Snakes In The Ball Pit => Yay, I get to talk about me! => Topic started by: Isfahan on December 23, 2013, 11:37:09 pm
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Isfahan on December 23, 2013, 11:37:09 pm
He's the guy who designed the AK-47 and, perforce, all its subsequent iterations.
(http://i.imgur.com/4IQZO3A.jpg)
The Kalashnikov design has only eight moving parts, and I only need 30 seconds to teach you how to field strip it, after which you will be able to do it in 15 seconds with heavy gloves on in the dead of winter. Throw it in sand, pick it up, shake it out, the rifle will fire. Feed it dirty ammo (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnTdQ0_ejJE), it will fire and cycle. Submerge it in water, take it out, the rifle will fire. Don't want to take it out of the water first? That's fine too. (http://youtu.be/W5K6YymPe_M?t=2m35s) Did your lunch somehow get caught up in the receiver (http://youtu.be/HhGih7eWI3E?t=3m47s)? No worries, the AK's cool with that.
Ready-made for the post-Cold-War shift from open-field, marksmanship-based warfare to close-in, urbanized combat, the AK is still the standard for reliability that other rifles are compared to. No other weapon system used during the 20th century killed more people than the AK. None even came close.
(http://i.imgur.com/ik3yJt3.jpg)
The political landscape of the world today would be much, much different if not for Kalashnikov. Whether it was for the better or the worse is for a bunch of pussy fat-bellied civilians to bloviate about, but the fact remains that his life changed the course of history.
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: One Of The Crappy Pokemon That Nobody Likes on December 23, 2013, 11:39:16 pm
<O
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Odd on December 24, 2013, 12:54:01 am
Pouring some 7.62x39 on the ground. Then picking it all up again because I would not like to accidentally stab my foot with cartridges that have been stored next to a Czech latrine for twenty years, can or no can.
Now to hear what the interns at the various news programs have Googled about him.
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Yossarian on December 24, 2013, 01:30:50 am
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Odd on December 25, 2013, 07:26:13 am
From some Military-focused clone of The Onion comes the most fitting news report of his death.
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Isfahan on January 03, 2014, 04:47:20 pm
Seeing as how you are still not appreciative enough of Mr. Kalashnikov, here's a ten-minute video of a guy shooting a Serbian AK-variant pistol until the wooden handguards start burning from the inside out and then cooling it off by throwing it into water.
Not enough fire or redneck for you? Have it your way, crybaby.
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: STOG on January 04, 2014, 10:08:23 am
When I get tired of all the cool easily-breakable handmade guns in the post-apocalypse, I'll be glad the AK will still be around.
(Just kidding, I'll be dead two seconds into said apocalypse)
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Cyberventurer on January 05, 2014, 10:36:50 pm
Really, all I can think about when I see the pictures is "hey that's the Goldeneye gun".
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Yossarian on January 06, 2014, 06:05:31 pm
A Russian guard of honour fires a gun salute during the funeral of Mikhail Kalashnikov. The 94-year-old designer of one of the world's most recognisable weapons died on Monday. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-25525931)
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Runic on January 15, 2014, 08:35:23 am
Just going to leave this here. (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jan/13/kalashnikov-weapon-inventor-spiritual-pain-dead-millions?CMP=twt_fd)
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Isfahan on January 15, 2014, 03:08:57 pm
I could see how being on a deathbed would tend to make one reflective, yes. I think, if you're concerned not about having been a failure but about having been too much of a success, you did pretty well for yourself.
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Odd on January 15, 2014, 05:57:08 pm
It is a bit silly for him to feel guilty. Even if he hadn't designed the AK there would just have been something else equivalent to fill the niche of a cheap and reliable mass manufactured weapon for the soviets and their allies. Without the AK47 maybe we would have seen the rise of the SKS47 or something entirely new. He was the right man at the right time but he was hardly the only weapons designer eager to fill the technological gap between the URSS and its enemies.
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Isfahan on January 15, 2014, 06:04:10 pm
I just noticed because I'm looking at a monitor now and not a phone screen, but the AKs in that gun-salute picture Yossarian linked? They're genuine old-school milled-receiver AK-47s, not the more common stamped-receiver AKMs.
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Odd on January 16, 2014, 08:20:59 pm
Good eye. Honor guards are funny in that way that they sometimes stick to early generation equipment. Some ex-soviet honor guards even stuck with the sks: http://m1-garand-rifle.com/garands-on-parade/sks.php (http://m1-garand-rifle.com/garands-on-parade/sks.php)
Title: Mikhail Kalashnikov has died.
Post by: Isfahan on February 01, 2014, 12:52:59 pm