From a post on another forum:
The original Colt Commando was a World War II war-time expedient gun.
It was simply a Colt Official Police with a rough parkerized finish, made only during 1942-45, and only for "official" use.
No sales were made to ordinary civilians.
These were for state-side defense plant guards and police departments, with some being issued to military personnel.
The Commando was made in a 4" barrel, a few with 2" barrels, and possible a 6" version.
There were approximately 50,000 made.
The S&W counterpart was a parkerized Model 10 M&P known as the Victory model.
In the mid-1980's Colt went through a period of attempting to reduce cost and keep making guns during the long labor strike.
They were using replacement workers who didn't have the skills of the regular employees, so Colt offered a short-lived series of revolvers with rough black parkerized finishes.
The Detective Special version in this series was also named the Commando. This is a small "D" framed 2" barreled gun, and should not be confused with the larger WWII Colt Commando.
Quality-wise, the WWII Commando was as high quality as the Pre-war Official Police it actually was. The only real difference is in the parkerized finish.
After the war, the Government gave large quantities of both the Commando and Victory models to civil defense and police departments. From there they made their way into civilian sales.