Guns and Ammo

The Kalashnikov AK-47 and its variants are the most widely used military rifles in the world. It has been put into service by more than 45 countries and seen action in every major military conflict since its creation in the late 1940s. While the overall design hasn’t changed significantly, many countries added their own unique tweaks to better fit their needs. In this article we will look at some of the most popular variants of the AK-47 and some of the lesser-known models as well. This guide can be used for identifying some of the less common models from around the world. We know you’d love to own the 20 AK-47 variants pictured here, but they’re owned by Kalashnikov Collectors Association member Stuart McDaniel.

When close- to mid-range targets require rapid engagement, operators rely on a sighting system with quick and clear acquisition. The Leupold Mark 4 High Accuracy Multi-Range Riflescope (HAMR) delivers in those tactical CQB and mid-range scenarios. When combined with a Leupold DeltaPoint reflex sight, the HAMR gives operators the ability to quickly transition between targets of varying distance.

On this segment of Guns & Ammo TV, Kyle Lamb takes a look at how the Leupold HAMR offers some serious performance in a compact, rugged package.

By use of this code snippet, I agree to the Brightcove Publisher T and C
found at https://accounts.brightcove.com/en/terms-and-conditions/.
-->

<

Sub machine guns were some of the most iconic weapons on WWII battlefields. Though their designs vary from one model to another, their role on the battlefield as a lightweight, maneuverable, pistol-caliber machine gun remains the same. That role continues with modern sub machine guns such as the H&K MP5 and SIG Sauer MPX.

This segment of Guns & Ammo TV takes a look at iconic WWII sub machine guns.

By use of this code snippet, I agree to the Brightcove Publisher T and C
found at https://accounts.brightcove.com/en/terms-and-conditions/.
-->

When gift cards and new socks just won’t cut it for that special gunny in your life, you need a more tactical surprise to make this holiday season memorable.

Red Ryder BB guns, leg lamps and Ovaltine are deeply-rooted in classic holiday traditions—but gun guys and gals who made the nice list this year are dreaming of new guns, gear and ammo for their collection.

Since the elves up north can’t make enough .22 LR to fill every stocking this year, we’ve rounded up some of the best gun gift ideas sure to please shooters of all ages.

From Jim Bequette, editor, “Guns & Ammo” Magazine:

As editor of “Guns & Ammo,” I owe each and every reader a personal apology.

No excuses, no backtracking.

Dick Metcalf’s “Backstop” column in the December issue has aroused unprecedented controversy. Readers are hopping mad about it, and some are questioning “Guns & Ammo”’s commitment to the Second Amendment. I understand why.

Let me be clear: Our commitment to the Second Amendment is unwavering. It has been so since the beginning. Historically, our tradition in supporting the Second Amendment has been unflinching. No strings attached. It is no accident that when others in the gun culture counseled compromise in the past, hard-core thinkers such as Harlon Carter, Don Kates and Neal Knox found a place and a voice in these pages. When large firearms advocacy groups were going soft in the 1970s, they were prodded in the right direction, away from the pages of “Guns & Ammo.”

In publishing Metcal

The forward assist is one of the features we’ve come to expect on the AR-15 and its multitude of clones. But how many of us ever use it or even understand why it’s there? Does it belong on the modern sporting rifle, or should it go the way of the carry handle?

To understand the forward assist, we need to take a step back to the early days of the M16 and its baptism in combat. U.S. troops fighting in Vietnam experienced numerous stoppages that undermined the soldiers’ confidence in the reliability of the then-new weapon. Though the bulk of the malfunctions—failures to extract—were ultimately traced to unsuitable ammunition, some significant upgrades were made to the M16 to enhance its reliability and it was redesigned as the M16A1

American heroes on the front lines rely on training, tactics, intelligence, and of course—advanced gear and weaponry.

In this segment of Guns & Ammo TV, former Special Forces Captain Tom Beckstrand visits Fort Bragg to take a look at some of the equipment deployed with our U.S. Army Green Beret snipers.

By use of this code snippet, I agree to the Brightcove Publisher T and C
found at https://accounts.brightcove.com/en/terms-and-conditions/.
-->

Photo by Mike Anschuetz

Anyone who has ever practiced dry-firing knows about the anti-climactic nature of standing in their living room, repeatedly drawing a pistol and discharging imaginary rounds into their walls and furniture. Obviously, guns don’t go “bang” or cause a target to react when dry-firing.

LaserLyte has forever changed the world of dry-fire practice with their laser training systems. One of their flagship products, the LT-Pro Laser Trainer, enables shooters to engage reactive electronic targets with a laser beam.

The LT-Pro slides into the muzzle of a LaserLyte Trainer Pistol—or a real handgun of your choice—turning at-home training into an entertaining activity, especially when paired with a Laser Tra

Photo: Jason DeCrow, AP

On Sept. 22, President Obama turned a memorial service for the victims of the tragedy at the Washington Navy Yard into a platform to call for a “transformation” of federal gun laws. For his remarks, the president found inspiration for such a transformation in the example set by foreign nations. The president admonished his fellow Americans that gun violence “ought to obsess us” and invoked the United Kingdom and Australia as modeling the correct paradigm. After “just a single mass shooting occurred in those countries,” he said, “they … mobilized and they changed ….”

The extent to which the president seeks international direction for American

To quickly incapacitate an assailant, shot placement is critical. Delivering multiple shots to vital areas of the body in a short period of time is typically the most effective way to stop a deadly threat.

On this segment of Personal Defense TV, Richard Nance and Dave Spaulding teach viewers a personal defense range drill, known as the 2x2x2 drill.

By use of this code snippet, I agree to the Brightcove Publisher T and C
found at https://accounts.brightcove.com/en/terms-and-conditions/.
-->

On Sept. 16, 2013, a civilian contractor with some history of mental illness used a valid security pass to enter the Washington Navy Yard. Hidden in his backpack was a disassembled shotgun, which he’d purchased in Virginia after passing a federal background check.

You know how this sad story ends: 13 people died, including the shooter, and three were wounded.

The Navy Yard shooting drew tremendous attention from various media outlets, as well as politicians. Calls for gun control were raised in op-ed pieces and by politicians, notably President Barack Obama

After ranking the Best States for Gun Owners in 2013, we’re back to rank the Best Concealed Carry States.

Since federal law specifically addressing the issuance of concealed carry licenses does not yet exist in the U.S., individual states are left with the task of regulating concealed carry laws within their own borders.

Over the past few decades, most states in the country have gradually shifted their carry laws to become less restrictive. Despite fewer restrictions, legally carrying a concealed firearm remains vastly different from one state to another—and in some cases, one town to another. The diversity of laws naturally creates ambiguity around the entire topic of concealed carry legislation.

Aside from background checks, training requirements and application fees, states are generally classified into one of four categories based on how they issue licenses.

Permitless/Unrestricted – Also commonly known as “Constitutional Carry,” individuals ca

After ranking the Best States for Gun Owners in 2013, we’re back to rank the Best Concealed Carry States.

Since federal law specifically addressing the issuance of concealed carry licenses does not yet exist in the U.S., individual states are left with the task of regulating concealed carry laws within their own borders.

Over the past few decades, most states in the country have gradually shifted their carry laws to become less restrictive. Despite fewer restrictions, legally carrying a concealed firearm remains vastly different from one state to another—and in some cases one town to another. The diversity of laws naturally creates ambiguity around the entire topic of concealed carry legislation.

Aside from background checks, training requirements and application fees, states are generally classified into one of four categories, based on how they issue licenses.

Permitless/Unrestricted – Also commonly known as “Constitutional Carry,”

On the list of people packing a sidearm, pastors are probably way down the list, placing somewhere between Girl Scouts and interior designers.

Nevertheless, a little faith in the Lord goes a long way when faced with a potentially deadly situation, and that faith came in handy for one man of God.

According to WFIE-TV in Evansville, Ind., the Rev. Carl Sanders thwarted a robbery attempt at a local Dollar General by drawing his own weapon and ordering the man to the ground.

Check out the video from WFIE-TV.

14 News, WFIE, Evansville, Henderson, Owensboro

Evansville Police say 25-year-old Jermaine Dewayne Marshall walked into an Evansville Dollar General on Friday night with a bandana over his face and and unknown o

Today’s consumer has a wide variety of choices when selecting a defensive shotgun, but which of these guns earns the title as the best home defense shotgun ever? In my opinion, the Mossberg 500 stands out from the crowd for a number of reasons.

First, Mossberg has been building the 500 for 52 years. During that time, more than 10 million of these pump guns have rolled off the assembly line in North Haven, Conn., and Eagle Pass, Texas. For the last 30 years, the 590  has been the shotgun of choice for the U.S. military, and more than 100,000 units have been supplied to the armed forces. The 500 and 590 lines also have the distinction of being the only shotguns ever to pass the rigorous Mil-Spec 3443 torture test, proving what generations of shooters already knew: Mossberg guns are tough.

Pump-action shotguns are favored by police and military for two primary reason

Soldiers in combat require an optic that allows them to shoot from the muzzle out to several hundred meters. We started the War on Terror with red dot optics for the close-range stuff and fixed on 4X scopes for wide-open spaces. Now the trend is toward a single 1-6X variable that can do it all.

Just prior to the now-infamous Sequester, the Department of Defense was preparing to evaluate a new crop of 1-6X scopes. This new direction reflects lessons learned from the last 10-plus years of war.

The first time I used my M4 on the battlefield came as I was chasing some Taliban across an open desert. Engagement ranges for this particular disagreement varied from 100 to 200 meters before my quarry slipped over a hilltop into a village. I was using Trijicon’s 4X ACOG, and it worked beautifully, even after banging around the truck for the preceding few weeks.

I had the choice of many optics to use on my rifle for the deplo

A San Antonio homeowner gave a would-be burglar the chance to leave, police say. Instead, the criminal ran at one of the men pointing a gun at him, a mistake that cost him his life.

According to the San Antonio Express-News, the unidentified homeowner awoke around 3 a.m. Sunday to a man trying to pry off the appropriately named burglar bars on the homeowner’s windows.

Check out the video from KENS-TV in San Antonio.

The 50-year wait for a modern submachine gun is over. Introduced at the 2013 SHOT Show, the select-fire SIG Sauer MPX  was developed for elite military and law enforcement applications.

After extensive testing, the MPX has become the next generation of submachine gun. Guns & Ammo TV recently visited the SIG Sauer Academy live-fire shoot house to put the MPX through its paces.

By use of this code snippet, I agree to the Brightcove Publisher T and C
found at https://accounts.brightcove.com/en/terms-and-conditions/.
-->

When John M. Browning designed the .50 BMG, odds are he had no idea the cartridge would lead to one of the greatest achievements in aviation history.

On Oct. 14, 1947, Charles “Chuck” Yaeger became the first human to break the sound barrier in a controlled-level flight.

The sound barrier—or Mach 1—is approximately 1,125 feet per second, or 768 miles per hour at sea level, in dry air at 68 degrees Fahrenheit.

Piloting an experimental Bell X-1 rocket plane, Yaeger was able to break the sound barrier and safely return to Earth. His aircraft—which was inspired and designed after the Browning .50-caliber bullet—was able to stabilize as speeds became supersonic.

Preceding Yaeger’s historical feat of aviation, several experienced pilots attempted supersonic flight, only to come up short of their mark. Flights remained subsonic, ma

This 2007 photo shows then-attorney general Jerry Brown standing next to a collection of firearms confiscated by law enforcement. Brown, now governor of California, vetoed two pieces of gun control legislation Friday. (Photo by Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)

Despite vetoing seven gun control bills, Calif. Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law AB 711, a bill banning the use of lead ammunition for hunting.

California is the first state to take formal action against the use of lead ammuniton.

Proposed by Assemblyman Anthony Rendon, D-Lakewood, the bill will ban hunters from using lead-based ammunition by 2019.

“We are thrilled that Governor Brown has made AB 711 the law of the land,” Rendon said. “There is simply no reason to continue using lead ammunition in hunting when it poses a significant risk to human health and the environment.