The caliber of .45ACP broomhandle definitely needs more study. There was a background. Original Shansei C96 was made by a warlord arsenal (in Shansei, of course). The warlord was a regiment commander in Qing Dynasty (1644-1912), setup his 'kingdom' in warlord years, lost Shansei province in 1949 and fled to Taiwan, finally died there. Many warlord power of the period did not survive that long, but he did. There was something special about this man. For example, the railway he built was narrower than standard. It was done intentionally. Probably learned from Russian.
The arsenal made C96 was not small. Taiyuan Arsenal was one of the three bigger arsenals in China at that time. They also made lots of Thompson-like 11.43mm submachine guns. In warlord years, warlords did not save money on guns, 80% of budget could be spent on weapons (otherwise, how could poor Chinese buy so many expensive Broomhandles at that time
) Owning an arsenal making guns and ammo, was like having a hen that could lay gold eggs. Not only the products could arm his own troops, guns and ammo could be sold or given to other warlords in alliance. But who knows... today's comrades could be tomorrow's enemies, that's especially true among warlords, "how to prevent today's comrades from hitting me in future using my guns".... say, a special cartridge was designed, and there was no other supply except Shansei, that's not impossible in this background and in this man's personality. So, in case of need, just cut that special ammo supply, even if enemy had his guns, those guns would be useless, nowhere else to find supply of this special ammo.
But this cannot be verified by looking at 1980s imports. Original Shansei samples must be studied. I have never gotten one. Write down an item on note book, for future.
Anyone has original Shansei?