Why so many Italian made clones?

[DocRock]

Most likely, Italy was less repressive against its gunmaking industry than the rest of the EU. Some fine old Spanish manufacturers basically got hounded out of business; their names are still around, but the actual guns are mostly made in Italy or Belgium.

The EU wasn’t created until the Maastricht Treaty 1993 and the regulatory powers of the EU over the Member States didn’t come into being until the Treaty of Amsterdam 1999. Spain’s gun manufacturing industry has been in trouble since the late Fifties. Concentrated in Eibar, in the Basque area of Spain, it suffered from government neglect / antipathy poor economies of scale, under-investment, poor overseas promotion and distribution. The Spanish gun industry was in trouble long before EU gun regulation.