Cristobal Model 2

     Notes: One of the few home-grown weapons of the Dominican arms industry, the Cristobal was designed in 1948 by a Hungarian immigrant to the Dominican Republic named Pal Kiraly.  He based it on a submachinegun he had designed before World War 2 called the M39M (which was itself based on the Beretta M1938), rebarreled for the .30 caliber Carbine cartridge and fitted with a longer barrel and stock.  This weapon was subsequently supplied to Cuba before the revolution, and many of them can still be found in the hands of Cuban farmers and hunters, usually modified for semiautomatic-only fire.  It could likewise still be found in the hands of Dominican farmers and hunters, and occasionally police and rebel forces.  Production of new Cristobals stopped in 1957; by then, some 200,000 had been built, with only 19,000 employed by the Dominicans themselves – most had been exported to the aforementioned Cuba, Columbia, sold to civilians, or sold to other Latin American countries.  (Che Guevara was a noted user of the Cristobal Model 2.) By 2003, the remaining Cristobals are generally in poor repair, but any weapon can be dangerous in the right hands.  The Model 2 is more commonly called the “San Cristobal Carbine.”

     The first version, the Model 1, was essentially a test weapon and regarded as a failure; it was never issued out to troops.  It was essentially a submachinegun and not an assault rifle.  The Model 1 was initially chambered in 9mm Parabellum, making the submachinegun designation more apt; however, only a few were chambered in this caliber and the rest chambered in .30 Carbine in an attempt to increase the power of the weapon. The Model 1 has a slender perforated handguard/heat shield, and has an under-folding wire stock, with a pistol grip behind the trigger. The barrel is 16.14 inches. Mechanical difficulties not quite ironed out became the Model 1’s bane; the Model 1 could be accidentally discharged with a sharp blow to the buttstock or pistol grip. The improved Model 1 became the Model 2.

     The Model 2 was the successful version; it had a wooden stock with a pistol grip-wrist and an action encased in the wooden furniture; the stock, receiver housing and fore-end are one piece.  The receiver is of tubular metal, and is closed on the rear end by a screw-on end cap.  Case ejection is almost straight upward, preventing the mounting of most optics.  The charging handle on the right side includes a shield that moves with the handle and helps keep dirt out of the mechanism.  The selector does not include a semiautomatic setting, allowing for automatic fire and safe settings only.  However, a second trigger inside the trigger guard allows the shooter semiautomatic fire; for this, the selector lever is set to automatic, but that second trigger is used instead.  The safe setting locks both triggers.  The Model 2 has a 16.2-inch barrel. The initial version of the Model 2 was chambered for the 9mm Parabellum cartridge, but only a few were chambered for that caliber.

     A slightly improved and more compact version, the M1962, was produced from 1962 to 1970.  This version differs primarily in a slightly slower cyclic rate of fire (unimportant in game terms), and in having a shorter 12.2-inch barrel.  The M1962 has a short perforated metal handguard; a swivel band and sling swivel is attached to the end of this handguard, and the rest of the furniture is almost identical to that of the M2.  A second version of the M1962 has a folding tubular metal stock with a rubber sleeve at the butt to prevent the stock from slipping from the shooter’s shoulder.  The folding-stock version has a true pistol grip instead of a pistol grip-wrist.  The M1962 is, in essence, a submachinegun rather than an assault rifle, but is included here for completeness.  (It is also arguable whether the M1962 is a submachinegun or a short assault rifle.)

     Twilight 2000 Notes: These weapons were largely replaced by M16A1s from the US and L1A1s from Great Britain shortly before the Twilight War, mostly to provide a better-armed military force as a bulwark against Cuban and Russian troops.  The remaining Cristobals were then handed down to folks who were normally not found with weapons in peacetime, such as the elderly, women, and children than were not yet even in their teens.