“Unveiling the Unexpected: Is It Possible for a Gun to Hit Targets Beyond Corners?”
In 1946 Kalashnikov entered his design into a competition for a new infantry automatic rifle, which it eventually won. In 1947, the weapon was approved for service under the designation Avtomat Kalashnikova – or “Kalashnikov’s Automatic Rifle” – 1947, better known as the AK-47. Trials of the new rifle began in 1948, and in 1949 the AK-47 was adopted as the Red Army’s standard rifle, replacing the SKS after barely a year in service. The AK family of rifles would go on to become the most successful and widely-produced firearms in history, renowned for their ruggedness, reliability, and ease of use. Millions were exported around the world by the Soviet Union, China, and other communist states, and can be found in war zones worldwide to this day. It is important to note here that while the weapon is popularly referred to as the “AK-47,” this designation technically applies to the first three patterns of the rifle. While the first AK-47 featured stamped steel construction like the StG 44, this proved unreliable and was quickly replaced by machined steel construction for the Type 2 in 1951 and Type 3 in 1954. Then, in 1959, Soviet manufacturers finally perfected the stamped-steel technology and introduced the Modernized AK or AKM. This is the AK most commonly encountered around the world, the original “AK-47” patterns being extremely rare.
Yet despite the success of the StG 44 and the AK, it took several decades for the assault rifle concept to catch on in the West. American infantry doctrine had long emphasized individual marksmanship and firing accurate aimed shots over long distances over suppressing fire, and despite the lessons of urban close-combat combat during WWII, the United States was reluctant to adopt an intermediate cartridge. In 1954 the U.S. pressured the newly-formed North Atlantic Treaty Organization or NATO into adopting the full-power 7.62×51 or .308 calibre cartridge as its infantry standard. This decision forced many NATO countries to abandon advanced assault rifle projects and adopt so-called “battle rifles” firing full-power cartridges, such as the Belgian FN-FAL, German G3, and American M14, which was essentially an M1 Garand with a detachable box magazine and select-fire capability. Unfortunately, these rifles proved less than ideal, the full-power .308 cartridge making them nigh-uncontrollable in full-automatic fire. This led many countries like the UK to delete the full-automatic capability from their battle rifles altogether.
