What is an assault rifle?

G

gunloony

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Hearing and reading accounts of the mass murder at a theater in Aurora, Colorado, the reports repeatedly describe the rifle used by the accused killer as an "AR-15 assault rifle." None of the reports make any mention of the rifle being sold through a Class III dealer or being adapted to automatic or selective fire, so how did a semi-automatic get to be an assault rile? I guess maybe we should be thankful it isn't being described as a "machine gun." Anyone care to discuss the abuse and misuse of language as it applies to the gun rights/gun control issue?
 
The non-knowing public will always be just that. The media is in too big of a rush to ever research facts. -7-
 
They're also often called "high-powered assault rifles" even though they chamber lower-powered ammo designed to give recoil reductions from the "high-powered" .30-06 and 7.62x54R they replaced. AKs and ARs are BAD, but Mausers, Mosins, and 1903s are OK.
 
"Assault rifles" are whatever the reporter says they are. Media is notorious for providing misleading facts leading to the public's general lack of accurate knowledge. "Assault rifle" has a sinister connotation and captures attention more dramatically than "semi-automatic rifle."

During my very short career as a science teacher, one of my general science students stated that she did not need to know science because she was going to be a journalist. There you have it: don't confuse me with the facts.

Aside from definition gone amok, there is profound sadness for the victims of the massacre and their families. No one should suffer needless and mindless slaughter.
 
I really don't see anything strange with calling an AR-15 type weapon an assault rifle. The style -- styling? -- of those is of course military which, as we all know, has its own appeal to certain folks. They also often have the ability to accept high-capacity magazines. I suppose you could call them military-style rifles, but assault rifle doesn't seem a strange name to me.

I also don't mind when the news calls a .308 bolt action a "hunting rifle."
 
Assault rifles are one of two things:

1) capable of select fire (auto)

2) the media's favorite term for an evil rifle used by a psycho

:rolleyes:
 
Gunny folks know what the definition of assault rifle is. The general public, and quite a few gun owners, do not. The way "assault rifle" is being used by the media has now become the accepted norm by the man at large. I don't like it either, and try to educate when I can, but that's the way it is.
 
One of the problems with English.....

Is everyone seems to make up definitions to fit the moment, or the agenda.
And, dictionaries give definitions "in popular use", whith no thought, or explanation that the "popular use" definition may be incorrect in the technical sense.

The definition I use, and the one I have been using since the 1960s is that an "assault rifle" is a rifle in the same general class as the German Sturmgewehre. The key defining elements are select fire (safe, semi & full auto), and the use of an "intermediate" power cartridge.

An intermediate power cartridge is one more powerful than a standard WWII pistol round, but not as powerful as a standard WWII infantry rifle/machine gun round. 7.62x39, 7.92x33 (the original) and even 5.56mm fit into this niche.

Up until the anti gun frenzy of the late 80 and early 90s, "assault rifle" was also stretched informally to include both the .22LR and sometimes centerfire semi auto copies of the original military assault rifles.

After the frenzy started, and the media began using the term "assault rifle", lots of folks tried to point out to them that they were technically wrong, and the rifles they were talking about were semi auto only, and therefore NOT actual assault rifles.

The media did, for a short time, use the term "semiautomatic assault rifle", but that proved to be too cumbersome a sound bite, so they came up with the term "assault weapon". Very close in sound to assault rifle, but subtlely different.

The term "assault weapon" applied to SEMI AUTO guns, that looked like the select fire military ones. In 1994, "assault weapon" became codified in Federal (and several states) law, and defined it as semi auto weapons with certain combinations of design features, such as (but not limited to) detachable magazine, pistol grip, bayonet lug, flash hider/suppressor, etc...

another factor complicating the correct use of the term assault rifle is the multiple definitions of the word "assault" in common usage. Some people think that any weapon used to assault (as in attack/shoot) someone is an assault weapon, and ought to be referred to that way. Technically correct in English usage, but totally wrong in contextual definifion.

"Assault" in assault rifle refers to a military assault on an objective. It is a direct translation of "Sturm" from Sturmgewehre. Sturm is translated as "assault" or "storm" (as in storming an objective, in the military sense).

Sturm is also translated as storm in the meterologial sense, so the correct translation depends on context. Something a great number of people (especially those in broadcast journalism) seem incapable of understanding.

The bottom line is an assault rifle is select fire, and shoots an intermediate power round. It can have a lot of other features, or not, but if doesn't have those main two, it's NOT an assault rifle, it is something else.
 
The Brady Campaign calls magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds "Assault Clips". In my opinion, it's their goal to demonize anything having to do with firearms.

The term "assault rifle" is now synonimous with AR15s and AK variants. It's the mainstream term for them. Just like "clips" for magazines.
 
Piggyback

Where/Who coined the term?
I know the Strumgwer (sp?) 44 has been given the term, but translation from German War Storm is closer to literal.
Is the term Assault Weapon/Rifle ever used in the military?
 
Haven't we talked about this before? No, the army doesn't call anything an assault rifle as far as I know. But different armies call their weapons by different names.

The FN 7.62 NATO rifle was called by FN the "Light auto rifle," abbreviated FAL in French. The British called it the Self-Loading Rifle. The United States liked to add "U.S."to the names of their rifles with "U.S.," as in "Rifle, U.S., Cal. 30 M1." You may also note that "Garand" was not used, nor was Springfield for the older bolt action. "Browning" was used for machine guns.

Because the basic Armalite AR-15 does not come with a select fire switch, it is clearly useless for military purposes and obviously a sporting weapon.
 
It just occurred to me that many folks who get bent out of shape over the misuse to the term "assault rifle" happily call magazines clips.
 
This is not an "assault rifle".

closeup.jpg


It is a semi-automatic rifle that was created by the rechambering of an existing semi auto clone of a military rifle. It has never been accepted into military service, and is in use in no countries as a service or police firearm. No one has ever been harmed by this rifle, and the chance of that happening is highly unlikely. It is just a neat fun rifle to own and shoot.


This rifle WAS the "assault rifle" of it's day. It was accepted into military service, had a, (then), high capacity magazine, and this particular specimen made it to England in 1943, back out in 1956. It may have shot a real live enemy or two.

PICT0056.jpg


Semantics - let them choose the words and we lose half the fight. Unfortunately, being the news media, it's for us hard to control the verbiage.
 
It depends who you ask, there is a technical definition of an assault weapon, & an utterly different legal definition of the same name.

Military definition is a man portable weapon with the ability to fire short bursts of intermediate calibers on full automatic fire controllably.

Based on the items cited by various advocates of the current U.S. Legal terminology it would be any foriegn designed/made weapon with the cosmetic appearance that makes us nervous. I cite the various restrictions of such things as folding stocks, pistol grips, interchangable magazines & the infamous "shoulder thing that goes up".
 
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