[9] Slides were ordered from Springfield Armory, with front sight pins, beavertail safeties and recoil spring guides from Ed Brown.

Novak was contracted for rear sights, Wilson Combat provided extractors and mag release buttons, while King's Gun Works supplied ambidextrous thumb safeties.

[10] However, as the U.S. Marine Corps began its process of hand selecting members from its Force Recon to be submitted to USSOCOM as Marine Corps Special Operations Command, Detachment One (MCSOCOM Det-1), the selection of a .45 ACP M1911A1-based pistol meant roughly 150 units would be needed, more quickly than the PWS could produce them, as PWS were already backlogged with producing DMRs, USMC SAM-Rs, and updating M40A1s to M40A3s, so DET-1 began the search for COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) surrogates to use.

[12] Kimber shortly began producing a limited number of what would be later termed the Interim Close Quarters Battle pistol (ICQB).

[11] The final units as issued to MCSOCOM Det-1 are the Kimber ICQBs with SureFire Integrated Military Pistol Light (IMPL), Dawson Precision rail, Gemtech TRL Tactical Retention Lanyards based upon the jury-rigged telephone cord versions, modified Safariland 6004 holsters, Simonich G-10 Gunner Grips manufactured by Simonich Knives (Strider Knives had previously replaced the original Pachmayr rubber grips), and Wilson Combat's '47D' 8-round magazines.

Springfield Armory entered a variant of the full-sized Loaded MC Operator M1911A1 pistol with a military-standard 1913 rail, tritium night sights and finished with a two-tone black slide with an olive-drab green frame.

[18] The original pistols were hand-selected standard government issued Colt M1911A1s that were gutted, deburred, and prepared for additional use by the USMC Precision Weapon Section (PWS) in Quantico, Virginia.

[17] The Marine Corps issued the M45A1 to Force Reconnaissance companies, MARSOC and Special Reaction Teams from the Provost Marshal’s Office.

It also has 3-dot tritium night sights, a 5-inch national match barrel, ambidextrous safety, picatinny rail, and a desert tan Cerakote finish.

The M45A1 ships with Wilson Combat 47 7 round magazines, and is a production grade weapon, rolling off the same line as the commercial M45A1 with identical markings and parts.