OT AK-47's used by US soldiers

Bear in mind I wasn't in the military and don't own an AK or M16. An Army sargent at a recruiting demo told me that both round would kill about the same. The problem was the guy hit with the M16 round kept shooting longer after a fatal hit. A solid AK hit usualy put the person down. A personal opinion by a sargent I only met and talked with for a few minutes. Karl

Don't confuse flash suppressors with silencers.

Unka' George ================ When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary. Thomas Paine (1737-1809), Anglo-American political theorist, writer. Common Sense, ch. 4 (1776).

Only rarely, have I shot indoors. I try to avoid the ringing that it causes. :-)

I can well understand several different reasons for keeping a suppressor on, both in and outside of, a close urban environment.

I think the part that surprised me, was that the photos are not being vetted. In this media sensitive age, pretty much any media rep that goes against the guidelines laid out for them, ends up without much in the way of access to stories, so I gotta presume that the official line is swung a bit.

Cheers Trevor Jones

Not a flash hider. 2 or so inches in diameter and well over a foot long, weldes sheetmetal look to the construction. Suppressor, silencer, muffler, moderator, but not a flash hider.

Cheers Trevor Jones

Good grief man. Even I can tell the difference. :-)

Cheers Trevor Jones

This photo, or one of the same lot, was a cover photo on the Canadian Forces Newspaper, The Maple leaf.

Definately a little large to be a flash hider.

Cheers Trevor Jones

(snips)

I have an SKS. I've even fired it. Not exactly a tack driver... somewhat better after I put a Tapco adjustable stock and a red dot on it. The Tapco stock has a rail on top of the fore end. It doesn't lock in the red dot all that securely, but we're talking about a 4" gun anyway, and the red dot is so much easier to use than the open sights that it's worth the slight wiggle. That wooden stock is WAAAY too short, and, in general, a real bitch to use. Besides, the Tapco's rail partially blocks seeing the iron sights, and the Tapco stock is enough better than the original wooden stock that, overall, shooting the thing with the Tapco stock and the semi-stable red dot is much better than shooting it with the wooden stock and the iron sights.

I was practicing using SKS stripper clips one day, and after I had loaded about ten of them into the rifle, my fingers were pretty well cut up. Gimme a detachable magazine, any day!

-- Robert Sturgeon Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms should be a convenience store, not a government agency.

Bob, how did you mount the red dot, did you mount it on the rear receiver cover or what.

i

"You Jews," Tim?

Where ever did you get the idea that Jews, like any other group, all agree with each other?

That kind of thinking leads to this kind of war...Iraq, etc.

In fact, pretty much all wars.

This bit if anti semitism so intrigued me that I made it a point to read a few of Glickman's posts.

I was looking for anything that suggested that he, as a Jew (if he is....don't go by names for ethincity or religious affiliation, he could be a Black Babtist for all we actually know) would attempt to tell you or I what we can or cannot read. He seemed to be very much concerned with his own skin.

In fact, to the point that, rather like you, he expresses some reservations about "authority."

"> War is the dirties of businesses to be in. I don't think that

*rules*

If anything he is inviting others to do what he would do..."anything."

A little thought for those that think "The Jooz" are out to take over the world.

What's keeping them?

They've had at least 5,000 years and they don't seem to be doing too well.

Could it be that isn't a collective goal of "The Jooz" at all?

After all, yah can't be "The Chosen" people if there's no one to be chosen over.

I'd bet my foreskin on it, really.

Kane

The top piece on the fore end has a Picatinny rail.

I see now that they have an available rail for mounting a sight above the receiver, which would be better.

I don't know if it would interfere with loading. Anyway, the SKS probably isn't worth much more fiddling. If things were to go sour, the rifle I'd rely on is a Ruger Ranch Rifle with a 3-9X Leupold scope and a big muzzle brake. The SKS is a curiosity I got from a relative who happened to be in need of some cash. I would never have bought one otherwise.

-- Robert Sturgeon Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms should be a convenience store, not a government agency.

gee, and since you are looking at a sniper team it's hardly surprising. Care to show us the average GI with a suppressor fitted to their M16 or AK47?

looking over a few sites with a number of photos from Iraq and looking at the general infantry rifles displayed I noticed a distinct lack of any suppressors shown.

Sorry, but ONE photo of a sniper team does not establish that suppressors are being used.

Actually, it establishes that at least one is! :-)

The site that that photo was at also has a picture of a Canadian soldier with a supressed AR-10.

Given that the total time I spent looking for any pictures at all amounted to less than 5 minutes, it shows that there are a few photos out there. I was looking for pictures of Canadian soldiers in Afganistan. The others I have seen were in various news and newsmagazine articles, where the main story had nothing to do with the guy with the gun that was visible in the background. In some of the cases, it was obvious that the guys were equivalent to operatives, in others, it was guys that looked like they were setting out on patrols. In any case, there have been enough pictures in the mainstream media, that it was worth commenting upon, so I did.

I am not to concerned whether you need any more evidence than that. I have not said anything to the effect that they were being issued to everybody, just that they were appearing, which is still far more acknowledgment by the military that they are using them, than they were willing to put forth in the years of late.

Given the Canadian government's general stand on supressors, I am surprised at the variety of suppressed weapons I have seen. Stuff from MP5's on up.

Cheers Trevor Jones

I dont have highspeed...so cannot watch the flick.

However..Iraqi security forces wear US uniforms and carry AK-74s or AK-47s.

It should be noted that its not a good idea in most cases to be shooting the enemies weapons. It doesnt take long for a troopie to be able to distinquish the different sounds they make...and if you hear the bad guys gun sounds on the other side of the wall..a grenade is indicated. Bad luck if its your buddy putting out rounds with a captured weapon.

However..this can indeed be used to your advantage, if all the players on your team are aware of the rules..and the bad guys are not.

Then you can sucker THEM into a kill zone.

Gunner

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. Lazarus Long

Google 6.8 Grendal and 6.8 SPC

Btw..any idea of the sheer cost of introducing a new cartridge in replacement of a 45yr old standard, particularly in a combat arena?

It should be noted that the current M16A4 and A3s simply need a new top end, barrel, bolt, receiver and in some cases, new magazines to handle the new 6.8 SPC or 6.8 Grendel cartridge. Its a superior cartridge with marvelous range and antipersonel charecteristics. Makes the "poodle shooter" into a real weapon.

Gunner

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. Lazarus Long

quickly quoth:

M-16, As far as I know no "AR-16" ever existed. I don't know. I do know that other earlier semi-auto US battle rifles (M-1, M-14) are much more sensitive to dirt than an AK, and that the M-16 was introduced into battle without enough de-bugging time, and I expect that some of the hard feelings of troops of the Vietnam war are due to that, not due to a realistic evaluation of the utility of the weapon.

You should be able to see that when your army is expending tens of thousands of rifle rounds for every enemy casualty inflicted, and that point of fact artillery and air power are much more cost effective in killing or injuring enemy (when you include the high cost of our infantrymen killed), that lowering the weight of infantry ammo by about half per round is more important to the Army than the killing power of the round as you have to fire around 10,000-20,000 rounds per hit anyway.

Also a live but injured enemy is more effective use of military resources than a dead enemy. Injured soldiers consume supplies, give other enemy soldiers an excuse to retreat (carrying back the wounded), and often reduces the moral of other troops more than a dead man.

And did not lose many men because you can carry about double the number of rounds of M-16 rounds as M-14 rounds in the same helicopter load. But that may not have been very obvious to the grunt in the field. Also the grunt carrying an M-16 can carry double the ammo load in terms of rounds for a total weight of less than half the ammo with an M-14, as the M-16 is IIRC several pounds lighter than the M-14.

Running out of ammo in a fire-fight can be fatally embarrassing.

I am not 100% for either side of the argument, but I can see that both sides have good points. My take is that Mr. Kalashnikov's point that smaller ammo will make for more jammed weapons (even if you increase the clearances of the smaller caliber weapon [the Israeli Galil rifle for example uses the AK action with a 5.56 mm round] ) is more telling than the power of the larger round vs. the smaller.

detailed description of Galil rifle

If you are talking elite troops like special forces or rangers and so on, where all of them shoot and make rounds count, then I think it obvious to let them use the weapons and ammo they prefer, they know their own tools best. When talking about typical infantry, many of whom never shoot aimed shots at the enemy (spray and pray), lighter weapons with lighter ammo is a valid choice especially from a logistics point of view.

On 14 Apr 2007 21:17:00 -0700, with neither quill nor qualm, snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com quickly quoth:

quickly quoth:

Yes, I meant the early M-16. I either had a brain fart or my fingers weren't awake when I typed that.

Between the fouling and dirt, the rifle got its early bad rep, but it lived up to its good name later, once they debugged that and got cleaning kits to the troops in the field (who were left.)

The personal style I look up to is the sniper's motto: 1 shot/1 kill.

Truth!

This is good.

I can imagine.

I agree. I'd much rather have a non-jamming weapon than choice of size, though I'd prefer the more powerful cartridge given a second druther. If it's jammed, size doesn't matter.

Interesting. Their ARs use longer 7.62x51 cartridges, too. Hmm, I like the intermediate 7.62x39 rounds now that I've shot a few, though they have a shorter range. Hell, I can't -see- far enough to make a difference there.

Absolutely!

I sure wish our soldiers were taught NOT to spray and pray, don't you? I'm pretty sure that the folks in Hollywood teach them their rifle skills if some of the field videos I've seen are any indication. What a waste of time, ammo, and money, not to mention all the damage all those unrequited bullets cause!

[snip] [snip]

I'd be curious how those that actually were in battle felt about how much ammo to carry before the first firefight and afterwards.

Somewhere along the way I heard the phrase, "Ammo is life".

Wes

I spent more then a year in Vietnam, stationed at Nha Trang and while I was in the Air force did considerable work for 5th Special Forces and got to know several of their people well. The attitude toward ammunition I heard expressed was "more is better". In fact, I heard specifically stated that one of the advantages of the M-16 was that you could carry more ammunition for it.

Bruce in Bangkok (brucepaigeatgmaildotcom)

The SKS is a TOTALLY different rifle from the AK The "K" in AK stands for it's designer Kalashnikov The "S" in SKS stands for it's designer Simonov The AK was and still is a "select fire" rifle, everywhere else in the world.