Good-Morning from Korea!

So I've been on here for a while now, but better late than never, right?

I'm an Army MP, currently in Korea.

This is my second year here, so it's been a little while since I've shot my trusty carbine :/ 

Last year, long days and nights at gunnery and training in the field made it evident to me that it I needed a rifle of my own to look forward to when I came home.

So, I got an Inland from the CMP through the mail.

I took some leave between my first and the beginning of my second year. Out of everything I did throughout my 28 days back in the homeland, I think the best part was just shooting watermelons with my new war baby, by my old church, and just a few minutes away from my hometown- in Dayton, Ohio.

To me, these rifles, and especially the Inlands, are a direct connection to home. With that being said, politics permitting, hopefully the last of the Korean carbines can come home with me after this next election..? :D

Mr. Tinker,

I'm on Humphreys, too. How long ago were you stationed here, If you don't mind me asking?

Ibelflowers, that's pretty cool!

Korea has changed quite a bit since you've been here, I'm sure. God knows the Army has too.

Cali, that's a good idea. I've put some of my KATUSA's to work on finding who I can talk to about the carbines. No luck so far.  I'm  going to have to do more research though, and probably a little bit of talking to the KNP, I'm not taking any chances on ending up in their jail system!! But I do want to see if I can't at least bring one or two carbines/almost complete carbines home.

I've mostly carried 249's here. On occasion I carried the M4. Of course, on patrols I carried the M9. That was last year, though, this year I am in a more administrative-in-nature type job. Between the two long-guns, I liked the SAW more- to me, at least, it seemed the SAW was more reliable. With my luck, I always drew a weapon previously held by a KATUSA, and it seemed none of them cleaned their weapons, so there would often be noticeable rust throughout them. The way our weapons draw worked was kind of unorganized and often I would draw a different rifle than the one I carried before. In field conditions it was difficult to get rifles clean enough to reliably fire, but I had much better luck cleaning the 249 than the M4. At any rate, I just don't trust the M4, and so when I first sought to buy a rifle of my own, the 30 carbine was appealing. When I found out many of them were made in my hometown, I just had to have one!

Mr. Tinker- I didn't know you were an MP! Were you a part of the 557th?

Cali- if you don't mind telling me, I would like to know more about whom ever you said imported rifle stocks back to the states. I briefly discussed with an ATF official about import laws and the forms I would have to fill out, it seems I might be able to import parts or maybe even entire rifles (with a ton of paperwork and special authorizations- all hoops I'm willing to jump through if the opportunity presents itself). However, before I can do anything I need a Korean point of contact that has access to parts, rifles, etc. I'm doing my own investigating, but I think my best bet would be to find somebody who has done it before. Most of the Koreans I've spoken with don't know where to even begin looking. I have an idea of which offices might be responsible for some of the rifles, but even those offices are kind of big and there is no telling if any of them will know anything about them, or if they'll even care enough to look into it. Any thing you can tell me will definitely be appreciated!

I'm glad to know there's quite a few vets in the club. A wealth of knowledge of not just carbines but all around military and life experiences on here. I really appreciate you guys, this forum is exactly the wealth of information younger guys like myself need.

No Status of Forces Agreement! That sounds better than what we have now. I'm sure the Koreans would disagree, but I'm not a big fan of the KNP. In my experience they often pursue Americans much more aggressively than they will go after Koreans for the same crimes. In my opinion, if they don't think it's worth dealing with us to let us handle our own soldiers, then they shouldn't need us here..

Glad you had a good time though. Casey should be closing up soon; everybody is on their way down to Humphreys eventually. Or, so they've been saying anyway.

SP6? I've only heard rumors that there used to be old SP5 and above ranks. I've always wondered what that would be like- in practice- and why they got rid of the rank (to save money I'm guessing).

The story about your platoon sgt letting you take a class on the M2 is pretty cool. I'm guessing you were sort of the technical expert in the platoon for the M2 after that.

It will be interesting to see how your "sweet thing" replica turns out. I'll be sure to check your page every now and again :)