Arisaka & Mosin Nagant rifles under Mexican service: Imperial Arms in the Mexican Revolution

After the toppling of the Diaz regime in May 1911, the subsequent Mexican administrations signed contracts with speculators, ordnance manufacturers, and foreign governments to purchase badly needed arms and munitions during the sustained civil wars for two decades (1911-1929). The Mexican administrations and ruling factions either used diplomatic entreaties to gain the United States recognition or sought support from other foreign powers such as Germany or Japan, adopting different arms platforms.

The subsequent US arms embargos, the outbreak of WWI, restricted access to international arms markets, and the lack of a developed domestic industrial base forced Mexican administrations to explore different venues to supply their respective troops.

From 1912 to 1930, Mexico dispatched several military and commercial missions to Germany, Spain, Italy, and Japan to offer raw minerals, oil, and trade concessions in exchange for arms, ammunition, and equipment to manufacture war materials domestically. These same arms were later utilized to equip second-line units, offered to national resistance movements fighting against US interests in Central America to distract the American government's pressure on Mexico, or given to foreign countries for ideological reasons.