[Rembrandt]

...Mr Peabody and Sherman just invited you to take a trip in the "Way Back Machine"....headed for any period of time in History (you select the date and place), you can also take one firearm of your choice to perhaps influence history or give a technology boost to the firearm industry. (sorry no full autos)....what firearm and time period should Mr Peabody be prepared for?

(edited to be any time in History)

[Feanaro]

No full auto? Sissy.

GMG from HK, semi only since you insist, with plenty of ammo, World War I. If I could bring a blue print and a description of the polymer/plastic imagine what we could have today. And fortyish grenades a minute is a lot of explosives. Especially for WWI. :)

[cool45auto]

An AR15 during WWI would be nice.

[sm]

Even though I'm the eldest, I only knew one grandparent, and that grandmother died when I was 5.

I have heard tell of my grandfathers and great grandfathers skill afield. I don't know or care what firearm, I'd just want to be afield with them. I do know my maternal grandfather made knives, mother has his "hog killing" knife, made from a saw blade from the mill and a wooden handle he crafted ( he also did carpentry work). I want to see him make this.

Again being selfish, Ruark, Hemingway, Capstick, Teddy Roosevelt. Again I don't recall the firearms, I'd let these fine gentleman make the choice, I just want to meet and go afield with them.

I wouldn't have to be a written part of the history, I'd just want the satisfaction of having been there and experienced it.

[Rembrandt]

I was thinking about the Alamo, showing up with a scoped M1A and picking off Santa Anna....dressed up all pretty sitting on his horse....

...of course going T-Rex hunting with a Barrett 50 BMG would be a rush...

[CGofMP]

Interestingly enough I have thought about this before... and it is REALLY a TOUGH call.

I guess that I'd probably have to settle for the most obvious and probably the most trite example. I think I'd load up with a few rounds and a Nor-Cal Nighthawk (http://www.norcalprecision.com/) and slip back to the early thirties.

I'd drop a few rounds into an aspiring artist who later caused the deaths of millions of men, women, and children, and set the USA on a course of moving from an isolationist policy to this one-world-government sickness we are participating in, (thus watering down our sovereignty and personal rights).

There are certainly many many more possibilities, many ways history could be 'corrected' but the example above has more importance for this century and the future of our rights as Americans than most I can think of.

Still.. the tyranosaurus idea is cool....

This has shades of Minority Report (which I just watched last night) as well as the movie The Final Countdown... lots of time paradoxes and other such. I rememeber reading ]A Short Story (http://www.sba.muohio.edu/snavely/415/thunder.htm) in grade school about hunters going back in time and killing Dinosaurs just before they'd have died anyhow. One of the hunters sliped off th path and stepped on a butterfly... when he returned to 'present time' there were incredible changes... all from that one little butterfly.

Oh oh.. a time travel thread.. this could get strange..
Oh oh.. a time travel thread.. this could get strange..
..egnarts teg dlouc siht ..dearht levart emit a ..ho hO

Charles

http://norcalprecision.com/images/whiteonlynighthawkmediumshadowed.gif

[lostdog]

A glock...any glock, take it to the middle 1800's

[Mike Irwin]

Easy for me...

A BAR and a place in the line with King Harold's troops at the Battle of Hastings.

[winstonsmith]

Alamo seems fun. I'd use a flame thrower though. I'd get to Santa Anna eventually. I don't know if that counts as full auto.

Battling through the Bocage with an OICW would be interesting. Especially with infared....

Getting guy's in black pjs in vietnam with an OICW would be cool too.

On 50 caliber and T. Rexes:
Guys, c'mon.. do you really wanna shoot it with what is, relative to it, a pellet gun? I'd do it with.. hmm.. maybe an AC130. Not the gatling gun, but the howitzer. Maybe some white phosphor shells. So I wouldnt have to cook the meat.

:what: :what: :what: :what: :what: :what:
:uhoh:

[rebbryan]

.50 cal sniper rifle to 1930's and watch hitler's head pop

[John G]

I'd grab some buddies, with whatever small arms they wanted, for this fantasy I'll say shotguns. Then we'd zap back to around September 10th 2001, and take care of some urgent business.

[illuminatus99]

My AK, a few thousand rounds, medieval england, it's good to be the king. :D

[Mike Irwin]

No autos?

FINE!

I guess I'm going back to the Battle of Hastings with a frigging Gatling Gun! :)

William the Bastard's cavalry still won't know what hit it!

[Coronach]

Lessee....FAL. A cartfull of Hirtenberger. A case of spare parts. Magazines. Gun oil. And aim me for...

Ancient Rome. :D

Mike

[mowgli]

February 13, 1933

I would be waiting outside a drug store in Miami Florida for Guiseppe Zangara with any reasonably powered scoped hunting rifle.

"Save your $4 Guiseppe, take mine"

[Jim March]

Hmmmm. I'd want to do my best to improve the US.

Two opportunities, and it turns out both would benefit from the very same gun, assuming I could bring a LOT of ammo and a decent parts/armorer's kit.

The gun: AR pattern in .223 with good sights (both glass and backup Tritium irons) with a 20" heavy barrel (match stuff). I'd also want to bring some key *knowledge*, particularly in wound care/doctorin'.

Option #1 (preferred): go to 1770. Boil down red seaweed until you've got a high-iodine-content "betadine solution" - combined with basic boiled rags sealed in wax paper, you can revolutionize wound care and make enough money to be a respected member of society.

Enter the Revolutionary war on the colonial side. Kick major redcoat butt until you've got a rep.

Convince Jefferson and company to outlaw slavery!

Do whatever it takes, including revealing you're a time-traveller and outlining the Civil War. Worst case, phase it out over 10 years or so. Put in an equality clause with teeth right into the original BoR.

Option 2: Go to 1870. Shoot every member of the US Supreme Court before they can dismantle the first attempt at civil rights reform (1866 - 1868). But there's no guarantee you won't get 9 more racist sons of birches :(.

Option is a little bit riskier personally, 'cuz you have to survive a whole war.

[larry_minn]

I would like to make many trips. For many of the trips no gun needed. Say for Sept. 11 get there say Sept. 1st with all info. I think in 10 days I could get things in motion to have armed Air Marshells on those planes. Two weeks would be better.
Then go back to when some locals were killed. Say Brian Klienfelter, Jacob Wetterling,etc. Get into position with .223 and at first shot take out BG and fade. Officer has one in the vest and shooter has .223 in head. Nobody knows from where. Same for kidnapping he has gun on three kids take him out./fade.
Hey you can't stick around because you will run into yourself when they are checking your background and trouble that will cause.

[IRONFIST]

How about standing shoulder-to-shoulder with King Leonidas, my trusty FAL on my shoulder, feeling a chill run up my spine to hear "Molan Labe" shouted to Xerxes, the Persian Emperor. To feel the welcome recoil from my faithful rifle as I send round after round into the faces of the onrushing horde and all those pretty brass casings pile up around my feet. Ahhh, the smell of history being made in front of my eyes.

Michael in Sandy, OR

[Jim March]

Nope. You want to fix something that went bigtime WRONG.

Thermopylae worked out exactly as the Spartans planned. Going there would cheapen it.

-----------

I'm not sure nailing Hitler would help. It might even hurt. Fascism as a political movement wasn't his invention, nor was he the only lunatic in Germany at that period...and another leader might not have invaded Russia :rolleyes:.

Better to strengthen the US for what lay ahead.

[firestar]

I would go back to the time of Jesus and prevent him from being killed. I would just have a pistol and and take out Pilot. Had Jesus not been killed, he would have lived until he was old and people would have lost interest in him. There would be no Christianity and many millions of innocent people would have been spared death at the hands of people claiming to be doing God's work.

[John G]

:rolleyes:

Great idea! We all know Christianity is the only religion to be misused for violent means.

(Heeeeeere we go...)

[IRONFIST]

Jim, I guess I agree in principal, but I kinda like the idea of being confronted by overwhelming forces and standing with brave men as wave, after horrific wave of sword wielding soldiers try to roll over us all. If you wont let me fight against Xerxes, how about letting me be holed up in Masada with the Jewish defenders? I would like an adequate sniping platform, with great optics and a huge supply of ammo. A laser rangefinder would be an added +. I could do alot of nice damage to the upper ranks of the Roman army encamped around the plateau. A hopeless cause has always appealed to the romantic in me.

Michael in Sandy, OR

[Bruce in West Oz]

.22 LR semi-auto handgun with silencer.

Back to the car park at Port Arthur, Tasmania, on Sunday, 28 April 1996, just as one sick little pr!ck named Martin Bryant climbs out of his car carrying his "sportsbag" containing a Colt AR15.

There'd be 35 innocent people alive today -- and shooters in Australia wouldn't have to feel much the way homosexuals did in the 1950s!

And the best part would be -- no-one would ever know just what had been averted -- or who had done it or why.

[Dr.Rob]

I'd go Dino hunting.

I'm not man enough to stand at the alamo or thermopolaye or the little big horn, and more importantly without training I'd likely get more people killed.

Lol that or get a camera and a backside view/side view of the grassy knoll.

[twoblink]

M14 introduced to the Americans when they fought the Brits..

<flame suit on>

If I want the Americans to lose, I'd hand them an M16.

<naw.. I'll keep the flame suit on..>:D

[H Romberg]

I want an HK PSG1. I'd go take out an economist named John Maynard Keynes, and Karl Marx, both before they wrote anything. With them gone, the great experiments in socialism that produced the depression, WWII, and the Cold war might not have happened.

[stevelyn]

An FAL, with an ox cart full of ammo and loaded mags, standing shoulder to shoulder with William Wallace preparing to sack London.:D :D

[larry_minn]

I actually had the thought yrs ago about going back to Garden the night Christ was taken. Or when he is being taken to cross. Thing is that is NOT the way it was supposed to be.
I would bet that would be the first time my Glock would missfire.
I also would like to go back to a certain date and slash my car tires. That way I would have not been on road when oncomming car lost control and dang near killed me.

[Joe Demko]

Guns? You have time travel and you're worried about guns? If you want to off Hitler, strangle him as a little boy on his way home from kindergarten. Even easier, just cause a ruckus outside his parents' house the night he was conceived, a little coitus interruptus ensues, and no Fuhrer is ever born.
A bunch of you seem to like the idea of visiting one "primitive screwhead" era or another with a modern rapid fire weapon and visiting great slaughter on one side or another of famous battles. That doesn't seem too "heroic" to me, sorry. The Spartans, the men at the Alamo, and all those others were heroic because they did what they did knowing they would die in the process.

[DJJ]

I'd go wherever "Miller" was, see to it that he made it to the Supreme Court, and take a trench gun along.

[Crimper-D]

And drop them enough in advance of the Chicom First Front Army's rout of retreat to Sensi in 1935 to set up a good ambush site - for the First Army's Chief Political Commissar = Mao Tse-tung!

[Penforhire]

Might be worth heading off a war, say WW I by saving Ferdinand? Of course you never know what would have happened next.

[DJJ]

Or, I'd go to where the Founders were debating the Bill of Rights, make up some story about where I'd come from and that we'd tried the same thing, but we "overestimated politicians' honor", and the system failed, and that they were about to do the same thing. I'd do my best to make sure they were much more explicit and detailed in laying out restrictions on Federal power. As far as a gun goes, I'd probably take something not too far beyond them, maybe a black powder cartridge bolt action, just to remind them to expicitly cover tecnological advances.

[AmericanFreeBird]

M1A (semi auto) and the American Revolutionary War. I think after we kicked King Georges buttocks good I'd get involved in an air-tight Bill of Rights / Constitutional role. :D

[TallPine]

Doesn't matter which gun.

Just drop me off somewhere in Illinois in the 1850s, and I would have nailed a long legged itinerant lawyer guy before he got to be president and destroyed our republic.

Can't believe no one else has thought of this one ...

[TechBrute]

Screw the gun, I'd go back and convince the Founders to leave the preamble out of the Second, since "stupid people in the future don't get it!"

[cordex]

I actually had the thought yrs ago about going back to Garden the night Christ was taken. Or when he is being taken to cross. Thing is that is NOT the way it was supposed to be.
Shades of an old SNL skit.

"Stop killing Judas!"

I'm surprised no one has suggested that they'd like to go back to the first ape with a higher forehead that looked at a rock in a different way (or Adam, depending on your view of how things started) and start gunning down anything that displayed anywhere near human intelligence.

Hey Mike ... where are you?

[JShirley]

TallPine,

Believe me, I've thought of it. "The Great Socialist" would be next on my list, as well as "The Butcher", and many others.

So many inequities, so little time.

[4v50 Gary]

Speaking of shooting Santa Anna off his horse, one rifleman had hidden in the tower of the Alamo and waited until Santa Ana appeared. From about 500 or so yards away, he fired but the shot whistled harmless over the brave general/president's head. Frightened, the stalwart and manly Santa Ana turned and fled to the safety of his camp.

Scoped Knight Armament SR-25 at Cowpens. Die, Tarleton, die. But then if he died, he wouldn't have written his book (complete with B.S.) about the Southern Campaign.

[winstonsmith]

How about the era of dueling pistols? Take a glock 31, and you'll be the coolest guy in court.

This one is more recent, but I'd take PSG-1 and take care two computer nerds long before they got into Columbine High School.

Go back to when slaves were being unloaded from ships. I'd take a PSG-1 suppressed and loaded w/ JHPs and take out all the overseers on the first few ships I see. That would put a dent into the slave trade.

[HBK]

Civil War with an M-14. Defend state's rights and convince Davis to end slavery.

[rageman]

winstonsmith had this to say:
This one is more recent, but I'd take PSG-1 and take care two computer nerds long before they got into Columbine High School.

As a gun-loving "computer nerd", this statement offends my sensibilities, good sir. I don't think those two punks should be lumped in with us computer nerds--we have higher standards. :p

Back on topic, all those who say "hitler" or "revolutionary war" or something else along those lines, you need to realize that those events, while tragic in some ways, are absolutely critical to what our world is today. Like CGofMP, the first thing I thought of when I saw this thread was Bradbury's "A Sound of Thunder." The only "recent" event that I would go back to would be to stop 9/11, simply for the problems with civil rights that it has caused. The paranoid inside of me, however, says that I couldn't do anything really--a situation like "12 Monkeys," where anyone I try to enlist to help me treats me like crazy. Or the government would try to steal my time machine.
More realistically, I would simply wait and load up with currency such as gold, and go back to the -20's or -30's (before the NFA could get passed) and get all those cool guns that I want for my collection, and take them back with me, sans paper trail. :cool:

[TheLastBoyScout]

If someone wiped out Hitler, I probably wouldn't be here (Grampa graduating college without that hiatus to go and save democracy would never have allowed him to meet Granma etc etc)...
That said, I'd probably grab a G3/SG-1 and go back to WW2 to take out Chairman Mao.

Then I could wait a few years and travel the world killing the tyrants of today while they would still be in diapers... Osama, Yassir Arafat and Saddam for example.

In addition almost anyone else in a position of power today or in the past 20 years was either a child or insignificant and relatively vulnerable in the time period from the outbreak of WW2 to the 1960s. Man, I would need to bring a lot of ammo, cause I could end up having one hell of a long "hit list".

[Justin]

I'd pop back in time to around 1760 or so to Boston, MA and see if I could hang out with James Otis. I'd convince him not to destroy his records and writings and push him to be more vocal about personal liberty. (Though that might not have been possible. :) )

Of course, if I happened to be at a particular ale house on a particular evening in 1769 when a particular John Robinson appeared, I might just have to respond with a particular magazine full of Gold Dots when he drew his sword. :D

[Andrew Wyatt]

I'd have to bring my mossberg to the "shotguns on sunday incident, where the townsfolk of bakersfield and the BPD had a running gun battle with a criminal.

I forgot the guys name, but it'd be neat to see chester avenue as it was in the 1890s.

[The Silver Bullet 1719]

I'm with Tallpine, also go back to December 9, 1879 and toss a little Man of Steel into a frozen lake.

[Fly320s]

I'd take the most evil-uber-sheeple-scaring-assault-AR15 loaded with a mil-dot night vision scope, laser designator, white light, and IR illuminator on picatinny rail back to 1776.

More importantly, I'd take every piece of recording equipment available at Best Buy. Then I'd sit down with our Founding Fathers to grill them on every aspect of human rights, firearms and the Constitution. "Hey, Jefferson, what do you think about this AR15? How about concealed carry? How about owning maching guns?"

I want it all on tape.

[capnrik]

But the truth is, I'd be selfish. Since I've got a sneaking suspicion that for some reason, I wouldn't be able to change the outcome of history very much, I'd just like to take my son back and introduce him to his grandfather and a duckblind.We wouldn't have to bring a gun. Dad would have 'em ready.

[HBK]

Actually cap, there's not one thing wrong with that idea.

[Recon By Fire]

It is sort of funny that you all feel that we should have gone back in time and killed all the bad people (Hitler, Stallin, Gore, Etc.) If these people had really been killed, our past would have greatly changed. We would be in a totally different place today. History is better left alone to be studied and learned from.

BUT

If I had to, it would deffinaly be a Smith and Wesson 500 and his name would have been John Wilkes Booth.

Hehe

[roscoe]

I'm with cordex - hunt down the first australopithecines. Solve all our problems.

[Ala Dan]

Easy Choice For Me-

Since we celebrate the anniversary of one of the
bloodiest battles of the Viet-Nam war this week
(May 11th thru May 20th, 1969), my choice would be
the standard issue Colt Government Model .45
ACP.




Best Wishes,
Ala Dan, N.R.A. Life Member

[Andrew Wyatt]

If I want the Americans to lose, I'd hand them an M16



that's funny stuff, twoblink.

nevermind that an m-16 requires less cleaning than a blackpowder musket to stay working.

[Orthonym]

No question. My victim: Elron. My weapon: any shotgun.The time: One second before he first laid finger to typewriter. Might even stick around for the law, confess, get hanged, etc. (I can get SO romantic) Anyway I think it would be worth the sacrifice even if caught involuntarily. Not only did that critter corrupt the minds of thousands with bad memes, he planted them in the noggin of John Campbell, which deed was an ENORMOUS crime. _Astounding_ was never the same afterwards.

[Solinvictus70]

Probably a Kalshnikov variant (RPD or RPK) with which I would make myself Emperor of Rome (circa 80 CE), then write a constitution with rules of election and succession, abdicate power, and re-establish the Republic so we could avoid the Dark Ages. Honestly, though, human nature as it is, they would probably wind up the way the US is today in a few centuries...like they did.

A dead Hitler would likely have led directly to World War Two being Stalin's war. I would like to remind history buffs that the Red Army of 1941 enjoyed tremendous numeric superiority over most of Europe. Without the rapid re-armament program of Hitler, the Weimar Reichswehr would not have been a speedbump to the Soviet attack and the Red Army would have washed their boots on the coast of Brittany and the Adriatic. The only hope would have been a leader who would have re-armed WITHOUT being invasion happy.

[Dionysusigma]

Hmmm...
I'd go with an AK or variant to the 1890s. A relatively simple rifle, with loads of potential for modification/ adaptation.

Scratch that.

I'd rather bring an old typewriter (once again, the most simplistic design imaginable) to the Romans. A culture with decent mathematical prowess, metalworking capability, etc. A culture with basically all the requirements for production of a cheap form of movable type. Ideas would spread further, for much cheaper, in greater quantity, advancing culture around the world at an amazing rate. It'd be about as revolutionary as the wheel, if not more.

In case that I'm not supposed to change history, I'd go back and meet my grandparents. Maybe go shooting with them.

Who says it ain't possible?

[DangerousSubvert]

Wow. I guess I'd have to say I'd want to be in Richmond around 1862 or so with something with a scope and take out a certain wannabe president... or a few years later to be in that corridor leading to the box at Ford's Theater and shoot that damn secesh actor...

As far as just watching, not participating? I'd love to be in the conference room when General Zhukov saved the world the second time (the first time it was by winning WW2) by holding a gun on Beria and arresting him while he was in a Politbureau meeting preparing to take over from the recently dead Stalin.

You guys all think "the Commies" (actually, the Stalinists) were bad as history actually happened? Check out Beria -- he made the Khmer Rouge look like the Red Cross.

[H Romberg]

AR-15 and M203 with lots of HE rounds I'll be going to Scotland. Specifically, I'll be going to the battle of Culoden. I'll be making sure the Clan Maclay (my ancestors) gets rid of those traitorous soup making Campbels for supporting the English. I wonder what would have happened if Bonney Prince Charlie had won. It sure would scramble things, but how, I've no clue. What the heck! :D

[bogie]

I'd like to have the opportunity to take a teenage Chuckie Schumer shooting...

[12.7x99mm]

I would go back and hunt dinosaurs with my barret. :cool:

http://imagecache2.allposters.com/images/BEN/AB5278.jpg

Then I would introduce myself to JMB and by stock

[45R]

I would take a bunch of "evil assault weapons" back to when Clinton, Davis, Boxer and Feinstien were kids and teach them at a young age that black guns were not evil.

[Correia]

I thought about this while watching Band of Brothers the other night. Don't bring back a gun. Bring back a case of Gen III night vision. :)

This is a tough question.

[dev_null]

FAL, on the beach as Cortez lands. Ditto for Pizarro. While we're at it, go after the Inquisition, Matthew Hopkins, and the King Louis' "informant" within the Knights Templar. Jump forward to Hitler and Tojo.

Hey, I like this... I could be the "Time-Travelling Battuosai." ;)

Of course, as many a sci-fi writer has pointed out, this kind of thing can have enormous unintended consequences. Can you hear the butterfly wings?

-0-

PS: Anyone remember the name of the book where the Confederates get a shipment of AKs?

[dev_null]

I would go back and hunt dinosaurs with my barret.
What difference does it make what kind of hat you wear? :D

-0-

[Alan Smithiee]

The book with the south getting AK's was "Guns of the South" by Harry Turttledove, a copy of which is sitting in my headboard.

[Glamdring]

Several thoughts come to mind.

1) Take a best grade Bowen Ruger Bisley in .475 back to Elmer Keith when he was in his 20s. Ask for lessons in exchange.

2) 9.3x62 Pseudo Scout for general travel. I am very interested in Mass Extinctions (like Dino die off, more interested in the KT event though), though I wouldn't want to be ON the planet when they occured.

3) M1a Scout vs Pizzaro

[Pilot]

Firestar wrote:

"I would go back to the time of Jesus and prevent him from being killed. I would just have a pistol and and take out Pilot. "


Firestar. That's Pilate NOT Pilot. Jeez....I mean J*sus!

[dev_null]

(Not to mention that would pretty much do away with the whole atonement thing.)

-0-

[Devonai]

I would also like to see Boston around the mid to late 18th century, since I know most of Boston like the back of my hand and there was so much important history then.

A close second would be WWII, as a paratrooper over the bocage of France, June 1944.

For Boston 1774, I would choose a steel slide/aluminum frame semi-auto with a decent capacity, probably a Para-Ordnance P16 .40 or a Beretta 92FS 9mm with a few hi-caps. That and about 1,000 rounds of ammo. My plan would be to become proficient with the rifle of the day and transition to the pistol when the fighting got too close. My explanation would be, "I'm an inventor but my shop and all my toolings and plans were destroyed. This is all that's left."

For France 1944, the only thing I would bring would be 1,000 rounds of non-corrosive .30-06 to make my life easier. Don't ask me how I plan on jumping out of an airplane with that :D

BTW, as a Christian I believe that Jesus died for our sins and His death was part of God's plan for humankind. Do you really think YOU are going to change what happened?;)

[arinvolvo]

Oh, Id go way back...and take me a 22 autoloader pitol.....WHy?

Because no matter what size the bullet....people will think it is magic, and stay away from me anyhow...Probably make me king....They will think I have the power of THOR, after I pointed my magic hammer at a rabbit, and it dropped dead. And I could carry 1000 rounds of it in my two pockets.:D

[dev_null]

"This... is my BOOMSTICK!!!" :D

-0-

[arinvolvo]

Exactly, Evil Dead style...but 12 guage shells are too bulky to lug around with you.

[Tommy Gunn]

I would deliver a reproduction matchlock musket and the recipe for making blackpowder to Julius Caesar. Maybe give Ghengis Khan a map to the "New World" and mention something about seven cities of gold.



That would change everything! :neener:

[Ian]

Could be very interesting to take an M14 back to change the course of the Whiskey Rebellion...what if the rebels had shot Washington and Hamilton for treason over their taxation policies?

[jsalcedo]

I would take an American 180 autocarbine and several drums back to Custers last stand

(177 round drum of .22lr at 1800rpm)

[12-34hom]

BIG GAME HUNTING with a 50 cal sounds good to me.:D

Got room for another??

12-34hom.

[.45Ruger]

Maybe go back and stop that idiot Hinkley from shooting Reagan, and James Brady thus silencing one of our most vocal opponents and getting a nut job off the street.

[erikm]

Hmm. What shall we take? :scrutiny: Where shall we go? :scrutiny:

Most likely a semiautomatic Barrett .50" rifle.

I'd also take the indepth books on large caliber guns and howitzers, machineguns and autocannon, tracked vehicle, AFV and tank development, aircraft design and engine design. I would also have a list of tracked vehicle designers, developers and builders throughout history.

I would also take detailed stock listings to make the money I will be needing. I'll also have to have proper ID paperwork as well.

My destination would be the eastern US, ca. 1910. The period until the outbreak of WWI I would spend quietly making a fortune on the stock markets and using the proceeds to lay the groundwork for later actions. Note that I would in no way try to prevent WWI. It or something like it was more or less inevitable since the late 1890s. My primary aim is to end WWI before the really nasty battles of attrition take place, to allow a milder peace for the loser and therefore hopefully prevent WWII. My secondary aim is to become very very rich. :D

On my list of 'things to do or buy' would be:
- Buy a license for or full rights to John M. Browning's .30 machine gun (which became the M1917)
- Commission John M. Browning to design a machinegun around the cartridge for my rifle. I ask him to base it on his .30 machine gun, scaled up. I negotiate to keep all rights to the weapon's design but am prepared to settle for a license.
- Buy a small locomotive works, boiler factory or other factory with 'heavy metal' engineering experience.
- Buy a license for the Holt Tractor, with R&D rights (I want to 'develop' the design).
- Try to talk Anthony Fokker into emigrating to the US. Help him set up an aircraft company there.
- Commission or 'invent' a heavy petrol engine
- Commission work on heavy high-torque transmissions

I would spend the time up to august 1914 developing a 20 ton sloped tracked chassis with a sloped, armored, 3 man turret. It would be armed with a 75mm howitzer, a coaxial .30" machine gun, a pintle MG (commander's hatch) and maybe a hull MG. A crew of 5 would be likely. The hull must be capable of taking a larger turret ring than initially fitted.

A very likely variant would be an armored engineering vehicle. Think of the Centurion AVRE, complete with fascine carrier.

I would also develop an unarmored cargo vehicle variant for use as a prime mover and a sloped moderately armored box variant as multipurpose tracked vehicle. These I might offer for sale prewar as all terrain tractors.

Other things to 'develop' (but keep under wraps) before war breaks out include a 4" mortar (Stokes type) and machine gun aircraft interruptor gearing.

Once war breaks out, I offer the weapons, armored vehicles and advice on how to use them (en masse, on hard ground, without preliminary bombardment, with infantry support) to the US Army and to the british, to the point of privately funding and fielding a volunteer armored company (1st volunteer armored, colloquially the Boss's Brass Knucks).

Of course, if I want to take a particularly perverse tack, I could land in the Netherlands or Germany instead of the US. In this case I would land a year or two earlier and work toward a fast german victory. I'm fairly sure Krupp and members of the german high command would be fascinated by some of my proposals. :D

Cheers,
ErikM :evil:

[erikm]

An interesting place and time would be northern germany, 1630 or so. The gun would be an automatic pistol, preferably a fairly powerful one. Other things to bring would be body armor, a good first aid kit and some good binoculars.

The job would be to keep king Gustav Adolf of Sweden alive as long as possible. Given that he leads horse cavalry charges this may be difficult. 1632 is a more extreme version of this (a town goes back).

Of course, if you want to muck up history really incredibly badly, you could go back to Italy (Florence probably) before 1416. You would have to kill Cosimo de Medici, one of the founding members of the de Medici family. The side effect of this slaying would be to significantly delay or even cancel the Renaissance. Middle ages lasting until 1700 anyone? A pistol seems the best tool for this job.

Cheers,
ErikM :evil:

[pale horse]

Well as some of you have mentioned killing todays tyrants or the tyrants of past would make you murders. If you can live with that then so be it. Killing/murdering these men would have done no good. As you know that when a tyrant is killed there is a power vaccum and someone just as bad and mean looks to make an example of the people to show how ruthless he really is. So with that in mind killing off the tyrants and what not is a good idea, but things are the way they are because of them. Dont get me wrong if given the chance and employeed by the government to bring about justice on Osama bin Laden I would. But who says that I have enough training as is to accomplish this task. He has been doing his thing and training since his youth but I am still but a youth, however I am confident that if the Lord wanted me to win I would. Going back to the various times as some of you have mentioned how can you be sure that your skill level of combat would hold up to those who have been fighting much longer than you?

As for me I would go back with my 1911 and learn the weapons of the various eras and become knowledgeable on a vast many styles of combat/types of weapons. I would not want to go back and kill anyone for in doing so things would be a great deal different and not what I know. The role of an observer would be my cup of tea.

Take note of this; I am not saying that hitler and the sort did not need to be killed. However, I am saying that things are the way they are for a reason. We as gun aficondos use hitler as a gun control example, if he was killed we would not have that specific example. Well I have worn out my soap box and brain so I am going to get back to my duties.

[KRAUTGUNNER]

I'd take a Mauser Gewehr 1871 and a few books about history, metallurgy and engineering and travel back to the year 1858.
Then I would visit Mr. Jefferson Davis to give him that rifle and the books. I assume that Mr. Davis would know what to do with those presents of mine.

:evil: :evil: :evil:

[Cosmoline]

With my trusty CZ-452 and a backpack full of ammo bricks and I'll rule the world (mu ha ha ha)

[grampster]

AK 47, about 10,000 rounds of ammo spotted strategicaly around W. Va and Kentucky, Penna, SE Ohio. Then partner me up with Lewis Wetzel, "La vent de la morte" (the wind of death) who roamed this area during the early settlement times prior to the Revolutionary War, protecting the settlers and living off the the land.
grampster

[LRRPS]

Hi guys,

I'm from the 30th century and carry with me an extra small but
extra powerful organic desintegrator capable of single or multiple
human extermination, in addition I have a 101th generation anti material laser musket for use against heavy armour, aircraft, building or ship.
Both weapons use mental energy from the shooter to fire.
Accuracy is in the order of .1 MOA at 1000 yards for the desintegrator and 1 MOA at 1000 yards for the musket, we are working hard to increase the accuracy of the design.
I'm myself equiped with a global threat protection module consisting of a see thru apocalypse blast and thermal energy bouncer as well as an ultra kinetic energy repeller.
In other words I'm invincible.
Furthermore, our medical field technology permits us to live 500 years instead of 75 years back in the 21st century, as far as our Galaxian library tells us.
Our scientists are constantly increasing our life expectancy, hopefully in 20 more decades, we'll be immortal.
I don't think I could benefit this medical progress 'coz I'm now 320 years old, but who knows, I keep on hoping.

I'm now back in june 14th 2003 and willing to change this world for a better one.
If you want my help, pls send me a message via the intersideral communication system.

Oops, I forgot that you still have the obsolete geostationary satellites.
OK then, let's meet at the bar of your choice, I can teleport to any location in the entire milky way.

LRRPS :evil: :D :D