Free Republic

American civilians are buying as many AK47s from Russia's top armory as the Russian military and police. The surge in sales of Russian assault rifles and shotguns are fuelled by firearms enthusiasts who are paranoid about the weapons being banned in the United States. The semiautomatic weapons, fitted with high-capacity magazines, are manufactured at Izhevsk Machinebuilding Plant, Russia's primary small arms factory. They are built alongside the fully-automatic military versions that are used by armies, militias and terrorists around the world. In the United States, they have become immensely popular. Among hunters, recreational shooters and survivalists, they are known for...

By Larry Kahaner Sunday, November 26, 2006; B01 In the grand narrative of World War II, the Battle of Bryansk is a minor conflict, barely deserving of a footnote. But Bryansk has another place in history. It was there that a then-unknown tank commander named Mikhail Kalashnikov decided that his Russian comrades would never again be defeated. In the years following the Great Patriotic War, as Soviet propagandists dubbed it, he was to conceive and fabricate a weapon so simple, and yet so revolutionary, that it would change the way wars were fought and won. It was the AK-47 assault...

Cowboys take up AK47s to combat drug runners on Mexican frontier By Philip Sherwell, near Nogales, Arizona (Filed: 20/11/2005) As he careered along the rock-strewn gulley towards his silver mine deep in the Sonoran desert of southern Arizona, Roger McCaslin first checked his bowie knife, then his pistol, and finally his Kalashnikov. From the road, he had already noticed that something was wrong. Under the harsh sun, Mr McCaslin's black cowboy hat cast a shadow over his droopy moustache and a face so deeply creased that it resembled cracked saddle leather. Welcome to the Wild West 2005, where modern-day cowboys...

AK-47s Headed to U.S. Had Legal Permits Wed Apr 28, 4:13 PM ET Add U.S. National - AP to My Yahoo! By CURT ANDERSON, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON - A U.S.-bound shipment of thousands of AK-47 assault rifles and other combat-type weapons, seized by Italian authorities who suspected they were being smuggled, actually have legal permits to be imported, American officials said Wednesday. About 7,500 AK-47s, AKM rifles and other weapons worth an estimated $6 million were seized April 20 aboard a Turkish-flagged ship in the port of Gioia Tauro. They were bound for New York from Romania. At the...

<p>April 22, 2004 -- A Florida-based arms company is at the center of the international probe into a New York-bound ship seized in Italy while laden with thousands of Kalashnikov assault rifles, The Post has learned.</p> <p>The AK-47s were apparently bound for Vermont.</p>

His name is synonymous with both death and excellence, and for years it was associated with the "enemy" on the other side of the Iron Curtain. Maj. Gen. Mikhail Kalashnikov, the inventor of the AK-47 automatic rifle, opened an exhibit of his life's work at the Military Museum in Delft on Thursday. The rare public showing, called "Rifle Without Borders," features dozens of variants of the weapon. It also includes multimedia displays on the various wars in which the AK-47 has played a major role, including ongoing conflicts in Africa where child soldiers sometimes carry Kalashnikovs. Introduced in 1949, the...