Mamba Pistol
The Mamba is a semi-automatic pistol developed in Rhodesia and later produced in South Africa, intended for military and police duty. Named for the venomous snake indigenous to southern Africa, the Mamba was the first semi-automatic pistol to be manufactured wholly out of stainless steel components. History The Mamba was designed in Rhodesia in 1976 and was initially intended to be manufactured there, in anticipation of a domestic military or police contract. The Rhodesian Security Forces were then fighting a long and bitter counter-insurgency campaign against two rival insurgent armies; however, much of their small arms were well-worn and obsolete due to an arms embargo imposed on the country by the United Nations. The embargo had severely limited Rhodesia's ability to acquire new weapons, forcing the country to source most of its material from a sympathetic South Africa and from international arms dealers willing to violate the embargo. However, Rhodesian engineers also showed great resourcefulness in utilising the country's limited industrial capacity to manufacture 9×19mm Parabellum ammunition, and a number of small arms chambered for that round. The Mamba was one of several such designs; its Rhodesian developers envisioned it as a combat pistol which combined all the most desirable