Last month I posted what I believe was the first commemorative edition Glock ever made–a Fraternal Order of Police engraved model available to the Metropolitan Police of D.C. As I covered there, the success of commemorative models makes for easy profits for gunmakers and Glock has become one of the best at it! Their second commemorative entry has really taken off in collector circles due to it’s wide appeal and limited run: A New World Order Commemorative, or more commonly called the “Desert Storm” Glock.
This special edition Glock was released in the spring of 1991 to commemorate the decisive coalition force triumph in the short lived Desert Storm war. Production was limited to 1,000 units (the entire UD prefix serial bank) and the model 17s were engraved on all three sides of the slide. There are various reports of the number, finish, and full contents of the earliest units but it is known that the first 50 also came with a knife and mahogany display case.
My example of this gun is from much later in the serial run so, while sporting the special engravings of the more limited offerings, it came in a standard tupperware box without the special finishes or the larger display box.
On the lid of the tupperware, a special sticker was placed that reads, “Operation Desert Storm/1 of 1000/Commemorative/January 16 – February 27, 1991.” Mine has clearly worn over the last 31 years so the sticker is almost unreadable–thankfully the gun was well maintained.
Along the top of the slide, Glock engraved the names of all 30 coalition countries involved in Desert Storm and you will find nearly every version of color filling on these (the large amount of text just begs to be filled in) but the original is all black as seen here. Even the list of countries involved can be an interesting study; what the heck was Niger doing helping to invade Iraq!?
The right side engraved text is the same as the box sticker minus the “1 of 1000” line and is the primary reason these are known as the “Desert Storm Glock.” Just as an interesting tidbit of history: The war is said to have lasted from January 16th to February 27th, but the only reason it went on that long was that ground forces did not cross the border into Kuwait until February 24th. The first five weeks of the war were a massive air offensive unlike anything ever seen in warfare up to that point. Had it not been for the missiles being fired into Israel and Saudi Arabia, the coalition might have broken the Iraqi army without ever stepping over the boarder. Once ground hostilities commenced, the Iraqis were quickly overwhelmed and surrendered in large numbers leading to a cease fire about 100 hours after the offensive began.
One other interesting tidbit: despite the ground war only lasting four days, it included three of the largest tank battles fought in US military history (https://www.wearethemighty.com/mighty-history/6-massive-tank-battles-from-us-history/)
Finally, we come to the controversial detail of the gun–the fact that it commemorates a New World Order. During this time in American politics, the NWO was quite a divisive topic eliciting the all manner of conspiracy theories about the illuminati, globalist elites, and communist takeovers. Traditionally, the New World Order was mostly talked about in right-wing circles as the end goal for the progressive liberals–a one world government which was the basis for railing against the UN and NATO. It is interesting that President George H. W. Bush used the gulf war as an example of what “New World Order” meant to him–this despite him being a republican president. I suspect his invoking of the term is a large reason why the Bush family is still mentioned in conspiracy circles as part of the illuminati or globalist elites (or even the green lizard people haha). While I don’t know Glock’s reasons for including NWO as a part of the commemoration, I do know they had a knack for being able to sell guns and there’s no such thing as bad publicity.
A Brief History of Glock Firearms Aimed at Collectors 