Lee-Enfield Rifles captured in Afghanistan 2006

[Peter Laidler]

Being cack-handed in an SA80 world is a bit irksome AND dangerous!

[Richard Hare]

Cinders,

Funny how it changes though.
I'm right -handed in most things, but left -handed with a shovel, pitchfork, and such, But!.....if anyone uses a cricket bat like I do, or a scythe, or baseball bat, he's considered Right -handed! (left hand at top of the handle)
So "Right -handed " is not consistent either.

"Murdered an ice -cream vendor"!! LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Sentryduty]

Eating with your right hand is a reminder of judgement day and the hereafter.

Well there is that, and use of gesturing with the left hand is considered a serious social slight because it's used as the cleaning hand post washroom visits. Toilet paper, and handwashing basins in a lavatory not being a common item in much of the country.

Thumbs up is actually a bad thing, unless the person had a lot of western exposure, then it was "who know's".

And in some villages it was customary for the children to bless your vehicles with thrown rocks and masonry in both greeting and farewell, such a fascinating culture.

[Peter Laidler]

Remember being advised that it was bad form or abusive to hand signal someone to '....come here' using the palm and fingers upwards as you do? There it was always done palm and fingers downwards. In Iraq all the tribal war lords seemed to know a good thing when they saw it, by wearing gold Omegas or Rolexes

[Seaspriter]

I'm right -handed in most things, but left -handed with a shovel, pitchfork, and such, But!.....if anyone uses a cricket bat like I do, or a scythe, or baseball bat, he's considered Right -handed! (left hand at top of the handle)
So "Right -handed " is not consistent either.

Richard: I'm the same way -- eat left handed, throw right handed, play hockey left handed, switch hit in baseball, golf right handed. Most R-L handed people have one parent who was left-handed and one right-handed (FWIW). Our brains are actually wired differently than those who use one hand predominantly.

[Cold_Zero]

Attachment 70988

Not many lefties in Afghanistan.

Very interesting. The negative was backwards in my original post.

[Flying10uk]

Of all the Lee Enfield Rifles that have turned up/been captured over the years in Afghanistan is it only SMLEs that have shown up as Kiber Pass copies or have No4 mk1/mk2 copies also made an appearance? I don't recall ever hearing of any reference to them. Thanks for any info.

[Peter Laidler]

Never saw a No4 copy that came back but did see a fair few cut-downs and doctored. That's not to say that they haven't been copied of course. Mind you, the quality of the Fazakerley made No4's looked like they were from the Khyber Pass........ just joking! But I would suggest that the reason why they're not copied in any great numbers is that by the time it came to start replacing their old clapped No1's with later No4's, the AK47 and M were plentiful. And I know what I'd prefer. Having said that, we did see AK copies and quite a few AK-SU's

[Paul S.]

Of all the Lee Enfield Rifles that have turned up/been captured over the years in Afghanistan is it only SMLEs that have shown up as Kiber Pass copies . . .

I wonder if the SMLE's open sights versus the No.4's peep sight is a factor there? Little things can be a huge influence at times or, given culture, society, etc., in places.

[Sentryduty]

Never saw a No4 copy

Same here, I can't say they don't exist, but I never encountered one, perhaps they weren't able to get the tooling? LOL.

Peter's assessment is probably the correct one, and really, a Lee Enfield, is a Lee Enfield, for a Khyber pass "craftsman" there would be no reason to hammer out a different version of the same gun you have already been banging out for decades. They probably have their stone dies and scrap oil drums cut to just the right specification to bang out a perfect No.1 rear sight protector in only a handful of blind hits.

Each stock is carefully crafted from only the finest pallet grade timber, and stained to beautiful finish with very best of used Mahindra tractor oils.

There is a whole tooling up factor to consider, LOL.