Who be the importer??
According to Steve at AIM, they bought the 260 Mle 49 Rifles from Century Arms, Century did not want to advertise such a small quantity....So Steve bought the whole batch. He told me this about 8 years ago, when I was trying to get the list of serial numbers that he sold.
In any case the Mle 49-56 was imported in some quantity, but the French issue Mle 49 was not. So this is a "rare" gun just by quantity in the US, however the average dealer or collector does not care about French guns, so we have a chance to load up on them!!
I have bought only one that was not from this batch, a non-Syrian 49, that came from Syria to Canada. It had the UAR Decal on the stock. It is the only non-rebuilt Mle 49 French that I have ever seen. With so many rebuilt like new guns around, it is nice to find an original one to compare with the new ones....
Dale