M9M4 BAYONET : COLLECTION KNIFE BUCK – LANCAY

M9 BAYONET PHROBIS III
Manufactured for the U.S. Army
FIRST GENERATION 1200 units

The small ( > ) CHEVRON stamp to the right of the U.S.A marking , was placed on the very first production line made M9 bayonets

NO MARKINGS on the other side

PHROBIS contracted with BUCK to make about 300k units for the Army.
One of the requirements of the contract was that there be no marks on the knife that would tell who actually made it.
BUCK added a year code mark, the chevron, to the first run thinking it would not violate the contract
and that it would yield helpful information.
They were instructed to stop the practice and only sent out about 1034 units with the mark to the U.S Army.
Another 166 were to be serialized with all odd numbered units going to BUCK and all even numbers going to PHROBIS.
This is one of the odd numbered knives from that first run.
It is serialized 123. It is stamped M9 PHROBIS III U.S.A. > (The > is the year code mark for 1987).
The tops of the M in m9 are flat.

The n° 1, was given to President Ronald Wilson Reagan

One other point worth consideration is PHROBIS researched, developed, & offered numerous improvements for the M9 to the Army.
This was one of the concepts at the core of the Multi Purpose Bayonet System (MPBS) M9.
Unfortunately Army thinking at the time had not evolved sufficiently (as is has now) to take advantage of this benefit.
Had it done so, improvements might have been made to make the M9 an even better bayonet, and likely at no additional cost to the Army...

For what its worth, I can attest to the accuracy of the above paragraph.
I remember when our engineers added the safety stop pin on the wire cutter plate for the civilian version of the 188.
We suggested that this improvement be added to the Army version, at no additional cost, but the idea was turned down.
I was not involved with all the details so maybe they had a good reason. It just seemed odd.

From my friend Joe HOUSER ( BUCK U.S.A. )

An example of the M9 numbered 12 mount on commemorative plaque
Courtesy from Mr LU, (China, Beijing / U.S.A.), great M9 bayonets collector