An...interesting and unique...challenge...

Romulus Augustulus · Oct 6, 2005

Your challenge, if you choose to accept it, is to make it so that while nothing else changes, the AK-47 is the automatic rifle used by the United States and its allies while the M-16 is the preferred weapon on the other side of the Iron Curtain.

This should be interesting...

Weapon M · Oct 6, 2005

Well, the AK is crude, simple and effective. It is made for peasants.

The M16 is precise, complex, and accurate. It is designed for people who can handle technological advances like flushing toilets and doorknobs.

You could swap Stoner and Kalashnikov, but you will need to adjust the tolerances and the machining capabilities of the Soviets to actually make the M16 work for them. For the west, we would have to get rid of the US Military tradition of accurate fire, and trade it for a greater reliance on volume of fire. Maybe a need to mass conscript large numbers of people into service quickly?

Forum Lurker · Oct 6, 2005

The two virtues of the AK-47 most widely touted are its field reliability and its higher per-bullet stopping power (the M-16 is heavily criticized for overpenetration, especially against unarmored targets). If the US finds itself, very early on, engaged in situations where these features are paramount, it will be more inclined to adopt the Kalashnikov.

The virtues of the M-16 most widely touted are its accuracy and the low per-bullet weight. Again, all you need to do is put the Soviets in a situation where someone with clout decides that the key thing is to make every bullet count, and they'll go for the M-16.

panzerjay · Oct 7, 2005

Weapon M said:
Well, the AK is crude, simple and effective. It is made for peasants.

The M16 is precise, complex, and accurate. It is designed for people who can handle technological advances like flushing toilets and doorknobs.

So the average GI must be a 4th grade dropout and the VC is someone working on their GED?

Ward · Oct 7, 2005

panzerjay said:
So the average GI must be a 4th grade dropout and the VC is someone working on their GED?

You are talking about some of the guys drafted in the US army in the 60's .

Straha · Oct 7, 2005

Ok. so what POD oculd we use??

panzerjay · Oct 7, 2005

Ward said:
You are talking about some of the guys drafted in the US army in the 60's .

yes. yes i am. i took the summerize notions of Weapon M and posted a context which each weapon is best utilized.

Ward · Oct 7, 2005

In the Mid 60's when the M-16 was first issued to the army had stickers made by mitel Toys . Let say those and the bad ammo made by Fedral gone hand and hand for more than a year . The US troops refuse to use the M-16 .
And start to carring the Captured AK-47 instead . Thats how you can have the US use the AK-47 in nam . I for one refused to carry the M-16 and carried the M-3 Grease Gun instead .

Aldroud · Oct 7, 2005

I've read that the AK-47 has been responsible for killing more people than any other weapon in history. That's just flat out amazing. Carried one most of last year while working as a 'consultant' to foreign country. Nice for stopping cars, but accurate only to about 200 meters.

jolo · Oct 7, 2005

In the 1970s, a civil war erupts in the US, maybe trigerred by some racial unrest.

The war gets really bloody, the US government falls apart.

The war lords replacing the government are happily supplied by the Russians with AK47s, while the Russians take many of the scientists, engineers, and so on to Russia, where the M-16 soon becomes the standard weapon for the army.

A fundamentalist Christian regime gets dominant in the US, after most of the Infrastructure is destroyed. Both their religion and ongoing resistance by rebels keeps the US from producing their own weapons, so that the AK47 stays standard weapon of the new US.

Edit: I overlooked the part with "nothing else changes"...

MerryPrankster · Oct 7, 2005

Aldroud said:
I've read that the AK-47 has been responsible for killing more people than any other weapon in history. That's just flat out amazing. Carried one most of last year while working as a 'consultant' to foreign country. Nice for stopping cars, but accurate only to about 200 meters.

That's pretty interesting. Do you have any stories?

Romulus Augustulus · Oct 7, 2005

Ward said:
In the Mid 60's when the M-16 was first issued to the army had stickers made by mitel Toys . Let say those and the bad ammo made by Fedral gone hand and hand for more than a year . The US troops refuse to use the M-16 .
And start to carring the Captured AK-47 instead . Thats how you can have the US use the AK-47 in nam . I for one refused to carry the M-16 and carried the M-3 Grease Gun instead .

Well, I don't think the M-16 was a bad weapon. Stoner was very good at designing firearms.

Just a bit too fragile in the early marks...

And there's nothing like an AR-15 with a Crossman reflex sight and a silencer for sniping...except for an M-14 with a Crossman reflex sight, a silencer, and a bipod for sniping.

Ward · Oct 7, 2005

Romulus Augustulus said:
Well, I don't think the M-16 was a bad weapon. Stoner was very good at designing firearms.

Just a bit too fragile in the early marks...

And there's nothing like an AR-15 with a Crossman reflex sight and a silencer for sniping...except for an M-14 with a Crossman reflex sight, a silencer, and a bipod for sniping.

Yes there is a 1903 springfield star series with the crossman refles sight .

Romulus Augustulus · Oct 7, 2005

Ward said:
Yes there is a 1903 springfield star series with the crossman refles sight .

I hate operating the bolt. Throws your aim off. I'd rather have an SLR with the reflex sight than something bolt-action.

Maybe an M-1 with an extra long barrel and rechambered for 7.62*51 mm NATO standard?

Weapon M · Oct 7, 2005

Romulus Augustulus said:
Well, I don't think the M-16 was a bad weapon. Stoner was very good at designing firearms.

Just a bit too fragile in the early marks...

And there's nothing like an AR-15 with a Crossman reflex sight and a silencer for sniping...except for an M-14 with a Crossman reflex sight, a silencer, and a bipod for sniping.

It was that crappy, extra nasty, fouling ammo first used in the 60's that give the M16 a les-than-stellar beginning...that, and that lack of a forward assist...

Ward · Oct 7, 2005

Romulus Augustulus said:
I hate operating the bolt. Throws your aim off. I'd rather have an SLR with the reflex sight than something bolt-action.

Maybe an M-1 with an extra long barrel and rechambered for 7.62*51 mm NATO standard?

It depends on what you learned on . I learned on a bolt action rifle how to shoot . And I never have been throw off target . If you cant hit what you are after with one shot you not a good shoot. Its like back in the early 70's we had an old tanker that could boar sight a tank faster then a crew with newer tech . And he never missed in 40 shoots .

Romulus Augustulus · Oct 7, 2005

Ward said:
It depends on what you learned on . I learned on a bolt action rifle how to shoot . And I never have been throw off target . If you cant hit what you are after with one shot you not a good shoot. Its like back in the early 70's we had an old tanker that could boar sight a tank faster then a crew with newer tech . And he never missed in 40 shoots .

I'm personally best with at least an SLR, but I can make do with something bolt-action.

I like the Hewlett-Packard (they purchased Armalite around 2074 and they became Hewlett-Packard's Armaments Division) Model 2805 series. Does very nicely. Completely caseless, and bullpup (the 5.56*45 mm round goes up from the magazine, is pushed forward by the bolt into the barrel and sealed, and is then set off. The bullet goes off and the cartridge, fluorocarbon-based, is completely converted into gas. No need to dispose of bits of brass. Pneumatically-actuated, very reliable...wonderful weapon.)

But in reality, the AR-15, the FN Five-seveN, and assorted hunting rifles are nice.