Japanese Surrender Pistol

jbc23060

Anyone here ever heard of such a pistol? A friend says he has one and the wrinkle is that it is supposed to discharge as soon as you pick it up, thus injuring the taker. He's afraid to fool with it and I haven't actually seen it. Any W.A.G.'s?

rufe-snow

It's the old wives tale (fiction) regarding the Type 94. Part of the sear bar is external (exposed on the side of the receiver). Just so much gun shop commando phantasy & BS.

perry shooter

Hello he might be talking about the semi auto type 94 that is said to be fired without touching the trigger but squeezing on the side of the slide.

p3skyking

The fellows named it correctly but why would your friend be worried since he probably has no ammo for it. 8mm Nambu is only sporatically produced, rare, and the cheapest box available is $35/50. They actually work and shoot pretty good as long as someone isn't shooting back at you. They were only made for a few years during the war and manufacture ceased during 1945. They are dated on the side by numbers like this;

19.3

The first number is the year according to the years the emperor has reigned. In this case, Hiro Hito called his reign "Showa" which means "Enlighted Peace" and it began in 1925. Add 19 to 1925 and you get 1944. The 3 is the third month, March. So a pistol so marked would be made in March of '44. Use whatever numbers are on his pistol and you will arrive at the manufactured date. Another example;

3.11

That would be November of 1928.

Now go blow him away with your knowledge of HIS gun![:p]

1KYDSTR

I agree with what the others have said. The type 94 was a rather inelegant design which replaced the overly complicated but well designed Nambu pistols. Sorta reminds me of the US going from the 1911 to the Berretta 92. The 92 gets it done but the older design, I feel does it better and has tons more knockdown power. The external sear does indeed make this a rather dangerous weapon, but the tales of a surrender gun are absolutely untrue. The Japanese were couts martialed for surrendering, and they preferred to booby trap souvenirs to perhaps get the odd American serviceman. There is the saying that goes something like "the Japanese fought for the Emperor, the English fought for Queen and Empire and the Germans fought for the Fuhrer. The Americans fought for souvenirs". Plenty of soldiers met their ends picking up crap off the battlefield they shouldn't have, but I assume that while it could have happenned once or twice, I doubt there are any DOCUMENTED cases of a Japanese soldier shooting a US soldier that way. Additioally, they would have been shot on sight with a weapon of ANY kind in their hands. Placing a pair of granades under their armoits and walking out of cover and raising their hands whwn they were closer to the US troops was the more common way to "take a few with 'Ya".

gruntled

Not unless they were American grenades. The Japanese grenades weren't set off that way but I do remember seeing an old war movie that had an American nurse doing that to the Japanese.
Those old war movies on each side had the bad guys all pulling the same sneaky tricks. I remember one that had the Japs surrendering & then falling down with one guy having a machine gun on his back.
Just a short time ago I saw a short section of a Japanese wartime propaganda movie with the exact same scene except it was British soldiers makeing the fake surrender.
I also saw a British propaganda film purporting to show the Germans using Q type ships.

jbc23060

Great information, as always, in here. I will pass this along. Thanks for your help!!

11echo

I have to agree with 1KYDSTR assessment, the 94 Nambu was rather crude, with the exposed sear ...not as away to "out smart" some unlucky G.I., it was just a POOR design!
FYI, Japanese grenades were started with acid chemical ignition. Normally the Japanese soldiers would strike the grenades on rocks or other hard surfaces ...to include their helmets! Unfortunately ignition didn't always happen at first blow! In fact I have a T-38 carbine my Dad had brought home from his efforts with the 25th Div at Balete Pass in the Philippines, for that reason. A Japanese soldier would stand up and made 3 attempts to ignite a grenade and throw it at my father; unfortunately for the Japanese solider he did it from the same place at about 5 to 10 second intervals. third time was the charm, Dad was waiting!