Where in Boudinot Hall were you hiding? These stories were rampant, and my unit (1/263 Armor) actually had possession of an M8 in unit markings. Strom Thurmond dropped that one on us.
I had a large poster on board of this M8 Buford. It is now at the US Army Armor & Cavalry COllection.
Just to be clear, I had no real insider info into this. I did extra duty helping with the development of the M7 BFiST (just a little) and the simulator for 13F FO training. At that time, at Ft. Sill, there was always time after duty for scuttlebutt and rumor. Same with other training/details…always keep your ears open. Plus, when the internet became a thing, there was a LOT of material being discussed AND I was a member of TANK.Net when that was a veteran run website with a LOT of unpublished material on a LOT of stuff. Add in all the PR places like General Dynamics were doing to win public support for weapons deals and there you have it. I was just able to draw some (to me) obvious conclusions. The 90’s and '00’s were really crazy times.
Or they could have bought the kit, and run a pantograph the turret parts like Academy used to do with Tamiya kits decades ago. Make a few subtle meaningless changes…
They could just buy AFV Club sprues straight from the manufacturer. Not like this sort of thing never happens — Tamiya sells Italeri and ICM kits in Tamiya boxes, for example, Revell sells/sold Italeri, Dragon, ICM and more in Revell boxes, AFV Club’s M113 FSV is an Academy M113 hull with an AFV Club Scorpion turret and miscellaneous parts, and so on.
I was frequently on Fort Knox for the Armor Conferences where you could see everything. I climbed into an M1A2 and was bedazzled.
The stories wer always more interesting than the facts!
