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Potential Sale of U.S. Ammo Maker Sparks National-Security Concerns

Talyn said:
This has already been discussed here before.

The Czech company is legit.

So, should Glock, FN-America, Sig, former Chrysler/Jeep, Bergara and Colt, etc. be shut down because they're owned & run by foreign companies?
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Ammunition is a different animal. Without ammo, guns are just expensive paper weights. Our ammunition supply is critical and shouldn't be reliant on the whims of a foreign government. Case in point: The controversy reflects heightened sensitivity to foreign influence in the United States and coincides with a global gunpowder shortage. CSG, which has grown significantly under Strnad’s leadership, has been a key arms supplier to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in 2022.
 
Onewolf426 said:
Ammunition is a different animal. Without ammo, guns are just expensive paper weights. Our ammunition supply is critical and shouldn't be reliant on the whims of a foreign government. Case in point: The controversy reflects heightened sensitivity to foreign influence in the United States and coincides with a global gunpowder shortage. CSG, which has grown significantly under Strnad’s leadership, has been a key arms supplier to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in 2022.
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I agree.
 
Onewolf426 said:
Ammunition is a different animal. Without ammo, guns are just expensive paper weights. Our ammunition supply is critical and shouldn't be reliant on the whims of a foreign government. Case in point: The controversy reflects heightened sensitivity to foreign influence in the United States and coincides with a global gunpowder shortage. CSG, which has grown significantly under Strnad’s leadership, has been a key arms supplier to Ukraine since Russia’s invasion in 2022.
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The vast majority of US military ammunition is not made by the Vista Group companies but by the Lake City plant under contract with Winchester, and the Vista Group companies manufactures sporting ammunition.

Plus, the US sources ammo from other companies/countries as the need arises

CSG is a private company, not the Czech government. As well as supporting Ukraine, CSG is a significant supplier to NATO, with several companies with Top NATO Security Clearance.

CSG owns and operates Fiocchi with plants in the US.

www.businesswire.com

The Czechoslovak Group Highlights the Benefits of Its Planned Acquisition of Vista Outdoor’s Sporting Products Business, The Kinetic Group

The Czechoslovak Group (“CSG”) today issued a statement reaffirming its commitment to the proposed all-cash acquisition (the “Acquisition”) of Vista O
www.businesswire.com

www.businesswire.com

CSG Sends Letter to Senator J.D. Vance Addressing His Concerns Regarding Planned Acquisition of Vista Outdoor’s Sporting Products Business, The Kinetic Group

The Czechoslovak Group (“CSG”) owner and CEO Michal Strnad today sent an open letter to U.S. Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) addressing concerns he raised i
www.businesswire.com

If MNC Capital of Canada (a foreign company) or Colt CZ (another foreign company) wants the whole group then they need to pony-up the $$.

The global gunpowder shortage has nothing to do with CSG, since Russia & China are #2 & #1 in the production of nitrocellulose.

JD Vance is entitled to his opinion, however misguided his is.

 
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Call me old fashioned, but I'd like to see any/all foreign manufacturing contracts pulled back. Think of the recent/still supply chain slow-downs, especially medicines and electronics. I'm sure there are some good ones, but in general what I see is a loss of jobs here, supply chain issues when bad things happen ... not just pandemics but high fuel costs for carriers, wars/strikes/etc of the foreign countries, lack of QC standards since they are out of our hands, and the list goes on.

Now I've already said I'm sure there are some good ones. But during the Covid thing, I was way behind on some pain meds for weeks at the time due to 'guess what' ... yep, overseas manufacturing. And now, even though supply of my meds have pretty much been reestablished, I'm almost afraid to take them now to the heavy influx of Fentenal/etc.

And yep I recognize the manufacturing labor costs are lower overseas, sometimes considerably lower, but the knowledge and comfort that certain meds are far more likely to be available than not when 'Made in America', I'll pay the extra. So yeh, call me old fashioned, or maybe just being practical.

And one last little thing ... I'm currently waiting for a part for my wife's car, not a critical part, but a substantial part to replace the one on her car. It's an ABS modulator that controls the Anti lock brakes and Traction Control system. When it goes out the brakes still function exactly as they did before the invention of ABS's so it's not a basic safety issue but a compensation issue to better braking for the vast majority of people under certain braking situations.

According to two local dealers, there is a nationwide back order of these modulators in the thousands of units. Why you ask can there be that many go bad. Well that's really not a lot, in fact a very few when compared to the total number of vehicles with the unit installed. And as I understand this same modulator is used across many different brands of vehicle manufacturers. The problem seems to be that the only manufacturer on earth that made these modulators (obviously a foreign country) has decided that with the slowdown of IC powered vehicles being pushed and the EV's having no use for the part, they just don't see the value in continuing to manufacture them and so are converting their assembly lines to other parts.

The benefit to 'Homeland' manufacturing is not real complicated, it's just good sense if we're ever to put America first, whether meds, vehicles, ammo, etc, etc, etc.
 
Antibiotics… the last figure i saw was that 80-90% of all generic antibiotics were made in China. If they wanted to play hard ball all they’d have to do is stop selling to the US and within a month we’d see people dying due to common infections, pneumonia in particular.
Microbes can be more devastating than anything that comes out of the business end of a gun. The US is not equipped to deal with a shutdown like that. There is one company in TN that brought amoxicillin production back to the US, but that won’t be enough.
 
HayesGreener said:
Trump was absolutely right. It is stupid to rely on potential foreign enemies for manufacture of critical goods. Bring and/or keep manufacturing here in the U.S.

I often wonder if foreign interests are what drives the anti-Trump campaigns
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Of course his was ,just like nato! When we rely on too much foreign supply we are a dead country! Some countries align with our goals, but many we get supplies from don't and WILL be on the enemies side!
 
CSG passed the CFIUS clearance to buy and operate the two Fiocchi plants in the USA. All the production of the Vista Group companies will remain in the USA.

I checked out the references in JD Vance's letters and he greatly exaggerated things in his letter to CSG and Yellen.

None of the Vista Group ammo companies make ammunition for the US military unless there's a serious shortage like there was during the Iraq and Afghanistan actions. Then, some ammo was sourced from some of the US sporting ammo makers, but mainly got the majority of the extra needs from Israel, Europe, Australia and S. Korea.

The US military makes the vast majority of their needs from the following domestic sources, some Govt-run and some contractor-run...


1) BAE (a UK company) operates and makes extruded smokeless powder produced at the Radford Army Ammunition Plant in Virginia, as well as the Holston Army Ammunition Plant. BAE also makes a lot of the US Army's vehicles.

2) Most of the small arms ammunition up to 20MM used by the U.S. military is produced at the Lake City Arsenal, a government owned facility that is operated under contract by the civilian entity Olin Winchester.

The McAlester Army Ammunition Plant (manufactures bombs and ammunition 20mm and above.

3) American Ordnance LLC (AO) is the contractor at the production facilities at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant (IAAAP) and storage facilities at the Milan Army Ammunition Plant (MLAAP).


The USA makes very little of the gunpowder used outside the military needs.

St. Marks Florida. It's the onetime Olin Corp plant, now part of General Dynamics. It makes double-based ball powders only or those (Such as Hodgdon Hybrid 100V and some Alliant types).

All Winchester and Hodgdon ball / 'spherical' grades are supplied by St. Marks as are nearly all propellants used in US military small arms ammo, the US government having decided way back in the 1950s with 7.62 adoption that this type would be the norm, sniper and special purpose ammo aside.

Ramshot/Accurate ball powder comes from PB Clermont in Belgium. Hodgdon extruded grades and IMR-8208 XBR from Thales/ADI in Mulwala, NSW, Australia. Other than 8208 XBR, IMR extruded rifle powders are also made by a General Dynamics Corp owned plant in Valleyfield, Ontario, Canada. (Hodgdon owns the IMR brand name and marketing rights IIRC.) This plant also makes some Accurate brand extruded numbers. All Vihtavuori powders come from the town of that name in Finland.

Re17 and Re33 are sourced from Nitrochemie Wimmins AG in Switzerland. Alliant has also started using spherical grades from St. Marks.

Who owns the major brands?

Colt CZ Group - Sellier & Bellot (Herters = re-branded S&B) is a firearms ammunition manufacturer situated in Vlašim, Czech Republic.

General Dynamics - American Defense Contractor that owns/operates the old Canadian IMR plant(Stick powders), and St. Marks, FL(ball powder) plant for the US military (to Lake City). They make All Hodgdons/Winchester ball powders, Some Accurate powders, All Canadian made IMR rifle powders. Also Alliant's Power Pro Series & IMR Enduron series.

Thales - French company that owns ADI (Australia), makes all of Hodgdon's "Extreme" rifle powders, plus some IMRs.

Rheinmetall - German Defense Contractor, owner of Nitrochemie. Makes Reloder-17.

Groupe SNPE - French State-owned. Makes all Bofors (most of the Reloder line, and the Norma line), Vihtavuori, and Ramshot powders via their Eurenco layer)

For those who are big on: "American Made", if you aren't using General Dynamics ball powder/ATK flake you're getting it from overseas. While those companies may own the plants, they're located somewhere else and employ local US workers. So you might want to thank the Aussies, the Swedes, the Canadians, the Finns, and the Czechs while you're at it.

JD Vance's comment that approving the CSG to own the Vista Group would ship US weapon production overseas is patently false.

Don't believe everything you read on the "net", and JD Vance's mouth, without doing some critical thinking.

My .02
 
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mikep said:
Antibiotics… the last figure i saw was that 80-90% of all generic antibiotics were made in China. If they wanted to play hard ball all they’d have to do is stop selling to the US and within a month we’d see people dying due to common infections, pneumonia in particular.
Microbes can be more devastating than anything that comes out of the business end of a gun. The US is not equipped to deal with a shutdown like that. There is one company in TN that brought amoxicillin production back to the US, but that won’t be enough.
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Over the past 6 years I’ve had THREE prescription meds recalled because they “contained carcinogens”☹️. Care to guess where ALL three were made? Yup, PRC. Same place that used melamine (plastic) in pet food and killed thousands of pets here. And our so called leaders are either too stupid or too well paid off to stop it. It’s truly sad that what was the greatest nation in the world has been reduced to this situation out of sheer Greed. I’m old enough to remember when Walmart (under Sam Walton) was a proud “ buy American” company. ‘Ol Sammade a fortune selling American made goods. Then he died and his heirs weren’t happy with mere tens of millions of $$ so they went to China for everything. Prices stayed roughly the same but the profit margin went WAAYY up. Greed, pure and simple.
 
Shibadog said:
Over the past 6 years I’ve had THREE prescription meds recalled because they “contained carcinogens”☹️. Care to guess where ALL three were made? Yup, PRC. Same place that used melamine (plastic) in pet food and killed thousands of pets here. And our so called leaders are either too stupid or too well paid off to stop it. It’s truly sad that what was the greatest nation in the world has been reduced to this situation out of sheer Greed. I’m old enough to remember when Walmart (under Sam Walton) was a proud “ buy American” company. ‘Ol Sammade a fortune selling American made goods. Then he died and his heirs weren’t happy with mere tens of millions of $$ so they went to China for everything. Prices stayed roughly the same but the profit margin went WAAYY up. Greed, pure and simple.
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My first wife worked for Walmart from the time she was 15 1/2 until she was 32 and was a receiving manager at a Sam's. I remember signs that said " We buy American so you can too".
 
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