Nothing in this video will be new to anyone who’s actually knowledgeable about firearms. But because so many Second Amendment opponents are either knowingly dishonest or willfully ignorant of such basic facts, here’s Forgotten Weapons’ Ian McCollum defining exactly what an assault rifle is.
“An assault rifle:
Is a select fire rifle, which means it can fire either semi-automatic or fully automatic or burst (a form of fully automatic)
That uses a detachable magazine
And is chambered for an intermediate cartridge, which means something larger than a pistol cartridge but smaller than a traditional full power rifle cartridge.”
Got that? If it’s not capable of firing fully automatic, it’s not an assault rifle, no matter how much bad Democratic Party legislation says otherwise.
“A semi-automatic rifle that meets the other two criteria, like a semi-auto AR-15 does not meet criteria, that is not an assault rifle.” No automatic fire mode, no assault rifle.
“The reason people think this is not a valid term goes to the late 1980s, and then especially 1994, when in the United States there was an assault weapon prohibition passed. Now, it was a ban with a sunset, so only lasted 10 years, and in 2004 it went poof and disappeared and is no longer in force.”
“But what that legislation did was legally define not assault rifles, but assault weapons, and it did so with rifles, with shotguns, and with handguns.”
“The definition in that law was not the same as the technically recognized definition of an assault rifle, in that essentially what they were trying to do was a blanket prohibition on firearms that had a military appearance. And so the elements that defined assault in that legislation were things like bayonet lugs, grenade launchers, folding stocks, threaded muzzles, barrel shrouds, and that sort of thing. No relation to the technical definition of assault rifle.”
“What they were trying to do is take a scary military phrase and apply it to not scary, or potentially scary-appearing civilian firearms that they wanted to restrict or prohibit.”
So any time a leftwing politician tries to lie about what an assault rifle is to further their quest for complete civilian disarmament, just send them this.
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31 Responses to “Ian McCollum Defines Assault Rifle”
Current usage favors Modern Sporting Rifle to designate a semiautomatic carbine that fires an intermediate range cartridge and which features a detachable box magazine.
I refer to my M4-gery as a battle carbine although it lacks any provision for automatic fire. It is best suited as a trainer for those who would like to be acquainted with the operational fundamentals of an assault weapon. It has the same manual of arms that the GI article has and also has the same ballistic performance of its military counterpart, making transition to the genuine article nearly seamless.
Every able-bodied citizen should own one in addition to ~1,000 rounds of ammunition, six or seven magazines and a magazine carrier. The security of a free state depends on a well—trained militia and every man has a duty to perform towards that end.
Most of this crap is marketing, just like the term “Battle Rifle”. Which has never, ever been a real doctrinal term, but which has snuck in through the good offices of ignoramus jackasses in high places.
“Sturmgewehr” is purest Hitlerian oratory; the original military term for the rifle was Mkb, or Maschinen Karabiner. Hitler nixed the project, being a big believer in full-house cartridges, and they changed it to MP or Maschinen Pistole, because they were hiding the program as a “product improved” sub-machinegun.
The whole issue is madness made manifest; the terminology surrounding these things is really meaningless until you start making believe it all means something. The reality is that the weapons are what they are, and get used for what they are best suited for.
I remain amused at the doctrinal terminology over in the machinegun world: I once had to build a friggin’ spreadsheet to lay out what all the different terms might mean to different people, and it is truly amazing how many different ways people have found to parse “Machine Gun” and the roles for them. You think you’re talking about one thing with a German, when you say “Heavy machinegun”, but the reality is, he’s talking about a tripod-mount GPMG, and you’re talking .50 caliber M2HB. Your grandfather, back in WWII? He would have thought that the “HMG” was a water-cooled Browning in 7.62, and the .50 would have been in an entirely separate category…
Don’t even get me started on the Commonwealth armies. That’s a whole other rathole of confusion.
What’s really amusing is that you go to what you would think should be the final arbiter, the NATO STANAG system, and what you find there is that basically, everyone has agreed to disagree on the categories… So, you look up the map symbol for an HMG on a map of a defensive position you’re taking over, and the symbol is going to mean different things to different armies, causing great confusion to all concerned… I have rather unpleasant memories of a turnover mission in Germany in the middle of winter, with me and my guys thinking we were taking over positions from the Germans that were already dug, and discovering that their idea of a GPMG position was vastly different than ours… Cue the “Oh, f*ck…” and a trip back to get our pioneer tools out of the truck. No sleep, that night…
This is one of those areas that is in dire need of clarification across the board. Of course, since everyone wants to make believe that small arms are obsolete and irrelevant… It’ll likely never get straightened out to anyone’s satisfaction.
Just remember that the same word means different things to different people…
Your evident fondness for nominalism will cause you to trip up when confronted with the challenge of formulating categories. Clearly, a military rifle chambered for 7.62 NATO has functional characteristics that distinguish it from one that fires the 5.56 NATO round.
So to designating the M-14 as a Main Battle Rifle and the M-4 an assault rifle does no violence to logic, design parameters or military history.
The nominal designation of “machine pistol” as applied to the MK-44 cannot obviate its startling departure from preceding designs that were either intended for long-range volley fire or short-range melee engagements.
This suggests that there are no fewer that three distinct weapon systems: submachine gun, assault rifle and main battle rifle.
Likewise, machine guns are either light or heavy depending on whether they are individually operated or crew served. If a particular example serves overlapping functions it does not mean that broad distinctions between the two categories cannot be made.
Definition and distinction are essential to all meaning. No useful discussion can occur if nominalism is your starting point.
I worked on range design and planning, all sorts of ranges, for near two decades. Public hearings and congressional inquiries were always fun because of the militaryese jargon which often defied logic.
Explaining that no ‘live’ bombs (bombs with explosive filler) would be used on many of our very small ranges, the term ‘dummy’ would always slide into the conversation. Subsequently explaining which aircraft would use the range, and with what weapons, we’d be including laser guided, aka “smart”.
And your desire to be trendy trips you up on meaningless verbiage.
Riddle me this: What is the qualitative difference, in terms of tactical role and capabilities, between something like an M1 Garand and an M14? Can you deliver any sort of sustained or controllable automatic fire with an M14?
The average soldier cannot. Which is why virtually nobody ever used that full-auto switch on the side of their supposed “Main Battle Rifles”, which is in itself a ridiculous term coined by dumbass ignoramus gun-rag writers back in the 1980s, trying to sound cool by copying the term “Main Battle Tank”. It’s a nonsense term created by nonsense men for a non-existent category. No military ever used that terminology, until the latest set of dumbass poseurs advocating for NGSW, men who don’t even understand what the hell the existing weapons suite is or how it functions.
Words mean things, and when you start pushing BS terms from games and other sources into the technical terminology, all it does is pollute the discussion. There are precisely zero role or effect differences between an M1 Garand and an M14, despite the fantastic imaginations saying there are.
You get to an actual controllable-on-full-auto intermediate caliber weapon like an M16, or any of the other weapons in that class? Then, yes, it makes sense for another term to be introduced, because those weapons give you an ability and need for a different set of tactics. I’m not fond of the term “assault rifle”, because what you actually use the added capability for is most often “counter-assault”, but… Hey, that’s what they went with. And, the term is actually one arrived at and agreed-upon by mutual definition within NATO.
Although, I will quibble until my dying days that any individual weapon with both a full-auto capability and in 7.62 NATO is by nature a useless affectation. Having fired a couple of those, and even being a fairly large and muscular person at the time, I found them essentially uncontrollable and entirely impossible to use to effect in any mode other than making noise and frightening the children. Sure, you can do it, kinda, under carefully controlled conditions on a range, but the realities of use in a firefight, as you’re running and gunning? I’m pretty sure that you’d probably be inflicting rather more damage to your fellow soldiers and your own hearing than on the enemy.
Definitions matter. You tell me you’ve got an LMG in your position on a defensive line, then we’d better be in agreement that that LMG is the same thing, or we’re going to be in trouble when the time comes to actually do that defense. In some NATO armies of the 1980s, when they used that term, they were talking about a bipod-supported BREN modified to fire 7.62 NATO. Others meant an MG3 on a bipod, and still others were talking about a heavy-barrel FAL… All with totally different tactical capabilities.
So, yes, despite your desires, words do mean things. And, they have to be generally-agreed upon meanings, or things can get well and truly f*cked up. The sophistry used by the gun control jackasses to paint things as “evil” because of how they were described…? Perfect example. Functionally, there’s little to choose between an M2 carbine and an StG44, but because the nattering children of the world look at the one and see “harmless Elmer Fudd gun” looking at one, and “Evil baby-killing thing” when looking at the other? We get what we want. And, allowing those dumbasses to set the terms of the discussion is an entirely unforced error. There were no “assault weapons” banned by the so-called “Assault Weapons Ban” of the 1990s; all that they banned were things that resembled actual military weapons in that category. I mean, seriously… When was the last time you heard of a drive-by bayonetting? How’d a “shoulder thing that goes up” play into anything, ever? Was someone speared by one during a drive-by, or something?
Again, your disdain for accuracy in terminology plays into these things. I believe that the outrageous bullshit that the gun rags got up to with all their marketing crap is what enabled a lot of that legislation to go through… If Joe and Jill Average weren’t walking through the magazine aisle at the local grocery store, and seeing these things like “Assault Weapons Monthly” with lurid pictures of the latest imitation “Main Battle Rifle”, none of that crap would have come up as something to legislate against. It was entirely a self-own by the firearms industry, a linguistic auto-da-fe that they created.
Again, words mean things. At least, for a little while, while everyone agrees upon their meaning. Once things start getting misnamed or they start picking up the underlying connotations of the object they describe, well… Yeah. That’s how “Idiot”, “Imbecile”, and “Cretin” shifted from unfreighted technical terms to actual loaded pejorative insults because of what they described… Creating the “euphemism treadmill”. Eventually, we’ll lose the weighting on these words, and whatever replaced them will assume their pejorative meaning, whereupon we can go back to them and start the cycle all over again…
Precision in language equals precision in thought, as language is the tool of thought, not just “expression”. There’s a reason for the Thirteenth Analect of Confucius having its place as one of his most important… Names must be rectified, in order for things to be properly discussed, considered, and acted upon. You don’t have the name right, you won’t think about the subject properly, mostly because you won’t be acknowledging the underlying reality.
You run into this fuzzy thinking crap a lot with regards to the current crime rates: They’re not “young black men” committing these crimes; they’re pure and plain criminals. The color of their skin has nothing to do with their actions, and should not play a part in determining what to do with them. We don’t insist on the proper names, then fuzzy wishful thinking and projection becomes all too easy…
I’ve been on the other side of this crap far too often. Words have meanings, ones that ought to be fixed and agreed-upon by everyone. Linguistic anarchy only prevents proper thought and action…
“Explaining that no ‘live’ bombs (bombs with explosive filler) would be used on many of our very small ranges, the term ‘dummy’ would always slide into the conversation. Subsequently explaining which aircraft would use the range, and with what weapons, we’d be including laser guided, aka “smart”.
So … smart dummies.”
The problem would have been obviated by implementing some clarity into the situation: “We’re going to be using inert munitions on the range, which will be guided…”
When you think about it, an awful lot of the terminology has not the slightest amount of apparent logic to it… Consider the word missile itself. At first glance, many think that it evolved at least partially from “miss”, in that many thrown things “miss their target”. I’ve had college graduates tell me that, along with things like “…a guided missile is an oxymoron; we ought to call them hittiles…”. The reality is that “missile” comes in from Latin, and “miss” is Germanic, with totally different etymologies despite sounding alike.
Common parlance where I was in the military had it that a rocket was unguided, and a missile was guided by one means or another; you could also use the term “ballistic” to describe something that did not have the ability to change its course, as well.
I do feel your pain; a lot of the jargon used inside the military makes for an awful lot of misunderstanding and error on the part of civilians. We ran into a lot of that, when they shut down Fort Lewis after Ninth ID went away; the surrounding communities had a few years of relative quiet, people forgot what living next to a base really meant, and then a bunch of real estate types got hot and heavy selling properties that had heretofore been unsellable… As soon as the base got to be a major training post, again? Oh, lord, did the complaints roll in. Not to mention, the stupidity: I have memories of running a demolition range down at the southern border of the training area, and discovering that people thought those training areas were national forest, or something: You’re set up for a series of 30lb shots (range limit, at the time…), fuses pulled, and here come a line of horseback riders out of the woodline around the demo pits, ‘cos ain’t nobody got to check in with Range Control… Closest I’ve ever come to having an aneurysm, I think. You just could not get it through those people’s heads that they were well inside a controlled military base, and that to be there, they had to first check in with Range Control up in the cantonment area… Mind-boggling.
On another note, ever seen what a bunch of horses do when they suddenly find themselves near fairly large explosions…? It ain’t pretty. Does end arguments about access rights pretty damn quickly, though.
The most important things to remember are that 1) the control freaks who do want to take away your weapons manipulate these terms expressly to scare people, 2) it’s been happening since at least 1934, 3) the people are a lot stupider than they used to be, and 4) introducing real people to shooting as a pastime/sport really helps destroy the stupidity and fear generated by the prophets and priests of Progressivism.
The best thing we could do to encourage support for the 2d Amendment would be to educate every single kid in America on firearms safety, and then teach them to shoot a firearm safely to a minimal competence level, and teach them to fence and to box or wrestle. IMO.
Something that sometimes gets missed, on the distinction between an Assault Rifle and an Assault Weapon, is that Assault Rifle has a FUNCTIONAL definition.
That is, the military uses the term Assault Rifle because it needs the term. It describes something important. Specifically, this: an Assault Rifle is an automatic rifle light enough to be carried on the battlefield by an average infantryman. Therefore, if you want a platoon, or a company, or a battalion, to all be equipped for automatic rifle fire, you issue them Assault Rifles.
Assault Weapon, by contrast, has no functional definition. There is nothing functional about the distinction between one rifle, that is considered an Assault Weapon, and another rifle that is not. If there were, then the term’s definition wouldn’t keep changing.
The closest you can get to a functional definition is this: an Assault Weapon is a rifle that a politician wants to ban.
“What is the qualitative difference, in terms of tactical role and capabilities, between something like an M1 Garand and an M14?”
The M-14 has better continuity of fire. It also has a better gas system, which makes for greater reliability under conditions of sustained fire. Was the Browning Automatic Rifle “controllable with automatic fire”? The M-14 is a more compact version of Browning’s major domo.
“Words mean things…”
Thanks for making my point. Perhaps you will stop obfuscating now and give up on your peckish nominalism.
“Although, I will quibble until my dying days…”
Unfortunately, that seems to be all too true.
“You don’t have the name right, you won’t think about the subject properly, mostly because you won’t be acknowledging the underlying reality.”
Now you are making the case for philosophical realism, which was my original argument. Thanks for agreeing with me for a change.
“What they were trying to do is take a scary military phrase and apply it to not scary, or potentially scary-appearing civilian firearms that they wanted to restrict or prohibit.”
Before ‘assault rifles’ we were hustled with the term ‘cop killer bullets’ to get us to accept a ban on cheap military surplus pistol plinking ammunition. Before ‘cop killer bullets’ we were hustled with the term ‘Saturday night special’ to get us to accept a ban on concealed carry pistols. Before ‘Saturday night special’, we were hustled with the term ‘chopper’ to get us to accept a ban on automatic weapons.
Do not engage the totalitarian left in their language games. You cannot win. Read George Orwell’s ‘Politics and the English Language’:
P.S. The selector on the M14 series rifles was only intended for the M15 and M14E2 variants. Both are easily controlled in prone with the E2 stock, bipod, muzzle brake, fore grip and special sling. The problem I had was changing magazines with sufficient alacrity to make automatic fire worthwhile.
Before ‘assault rifles’ we were hustled with the term ‘cop killer bullets’
Don’t forget “teflon bullets” that would slide right through a bulletproof vest! Just like an egg out of a frying pan.
And the “Saturday Night Special” is a great example of finagling the language. The Saturday Night Special was a real weapon: a cheap snub-nosed .38. And it was a real problem because it was so cheaply made – it was crap that sometimes hurt the shooter. That made it a dangerous weapon. Which now became a “dangerous weapon” to everyone out there (not just the owner). And, it was cheap, so anyone could buy one. Which leads to the easy story of it’s “dangerous” and everyone can get one, so pretty soon every person with even a tiny bit of ill intent in their heart will be carrying one and shooting anyone that crosses them up. Which movies and tv shows then made into a trope: Death Wish and loads of other stories.
And, suddenly, cheap firearms became an evil to be thwarted.
(Note: They didn’t go after expensive firearms. Because the people who could afford those were the right kind of people. It was the masses who were a danger.)
One other requirement for a weapon to be an “assault rifle”, at least according to the US Army in the 80s and 90s, was that it had to have a maximum effective range of at least 300 meters. Anything less than that would be a carbine. Example being the M2 carbine.
“(Note: They didn’t go after expensive firearms. Because the people who could afford those were the right kind of people. It was the masses who were a danger.)”
The U.S. Treasury’s ATTD Nazis banned the Walther PPK in all calibers and versions as a ‘Saturday night special’ by regulations authorized by the 1968 Gun Control Act. It failed the arbitrary 4 inch height ‘box test’ devised by ATTD specifically to prohibit the PPK.
The Walther/Manurhin PPK in 9mm kurz was the finest quality, most effective subcompact handgun ever made. Its last retail price from Interarms, $ 189.00 in 1968, would be something like $ 1,700 in current dollars after adjusting for inflation.
really not a very well written article. “So any time a leftwing politician tries to lie about what an assault actually to further their quest for complete civilian disarmament, just send them this.” huh?? the meme doesnt make sense.
“The problem I had was changing magazines with sufficient alacrity to make automatic fire worthwhile.”
The M-16’s ergonomics are vastly superior but the M-14’s magazine release lever can be mastered with practice. In the video, Ian demonstrates the proper technique while using the AK-47’s nearly identical set up.
Do not allow the enemy to frame the narrative. Assault rifles and assault weapons (sic) are not synonymous terms. “Assault weapon” is anything Leftists want to ban.
Ian uses the correct terminology to set the record straight.
“Before ‘cop killer bullets’ we were hustled with the term ‘Saturday night special’”.
I took a Hebrew course taught by an Orthodox rabbi. His theology was conservative but his politics were not. During one class, discussion swerved from ancient history to current events and he dropped the phrase “Saturday Night Special “.
I gently called his attention to the original meaning this phrase held, namely these were the guns likely to hold a place of prominence in N***** Town on a Saturday night. Not wishing to look like a racist, he stopped the discussion cold and never brought up the subject again.
“The M-16’s ergonomics are vastly superior but the M-14’s magazine release lever can be mastered with practice.”
The magazine catch lever isn’t the problem when firing an M15 or M14E2 on automatic. You have a special sling which you have to run really tight from the bipod, through the fore grip, to the butt swivel to make the fore grip an effective hold point to prevent muzzle rise. That sling occupies the space behind the fore grip you need to latch the front of the fresh magazine on the back end of the drive spring guide.
The quandary: Loosen that sling and you can’t keep the bursts on target at 600 yards. Tighten the sling so it rigidizes the fore grip and you have to wrestle with it every time to get fresh magazines latched in their front, and their rear.
1. I’ve inserted a final edit that seems to have gotten lost.
2. Given his long hair, mild demeanor and encyclopedic knowledge of firearms, Ian McCollum has been nicknamed “Gun Jesus.” It’s an Internet thing.
3. As is your argument is invalid.
“I wonder how many panties at the ATF were twisted when Walther just put the PPK’s slide/barrel on the frame of the PP, and called it a PPK/S?”
The Walther PPK/S was the brainchild of Russ Moure, Interarms’ Director of Engineering. Dick Winters, their EVP, presented it to ATTD at the late 1968 appeal of the ATTD ‘box test’. A very high pucker factor meeting. I was in stiches.
A 7.62mm NATO battle rifle is indeed a possible thing, but would take careful design to have controllable recoil. The predecessor, the 7.62mm x 63 rifle with a 174 grain projectile was set at the very upper limit of tolerable recoil for the rifle of its day. The reduction from 174grain to 150 grain was intended to limit maximum range, because of the limitations of ranges in the US (~5000 meters), that was not a limitation in Europe. Still the recoil reduction from that change was very small, perhaps 10%. 7.62mm NATO was designed to get that same velocity and grain from more efficient propellant, yielding a slightly smaller cartridge, so ammunition was 20 rounds to the pound rather than 16 to the pound. For a useful automatic fire capability, the rate of fire would have to be quite low, with the recoil spread out over time, perhaps with some spaces in between with no recoil that would prevent recovery. If we stipulate that the M-16 with a 62 grain bullet and a 3000 meter/sec velocity has such a useful automatic fire capability, with a rate of fire of 600 rpm, recoil of a single 5.56 NATO round is about 47% of the 7.62 NATO, but the M-16 rifle weight is also 2/3rds that of the M-14. Recoil of a M-16 weight automatic rifle with a 7.62 NATO round would have to have the rate of fire reduced by 0.47 x 2/3 x 600, or about 185 rpm. One approach might be to a variation of the “Long Recoil” operating system, modified to slowly arrest the bolt/barrel with volute operating springs (both barrel and bolt springs) and a gradual unlatching mechanism that would prevent an impulsive contact of the bolt/barrel into the receiver. Some versions of the BAR explored that approach with a 240 rpm operating rate, for a 19 pound rifle, but high effectiveness probably required a fairly large and strong operator with good technique. Val Browning could demonstrate it well, others probably had more difficulty.
I will also note that the assault rifle was to be used as part of a squad. The Army in WWII infantry squads (non-airborne) had one fire team with a BAR, and a second team had M-1 rifles, with a third “scout” team had submachine guns(M-1 or M-3). While the BAR gunner was changing magazines, other men in his team would continue suppressive fire, so the maneuver team wouldn’t be left exposed. While the BAR fired the other men in his team would reload. The intent was to get the maneuver team close enough to use rifle grenades. This tactic was developed to exploit the Chauchat automatic rifle during WWI by French Chausseur units, and taught to the newly arriving Americans.
2nd Amendment opponents, both Liberal and Conservative, cannot be convinced by facts and actually care nothing for facts. They know what they think they know and resent any effort to persuade them with facts that they do not accept.
There were once two schools of thought about combat… One held that the “best practices” meant giving everyone a semi-auto, and flinging them against the enemy and their positions in frontal assaults; the mere possession of a semi-auto rifle was a magical thing, able to overcome all. Because, don’t you know, the individual rifleman is the basis of all things tactical.
The other school said “Firepower trumps all…” and spent its time and money on a belt-fed multi-purpose MG that could serve in every role between “Automatic Rifle” and “Heavy sustained-fire Machinegun”. Their idea of tactical superiority was to get those guns into ideal positions and then use them to undo enemy defenses, while using them to hold off the enemy at the maximum range possible during their own defenses.
In the first school, your MG teams supported the riflemen, and you maneuvered your individual riflemen to win the war, as if you were playing chess with living men. Second school? You maneuvered your firepower, the machinegun, and your riflemen supported that, instead.
Pragmatically, the second school pretty much cleaned the floor with everything it went against, unless there were copious amounts of support on the other side… Leave the fight to the organic weapons and assets of the infantry? The differential in casualty rates would make your eyes water.
That was the state-of-the-art there midway through WWII. Then, someone got the bright idea of diffusing that firepower via giving every man an intermediate power rifle that could do full-auto out to about 400m, and they thought things had changed. It really hadn’t, because “Human psychology”: No matter what, a crew-served weapon will always stay in action longer and be far more effective, because “team”. Also, “supervision”. You may have the ultimate uber-StG out in the squad, but those individual weapons in the hands of individual riflemen will not be as effective as those MG teams, because individuals will tend to go all least-common denominator on you, and flake out in the face of even moderate enemy fire. As well, if you’ve got really good guys who do their utmost under fire? Guess what? You’re gonna only get one or two engagements out of them before the law of averages catches up with them in the form of a bullet or mortar fragment, and then you’re back to where you were…
Makes way more sense to follow the second school, but that’s something which was only really obvious to the Germans; everyone else chose violence and the frontal assault. With the attendant implications of heavy casualties…
I’m a fan of German MG technique and the “strategy of surfaces and gaps” they used to such great effect. The idea of blasting my way onto an objective frontally, with the MG playing a mere supporting role as I bravely stand up and charge through enemy fire?
Yeah; f*ck right the hell off. About the only time I see a frontal assault as a good idea is when I’ve been so stupid as to blunder my dumb ass into an ambush, and then you’ve got no other damn choice but to do or die, hey-diddle-diddle, straight up the middle.
Rest of the time? Get yourself into a tactically advantageous position, rain hellfire on the enemy from it, dislocate their defenses, and then make them pay as they withdraw. Occupy the objective at leisure, rinse and repeat… You’ll still have most of your men, although the ammo bill will make your commander and his bosses wince. You save money on insurance pay-outs, though…
News flash for you, sweetheart… The only lives gun regulation has saved has been those of agents of the Gestapo and SS who went and rounded up the Jews, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Gypsies, and all the rest they herded into camps.
Only a goddamn fool disarms himself, and only someone intending you harm wants you to. If they’re going to use force? Those are not your friends.
It’s typical, though… Self-declared Democrat, which is to say statist freak that thinks his government and his own kind are at all trustworthy. They’re not, but he’ll only learn that when they’re taking him away to the camps…
Current usage favors Modern Sporting Rifle to designate a semiautomatic carbine that fires an intermediate range cartridge and which features a detachable box magazine.
I refer to my M4-gery as a battle carbine although it lacks any provision for automatic fire. It is best suited as a trainer for those who would like to be acquainted with the operational fundamentals of an assault weapon. It has the same manual of arms that the GI article has and also has the same ballistic performance of its military counterpart, making transition to the genuine article nearly seamless.
Every able-bodied citizen should own one in addition to ~1,000 rounds of ammunition, six or seven magazines and a magazine carrier. The security of a free state depends on a well—trained militia and every man has a duty to perform towards that end.
I wanted to buy an assault gun – but it would have ruined my driveway.
Most of this crap is marketing, just like the term “Battle Rifle”. Which has never, ever been a real doctrinal term, but which has snuck in through the good offices of ignoramus jackasses in high places.
“Sturmgewehr” is purest Hitlerian oratory; the original military term for the rifle was Mkb, or Maschinen Karabiner. Hitler nixed the project, being a big believer in full-house cartridges, and they changed it to MP or Maschinen Pistole, because they were hiding the program as a “product improved” sub-machinegun.
The whole issue is madness made manifest; the terminology surrounding these things is really meaningless until you start making believe it all means something. The reality is that the weapons are what they are, and get used for what they are best suited for.
I remain amused at the doctrinal terminology over in the machinegun world: I once had to build a friggin’ spreadsheet to lay out what all the different terms might mean to different people, and it is truly amazing how many different ways people have found to parse “Machine Gun” and the roles for them. You think you’re talking about one thing with a German, when you say “Heavy machinegun”, but the reality is, he’s talking about a tripod-mount GPMG, and you’re talking .50 caliber M2HB. Your grandfather, back in WWII? He would have thought that the “HMG” was a water-cooled Browning in 7.62, and the .50 would have been in an entirely separate category…
Don’t even get me started on the Commonwealth armies. That’s a whole other rathole of confusion.
What’s really amusing is that you go to what you would think should be the final arbiter, the NATO STANAG system, and what you find there is that basically, everyone has agreed to disagree on the categories… So, you look up the map symbol for an HMG on a map of a defensive position you’re taking over, and the symbol is going to mean different things to different armies, causing great confusion to all concerned… I have rather unpleasant memories of a turnover mission in Germany in the middle of winter, with me and my guys thinking we were taking over positions from the Germans that were already dug, and discovering that their idea of a GPMG position was vastly different than ours… Cue the “Oh, f*ck…” and a trip back to get our pioneer tools out of the truck. No sleep, that night…
This is one of those areas that is in dire need of clarification across the board. Of course, since everyone wants to make believe that small arms are obsolete and irrelevant… It’ll likely never get straightened out to anyone’s satisfaction.
Just remember that the same word means different things to different people…
Your evident fondness for nominalism will cause you to trip up when confronted with the challenge of formulating categories. Clearly, a military rifle chambered for 7.62 NATO has functional characteristics that distinguish it from one that fires the 5.56 NATO round.
So to designating the M-14 as a Main Battle Rifle and the M-4 an assault rifle does no violence to logic, design parameters or military history.
The nominal designation of “machine pistol” as applied to the MK-44 cannot obviate its startling departure from preceding designs that were either intended for long-range volley fire or short-range melee engagements.
This suggests that there are no fewer that three distinct weapon systems: submachine gun, assault rifle and main battle rifle.
Likewise, machine guns are either light or heavy depending on whether they are individually operated or crew served. If a particular example serves overlapping functions it does not mean that broad distinctions between the two categories cannot be made.
Definition and distinction are essential to all meaning. No useful discussion can occur if nominalism is your starting point.
I worked on range design and planning, all sorts of ranges, for near two decades. Public hearings and congressional inquiries were always fun because of the militaryese jargon which often defied logic.
Explaining that no ‘live’ bombs (bombs with explosive filler) would be used on many of our very small ranges, the term ‘dummy’ would always slide into the conversation. Subsequently explaining which aircraft would use the range, and with what weapons, we’d be including laser guided, aka “smart”.
So … smart dummies.
And your desire to be trendy trips you up on meaningless verbiage.
Riddle me this: What is the qualitative difference, in terms of tactical role and capabilities, between something like an M1 Garand and an M14? Can you deliver any sort of sustained or controllable automatic fire with an M14?
The average soldier cannot. Which is why virtually nobody ever used that full-auto switch on the side of their supposed “Main Battle Rifles”, which is in itself a ridiculous term coined by dumbass ignoramus gun-rag writers back in the 1980s, trying to sound cool by copying the term “Main Battle Tank”. It’s a nonsense term created by nonsense men for a non-existent category. No military ever used that terminology, until the latest set of dumbass poseurs advocating for NGSW, men who don’t even understand what the hell the existing weapons suite is or how it functions.
Words mean things, and when you start pushing BS terms from games and other sources into the technical terminology, all it does is pollute the discussion. There are precisely zero role or effect differences between an M1 Garand and an M14, despite the fantastic imaginations saying there are.
You get to an actual controllable-on-full-auto intermediate caliber weapon like an M16, or any of the other weapons in that class? Then, yes, it makes sense for another term to be introduced, because those weapons give you an ability and need for a different set of tactics. I’m not fond of the term “assault rifle”, because what you actually use the added capability for is most often “counter-assault”, but… Hey, that’s what they went with. And, the term is actually one arrived at and agreed-upon by mutual definition within NATO.
Although, I will quibble until my dying days that any individual weapon with both a full-auto capability and in 7.62 NATO is by nature a useless affectation. Having fired a couple of those, and even being a fairly large and muscular person at the time, I found them essentially uncontrollable and entirely impossible to use to effect in any mode other than making noise and frightening the children. Sure, you can do it, kinda, under carefully controlled conditions on a range, but the realities of use in a firefight, as you’re running and gunning? I’m pretty sure that you’d probably be inflicting rather more damage to your fellow soldiers and your own hearing than on the enemy.
Definitions matter. You tell me you’ve got an LMG in your position on a defensive line, then we’d better be in agreement that that LMG is the same thing, or we’re going to be in trouble when the time comes to actually do that defense. In some NATO armies of the 1980s, when they used that term, they were talking about a bipod-supported BREN modified to fire 7.62 NATO. Others meant an MG3 on a bipod, and still others were talking about a heavy-barrel FAL… All with totally different tactical capabilities.
So, yes, despite your desires, words do mean things. And, they have to be generally-agreed upon meanings, or things can get well and truly f*cked up. The sophistry used by the gun control jackasses to paint things as “evil” because of how they were described…? Perfect example. Functionally, there’s little to choose between an M2 carbine and an StG44, but because the nattering children of the world look at the one and see “harmless Elmer Fudd gun” looking at one, and “Evil baby-killing thing” when looking at the other? We get what we want. And, allowing those dumbasses to set the terms of the discussion is an entirely unforced error. There were no “assault weapons” banned by the so-called “Assault Weapons Ban” of the 1990s; all that they banned were things that resembled actual military weapons in that category. I mean, seriously… When was the last time you heard of a drive-by bayonetting? How’d a “shoulder thing that goes up” play into anything, ever? Was someone speared by one during a drive-by, or something?
Again, your disdain for accuracy in terminology plays into these things. I believe that the outrageous bullshit that the gun rags got up to with all their marketing crap is what enabled a lot of that legislation to go through… If Joe and Jill Average weren’t walking through the magazine aisle at the local grocery store, and seeing these things like “Assault Weapons Monthly” with lurid pictures of the latest imitation “Main Battle Rifle”, none of that crap would have come up as something to legislate against. It was entirely a self-own by the firearms industry, a linguistic auto-da-fe that they created.
Again, words mean things. At least, for a little while, while everyone agrees upon their meaning. Once things start getting misnamed or they start picking up the underlying connotations of the object they describe, well… Yeah. That’s how “Idiot”, “Imbecile”, and “Cretin” shifted from unfreighted technical terms to actual loaded pejorative insults because of what they described… Creating the “euphemism treadmill”. Eventually, we’ll lose the weighting on these words, and whatever replaced them will assume their pejorative meaning, whereupon we can go back to them and start the cycle all over again…
Precision in language equals precision in thought, as language is the tool of thought, not just “expression”. There’s a reason for the Thirteenth Analect of Confucius having its place as one of his most important… Names must be rectified, in order for things to be properly discussed, considered, and acted upon. You don’t have the name right, you won’t think about the subject properly, mostly because you won’t be acknowledging the underlying reality.
You run into this fuzzy thinking crap a lot with regards to the current crime rates: They’re not “young black men” committing these crimes; they’re pure and plain criminals. The color of their skin has nothing to do with their actions, and should not play a part in determining what to do with them. We don’t insist on the proper names, then fuzzy wishful thinking and projection becomes all too easy…
I’ve been on the other side of this crap far too often. Words have meanings, ones that ought to be fixed and agreed-upon by everyone. Linguistic anarchy only prevents proper thought and action…
[…] VIDEO: Ian McCollum Defines Assault Rifle. […]
@The Gaffer, who said:
“Explaining that no ‘live’ bombs (bombs with explosive filler) would be used on many of our very small ranges, the term ‘dummy’ would always slide into the conversation. Subsequently explaining which aircraft would use the range, and with what weapons, we’d be including laser guided, aka “smart”.
So … smart dummies.”
The problem would have been obviated by implementing some clarity into the situation: “We’re going to be using inert munitions on the range, which will be guided…”
When you think about it, an awful lot of the terminology has not the slightest amount of apparent logic to it… Consider the word missile itself. At first glance, many think that it evolved at least partially from “miss”, in that many thrown things “miss their target”. I’ve had college graduates tell me that, along with things like “…a guided missile is an oxymoron; we ought to call them hittiles…”. The reality is that “missile” comes in from Latin, and “miss” is Germanic, with totally different etymologies despite sounding alike.
Common parlance where I was in the military had it that a rocket was unguided, and a missile was guided by one means or another; you could also use the term “ballistic” to describe something that did not have the ability to change its course, as well.
I do feel your pain; a lot of the jargon used inside the military makes for an awful lot of misunderstanding and error on the part of civilians. We ran into a lot of that, when they shut down Fort Lewis after Ninth ID went away; the surrounding communities had a few years of relative quiet, people forgot what living next to a base really meant, and then a bunch of real estate types got hot and heavy selling properties that had heretofore been unsellable… As soon as the base got to be a major training post, again? Oh, lord, did the complaints roll in. Not to mention, the stupidity: I have memories of running a demolition range down at the southern border of the training area, and discovering that people thought those training areas were national forest, or something: You’re set up for a series of 30lb shots (range limit, at the time…), fuses pulled, and here come a line of horseback riders out of the woodline around the demo pits, ‘cos ain’t nobody got to check in with Range Control… Closest I’ve ever come to having an aneurysm, I think. You just could not get it through those people’s heads that they were well inside a controlled military base, and that to be there, they had to first check in with Range Control up in the cantonment area… Mind-boggling.
On another note, ever seen what a bunch of horses do when they suddenly find themselves near fairly large explosions…? It ain’t pretty. Does end arguments about access rights pretty damn quickly, though.
The most important things to remember are that 1) the control freaks who do want to take away your weapons manipulate these terms expressly to scare people, 2) it’s been happening since at least 1934, 3) the people are a lot stupider than they used to be, and 4) introducing real people to shooting as a pastime/sport really helps destroy the stupidity and fear generated by the prophets and priests of Progressivism.
The best thing we could do to encourage support for the 2d Amendment would be to educate every single kid in America on firearms safety, and then teach them to shoot a firearm safely to a minimal competence level, and teach them to fence and to box or wrestle. IMO.
Something that sometimes gets missed, on the distinction between an Assault Rifle and an Assault Weapon, is that Assault Rifle has a FUNCTIONAL definition.
That is, the military uses the term Assault Rifle because it needs the term. It describes something important. Specifically, this: an Assault Rifle is an automatic rifle light enough to be carried on the battlefield by an average infantryman. Therefore, if you want a platoon, or a company, or a battalion, to all be equipped for automatic rifle fire, you issue them Assault Rifles.
Assault Weapon, by contrast, has no functional definition. There is nothing functional about the distinction between one rifle, that is considered an Assault Weapon, and another rifle that is not. If there were, then the term’s definition wouldn’t keep changing.
The closest you can get to a functional definition is this: an Assault Weapon is a rifle that a politician wants to ban.
Not knowledgeable about firearms is a feature, not a bug with Gun Grabbers. They can remove your rights with clear conscience.
“What is the qualitative difference, in terms of tactical role and capabilities, between something like an M1 Garand and an M14?”
The M-14 has better continuity of fire. It also has a better gas system, which makes for greater reliability under conditions of sustained fire. Was the Browning Automatic Rifle “controllable with automatic fire”? The M-14 is a more compact version of Browning’s major domo.
“Words mean things…”
Thanks for making my point. Perhaps you will stop obfuscating now and give up on your peckish nominalism.
“Although, I will quibble until my dying days…”
Unfortunately, that seems to be all too true.
“You don’t have the name right, you won’t think about the subject properly, mostly because you won’t be acknowledging the underlying reality.”
Now you are making the case for philosophical realism, which was my original argument. Thanks for agreeing with me for a change.
“What they were trying to do is take a scary military phrase and apply it to not scary, or potentially scary-appearing civilian firearms that they wanted to restrict or prohibit.”
Before ‘assault rifles’ we were hustled with the term ‘cop killer bullets’ to get us to accept a ban on cheap military surplus pistol plinking ammunition. Before ‘cop killer bullets’ we were hustled with the term ‘Saturday night special’ to get us to accept a ban on concealed carry pistols. Before ‘Saturday night special’, we were hustled with the term ‘chopper’ to get us to accept a ban on automatic weapons.
Do not engage the totalitarian left in their language games. You cannot win. Read George Orwell’s ‘Politics and the English Language’:
https://files.libcom.org/files/Politics%20and%20the%20English%20Language%20-%20George%20Orwell.pdf
P.S. The selector on the M14 series rifles was only intended for the M15 and M14E2 variants. Both are easily controlled in prone with the E2 stock, bipod, muzzle brake, fore grip and special sling. The problem I had was changing magazines with sufficient alacrity to make automatic fire worthwhile.
10x25mm says:
March 18, 2024 at 1:48 PM
Before ‘assault rifles’ we were hustled with the term ‘cop killer bullets’
Don’t forget “teflon bullets” that would slide right through a bulletproof vest! Just like an egg out of a frying pan.
And the “Saturday Night Special” is a great example of finagling the language. The Saturday Night Special was a real weapon: a cheap snub-nosed .38. And it was a real problem because it was so cheaply made – it was crap that sometimes hurt the shooter. That made it a dangerous weapon. Which now became a “dangerous weapon” to everyone out there (not just the owner). And, it was cheap, so anyone could buy one. Which leads to the easy story of it’s “dangerous” and everyone can get one, so pretty soon every person with even a tiny bit of ill intent in their heart will be carrying one and shooting anyone that crosses them up. Which movies and tv shows then made into a trope: Death Wish and loads of other stories.
And, suddenly, cheap firearms became an evil to be thwarted.
(Note: They didn’t go after expensive firearms. Because the people who could afford those were the right kind of people. It was the masses who were a danger.)
One other requirement for a weapon to be an “assault rifle”, at least according to the US Army in the 80s and 90s, was that it had to have a maximum effective range of at least 300 meters. Anything less than that would be a carbine. Example being the M2 carbine.
“(Note: They didn’t go after expensive firearms. Because the people who could afford those were the right kind of people. It was the masses who were a danger.)”
The U.S. Treasury’s ATTD Nazis banned the Walther PPK in all calibers and versions as a ‘Saturday night special’ by regulations authorized by the 1968 Gun Control Act. It failed the arbitrary 4 inch height ‘box test’ devised by ATTD specifically to prohibit the PPK.
The Walther/Manurhin PPK in 9mm kurz was the finest quality, most effective subcompact handgun ever made. Its last retail price from Interarms, $ 189.00 in 1968, would be something like $ 1,700 in current dollars after adjusting for inflation.
really not a very well written article. “So any time a leftwing politician tries to lie about what an assault actually to further their quest for complete civilian disarmament, just send them this.” huh?? the meme doesnt make sense.
“The problem I had was changing magazines with sufficient alacrity to make automatic fire worthwhile.”
The M-16’s ergonomics are vastly superior but the M-14’s magazine release lever can be mastered with practice. In the video, Ian demonstrates the proper technique while using the AK-47’s nearly identical set up.
“ huh?? the meme doesnt make sense.”
Do not allow the enemy to frame the narrative. Assault rifles and assault weapons (sic) are not synonymous terms. “Assault weapon” is anything Leftists want to ban.
Ian uses the correct terminology to set the record straight.
“Before ‘cop killer bullets’ we were hustled with the term ‘Saturday night special’”.
I took a Hebrew course taught by an Orthodox rabbi. His theology was conservative but his politics were not. During one class, discussion swerved from ancient history to current events and he dropped the phrase “Saturday Night Special “.
I gently called his attention to the original meaning this phrase held, namely these were the guns likely to hold a place of prominence in N***** Town on a Saturday night. Not wishing to look like a racist, he stopped the discussion cold and never brought up the subject again.
“The M-16’s ergonomics are vastly superior but the M-14’s magazine release lever can be mastered with practice.”
The magazine catch lever isn’t the problem when firing an M15 or M14E2 on automatic. You have a special sling which you have to run really tight from the bipod, through the fore grip, to the butt swivel to make the fore grip an effective hold point to prevent muzzle rise. That sling occupies the space behind the fore grip you need to latch the front of the fresh magazine on the back end of the drive spring guide.
The quandary: Loosen that sling and you can’t keep the bursts on target at 600 yards. Tighten the sling so it rigidizes the fore grip and you have to wrestle with it every time to get fresh magazines latched in their front, and their rear.
1. I’ve inserted a final edit that seems to have gotten lost.
2. Given his long hair, mild demeanor and encyclopedic knowledge of firearms, Ian McCollum has been nicknamed “Gun Jesus.” It’s an Internet thing.
3. As is your argument is invalid.
I wonder how many panties at the ATF were twisted when Walther just put the PPK’s slide/barrel on the frame of the PP, and called it a PPK/S?
“I wonder how many panties at the ATF were twisted when Walther just put the PPK’s slide/barrel on the frame of the PP, and called it a PPK/S?”
The Walther PPK/S was the brainchild of Russ Moure, Interarms’ Director of Engineering. Dick Winters, their EVP, presented it to ATTD at the late 1968 appeal of the ATTD ‘box test’. A very high pucker factor meeting. I was in stiches.
I still own the very first PPK/S; Moure’s mule.
Ian McCollum test fires an H&R prototype M-14:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VAABMvmaGWQ
Verdict: it’s not nearly as manageable as a BAR, so maybe Kirk has a point.
A 7.62mm NATO battle rifle is indeed a possible thing, but would take careful design to have controllable recoil. The predecessor, the 7.62mm x 63 rifle with a 174 grain projectile was set at the very upper limit of tolerable recoil for the rifle of its day. The reduction from 174grain to 150 grain was intended to limit maximum range, because of the limitations of ranges in the US (~5000 meters), that was not a limitation in Europe. Still the recoil reduction from that change was very small, perhaps 10%. 7.62mm NATO was designed to get that same velocity and grain from more efficient propellant, yielding a slightly smaller cartridge, so ammunition was 20 rounds to the pound rather than 16 to the pound. For a useful automatic fire capability, the rate of fire would have to be quite low, with the recoil spread out over time, perhaps with some spaces in between with no recoil that would prevent recovery. If we stipulate that the M-16 with a 62 grain bullet and a 3000 meter/sec velocity has such a useful automatic fire capability, with a rate of fire of 600 rpm, recoil of a single 5.56 NATO round is about 47% of the 7.62 NATO, but the M-16 rifle weight is also 2/3rds that of the M-14. Recoil of a M-16 weight automatic rifle with a 7.62 NATO round would have to have the rate of fire reduced by 0.47 x 2/3 x 600, or about 185 rpm. One approach might be to a variation of the “Long Recoil” operating system, modified to slowly arrest the bolt/barrel with volute operating springs (both barrel and bolt springs) and a gradual unlatching mechanism that would prevent an impulsive contact of the bolt/barrel into the receiver. Some versions of the BAR explored that approach with a 240 rpm operating rate, for a 19 pound rifle, but high effectiveness probably required a fairly large and strong operator with good technique. Val Browning could demonstrate it well, others probably had more difficulty.
I will also note that the assault rifle was to be used as part of a squad. The Army in WWII infantry squads (non-airborne) had one fire team with a BAR, and a second team had M-1 rifles, with a third “scout” team had submachine guns(M-1 or M-3). While the BAR gunner was changing magazines, other men in his team would continue suppressive fire, so the maneuver team wouldn’t be left exposed. While the BAR fired the other men in his team would reload. The intent was to get the maneuver team close enough to use rifle grenades. This tactic was developed to exploit the Chauchat automatic rifle during WWI by French Chausseur units, and taught to the newly arriving Americans.
2nd Amendment opponents, both Liberal and Conservative, cannot be convinced by facts and actually care nothing for facts. They know what they think they know and resent any effort to persuade them with facts that they do not accept.
There were once two schools of thought about combat… One held that the “best practices” meant giving everyone a semi-auto, and flinging them against the enemy and their positions in frontal assaults; the mere possession of a semi-auto rifle was a magical thing, able to overcome all. Because, don’t you know, the individual rifleman is the basis of all things tactical.
The other school said “Firepower trumps all…” and spent its time and money on a belt-fed multi-purpose MG that could serve in every role between “Automatic Rifle” and “Heavy sustained-fire Machinegun”. Their idea of tactical superiority was to get those guns into ideal positions and then use them to undo enemy defenses, while using them to hold off the enemy at the maximum range possible during their own defenses.
In the first school, your MG teams supported the riflemen, and you maneuvered your individual riflemen to win the war, as if you were playing chess with living men. Second school? You maneuvered your firepower, the machinegun, and your riflemen supported that, instead.
Pragmatically, the second school pretty much cleaned the floor with everything it went against, unless there were copious amounts of support on the other side… Leave the fight to the organic weapons and assets of the infantry? The differential in casualty rates would make your eyes water.
That was the state-of-the-art there midway through WWII. Then, someone got the bright idea of diffusing that firepower via giving every man an intermediate power rifle that could do full-auto out to about 400m, and they thought things had changed. It really hadn’t, because “Human psychology”: No matter what, a crew-served weapon will always stay in action longer and be far more effective, because “team”. Also, “supervision”. You may have the ultimate uber-StG out in the squad, but those individual weapons in the hands of individual riflemen will not be as effective as those MG teams, because individuals will tend to go all least-common denominator on you, and flake out in the face of even moderate enemy fire. As well, if you’ve got really good guys who do their utmost under fire? Guess what? You’re gonna only get one or two engagements out of them before the law of averages catches up with them in the form of a bullet or mortar fragment, and then you’re back to where you were…
Makes way more sense to follow the second school, but that’s something which was only really obvious to the Germans; everyone else chose violence and the frontal assault. With the attendant implications of heavy casualties…
I’m a fan of German MG technique and the “strategy of surfaces and gaps” they used to such great effect. The idea of blasting my way onto an objective frontally, with the MG playing a mere supporting role as I bravely stand up and charge through enemy fire?
Yeah; f*ck right the hell off. About the only time I see a frontal assault as a good idea is when I’ve been so stupid as to blunder my dumb ass into an ambush, and then you’ve got no other damn choice but to do or die, hey-diddle-diddle, straight up the middle.
Rest of the time? Get yourself into a tactically advantageous position, rain hellfire on the enemy from it, dislocate their defenses, and then make them pay as they withdraw. Occupy the objective at leisure, rinse and repeat… You’ll still have most of your men, although the ammo bill will make your commander and his bosses wince. You save money on insurance pay-outs, though…
That’s great, gun nuts, but we still need a lot more gun regulation or else people are still going to regularly die preventable deaths.
-A Democrat who owns more than one firearm
Awww… Look, a moron!
News flash for you, sweetheart… The only lives gun regulation has saved has been those of agents of the Gestapo and SS who went and rounded up the Jews, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Gypsies, and all the rest they herded into camps.
Only a goddamn fool disarms himself, and only someone intending you harm wants you to. If they’re going to use force? Those are not your friends.
It’s typical, though… Self-declared Democrat, which is to say statist freak that thinks his government and his own kind are at all trustworthy. They’re not, but he’ll only learn that when they’re taking him away to the camps…