CF Member Bring Back Dewatt AK From Afganistan?

Max Owner

Max Owner

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Hey all.

Put in a request with firiend's child to bring back an AK47 from Afganistan.

Suspect that the barrel and bolt would have to be welded.

Can a CF member bring back a dewat from the sand box without any trouble?

I hope current members can answer this for me. One guy I know is out at the moment. Wondering what the CF policy is.....................
 
Your chances are slim to nil, especially for personal purposes. When I was over there, we were reminded constantly that war trophies were prohibited. The stuff that does come back is usually destined for the museums or for the units and even then, it is subject to a pile of paperwork to justify and authorize the bring back. I wouldn't want to be your friend's kid if he does bring one back without clearance from the chain of command.
 
I'll make a long story short. No.

Did this back in '03 with a Sten that I bought from Canada. Lived in the shacks at the time and all my mail, including the Sten got forwarded to me. No biggie I thougt, it was legally dewatted back in Canada.

Brass lost their mind and looked into charging me when they realized I had it. They couldn't charge me of course, but that didn't stop them from hassling me.

Of course I was singled out on my return to Canada, think I was the only person on my flight they actually inspected. The customs person was unsure of the situation, so confiscated it for verification. A perfectly reasonable thing for her to do. Of course I got a receipt.

Months went by, when I finally heard back it wasn't good news. Their are only guidelines for dewatting, but bringing something in the country they can be pricks and say that it's not good enough for them. They insisted a 'smith do more work to it, including welding the mag to the receiver, even though the follower was already welded. Called the 'smith up, said the work would be about $400, plus whatever a bonded courier would charge to get it to him. Well, that was more than the thing cost me in the first place, so I decided it wasn't worth the hassle and abandoned it, it's a shame too, it was a nice little Longbranch MkII with loop stock.
 
Max, I can't believe you would but your " friends"
in that position, Just asking for trouble, beside, how
would you get it dewat. before it got here???
 
J-man said it best..piles of paperwork..we found an old Ppsh-41 over there and couldn't for the life of us get it back to the regimental museum..so not saying it can't be done just that it's very difficult.
 
We had a guy who had a dewat STG-44 in the shacks also & he never got bugged about it by the higher ups. It all depends where you are of course, we were in Alberta :)
 
Certain firearms can be brought back. I know on my tour in 06 a fellow was working on having a couple of old antiquated boltguns brought back (he ended up mailing them FedEx but it was a lengthy process - I can't even remember how he got them verified as antiques. As for AKs the answer is "no - at least not in a reasonable amount of time" As AKs are prohibited, he would have to have it Dewatted (I don't even think that anyone in KAF would be able to do it w/o making the rifle a mess but even if they did, he would have to somehow get it verified as dewatted). So short answer No
 
Airborn_69 said:
We had a guy who had a dewat STG-44 in the shacks also & he never got bugged about it by the higher ups. It all depends where you are of course, we were in Alberta :)
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I think in Leg's case, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that he was living in shacks but was deployed. So all his mail was forwarded to him overseas, including the Sten. When he tried to bring it back to Canada, he ran into a tough time, even though it was originally shipped, trouble-free, to his Canadian address in barracks.
 
Yes you can....you have to go through the proper channels....you could even bring a live one back (for museum purposes). It can all be done. One simply has to cut through all the BS and get the right paper work.
 
Your best bet, if you are truly serious, is to contact DFAIT and ask them what steps to go through. I'm not even sure that you can bring a prohib into Canada any more, even if it is properly dewatted.

Yes, they can bring back all kinds of stuff for museums, they don't have to go by the same rules. Anyone that says they can't, just didn't look into it hard enough. I actually asked the RSM if he'd like me to donate the Sten to the Regiment since it would be destroyed otherwise and he just said "No". Probably figured it wouldn't be legal, or too much hassle. Truth is a lot of people will just make assumptions and believe that it can't be, or shouldn't be legal. Like I said, they investigated me and wanted to have me charged.

I had all the proper import paperwork, but the Mounties have the final say.

Bolt actions and antiques are a completely different ballgame and perfectly legal, I'd contact the CFC for the procedure.
 
There are no more imports of dewats. All are now imported as full guns and then certified in Canada by a gunsmith. As a result you would need the same paperwork as with a full gun.
 
My old unit has a an old Soviet MG taken from a destroyed Syrian tank that was liberated by a couple of memebers, not sure how they got it back though.
 
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