that simple. Henk, you lived right through the middle of the Jakarta incidents? Is this the point where you started to develop more of an interest in machine guns?

Visser: No, Dan, I have always been crazy about weapons. But going through the war years changed my perception of the world. When the Germans first “arrived,” they acted nice and very friendly. Holland was very wealthy and a rich booty. When it came to food I saw German soldiers go into Dutch shops to buy and eat an entire stick of butter, they hadn’t seen real butter in so long. Other things too, pastries, breads, all sorts of foods, they took them back home to their families. So in the beginning there wasn’t any ill treatment, but as every good Dutchman, I hated them from the very first moment. It wasn’t until later that the Germans showed their real character. They cleaned out the whole country. I actually started my collecting interest with military weapons when I got home from prison and the sanatorium. There was a gun in almost every home, taken from the Germans when they fled. I had friends at the police department, so if they had a really nice machine gun I was able to shoot it or buy it if they didn’t require it.

SAR: This was before your journey to Indonesia? Were you able to pick up many rare guns?

Visser: Yes, this was from 1947 to 1949. My interest in collecting military firearms was very intense, starting then. In those days it was all the common guns, also French guns that the Germans used. For instance, the first French machine gun that I got was a Hotchkiss 1914. It was a great big machine gun with cooling fins and a huge tripod. I was very interested in German sniper rifles at the time. When I went to Indonesia, I had to hide my collection in my mother’s house, since I had no license for these guns.

SAR: Are we seeing a pattern of youthful disregard for gun laws here?

Visser: (laughs) Yes, yes, and they were all cleaned very well before I left, so that when I returned there wasn’t a spot of rust on any of them.

SAR: When did you get involved in arms trading?

Visser: On my way to an appointment I stopped at a gun shop in a small street in Groningen. The guy that owned the shop had also spent some time in a German prison, as well as a concentration camp. In the shop I met a gentleman who was on the board of an ammunition factory in the south of Holland, he invited me to come and see the operation. I went there; it was a small factory that had just received an order for .30 carbine ammo from the Americans. The factory itself was a mess. I was told that the chairman of the board from the factory would like to talk to me; he offered me a job as director. He told me that the founder of the factory had died and that his younger brother wasn’t doing a good job running things. I said no, I didn’t want that job; I wanted to go back to Indonesia.

My boss back in Indonesia was a colonialist. He worked us to death, we never got enough salary, but we still led a wonderful life. He would always say, “Do this and I’ll give you a raise and a promotion.” I learned that even if I got a promotion, there would be no raise for me. He told me to go to Jakarta for a year and if I did a good job there, I would get a raise and a promotion, but when my review came up, I got a good promotion but no raise, as usual. He always had another task for me but I never got a raise. After five years, I got 8 months furlough. Usually when people went on furlough they would go straight home to Holland, but I asked if I could go to America. My boss agreed to pay for it, saying that I wasn’t such a bad guy. I flew to the Cocos Islands, Australia, lots of other small islands, Samoa, and then on to Hawaii, Los Angeles, Denver, Chicago, Boston to visit a friend, and down to Washington D.C.

SAR: That doesn’t explain your start in the arms trade…

Visser: I am getting to it, Dan, patience. Before I went on vacation my boss in Indonesia began to worry about the link between cigarette smoking and lung cancer, which was getting more and more attention in America. He asked me to see how the American tobacco companies were dealing with it. I went to Philip Morris, and they told me that more and more people were buying mentholated and filtered cigarettes because the public thought that they were not as bad. I wrote back to my boss what the Americans had told me, and he quickly started ordering the machinery to manufacture filtered cigarettes. These of course are more dangerous than unfiltered cigarettes because it allows you to smoke the cigarette all the way to the filter. You end up inhaling far more tar, etc. than you would get from smoking a cigarette without filter.

My boss had told me that upon my return from furlough I would become the Inspector for the Island of Sumatra. And so again I asked him if I would get my raise, he said that we would discuss it when I returned. He was in Holland at the same time, so I traveled to Eindhoven where he was with his family and had dinner with him. I asked him during dinner if I would finally get the position I wanted, with a higher salary and the ability to sign for the company as a representative. (Editor’s note: In Europe, the right to sign documents in the name of the company puts you in a much higher level socially. You generally get a much better salary.) He said that if I did a good job working in Sumatra that I would get the position I wanted. At that moment I realized he was lying, and the next morning I started talking to the people from the ammunition factory again. I asked for what was at that time a fantastic salary, not at all contingent on how the company did at the end of the year. They accepted!

SAR: So your international weapons career started in the ammunition factory in Hertogenbosch in Holland.

Visser: You might say it started when I was making those fuzes in a German prison (Laughs). But, I’ll tell you, my first day as director there, I almost cried. There were two secretaries, and neither one could write or type a letter without mistakes. Everything looked horrible and unprofessional from that office on down to the factory. I had to fight to straighten out that company. When I arrived, there were 63 people working there, and when I left there were over a 1,000.

SAR: Did this job lead to you becoming a member of the 7.62 NATO council?

Visser: After the cigarette factory in Indonesia, I think this was a really big start for me. I got a call one day from an American friend at the Pentagon who said, “Henk, we know you’re working on blanks with a lengthened case so that they feed automatically. We don’t have that, and this morning during a mock battle in Panama the American side had to shout “Poof! Poof!” because they had no blanks that would function automatically in their weapons. The general who was responsible for Panama got mad and demanded immediate delivery of the special blanks.”

I said to my friend that I could get some of my guys and some of our new blanks, cases, powder, tools and the necessary weapons, and fly over to see what we could do. We flew to Washington and went from there to Frankfurt Arsenal, where testing began on our ammo. Whether fired from a gun that had been in a freezer or not, our blanks worked perfectly! The guys from Frankfurt Arsenal wanted to inspect our blanks and see how they could copy them, but they didn’t have the time. The Pentagon wanted 45 million blank rounds in cal. 7.62 NATO, and we would get one-third of the order, which for us was a very, very big order. We were very excited until one day I got a call from them with sad news. They said that Congress refused to release the money needed for that big order and instead specified that only 30 million rounds would be purchased, with the order going to Frankfurt Arsenal, so we lost out. This was a big blow to our company, but there was also good news. They told me that they understood that we wanted to make 20mm aircraft ammo. They offered me a 20mm ammunition factory for free, with new machinery and everything, in St. Louis, that had been used to manufacture .60 caliber ammo and later 20mm aircraft ammo. It had been “mothballed” for use in an emergency.

SAR: The early M39 revolver cannon series, the T161s, were T130E3 .60 caliber machine guns before they were moved into the 20mm range.

Visser: Yes, it was the plant for that ammunition. We went to St. Louis to look at it, and we were flabbergasted. Everything, the machines, the tools, etc. was brand new, and just for us. I went back to Holland to arrange for transport. I came back to the Pentagon (which was very easy to just walk into in those days) to talk to Colonel Moor and a couple of other officials, but they had sad news again. “We cannot give you the plant,” they said. They saw my reaction…and after a long pause continued, “But we can sell you the plant for a $1,000.” We paid the thousand dollars and brought all of the machinery back to Holland. The end result was that once we got operational we supplied every NATO Air Force with the 20mm rounds: the Brits, the Norwegians, the Germans, the Dutch, everybody. Later, when the Vietnam War began, the US Air Force realized that they did not have enough 20mm rounds. They requested an order for 10 million 20mm rounds. Our Holland plant could fill that order so a meeting took place at the pentagon. One of the officials said, “This is crazy! Lake City is not the only ammunition plant we have. Don’t we have one in the South?” Colonel Moor pointed at me and said, “Yes, and HE has that plant.” (Visser laughs) So we used the plant from St. Louis to fill a 23 million dollar order for 10 million rounds.

SAR: Like all good arms dealers, I love a story where you get a plant for surplus and then get to sell the product back to your source (laughter). Henk, that probably would have been 1967 or 1968 and jumps us too far ahead in this story. When did you first get involved with Armalite?

Visser: Ah, patience, Dan, patience. First we must address the CETME (Centro de Estudios Technicales de Materiales Especiales) program. When I started to work in Holland for NWM in 1955, they had an advisor that was a retired Dutch rear admiral who became a very good friend of mine. He had been in Spain recently (he spoke fluent Spanish), where some Spanish and Germans had been working on a new gun made from sheet steel. I knew of some of the developments that had been done in Germany with the Sturmgewehr, and I flew to Madrid. The operations there were very isolated from the outside world. The main operation was on the CETME rifle. They showed me the whole factory, and pointed out some of the small tools and things that they were missing which I could supply, so I told them I’d help out. I became very friendly with them, and pretty soon I had my own CETME rifle to take back with me to Holland. That rifle…that’s a whole other story.

It was made for special ammunition, an aluminum bullet with a copper jacket…a very long bullet with a short case. The man who designed this ammunition was Dr. Voss, and he was the German Air Force ballistician, and he was also the ballistician for the CETME group. He was very knowledgeable about recoil and automatic fire and the physics of holding a gun. During that time, the first German armed forces were the Bundesgrenzschutz who were supposed to guard the German boarders. There were 20,000 soldiers armed with German K98’s and the MG42’s, as well as 100 new 20mm Hispano guns and of course the P38 pistol, and nothing else. The boss was Colonel Naujokat, and he had been in charge of the two flat cars before and behind Hitler’s quarters on his train (during WWII). These open cars had 4-barreled 20mm automatic cannons on them.

The Spanish went to the Colonel and demonstrated for him in Bonn. The Colonel liked the new Sturmgewehr and the ammo very much, but told them they had the wrong caliber. The standard caliber was cal. 7.62, but this new Spanish ammunition was cal. 7.92. So they went back to Spain and changed the gun, the magazine, and, of course, they had to make new ammunition. They also made new firing tables, it took a year. After which they had their new CETME ammunition in cal. 7.62.

SAR: This was not yet 7.62 NATO ammunition, correct?

Visser: Correct. After the Spanish finished their new ammo, they brought it and the guns back to the German Colonel, who turned white and said, “Oh my God. I should have told you that 7.62 also requires a new case: the T65 case.” The Spanish group was beside itself, returned to Madrid and decided that it was all over. The gun was mathematically designed for a low powered cartridge and the 7.62 NATO had much more power, so it needed a totally new gun. But one of the bosses at the Madrid factory pointed out that the factory had good relations with the American military attaché, since they had just received an order to develop caseless rifle ammunition and caseless 20mm. The boss said, “Go and get a barrel and 1,000 7.62 NATO rounds.” Which they got from the U.S. The CETME with that barrel fired 600 7.62 rounds before the gun fell apart. The cartridge was far too powerful, since the gun was designed for a lighter round. The German engineers rebuilt and strengthened the housing as the German army wanted to arm their soldiers with them.

They had contact with the Heckler & Koch people, who were all old Mauser people working in two wooden barracks, making tools for pressings and so forth, and that’s how I came into contact with Heckler & Koch. The Germans at the Weapons Department in Bonn were always making changes in the gun, and it was Heckler & Koch who made the changes on the CETME. I told the CETME people, “You guys have no sales organization….let NWM have the rights to act for you all over the world.” They told me I had to pay for the right, which was no problem for NWM. They gave me the world rights for the CETME rifle, excluding Spain, Portugal and Germany. The rest of the world was ours. They also said that if I wanted to set up production elsewhere, they would help us get started.

In the meantime they were still working on the guns…making a new grip and so on…they had spent millions making the guns and making the changes. I went to the Dutch army, who agreed to test out the gun with all kinds of different ammo, including French steelcased ammo. They fired the steel ammo. When the trigger was pulled, there was a BIG noise, the rate of fire was 1,800 rounds per minute, and about half of the empty steelcases got stuck in the wooden wall. I told the Colonel to stop the test…it was a hopeless case. As it turned out, they never actually manufactured the steel ammo, but it was a hopeless case nonetheless.

To make the gun work, they had added grooves in the chamber, so that some of the gas would press on the exterior of the case to release it. The main fault of the CETME rifle is that as soon as the climate gets moist, firing the gun without immediately cleaning it results in sticky cases. This design of the roller locking system is only good for lightly-powered ammunition. We had a very fortunate thing happen; the Germans had improved the gun enough so that it functioned, but later on I learned that Heckler & Koch had a trick up their sleeves. All of the guns were tested, and they had seven different-sized sets of rollers, so that if there was a problem they would put other rollers on the locking mechanism. They would change the rollers until everything worked properly!

SAR: Very pragmatic from the point of view of a demonstrator. What year was that?

Visser: 1958 as I remember. Because the Germans had changed the rollers and had gotten the first order for 400,000 rifles, the whole world wanted the CETME rifle in the form of the G3. They had to say no to worldwide orders, because they didn’t have the rights to sell outside of Spain, Portugal and Germany, I did! We did have plans to make the rifle outside of Spain, but I stopped those plans because I felt the design was not good. I got a call from Bonn, it was my good friend from the Ministry who said, “Henk, we cannot have this. Here we are, a great nation, and we cannot sell our own rifle. I’ll offer you a deal: I know you want to make 20mm ammo for those thousand Starfighters we have bought.” They were so far back, they bought 1,000 Starfighters and they didn’t know what gun was in it! He said, “You’ll get 33% of all orders for 20mm ammo if you relinquish the rights to sell the CETME rifle.” I said, “OK.” He immediately went and got his secretary to type up a document saying that I would forever get 33% of all the 20mm orders for the Germans. ANY 20mm ammo. It saved our neck. It was one of the best days of my life…I didn’t realize it at the time, but that was the end of our CETME involvement.

SAR: You were the link between CETME and Heckler & Koch?

Visser: Partly, yes. Heckler & Koch were not big shots. Their company wasn’t large enough at that time to make the big deals. They grew because of all these orders that came in from everywhere. Later they designed many important weapon systems. It was really something to see.

SAR: Henk, I would like to come back to the rifle design programs in more depth, later. If you share your experience as a collector with our readers, I am sure they would be interested. This may seem somewhat insensitive, but to obtain your collection must have cost a fortune; far above the income of a young Dutch boy who was on the Nazi death row.

Visser: Yeah, that’s about right. I have been very fortunate in my business decisions and made some very nice commissions. We can come back to that business later.

SAR: So, what was your passion?

Visser: Collecting guns. Well…really the military guns. That was the start, anything military I could get. Later it was the Dutch firearms and I sold my military collection to Bonn, it was the beginning of the museum they have now in Koblenz. 849 of my guns are still there – even my Gatling gun – the beautiful brand-new Gatling gun with the carriage and the ammunition car.

SAR: What was the Gatling, a British one?

Visser: No, an American one. The Colt 1883 model with the jacket around the barrel, and the tripod. One day in a military base, somewhere in America, near Picatinny I believe, a sergeant was cleaning up the attic, and he found this Gatling gun. It was brand new but completely taken apart, no one had ever looked at it. He went to his Colonel who said to get rid of it. And there, magically, was Val! (laughs) And who do you think bought it on the spot?

SAR:(Dolf) Yes, Val would certainly have been there! (We are discussing the late Val Forgette of Navy Arms, another international arms dealer of the good old days.)

Visser: I knew Val very well and he sold the gun to me. Very cheap, I might add. It was really a big affair, and when I left NWM they wanted to take it, but instead I sold it to Bonn, and the Gatling is in their museum today. Two of the magazines disappeared, it is sad that there are always people in museums stealing things. There were many rare guns in the military collection. One that I thought was very rare was a 7.62 NATO Gatling gun from GE. I was the only private guy in the world who had a brand-new one.

SAR: Gatling Gun, you mean an M134 Minigun?

Visser: Yes, I got it out of Vietnam…I had so much stuff there….I was working for Dutch intelligence at the time, so they arranged for a Shell tanker to haul all the stuff I had gotten to Singapore. I had 10 RPG-7 anti-tank launchers, with 200 rounds of HE grenades. The Dutch and the Germans wanted to test them.

SAR: And how about the testing?

Visser: Well, we finally got the shipment and it had to go on the deck of a Dutch destroyer in Singapore. They loaded it from the tanker onto the warship. I had managed to get a lot of interesting items for the collection during my time in Vietnam. With the RPG-7, we had to do some testing for the government. They decided that this test they wanted to run was too big for them and they made a deal with the Germans, who did a tremendously detailed testing. They even tested the glue on the wooden cases, they checked the labels to see where they were made, in Russia or East Germany. I still have one RPG-7 and an inert rocket at home. I was very interested in the American M72 LAW. I once owned six LAWS.

SAR: When did you get into the antique guns?

Visser: Slowly I got more and more interested in the antique guns…I had always hated them, so crazy and ugly they seemed to me…but then, because of my historical interests, I decided to get rid of anything that was non-Dutch. I had the best automatic pistol collection in the world, all the early Mausers, Bittners, Schonbergers, Borschards, Gabbit Fairfaxes, etc, etc. I sold them all in one lot to Dr. Sturgess, a good friend of mine. He came to my place the first time and I opened drawers for him, and he started sweating, he was going crazy. He was…really, I’ve never seen anybody so excited by my collection.

SAR: (Dolf) Even the Maxim automatic pistols came from you? I have them in my latest book.

Visser: Yes, Dolf, the Maxims as well! I was collecting automatic pistols when nobody was interested. I went to every gun shop in Switzerland where they hadn’t had the German occupiers to take everything, and there were a hell of a lot of people saying, “That old gun there, 150 francs and you can take it, with ammo too.” Those days are gone, you know. There was a gunsmith who I was talking about Lugers with, about how the prices of the Lugers had started going up, and he said, “You know, I have Luger serial number 0001, which was presented to my neighbor, an officer, in front of the troops.” It was the first Luger that the Swiss Army officially adopted. I said “That’s interesting, can I see it?” and he brought it to me in the holster. He said, “The normal price for this is 225 francs, but if you give me 275 then it’s yours.” Those were better days, you know? You would go into a gunshop and there would be a Mondragon rifle with special bayonet. It just doesn’t happen like that anymore.

SAR: Basically Henk, all the money you made you put into collecting guns?

Visser: Everything. I had no capital, no shares; I only had substantial commissions from sales. Eventually I sold my pistols and all my special ammo to Geoff Sturgess…but…it’s like a sickness, you know? I was at the Las Vegas Antique Show and there was a very rare Dutch gun there. It looks like a single-shot pistol, but it’s a three-shot pistol with a little channel where the powder goes for the first, second and third shot, and there is a Maastricht mark under the barrel. It was from the Funderburg Collection, a very famous collection. It’s in a catalog. I bought it for a lot of money! It’s crazy!

SAR: You’re preaching to the choir when you talk to Class 3 owners in the United States. You did a series of books on your collection of Dutch guns….

Visser: Yes, they are available commercially, but are out of print at the moment. The set weighs 22 kilos. Now I’m writing more books, one with the names of all of the Dutch gun makers, about 1,400 of them. Another book project that I was working on with two technicians, both specialists with Master’s degrees in History Drs. Martens en Drs. de Vries, was to write the story of Dutch weapons starting at the Napoleonic era. As these books were written in Dutch they will be translated into English and the 3 volumes will be condensed into one. There is another book in English, almost finished, about a very special German – who later became an American – Otto von Lossnitzer, the father of the modern aircraft revolving guns.

Look for a link to the second half of our smallarmsreview.com interview with Henk Visser in an upcoming SAR newsletter when we look at Vietnam, Oerlikon, the changes to the Stoner 63 system and the innovative Mecar rifle grenade programs, as well as Visser’s work to restore Dutch firearms in Russian museums. – Dan Shea

Eugene Morrison Stoner is the designer of what became the M16 system, but he was far more than that. He was a weapons designer for sure, but his interests included rotary winged aircraft, boats, and many other things. He was a genius on many levels.

Stoner was born on 22 November 1922, in Gasport, Indiana, an irony not lost on many AR-15 family collectors. He was a WWII veteran of the USMC, serving as an aviation ordnance technician in El Toro, the South Pacific, the Philippines, Okinawa, and in North China. He died 24 April 1997 in Palm City Florida. As a veteran, he had a solid understanding of what traits an infantryman wanted from a fighting rifle; it should be simple, reliable, robust, and accurate.

Most people today understand the effect Stoner had on modern weaponry; this article is not really about that. What we’re here to discuss is the birthday event that Stoner’s close friend and business partner C. Reed Knight, Jr, put on to celebrate Stoner’s 100^th birthday.

In all their years of friendship, Mr. Knight had managed to hunt down and collect almost all the Stoner designs. Hundreds of firearms were found, and in the process, one of the most amazing small arms collections in the world grew to fantastic size; first in Vero Beach, then in Titusville, Florida. The collection is referenced as either the Knight Collection, or more properly, the Institute of Military Technology. Reed Knight had a lot of dreams. He pursued, adjusted, and excelled at many, but a fervent one was to create a university, more or less, for mechanical engineers to learn firearms design. The institute provided the road map and the collection… well, it’s a working reference collection, one of the finest in the world. The collection goes far beyond just the designs of Stoner and Knight, it covers the development of small arms in almost every country in the world and provides an amazing glimpse into the weapons of our enemies and allies.

When it became close to Mr. Stoner’s 100^th birthday it appeared the date would coincide with the 60^th anniversary of the M16 and 40^th anniversary of Knight’s Armament Company, Mr. Knight and his staff sprang into action with a very ambitious plan; a party for 1200-1400 people. Many members of Knight’s Armament and the Institute’s employee groups devoted a lot of time to make impressive presentations. Attendees were treated to a band, local barbecue, and facility tours. The list of attendees was impressive, many manufacturers and government people were there, as well as members of the general public who had signed up for the tours. All in all, it was an excellent day. Good barbecue, good company, and one of the world’s most

There is no other weapon so closely connected with the Navy SEALs of the Vietnam era than the Stoner light machine gun. For the operators in the Teams, the weapon was either lauded or vilified, loved or hated, with very little middle ground.

In spite of appearances, the Stoner 63 system and its variants were not first taken into combat by the men of the Navy SEALs. Instead, the U.S. Marine Corps had combat tested the Stoner as early as 1966. The USMC tested the Stoner, had it modified, liked it, and were promptly told they couldn’t have them.

As has been mentioned, the Stoner 63 was unique in the field of military weapons. A single receiver could be used to assemble any of a variety of weapons, from short carbine to a fixed machine gun. When set up as a carbine or rifle, the gas system of the Stoner is above the barrel and the weapon fires from closed-bolt. Set up as a belt or magazine fed machine gun, the gas system of the Stoner can be seen below the barrel and the weapon fires from open bolt. This arrangement allows the Stoner to fire most accurately (closed bolt) as a shoulder weapon while the open-bolt system allows air to circulate better and prevents cook-offs in a support-fire automatic weapon.

Early in 1967, the SEALs first became interested in the Stoner 63, primarily as a belt fed light machine gun. The SEALs were entering a new stage in their direct actions in Vietnam. SEAL Team Two was just starting to deploy platoons for combat in Vietnam at the end of January, 1967. Maximum firepower in a minimum package was a prime concern to the SEALs. On January 17, 1967, the US Navy Test Station ordered eight Stoner 63 light machine guns for testing in combat by the SEALs.

Within a month of the new Stoners being received by the Navy, they were sent out to the SEALs in Vietnam. The limited number of weapons available resulted in only one Stoner being shipped to each deployed platoon. Though the Stoner was known for requiring regular maintenance for consistent functioning, the weapon was well received by the SEALs.

SEAL TEAM ONE – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORY – 1967

SPECIAL TOPICS

(b) PERFORMANCE OF WEAPON SYSTEMS

The Stoner system malfunctioned frequently, but the problem has been eliminated to a certain extent by the proper indoctrination of personnel on the gas system of the weapon. The Stoner system performs well when properly cared for and is the most effective automatic weapon for SEAL Team operations. The weapon itself is sufficiently light that the automatic weapons-man can carry a realistic combat load of ammunition and still move with relative ease.

There were a number of difficulties with the new weapon being fielded in the Teams. But in general the Stoner fit the need for a light weapon with high firepower nicely. One of the more unusual problems the operators had with the Stoner was a certain lack of ammunition. Though the Stoner fired the same .223 round the SEALs had in abundance for their M16’s, the Stoners required linked ammunition. Though a limited supply of pre-linked ammunition was supplied, packed in 150-round plastic ammunition boxes that could be hung on the Stoner, the majority of the Stoner’s ammunition had to be supplied locally.

The special S-63 link for the Stoner came packaged in a small cardboard drum that held thousands of links. The link was very much a reduced-size version of the M13 link used with the M60 machine gun but was unique to the Stoner weapons system. There were more problems with the Stoner 63 for the SEALs than just policing used links and loading belts. It was very much a case of one service not talking to the other that resulted in the SEALs having many of the same problems with their Stoners as did the Marine Corps when they tested the system.

In spite of the minor difficulties run in to while fielding the new weapon, the Stoner soon earned itself a solid position in the SEALs armory. The Stoner needed more cleaning and closer attention to detail in its maintenance than other weapons did, and there were still bugs that had to be worked out of the system.

The SEALs liked the Stoner, but the weapon still needed a good deal of improvement before being fielded in quantity. When the second Platoon of SEAL Team Two returned from Vietnam after their first deployment, a series of recommendations were listed by the Platoon officers and men. Included in these recommendations was a very specific one directed to the Stoner;

Excerpt from SEAL Team Two, 2nd Platoon’s Vietnam operations, 30 January to 30 May 1967

Weapons and Equipment

8. Use of the Stoner LMG is not recommended until the drum magazine becomes available.

The plastic box used to attach a supply of ammunition was considered just too difficult to use in its available form. Hanging as it did one the side of the LMG, when the box was knocked off by an operator’s knee, the ammunition belt would just trail out of the box into the mud. This was only one of several recommendations taken into account by the Navy when they ordered additional Stoners for the SEAL Teams. On 25 May, 1967, Cadillac Gage received a phone call from the Naval Ordnance Test Station requesting a delivery date for 36 additional Stoners. All of these weapons were to be 63As in the light machine gun configuration and equipped with the 150 round drum magazines.

The Stoner machine gun had become a stock item in the SEAL armory by the middle of 1967. Several hours were dedicated to the weapon, its use, and its maintenance during pre-deployment training for Vietnam. Each deploying SEAL platoon now had at least two Stoners, one for each squad, with more desired. SEALs who demonstrated a penchant for the weapon were usually allowed to carry one. These SEALs were often referred to as Stonermen in later recounting of particular actions. For the weapon itself, SEAL Team One was the primary unit for developmental items and the Stoner was secure on their list for attention;

SEAL TEAM ONE – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1967, Enclosure 3, (j) Research and Development, pg 13-14

.. A listing of special procurement actions completed is summarized below:

(#22) Stoner 63A
(#28) Stoner Drum Magazine
(#29) .223 Linking Machine for Stoner Ammunition

The new drum for the stoner made the weapon considerably more dependable while moving. An ammunition belt was secured in the drum and held underneath the receiver, close to center of balance of the weapon. Early experiments by Cadillac Gage in 1966 had resulted in a small 100 round drum, but this device was quickly dropped as impractical. The first model drums were made of spun aluminum and had a double-pinned bracket that secured them to the bottom of the receiver at the back of the forestock and front of the trigger group.

The double-pinned drums were secure, but very difficult to reload without taking them completely off the weapon. The second model drum was secured by a pin to the rear of the forestock where it was free to pivot. The rear portion of the drum mount had a lug that fit under the magazine catch on the front of the trigger group. This model drum could be unlatched and swung down for reloading without having to completely dismount the drum from the weapon.

The drum was mechanically very simple, not much more than a round container with a removable back. A 150 round belt would be coiled together in a counter-clockwise spiral and inserted into the back of the drum with the bullets forward. The loose end of the belt would be slipped up the guide located on the left side of the drum. The back of the drum would then be secured in place with its twist-latch and the ammunition supply for the Stoner would be ready for use.

A stamped-metal cover was hinged at the outside, top of the feed guide on the left side of the drum. This cover could be folded back, exposing a short length of the belt. A somewhat fragile spring clip was on the side of the drum’s feedway to help keep the loose belt from slipping back into the drum.

Individual SEALs developed their own manner of carrying ammunition for their Stoners. Since the drums were relatively slow to reload during a patrol, the loaded drum would be kept secured for use while moving on patrol. When set up for an ambush, another method would be used to feed the Stoner.

SEALs would often carry their extra supply of ammunition belts slung across their shoulders and crossing the chests and back like bandoleers. Sometimes, an extra t-shirt was worn over the belts, keeping them out of the worst of the dirt and mud and preventing them from shining. On getting into a fixed position, such as an ambush site, the belt in the drum of the Stoner would be taken out of the feed tray and left hanging from the drum.

A loose belt of ammunition from the SEALs “bandoleers” would be piled next to the weapon, possibly on a piece of cloth or gear to keep it out of the mud, and loaded into the weapon. In case the SEAL with the Stoner had to break cover and move out, it was a simple matter to snap the end of the drum’s belt onto whatever belt was left in the feed tray.

Unlatching the magazine release allowed the empty drum to swing down until the back cover was free of the weapon. Turning the cover latch would remove the whole back of the drum. To reload the drum in the field, a SEAL could reach to his bandoleers of belts and break the link connection between any two rounds.

Keeping the loops of belts in 150 round or shorter lengths made the next step in reloading a drum relatively easy. The SEAL would pull out his loose belt of ammunition, wrap it clockwise around his finger, and slip it into the back of the drum. feeding the end of the belt up the feed chute, securing the cover, and snapping the drum back into place underneath the weapon allowed the fresh belt to be loaded into the receiver.

Other SEALs made additional modifications to their weapons to fit them to the individual’s taste. No changes were allowed that could jeopardize the dependability of the weapon, otherwise it was up to the individual SEAL. When the Stoner 63A’s arrived at the two SEAL Teams, they were accompanied by a number of complete systems for the weapons. Though the primary configuration of the Stoner used by the SEALs was as the belt fed light machine gun. At least two SEALs used other configurations.

These SEALs found the carbine configuration of the Stoner to their liking. The only magazines supplied with the Stoner systems held a full 30 rounds of ammunition. This larger magazine capacity was considered a big plus by the SEALs who knew about it. The standard M16 magazine at that time (1967) held 20 rounds. The larger 30 round M16 magazines were available, but were very scarce in the SEAL Teams in 1967 and 1968. The short, handy, Stoner 63A carbine, with it’s folding stock and 30 round magazine was the only other configuration of the Stoner system to see any use by the SEAL Team in Vietnam.

One reason that the Stoner system didn’t see wider use with the SEALs in the carbine or rifle configurations was the limited number of 63A receivers that had been purchased by the Navy. Eventually, all of the available weapons were set up as belt fed light machine guns. But some of the conversion parts were still put to use by the SEALs. At least one Stonerman attached the vinyl-covered tubular steel (referred to as the wire type) folding stock of the carbine configuration to his Stoner machine gun. This made for a very compact package of firepower, even though the folding stock wouldn’t secure properly to the side of the weapon.

In spite of the good reception the Stoner received from the SEALs, there were still a number of problems with the design that had to be worked out. Most of these details developed from the SEALs experience with the weapons. The SEALs also gave their Stoners a lot of hard usage so even with the careful maintenance they received, weaknesses showed up faster with the Teams than they would have with other units.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1968, Enclosure 1, Special Topics, pg 9

The Stoner LMG has been modified due to suggestions submitted from members of SEAL Team TWO who have used the weapon in combat.

Cadillac Gage was very responsive to the SEAL requirements for modifications to the Stoner 63A. Feedback from the field resulted in a number of minor changes to the weapon. The only difficulty with the company response to the input from the Teams was the gradual changes in the parts to the Stoner system. It soon became hard for anyone not very familiar with the differences between the Stoner 63 and the 63A and the Team’s requested modifications to the 63A to make sure the correct parts went into the correct model guns.

But during the Vietnam era, such problems of commonality of parts were not a difficulty for the SEALs. Operators who preferred the Stoner made sure that their weapons operated correctly, and this testing was conducted constantly during predeployment training. This made sure that any problems were corrected long before any specific Stoner went into combat.

One problem with the Stoner centered on the basic design of the weapon and took a major change to correct it. The ejection port on the Stoner was on the left side of the weapon when set up in the light machine gun configuration. Feeding from either the plastic box hanging from the feed tray or the 150 round drum caused a jam known as “spin-back”.

Sometimes when firing, an ejected cartridge case would strike the box, or more often the drum, and bounce back into the receiver. The empty case would block the bolt going forward and stop the weapon from firing until it was cleared. This problem did not happen constantly, only about one or two percent of the time when the weapon was fired. This spin back problem was serious enough to require correcting.

Moving the ejection port of the Stoner was out of the question as that would require a major change in the receiver and a number of internal parts. Instead, the direction of feeding was changed from the left side of the weapon to the right. The right hand feed involved replacing the feed cover and feed tray but eliminated being able to use the drum magazine. SEALs who found that their individual Stoner either didn’t have spin-back problems, or liked the drum enough to accept the occasional jam, stayed with the left-hand feed. Others used the new right hand feed mechanism and a new method of feeding a belt.

SEAL TEAM ONE – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1969, Enclosure (2) (c) 6, Research and Development

2. SEAL Team ONE is in the process of being supplied with a new type of feed system for the Stoner Weapon, that practically eliminates the danger of shell spinback which was one of the major causes of malfunctions.

c. LINKING MACHINE FOR 5.56MM BALL AMMUNITION – Provides a portable linking machine for 5.56 MM Ball ammunition as used by the Stoner 63A weapon system. One unit is now in SEAL Team [ONE].

Along with the right hand feed mechanism was a new method of loading the Stoner 63A with the 100 round plastic boxes. The hanger was a device that fit underneath the center line of the receiver, in the same position the belt drum was in. A plastic ammunition box could be slipped into the hanger where it would be held securely and the belt fed into the weapon. The box hanger system went through a number of variations with only one design seeing widespread use.

The box hanger that became standard issue was a right hand feed system that held a single 100 round ammunition box horizontally across the underside of the receiver. The belt fed up a covered tray and into the feed cover. A spring-loaded latch was on the inside of the hanger’s feed tray to keep the belt from slipping back into the ammunition box when the weapon wasn’t firing. This latch helped cut back on the strain on the feed mechanism.

A new style of quick-detachable mount was used to hold the standard box hanger in place underneath the receiver of the weapon. A spring-loaded plunger was squeezed to release the front latch, which fit over the forestock holding pin. The rear of the quick-detach mount had a curved protrusion that fit over the front pin of the trigger group. This box hanger only worked with a right-hand feed top cover and feed tray. But other systems were tried.

Both China Lake and Cadillac Gage made a variety of box hangers and drums to try and come up with the best ammunition holding system for the Stoner. Some left-hand feed box hangers were made, but these had the same spin-back problems as the drum. A 250-round belt drum was made in limited numbers at China Lake for testing by the SEALs. But the Stonermen who tried the 250-round drum found it was too large and unbalanced the weapon, making it clumsy to handle.

Other box hangers were tried that held 150 round plastic ammunition boxes or secured the ammunition belt under a long cover, hinged at the bottom. None of these systems found the acceptance of the right-hand feed, 100 round belt box hanger.

But with the belt box hanger came another new problem with loading the Stoner 63A. The cocking lever for the machine gun versions of the Stoner 63A was still in the same location as the lever for the earlier 63 model. The cocking lever had been made longer on the 63A, and was more secure to use. But the box hanger and the right hand feed interfered with the operator easily reaching the cocking handle to charge the weapon. The feed tray of the box hanger would block much of the cocking lever so that the operator could only reach the lever with one or two fingers.

To ease the cocking lever problem, a solution was taken from the carbine and rifle configurations of the Stoner 63A. The forestock for the Stoner 63A machine gun was modified with a wide, six-inch long slot cut in the bottom center of the handguard. The protruding rod cocking lever of the carbine and rifle versions was modified by removing the center plunger and installed under the barrel of the machine gun, fitting through the slot in the bottom of the handguard.

Now a Stoner gunner could use either hand to pull back the cocking rod, easily charging the machine gun with whatever feeding system the weapon might be mounted with. Some operators found the protruding cocking rod to be a little short for their comfort. A piece of tubing forced over the rod of the cocking piece would extend it several inches and satisfy the operators who thought it too small.

The size and weight of a weapon was always a consideration in the Teams. Even with its light weight, the SEALs wanted the Stoner to be made even more compact if possible. Using the carbine configuration barrel as a starting point, Cadillac Gage designed a short, heavy machine gun barrel for the SEALs in 1968.

This short barrel was heavier and larger in diameter than the carbine barrel, but was the same overall length. To cut down on the weight of the short machine gun barrel, the outside was fluted with six deep flutes cut lengthwise into the steel. The flutes removed some weight and increased the surface area of the barrel, allowing it to radiate heat better and cool quicker.

Referring to the new barrel as their “commando” model, Cadillac Gage began supplying the new part to the SEAls in 1968. The short barrel also had a gas port selector underneath the front sight, but this selector only had two settings. The commando barrel could be slipped onto any SEAL Stoner 63A, removing 6.25 inches of length and about 1.56 pounds of weight.

A short commando barrel, right hand feed top cover, and 150-round drum, assembles a Stoner 63A into what is considered the “classic” SEAL Stoner configuration. Most of the 63As in SEAL hands were modified with the new cocking system and the new right-hand feed mechanisms. The short commando barrel had some difficulties in operating the Stoner in certain environments. With the very short section of barrel, actually just the flash hider, in front of the gas port (underneath the front sight) there is very little residual gas pressure to operate the action of a Stoner fitted with the short barrel. The longer standard barrel maintained a higher gas pressure for a longer time when the weapon was fired. This allowed for a greater level of energy to be available to operate a dirty or sluggish action.

But a number of SEALs swore by the new short barrels and made sure that their Stoners remained as clean and well lubricated as possible. The advantage of the short commando barrel was that it made a compact weapon even smaller and easier to handle in the close brush and jungle. Some SEALs made the Stoner an even more compact weapon for close-in use by removing the buttstock completely and trying a piece of line onto the weapon to act as a sling.

The short commando barrel, right hand feed, and 100 round box hanger completed the final version of the SEAL Stoner. This weapon resulted from the input of the SEALs having used the Stoner in combat for almost two full years. In this final form, the Stoner received a nomenclature assignment by the Navy as the Mark 23 Mod 0. The original request for the nomenclature was submitted on 14 March 1969, Mark number assigned on 31 October 1969, and the final approval made on 4 December 1969. The description of the weapon on the assignment request was;

Gun, Machine, 5.56 Millimeter, Mark 23 Mod 0 …is a gas operated 5.56MM automatic weapon using disintegrating metallic belts, belt fed, fires from the open bolt position, has a quick change barrel, with right hand twist rifling (6 grooves) one turn in 12 inches, fires 700 to 1000 rounds per minute, with a muzzle velocity of 3256 feet per second. Giving a maximum range of 2895 yards (2653 meters), the maximum effective range is 1203 yards (1100 meters). The overall length is 40.25 inches. The gun empty weighs 11.68 pounds. Manufactured by Cadillac Gage Company, Roseville, Michigan. Company designation is 5.56M light machine gun, belt fed, Stoner 63A

The nomenclature assignment fit both the long and short barreled Stoner, with either the right or left hand feed. All Navy purchases of the Mark 23 Mod 0 were of the short-barreled, right hand feed versions with the 100 round box hanger. The Mark 23 was offered by Cadillac Gage to other military customers as the “Commando machine gun.”

The correct nomenclature of the final configuration of the SEAL Stoner becomes difficult at this point. The Mark 23 Mod 0 Stoner was referred to as the Stoner 63A in most Cadillac Gage literature and this was the designation used by SEAL Team Two.

Receiver markings on the Stoner series had not significantly changed during the entire production run except for the address of the company. All Cadillac Gage Stoners were marked STONER 63 .223 CAL. just in front of the serial number. All of the modifications requested by the SEALs and incorporated as a whole in the Mark 23 resulted in significant changes in the weapon. Both SEAL Team Two and Navy documentation refer to the Mark 23 as being known commercially as the Stoner 63A1.

NWM of Holland had licensed production of the Stoner weapons system for sale in Europe. Only a handful of the Dutch weapons were produced, reportedly on about 60 US made receivers. These weapons were advertised in a September 1969 booklet produced by NWM and titled the Stoner 63A1 Weapons Modifications. The machine gun configuration illustrated in the booklet, identified as the XM207, was identical to the Mark 23 except for an NWM designed bipod and mount and a long barrel.

The most numerous Stoners in SEAL hands were the Mark 23/63A1 weapons purchased by the Navy in 1969 and 1970.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1969, Enclosure 1, VI NEW EQUIPMENT, pg 14

4. (U) During the year, the Team received twelve new Stoner 63A1 light machine guns which, although they are only half the operational quota requested, will help provide each platoon with greater firepower in the field.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1970, Enclosure 1, VI. NEW EQUIPMENT, pg 12

3. (U) Twelve new Stoner 63A1 light machine guns were received. Each deployed platoon now has two of these weapons per squad.

Estimates according to available documents puts the number of Stoners purchased outright by the Navy for the SEALs at 8 Stoner 63s, 36 Stoner 63A’s, and 48 Stoner 63A1’s (as Mk 23’s). Additional Stoner receivers and systems may have been transferred into the Teams from the stocks of Marine weapons that had been turned in to storage.

With the final acceptance of the Mark 23 machine gun, no further purchases were made of parts for the Stoner 63’s that were in inventory or accessories that would fit the earlier weapons. This means that drums gradually became harder to find for those SEALs who preferred that method of loading. Though the drums were simple and had few parts, the method of securing the rear cover with a twist latch was subject to wear. This resulted in an increasing number of drums being sealed with tape prior to going out on an operation. This made reloading the drums very difficult in the field.

As a field-expedient solution, a number of SEALs modified a mount for the Stoner that would accept the ammunition drum from the Soviet RPD machine gun. The Soviet RPD used a stamped steel drum to contain a 100-round non-disintegrating metal belt of 7.62x39mm ammunition. The drums were commonly found in munitions caches and were available to the SEALs in some numbers.

Each RPD drum would hold a 150-round belt of Stoner ammunition easily, and feed it smoothly into the weapon. The quick-detachable mount portion of an ammunition box hanger could be removed by simply cutting away two rivets. A sheet metal extension would be locally fabricated and secured to the mount with two screws. The addition of a twist latch, such as used on a screen window, completed the mount. The RPD drum mount would fit underneath a Stoner and could be set up to feed into either a right or left-hand feed weapon. In addition, an empty RPD drum was easily and quickly exchanged for a loaded one to reload the weapon.

Throughout the Vietnam War, the Stoners were demonstrated to be a useful addition to the SEALs arsenal. But this didn’t come without a cost. Technical training on the Stoner weapons system was increased to help minimize problems with the weapon.

SEAL TEAM TWO – COMMAND AND CONTROL HISTORIES

1969, Enclosure (1) V. PREDEPLOYMENT TRAINING

Some members of deploying platoons…….received special training in the maintenance and use of the Stoner 63A1 light machine gun and the M16A1 rifle. The machine gun instruction was administered by the manufacturer of the weapon, Cadillac Gage Company, Detroit, Michigan

Any new weapons system has to go through a development process to locate and eliminate errors in the design. Sometimes these errors were located with little more than some difficult incidents for the operator.

The quick disconnect barrel of the Stoner was held in place with a push-button latch just in front of the feed cover. With the bolt cocked, the only thing holding the barrel in place was the barrel latch. If the latch had been depressed accidentally, such as while moving through brush on a patrol, as soon as the trigger was pulled, in forward moving bolt had as good a chance of pushing the barrel off of the weapon as it did of firing the cartridge it had stripped from the belt.

In spite of the general opinion the SEALs had about the Stoner, there had been some serious incidents with the weapon. One incident in particular almost resulted in the Navy dropping the weapon entirely. To field-strip the Stoner for cleaning, one step in the procedure is to remove a takedown pin found just above and behind the pistol grip, With the takedown pin withdrawn, the receiver can pivot up and away from the stock and trigger group. This allows the bolt and internal mechanism of the Stoner to be withdrawn.

With the Stoner machine gun operating from an open bolt and the sear which holds the bolt in the cocked position part of the trigger group, separating these parts with the bolt cocked will release it to drive forward. If there is a round in the feed tray, the weapon will fire. If there is a belt in the feed tray, the weapon will fire uncontrollably until either the belt runs out, or the bolt flies out of the back of the partially opened weapon. Something very close to this situation happened to a squad of SEALs from SEAL Team One while inserting on an operation.

Mike Platoon of SEAL Team One was operating in the Kien Hoa province of Vietnam, having moved down into the Mekong Delta area from the Rung Sat Special Zone just a short time earlier. On 29 April, 1968, the platoon was moving in for an insertion from a Mark 4 landing craft. The trip to the insertion point was an uneventful one up to a point. The SEALs were relaxing aboard the boat as was normal prior to an operation. One SEAL, Walter Pope, was armed with a Stoner 63A fitted with a 150 round drum. The Stoner was up, leaning against the side of the armored landing craft as the unit moved along the waterway.

It was never determined exactly what happened next, but the sudden results were that Pope’s Stoner fell over on its side as it began firing wildly. According to witnesses, Pope had not been touching the weapon when the incident began, but suddenly the Stoner was firing uncontrollably.

Frank Toms, reclining nearby, was half-asleep when the accident happened. He was suddenly awakened when he was struck with an estimated 6 to 10 bullets from the runaway Stoner. Walter Pope dove onto the firing Stoner and pulled it into himself to stop the firing and protect his teammates in the boat. Pope took an estimated 40 rounds from the Stoner but prevented any one else from being struck with the ricocheting rounds bouncing around inside the armored boat.

First Class Boatswain’s Mate Walter Pope was killed instantly, but saved his fellow SEALs in the boat. Frank Toms recovered from his wounds. The intense investigation that followed could only come up with the most probable reason the accident occurred. The take down pin on the trigger group of the Stoner at that time was retained by it’s own friction and a small spring detent in the pin itself. It is thought that the vibration from the boat’s engines and pitching of the craft in the water worked the takedown pin free of Pope’s Stoner.

Sitting as it was, muzzle up, the force of gravity as well as the spring tension inside the cocked weapon would have combined to separate the two parts of the receiver, releasing the bolt to drive forward. In this situation, the weapon would have continued firing until it had jammed or run out of ammunition.

As far as Frank Toms is concerned, Pope’s actions that day saved his Teammates and is deserving of the highest award that can be given. The SEALs were in immediate contact with Cadillac Gage about the incident, how it happened, and how to prevent it from ever happening again.

The pivot pin that held the feed cover to the receiver of the Stoner was secured in a different manner than the detent-held takedown pin. The pivot pin is made of two parts that screw together securely, and are further held together by a spring detent inside the body of the pin. It takes the point of a bullet to release the detent and then the two parts have to be unscrewed before the pin can be removed.

This pin was immediately supplied by Cadillac Gage to the Teams in sufficient quantities to replace all of the earlier pins in service. The field stripping procedure on the Stoners with the new pins took a little longer, but the accidental discharge of a weapon due to the receivers separating didn’t happen again.

The Stoner was not the only light machine gun used by the SEALs in Vietnam, But it was one of the most unique. All production of the Stoner ceased by 1971 and Cadillac Gage closed the records on the weapon system in 1973. The Stoner remained in the SEAL inventory until the early 1980’s. By 1983, the last few Stoners remaining in SEAL hands were removed from active duty due to a lack of parts and support to maintain the weapons in operating condition.

On March 30, 1964, Cadillac Gage received order SS-22 for 60 rifles and 20 complete systems from ARPA, The large order was for weapons to be tested by the US Marine Corps. The Marines had been suitably impressed with the Stoner system and ARPA had agreed with their request to field test the new weapon.

Marine enthusiasm for the Stoner was well received and they took in some of the earliest weapons made. Stoner 63’s, serial numbers 00004 and 00005 are still maintained in the Marine Corps Museum’s small arms collection. Springfield Armory also ordered two fixed Stoner 63s during the Spring of 1964 for test purposes.

In May the Aberdeen Proving Grounds report on the Stoner was made to the Army. In July, the Office of the Chief of Research and Development made his report on the Stoner to ARPA. Neither of these reports listed the weapon in glowing terms. This situation is hardly surprising given that the Army had just recently been forced to accept a number of AR-15 rifles.

The leadership at Cadillac Gage still thought the future of the Stoner 63 looked promising. The manufacture of the weapon centered around sheet metal stamping, forming, and precision welding. The California Cadillac Gage facilities were inadequate to the task of mass producing the new weapon but the company also had a manufacturing facility in Detroit where the mechanical support for such manufacture was easily available. Detroit was the center of the automobile industry and the precision forming and welding of sheet metal was a common practice for such manufacture.

In September, 1964, after some 234 Stoner 63s had been produced and serial numbered, Cadillac Gage moved the production of the weapon to their facilities in Michigan. The Arms Development and Engineering staff, Eugene Stoner among them, moved to the newly set up Weapons Manufacturing Facilities in Roseville, Michigan, just north of Detroit. At this time, the wooden stocks and pistol grips on the Stoner 63 were changed. Grips and stocks were now made of polycarbonate plastic, though the forestock for the machine gun configuration remained black-painted wood.

General Wallace Green, the Commandant of the Marine Corps, had been impressed with the idea of the Stoner family of weapons. This may have come about in no small part due to Cadillac Gage hiring a newly retired Marine Colonel who, during the end part of his military career, spoke to General Green convincingly on the advantages such a system offered to the Corps. Colt at the time, was offering what they called a family of weapons based on the AR-15. But the Colt weapon system, the CAR-15, was made up of specific firearms which could not be interchanged easily. This did not meet some of the advantages of the Stoner 63.

The situation did start to look very good for the future of the Stoner 63 system in 1965. On 23 April 1965, the Army Weapons Command put in an order for 861 Stoner weapons in various configurations for testing as part of the new Small-Arms Weapons Systems (SAWS) program. Within just a few days of this purchase order being issued, the Marine Corps Landing Force Development center (MCLFDC) test report was delivered to Marine Corps Headquarters.

The MCLFDC report recommended the Stoner 63 for further, more advanced, field testing. This report helped fuel the enthusiasm for the Stoner 63 among the Corps Command and Marine Corps Commandant General Wallace Greene in particular. This situation was not well received by the Army Weapons Command who strongly disliked the new AR-15 rifle over the M14 rifle. For the Army, it was now looking like the Marine Corps was going to push for another, completely different, .223 caliber weapon that also could compete with the still new M60 machine gun.

On 20 December, 1965, the Marine Corps put in an order for 1,080 Stoner rifles as well as the parts necessary to assemble other configurations of the weapon. Extensive testing of the Stoner system by the Marine Corps did indicate some weaknesses in the system that needed correction. In the first several months of 1966, these weaknesses were identified and brought to the attention of Cadillac Gage.

While the modification problem was being addressed, the Marine Corps continued their testing of the Stoner 63 system. results from the field were varied, but in general, the weapon system was well liked by many of the men employed in testing it. Substantial tactical and logistical advantages were found in using the system by the evaluation groups. Testers included one rifle company, a platoon of the division reconnaissance battalion, and a platoon of the force reconnaissance company.

An almost immediate change to the fielding of the Stoner weapons system during evaluations was the dropping of the automatic rifle configuration. It was found that the automatic rifle was the least dependable of all of the Stoner 63 configurations. This was due to the top-loading magazine feed used in the automatic rifle. It was found during Marine testing that every time the automatic rifle was loaded, any sand, dirt, or foreign material in the magazine was poured directly into the receiver. With the open bolt of the automatic rifle configuration, this material jammed the action causing an unacceptable number of stoppages.

The remainder of the Stoner 63 weapons system was evaluated by the Marine Corps during March, April, and May, 1967. A comparison testing of the new M16E1 was conducted by the same test groups during June and July of that same year. Test results were tabulated and the report made at the end of August that same year.

Testing showed the Stoner rifle had the advantages of weight, accuracy, improved ammunition, and compatibility with other weapons (the balance of the 63 system), when compared to the standard M14 rifle. The Stoner rifle was found to have a lower reliability than the M14, but this problem was considered correctable with modifications. The difference in reliability between the Stoner 63 and the M14 was not considered significant when considering the overall advantages of the entire system. When compared to the M16E1, the Stoner 63 Rifle was found to be more accurate, more reliable, and had a family of weapons that it was compatible with.

The Stoner light and medium machine gun configurations also received high recommendations by the majority of Marine testers. The Stoner light machine gun was considered a suitable replacement for the automatic rifle configuration in the Marine rifle squad. The LMG and MMG were found to be highly reliable when compared to any other machine gun in the Marine testing environment.

The Marine testing was extensive. Boot Camp trainees were issued with the Stoner and completed their training cycle with it, in the process scoring higher during weapons qualifications than any comparable Marine unit. Stoners were taken into limited combat in Vietnam, where the design was proven to be accurate and reliable in the jungle environment.

The results of the first major Marine Corps evaluation of the Stoner 63 weapons system were very positive. In the words of the evaluation committee;

3. The basic conclusions of the evaluation are that the Stoner family of weapons provides substantial tactical and logistics advantages. There are some relatively minor modifications required prior to acceptance but none of these appears to create any problem. The system received a high degree of acceptance from personnel involved.

4. The Stoner Weapons System is strongly recommended for adoption.

Some of the difficulties with the Stoner 63 had been addressed by Cadillac Gage prior to the evaluations being run by the Marine Corps. The order for evaluation weapons put forward by the Marine Corps in December 1965, had been filled with the available Stoner 63s. The redesign of the Stoner 63 to the Stoner Model 63A was completed in March 1966. Changes from the Stoner 63 to the 63A configuration include;

a. Larger gas port opening b. Chromium plated chamber c. Stronger and better fitting dust covers d. A relieved breech block cam pin e. A gas nitrided bore f. Separate safety in front of trigger guard g. Feed tray machined casting instead of stamped metal h. Three position gas port valve i. Redesigned stock and forearm of polycarbonate material j. Three piece cleaning rod fitted inside of forearm k. ENDURION metal finish on all exposed surfaces l. Bipod locks onto weapon or locks open for stowage m. Right side belt feed mechanism available, exchanges w/left side feed n. Over-the-shoulder assault sling available o. Upper sling swivel attached to front of barrel handle

The removable trigger guard of the Stoner 63, intended for using the weapon when wearing gloves or mittens and easily lost during testing, was replaced with a permanently attached trigger guard. The size of the plastic ammunition box that could be hung onto the side of the light machine gun was reduced from 150 round to 100 rounds. It was found that the larger box was easily struck by the users leg when patrolling and could be knocked off the weapon.

Other changes to the system included replacing the folding stock of the carbine with a wire folding stock that had considerably fewer parts. The cocking handle of the Stoner 63 was the same for all of the weapons in the system. A perforated length of handle with an outward curved end extended along the side of the handguard, right over the gas tube. On the rifle/carbine versions of the Stoner 63, this handle was on the upper left side of the weapon, above the forestock. On the machine gun versions, the cocking handle was at the lower right side of the weapon, just behind the forestock.

For the rifle and carbine versions of the Stoner 63A, the cocking handle had been completely changed from the original. A small lug had been welded onto the operating rod, several inches behind the piston head. The new cocking handle was located on top of the receiver, over the barrel and handguard, where it could be reached by the operator with either hand easily. The new cocking lever rode along a slot cut into the receiver, just below the gas tube, and engaged the lug welded onto the operating rod. A plunger in the center of the operating handle could be pushed down by the operator and used to push the bolt forward to assist it to close.

For the machine gun versions of the Stoner 63A, the cocking lever engaged the new lug on the bottom of the operating rod, but was otherwise in the same place as in the earlier system. The machine gun cocking rod had been made longer so that it could be more easily reached.

The feed cover of the machine gun had been improved in both strength, manufacture, and function. The cap carrier had been redesigned to include a spring plunger mechanism. In the Stoner 63A, the feed cover could be closed with the bolt in any position while in the Stoner 63 the feed cover could only be closed with the bolt in the cocked position to insure no damage to the weapon.

Another change to the feed system of the Stoner 63A was the development of a drum carrier for the ammunition belt. The final drum design would hold a 150 round ammunition belt securely to the bottom of the weapon and feed the belt in smoothly while firing. The drum was made of spun aluminum to keep weight to a minimum and was securely attached to the receiver of the 63A.

To help keep the system from being jammed by excess dirt, spring loaded covers were placed over both the ejection port of the receiver and the link ejection port on the feed cover. The ejection port cover on the receiver would spring open and remain that way as soon as the bolt carrier moved. The cover over the link ejection port only opened when a link was being ejected and otherwise remained closed.

The gas tube of the 63A was made from 17-4 PH stainless steel to minimize corrosion and giving the new tube a silver outside finish. The inside of the gas tube of the 63A was remachined to prevent carbon build up from jamming the gas piston. This allowed the 63A to fire for longer periods of time between cleanings of the gas system. From roughly serial number 2,000, all Stoners produced by Cadillac Gage were built as 63A’s. No changes were incorporated in the markings Cadillac Gage stamped into the receivers of their Stoners and all weapons remained marked “Stoner 63”.

The large number of improvements in the Stoner 63A system made the weapon of even greater interest to the Marine Corps. On 3 October, 1966, Cadillac Gage received an order from the Marine Corps to modify 286 weapons to the new 63A configuration. The new weapons were scheduled for extensive testing under combat conditions in Vietnam. This combat test series was to be completed by May 31, 1967.

On March 3, 1967, a further order was received from the Marine Corps, this one for an additional 8 weapons to be converted to the 63A model. These additional weapons were intended for further testing under controlled conditions to confirm the field trial results. The tests did confirm what had been determined by most of the Marine users. The Stoner 63A was considered suitable for Marine Corps use without further testing.

Cadillac Gage received a further order from the Marine Corps on 19 April, 1967, for ammunition linking systems and spare parts for the overseas support of the 286 63A systems in Marine Corps hands. But shortly after this order was received, the Army Weapons Command declared the Stoner 63 and 63A to not be acceptable for issue at the time.

Without much fanfare, all of the Stoners in Marine hands were to be turned in. The Army was still interested in the Stoner 63A as a light machine gun, but only as a low-priority project. Army tests of the Stoner to approve the system for procurement were considered extremely biased. But for whatever reason, the question of the Stoner in Marine hands was over by the middle of 1967.