Mikhail Kalashnikov Passed.

[Pep]

I was not aware that he passed this past Dec 23rd.

Rest in peace.

Burial

[toadwbg]

RIP and

Hopefully no one here will be "that guy" who has to try to demonize the man. He was a patriot of his country and time who worked to defend his country.

[GreyGhost]

Rest in Peace ...

-Gregg

[CorsairMan]

I hope he got a piece of all those sales!

[vince14]

I hope he got a piece of all those sales!

He didn't - he was once quoted as saying that he'd have made more money out of designing a lawnmower!

Vince

[salvine]

RIP and :salute:/>

Hopefully no one here will be "that guy" who has to try to demonize the man. He was a patriot of his country and time who worked to defend his country.

I won't demonize him as it's not the gun that kills people but the person holding it. That being said I bet a good case can be made that the AK has been the gun that has been used to kill more people than any other in history.

[yardbird78]

May he rest in peace. He was certainly a patriot to his own country. :salute:

Darwin

[gonzalo]

I won't demonize him as it's not the gun that kills people but the person holding it. That being said I bet a good case can be made that the AK has been the gun that has been used to kill more people than any other in history.

It can also be argued that the AK has shaped history. From Vietnam to Iraq to Africa to the US the AK has been involved in many historical events.

[vince14]

It can also be argued that the AK has shaped history. From Vietnam to Iraq to Africa to the US the AK has been involved in many historical events.

It's certainly the only weapon I can think of that's actually featured on a nation's flag...

Vince

[Scooby]

I won't demonize him as it's not the gun that kills people but the person holding it. That being said I bet a good case can be made that the AK has been the gun that has been used to kill more people than any other in history.

When I was doing IED pre-deployment training for Afghanistan I trained on a US built AK-47. My instructor stated that the US was one of the largest producers of AK-47.

He stated during the Cold War they covertly provided the weapons in large numbers to combatants fighting Soviet forces. It was beneficial to provide these weapons as it was not obvious it was being done and when they overran positions they could use the munitions they captured.

The weapon I trained on was definitely US built. I know it was reported AKs were purchased from eastern countries Buford covert ops but the truth is they were US built.

[ChesshireCat]

When I was doing IED pre-deployment training for Afghanistan I trained on a US built AK-47. My instructor stated that the US was one of the largest producers of AK-47.

He stated during the Cold War they covertly provided the weapons in large numbers to combatants fighting Soviet forces. It was beneficial to provide these weapons as it was not obvious it was being done and when they overran positions they could use the munitions they captured.

The weapon I trained on was definitely US built. I know it was reported AKs were purchased from eastern countries Buford covert ops but the truth is they were US built.

I did not know that! Who built them? I do know that the U.S. Got a few RPD's and rebuilt them with many surface mods done to them (reworked stock, new barrel with an M14 flash suppressor, redesigned safety to eliminate the loud clunk, some even had different sights as well). These were mostly given to SOG teams.

gary

[HOLMES]

May he rest in Peace

[toadwbg]

I did not know that! Who built them? I do know that the U.S. Got a few RPD's and rebuilt them with many surface mods done to them (reworked stock, new barrel with an M14 flash suppressor, redesigned safety to eliminate the loud clunk, some even had different sights as well). These were mostly given to SOG teams.

gary

Century Arms?

http://www.centuryarms.com/

[TheFlyingDutchman]

Hopefully no one here will be "that guy" who has to try to demonize the man. He was a patriot of his country and time who worked to defend his country.

What a nasty way of imposing your own opinion: talking down others who don't think the same by disagreeing with them before someone even said something like that. Yuck.

Fact is that he created a machine that's designed for one sole purpose which is killing people. If it wasn't for the money anyway he should have kept with the lawnmowers.

[Flankerman]

I hope he got a piece of all those sales!

Not from the weapon - but I understand that, in his retirement, he was paid for the use of his name on a bottle of Kalashnikov Vodka.

Ken

[toadwbg]

What a nasty way of imposing your own opinion: talking down others who don't think the same by disagreeing with them before someone even said something like that. Yuck.

Fact is that he created a machine that's designed for one sole purpose which is killing people. If it wasn't for the money anyway he should have kept with the lawnmowers.

Thanks for identifying yourself as "That Guy"

If you'd like to start your own thread about the implications of the Industrial Age on public safety, like the automobile, please do so.

Edited December 28, 2013 by toadwbg

[TheFlyingDutchman]

Thanks for identifying yourself as "That Guy"

If you'd like to start your own thread about the implications of the Industrial Age on public safety, like the automobile, please do so.

You shouldn't have started the discussion by your first comment in the first place, if you didn't want anyone to 'demonize' the person whose passing this thread is about.

And there's a hell of a difference between a car and a gun, and you know that.

Edited December 28, 2013 by TheFlyingDutchman

[toadwbg]

You shouldn't have started the discussion by your first comment in the first place, if you didn't want anyone to 'demonize' the person whose passing this thread is about.

And there's a hell of a difference between a car and a gun, and you know that.

Wow man, just wow. Not taking this any further.

[Fly-n-hi]

What a nasty way of imposing your own opinion: talking down others who don't think the same by disagreeing with them before someone even said something like that. Yuck.

Fact is that he created a machine that's designed for one sole purpose which is killing people. If it wasn't for the money anyway he should have kept with the lawnmowers.

You need to step back and take a deep breath. Toadwbg didn't say anything inflammatory. You're the one who's turning this into an argument.

But for the sake of curiosity...what point are you making exactly? Are you suggesting that Kalashnikov is a mass murderer because people use a gun he designed to kill other people with it? Is John Moses Browning a mass murderer? If I design a car and somebody uses it to commit a crime am I complicit in that crime?

How about this: If I use an AK-47 to protect my family from a murderer does that make Kalashnikov a savior or a saint?

Please clear this up for me.

[HOLMES]

Not from the weapon - but I understand that, in his retirement, he was paid for the use of his name on a bottle of Kalashnikov Vodka.

Ken

...... And a small percentage share in his sons small engineering { arms ?} firm in .Germany... ...it's called MMI.......

HECK!so what if he made a few Rubles or not... Must be a few inventors out there whose inventions have been used to destroy others and they I am sure were paid handsomely....

As Kalashnikov stated he designed the rifle to safeguard his country's borders during the war years ...

.....for it to be used by terrorists etc is not his fault... Is it?

<_<

[Horrido]

Must be a few inventors out there whose inventions have been used to destroy others and they I am sure were paid handsomely....

Such heinous characters as Alfred Nobel, for example.

My impression of Kalashnikov from writings and interviews, is of a highly patriotic individual, disgusted and sickened by the suffering of his nation at the hands of foreign invaders, whose intent was to design a readily mass-produced, effective, durable, and reliable firearm for the common soldier to defend his homeland. Kalashnikov succeeded to an outstanding degree.

I would have loved to have seen his design for a lawnmower.

[Alvis 3.1]

At the bottom of the page is his mower design.

http://kalashnikov-weapons-museum.ak47-guide.com/ch8.html

Didn't have a curved grass magazine like I expected! :)

Alvis 3.1

[ChesshireCat]

What a nasty way of imposing your own opinion: talking down others who don't think the same by disagreeing with them before someone even said something like that. Yuck.

Fact is that he created a machine that's designed for one sole purpose which is killing people. If it wasn't for the money anyway he should have kept with the lawnmowers.

first of all Mr. Kalashnikov didn't invent that beast. He took a good sound design that the Nazis were using, and reworked it to better fit his country's needs. It took him about forty years to finally admit what most folks already knew. The basic rifle has been stretched and even converted into a shot gun. Valmet made a series of hunting rifles off that action that was slightly redesigned. Nice rifles I might add. The intent was a 350 foot combat rifle, and it did that well. Not much more although. The M16 is often regarded as it counter part, but also came around 20 years later. It was a 1000 foot weapon system for the average shooter. Looks like the only reward Mr.K. got was a five dollar hero badge, and that's kinda sad. Mr. Stoner made a lot of hard dollars in royalties. The basic case design that Mr. K. used was off the old .220 Russian case. He simply necked it up to .311" (why that number?). That same .220 Russian case necked up to 6mm is known as the most accurate cartridge under 300 yards (Lou Palmisano and Ferris Pindell created the 6PPC). I used to know Ferris, and he said more than once that the 6BR was a better design from 300 yards outwards.

The basic design of the AK47 was a good design in 1943, and was considered to be the finest infantry weapon in the 1950's and 1960's. Yet time marches on. The design had some issues that were unknown till many years later. And trust me it wasn't without it's own share of problems just like anything else would have been. It's main issue beside the lack of accuracy was noise. It was a very noisy rifle. If the person you were going to shoot was 200 yards away; you were OK. Yet you would probably miss him as well. You could hear the safety at 300 yards in the jungle. Both rifles (M16 and AK47) had a noisy magazine system (even the red Russian magazines were noisy). The Russians and the Israelis were the only folks to address this issue. There were ways to make them quieter in the M16, but the latch on the AK was also a killer when silence was deadly. It has been said that the AK 47 was the preferred weapon of U.S. Special Forces in Vietnam. Maybe, but probably never. There were a very small handful of SOG teams that tried using them, but all went back to something else.(they could use anything they wanted). SOG teams did use a modified RPD on many occasions, but that was mostly heavy teams and hatchet teams. The basic AK47 has been redesigned many times. Some are better than others, but they all pretty shot about the same. The one serious advantage the AK design had was that it was cheap to build. They could simply just spit them out. Others took that design and rebuilt it into a better design (Israel). The Germans did their own with the HK's. The UK and a couple others moved into a different direction, and that's their own business. As I said time marches on!

gary

[ChesshireCat]

Such heinous characters as Alfred Nobel, for example.

My impression of Kalashnikov from writings and interviews, is of a highly patriotic individual, disgusted and sickened by the suffering of his nation at the hands of foreign invaders, whose intent was to design a readily mass-produced, effective, durable, and reliable firearm for the common soldier to defend his homeland. Kalashnikov succeeded to an outstanding degree.

I would have loved to have seen his design for a lawnmower.

the down side of the AK 47 is simply that more men and women have died with that rifle in their hands than any other combat rifle ever. The next one is probably the K44, also from Russia.

gary

[Jinxter13]

May he rest in peace. Mr. Kalashnikov designed the Ak-47, John Browning, and Eugene Stoner did similar with the BAR and AR-15 all have been used for the same purpose. I won't make him a villain for doing what others in the west have done for the same reason. His design is being used to help make a better weapon for use by the US, and maybe others :unsure: .

Edited December 29, 2013 by #1 Greywolf