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A Hero Of The People Has Fallen
12 years ago
General
http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/.....ead-at-94?lite
Few men in history with or without royal titles, or states at their disposal, have left their mark on the world.
A WWII tanker, while injured in the hospital, he put his mechanically inclined genius to work to develop a better weapon for his countrymen to fight the then Nazi aggressors who would ravage them when they closed to 300m or less, usually far less. Under such conditions, submachineguns were far more deadly than their long-range Mosin Nagant rifles.
So he designed something better. He designed a rifle that held 30 rounds in a detachable magazine, which could fire at it's controllable rate, barking in full auto or semi, and could do so under the most punishing of conditions. He did this not through sophistication or tight tolerances, like previous designs (like the phased out SVT-40), but through simplicity and loose tolerances.
The world needed more engineers like Mr. Kalashnikov.
The Beatles White album has sold 20 million copies worldwide.
The Catholic Church has over 400,000 priests.
The population of New York City is approximately 19.8 million people.
Keep those numbers in mind for shear comparison. The AK-47 and it's numerous derivatives number 175 million.
That's enough AK-platform weapons to give everyone in Germany two and a fifth guns. That's, assuming an average weight of 8lbs, over 636,000 metric tons of firearms.
If I were to take your personal AK, and throw it in a theoretical pile of all of them ever made and give you chances to dig one out at random, your chance of picking your original gun would be the same odds as winning the Powerball Lottery.
The man built the gun with a foreign invader in the sights of it, and the Soviets loved it. The Russians and others loved it post collapse, it has been to every corner of the Earth, shot by governments, criminals, terrorists, revolutionaries and children alike. The AK-47 may well have killed more people than any other gun in the world.
The designer was not apologetic though, having merely ushered in an age of better weaponry, and specifically weaponry for the people. Now, at the age of 94 he is laid into the ground.
The Soviet Military decorated him with just about every medal they had, but he lived his life off a meager state pension. Once, he said he wished he had invented a lawnmower instead.
So oil your Kalashnikov. Drink stout vodka. Honor this great man.
But how can any of us hope to honor a man that deserves a 175 million gun salute?
Few men in history with or without royal titles, or states at their disposal, have left their mark on the world.
A WWII tanker, while injured in the hospital, he put his mechanically inclined genius to work to develop a better weapon for his countrymen to fight the then Nazi aggressors who would ravage them when they closed to 300m or less, usually far less. Under such conditions, submachineguns were far more deadly than their long-range Mosin Nagant rifles.
So he designed something better. He designed a rifle that held 30 rounds in a detachable magazine, which could fire at it's controllable rate, barking in full auto or semi, and could do so under the most punishing of conditions. He did this not through sophistication or tight tolerances, like previous designs (like the phased out SVT-40), but through simplicity and loose tolerances.
The world needed more engineers like Mr. Kalashnikov.
The Beatles White album has sold 20 million copies worldwide.
The Catholic Church has over 400,000 priests.
The population of New York City is approximately 19.8 million people.
Keep those numbers in mind for shear comparison. The AK-47 and it's numerous derivatives number 175 million.
That's enough AK-platform weapons to give everyone in Germany two and a fifth guns. That's, assuming an average weight of 8lbs, over 636,000 metric tons of firearms.
If I were to take your personal AK, and throw it in a theoretical pile of all of them ever made and give you chances to dig one out at random, your chance of picking your original gun would be the same odds as winning the Powerball Lottery.
The man built the gun with a foreign invader in the sights of it, and the Soviets loved it. The Russians and others loved it post collapse, it has been to every corner of the Earth, shot by governments, criminals, terrorists, revolutionaries and children alike. The AK-47 may well have killed more people than any other gun in the world.
The designer was not apologetic though, having merely ushered in an age of better weaponry, and specifically weaponry for the people. Now, at the age of 94 he is laid into the ground.
The Soviet Military decorated him with just about every medal they had, but he lived his life off a meager state pension. Once, he said he wished he had invented a lawnmower instead.
So oil your Kalashnikov. Drink stout vodka. Honor this great man.
But how can any of us hope to honor a man that deserves a 175 million gun salute?
ShawnSkunk
~shawnskunk
rest in peace Mikhail
