Assault Rifle History

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In this short paper I will go over my thoughts on this week’s required reading. This week we read Chapter One of the FTA 215 text. In the beginning of chapter one we were introduced the AR-15 platform. The author stated that “A great deal of confusion and misunderstanding surround this firearm. Demonized as an assault rifle, many people incorrectly believe that the “AR” in AR-15 stands for “assault rifle” or “automatic rifle,” when actually, it stands for “ArmaLite," the name of the company that initially developed the rifle. The “15” is merely the firearm 's model designation.” This is one misconception that really aggravates me personally. I’ve got family members on the anti-gun side of the house and they try to make the “Assault Rifle” argument, …show more content…

The author told us that the platform can be “traced back to the early 1950s, when two men sought to design a military-style rifle that was radically different from anything available at the time. Engineer and attorney George Sullivan, together with inventor Jacques Michault, created prototype rifles that featured straight-line fiberglass stocks, lightweight aluminum receivers, high-line sights, and receiver-mounted carrying handles.” I really liked reading about where the Ar-15 came from, and it made me look forward to building one all that much more. I knew quite a bit about the platform in its current configuration and the capabilities of the weapon, but I was definitely lacking when it came to historic information. We were then spoken to about some modifications made to the platform over years. The author told us that the “M16 rifle continued to be developed and by the mid-1990s, Colt, at the request of the U.S. Special Forces, produced a carbine version of the M16A2, designated the M4 (Figure 3). The roots of this carbine can be traced back to the 1960s vintage Colt CAR-15 carbine, but has several improvements. It is basically the M16A2 rifle, but is fitted with a shorter barrel and handguards, and the gas port is moved back.” As much as I love the M-4 I think the weapon I put together here will be an M-16 a4