How The AK 47 Took Over The World
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You're listening to an Airwave Media Podcast. Welcome to Naughty Yotta Island. Next on Naughty Yotta Island. I knew I deserved so much more, so I left. I finally switched to Metro and got what I was looking for. Get one line for only $25 a month with AutoPay. Just bring your phone to Metro and experience all the data you want on the largest 5G network. That's Naughty Yotta Yotta, only at Metro by T-Mobile.

First month is $30. Bring your number and ID. Offer not available if with T-Mobile or with Metro in the past 180 days. Hello, my friends. Nakuyi here, and this is actually going to be a little bit different than what I normally do for a lot of the podcast episodes. So just as a heads up from the very beginning, what is happening here is that this is the audio for a YouTube video that I actually put out this week on the history of the AK-47 and how it came to absolutely dominate the globe.

The reason I'm doing this here now is because with everything that began to launch on the 1st, from my Mongolia trip, from my merch, from the War of the Barons event that I'm doing for LARP, a lot of things ended up happening on November 1st that because of how I've had to focus on these things, it meant that I could not get an episode prepared in time specifically for the

So even now I'm releasing this late. I do apologize for that in the first place, but this is still an amazing episode. And on that note, if you want to check out my YouTube page, make sure to check out the History of Everything podcast YouTube page. It is so much fun and we dive into all different kinds of things with geopolitics.

weapons, tanks, and more. For this week's patron exclusive episode, we're going to be doing a listener special, much it is like that we did with the Instagram post that we made before, except this time it's going to be questions that you, the audience, have asked specifically on Patreon. So we're going to be tackling that.

Either way, without further ado, let's go ahead and dive into this fascinating weapon and its history. The AK-47 is the deadliest weapon in history. But how did it become that? Now I know, my friends, from the very beginning that those of you, the viewers who have just tuned into this video, may be scoffing at that and go, "Stack, what the hell are you talking about? How can a simple gun like the AK be the most deadly weapon when nuclear bombs exist?"

Well, yeah, I mean, nukes are estimated to have killed as many as 200,000 people when the United States dropped two on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki back in 1945. And yeah, those are arguably the most deadly weapons to be used at one given time. But that all being said, even at the point that we're talking about, incendiary bombs did far more damage to the Japanese than nukes did overall. And even then, what we are talking about here is 80 years of destruction potential that can be tallied up.

The AK is responsible for far more deaths, numbering into the millions, and it is still going to this very day. Whether in use by state, military, and police, warlords, terrorists, or even civilians, the AK-47 is everywhere. In fact, when I talk about this, this thing is so popular, it is even featured on actual army flags.

Yes, in 1983, the Mozambican Liberation Front would go and adopt a new national flag for their movement. Years after independence and at the height of a bitter civil war, the flag was introduced to embody the spirit of the country. On it, you have a number of different colors.

The black, green, and yellow were derived from the flag of the African National Congress. In the hoist was a red triangle, and like other communist-aligned entities associated with the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communist Party, the star of Marxism was also there. However, when I describe this thing, there is one thing that sets the country's national flag apart from

others. There is an AK-47 printed on the left side of the flag, in the same way that the states of old would put crossed swords or other weapons as a form of heraldry. The AK-47 was the weapon of the Mozambican Liberation Front and other communist guerrillas and any other rebel groups throughout Africa and the globe.

But, that all being said, they only represent just a small part of the AK's reach throughout the globe. Originally developed in secrecy for the Soviet military, an estimated over 100 million AK-47s and their variants have been produced to this date. In fact, at this point, it's kind of hard to tell just how many have been created.

The gun is found throughout the world, including in the hands of many American civilians, who even as far back as the year 2012, bought just as many AK-47s as the entire Russian police and military. Yes, my friends, if that sounds surprising, that is true. The surge in sales of Russian assault rifles and shotguns back during 2012 were fueled by firearms enthusiasts being concerned about the weapons being banned in the United States.

To clarify, these are not automatic weapons, they're not the automatic variants of AKs, but civilian-grade AKs that were semi-automatic. So I feel the need to go ahead and point that out, because otherwise people are going to wonder why people have automatic AKs within the United States. Wait, no, that's not the case.

But either way, this is already insane, and we have not even pointed out scale and market share yet. Back in the year 2004, it was estimated that of the 500 million guns that were possibly in circulation, that around 20% of those guns were AKs. The majority of those being AK-47s. 20 years later, and the number of guns in circulation is estimated to be over a billion. So you can then only estimate that the number of AKs has seen a similar increase.

More than ever, the Kalashnikov rifle is the weapon of choice for many armies, militias, armed gangs, law enforcement officials, rebels, and other private actors. Although the United Nations and its member states have taken efforts in order to be able to limit the proliferation of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons, the number one tool that is actually used for killing and injuring civilians today is small arms, including the assault rifle or

And the most popular of that is the AK-47, which is reaching more countries than ever before. The question that becomes from all this is how and why? How did the Kalashnikov come to be and why is it so incredibly popular? Well, the short answer to those questions is that the Soviets made it, they made it really cheap, they made it easy to use, reliable, and they helped to funnel it to every single kind of entity that could or would potentially resist their Cold War enemies, the West.

It was a matter of price, durability, and logistics. That, my friends, is the short of it. But let's go ahead and dive deeper before various government agencies start somehow tracking me down and showing up my house for even talking about all this here in the first place.

I'm not under threat from YouTube yet, but please like comment and subscribe to show some support to the channel. Anyway, let's go ahead and dive into this. First thing up background. Carla only has the best tech can't connect to network, but she didn't have the best internet. So she got Cox multi gig speeds to power all her. Now all her tech is connected.

Exactly. Step it up with multi-gig speeds available everywhere, only from Cox. Two gig download speeds, individual speeds vary. See cox.com for details. In order to understand just how the AK became as important as it is today, one has to go back and revisit the context in which this gun was designed in the first place, which is the end and aftermath of World War II. Guns at this time, of course, came in a variety of different shapes and sizes with different caliber rounds for different

purposes, but overall, if you want to describe things, you had three main categories, at least in terms of primary weapons that people would outright using. There's any number of ways that you could divide this, and I know off the get-go, I'm going to get a whole bunch of people in the comments section that are going to be angry at me for even describing things in general terms like this.

Calm yourself, please. First and foremost, of course, you have rifles, which were the mainstay of every army. These would fire a large caliber round and had great stopping power and range, but typically the majority of these were bolt action and thus slower to fire. Second, you had machine guns, which also fired a larger caliber round, but these were typically quite heavy, which drastically reduced their utility and

mobility, which made them significantly better for defense, covering fire, and holding positions. After this, then, you would have the third category, the classic submachine gun, which did have a high rate of fire and was far lighter than the regular machine gun and thus significantly more mobile, but at the same time, it fired a lower caliber pistol round, which had far less range. This, of course, made it great for storming positions and close up front combat, but it was not good at range.

Over the course of World War II then, the Soviets and other entities such as the Germans found that an intermediate cartridge would be ideal for frontline troops because it could effectively do everything. Unlike large caliber rounds that were common of the period, intermediate sized rounds would be easier to shoot in rapid succession, they would be lighter and allow troops to carry greater quantities of ammunition, and yet at the same time still be able to be used at risk.

range or at closer range. You could do it for pretty much everything. The Germans had in fact developed their own round, the 7.92mm Kurz, for a rifle called the Maschenkarbiner 42, which would eventually evolve into the StG 44 or the Sturmgewehr. For those of you who speak German and are going to mock how it is that I pronounce things, yes, I know, one of the most common criticisms that I get in any of my videos is pronunciation. I do try, but over the course of saying things, I do mess things up. Again.

Calm yourself. The thing about the STG is that this weapon had a particularly high rate of fire. It had a larger round than submachine guns, yet at the same time was still lighter than a machine gun, which made it a very nice balance. The STG-44 stood in sharp contrast to the weapons that were used by the Soviets in the war, which, if you want to look at their primary submachine gun, that was the PPSH.

For greater range and the more common infantry weapon, most troops were typically equipped with something like the Mosin-Nagant rifle. After capturing a number of StG-44s and seeing just how incredibly useful they could be, the Soviets wanted to go and create their own version of it.

So, afterwards, they would soon develop the 7.62x39mm M43 cartridge, and this is a cartridge round that would be used in the semi-automatic SKS carbine and the RPD light machine gun. Which was nice, but simultaneously, they would not be able to develop their own variant of an early assault rifle during World War II.

For that, it would have to wait until after the war, and it is at that point that the AK-47 would be made. Which, my friends, at that point, it brings us to its creator, Mikhail Kalashnikov. Born on November 10th, 1919, Kalashnikov was a tank mechanic in the Soviet military during the Second World War. He was wounded during the German invasion of the USSR in 1941 during Operation Barbarossa, and according to legend, when it was that he was in hospital, he admired the weapons that had been made by the

the Germans and even overheard in his last couple months a number of his fellow soldiers going and complaining about how inadequate their weapons were in comparison. According to Kalashnikov in later interviews, he would state, quote, I was in the hospital and a soldier in the bed beside me asked, why do our soldiers have only one rifle for two or three of our men when the Germans have automatic?

So, I went and designed one. I was a soldier, and I created a machine gun for a soldier. It was called an Avtomat Kalashnikova, the automatic weapon of Kalashnikov, AK, and it carried the year of its first manufacture, 1947. And

Of course, my friends, when I talk about this, things are never really as easy or as simple as immediately described, and he did not immediately create the AK at that time. Kalashnikov would first go and design a submachine gun, something which, after testing, was eventually not accepted into service. Despite this, his talents at design were noticed, and Kalashnikov would be assigned to work closely with the Soviet Union's Chief Artillery Directorate.

From here, he would be able to continue to work on designing more and more weapons. In 1944, Kalashnikov, along with several other arms designers, would be tasked to design a weapon that could use the new 7.62x39mm cartridge. Taking inspiration from the American M1 Garand, Kalashnikov would go and design a gas-operated semi-automatic weapon, which, though very effective, would actually lose to its competitors and not be adopted. So here, we have two failures.

But it's okay, because that brings to mind the phrase that is commonly said, hey, third time's the charm. In 1946, during another rifle development competition, Kalashnikov would go and design another gas-operated weapon, something that would be known as the AK-46, the prototype of what would eventually be the AK-47.

I say prototype because this thing actually had a number of differences in comparison to what you would have with the AK-47 itself. This rifle had a short-stroke gas piston just above its barrel, known as a breech block mechanism. It also had a rotary bolt, separate safety and fire selector switches, and a two-part receiver with separate trigger unit housing.

Further, it had a non-reciprocating charging handle and the iconic curved 30-round magazine that we would come to associate with the AK-47 itself. Overall, when we talk about it, the design was quite similar to the German StG-44, and it moved on to the second round of the competition, where it did prove to be extremely reliable. But it wasn't...

In late 1946, as other rifles were being tested, one of Kalashnikov's assistants, Alexander Zaitsev, would suggest a major redesign to improve the reliability of the weapon. At first, Kalashnikov was reluctant, given that this rifle had done way better than anything else that he had previously designed, and it was already well ahead of its other competitors.

Zaitsev, though, was persistent, and eventually he would manage to persuade Kalashnikov, who would go back and with the team, redesign the weapon. And it was in November of 1947 that the new prototype AK-47 was complete.

It used a long-stroke gas piston just above the barrel, the upper and lower receivers were combined into a single receiver, the selector and safety were combined into just a single control lever and dust cover on the right side of the rifle, and the bolt handle was attached to the bolt carrier. Overall, this would simplify the design, the handling, and the production of the rifle. It became significantly easier, not just effective, which would subsequently be a huge hit to

during testing in 1948. By far, this appeared to be the superior weapon. And so in 1949, the AK would be officially adopted by the Soviet army as the 7.62 millimeter Kalashnikov rifle, the AK. And so then, my friends, it is from here that the world was never going to be the same again, because now we are entering the Cold War.

The point in which the AK is going to be used to create, well, a lot of havoc. To explain things in short, during the Cold War, the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China, as well as the United States and other NATO nations, would go and supply arms and technical knowledge to numerous different countries around the world and rebel forces in constant competitions and proxy wars with one another. During this time, the Western countries typically would use relatively expensive, but rather beautiful, automatic rifles with complicated parts.

Things such as the HKG3, the M14 and M16, and the FN FAL. Maybe it's not accurate for me to describe things this way, but imagine that these are the BMWs of guns. Good looking, fancy, a number of complicated parts. And in contrast to that, you have the Russians and the Chinese, which would produce and primarily use the AK-47, which honestly has all the aesthetic appeal of just a beat-up Toyota Corolla from the 90s with 300,000 miles on it, and maybe also missing its fender.

Yeah, I know you're probably looking at me weird. My friends, that comparison does probably sound a little bit harsh, but you need to understand just how drastic a difference existed between these two sides and their typical gun. Nobody really intended the AK to be paraded around on some kind of pedestal. This was a tool of the proletariat, of the downtrodden, of the common man. It was the ultimate communist weapon. And oh boy, did that thing become common.

Yes, my friends, the AK supremacy in the pantheon of small arms is something that was guaranteed by the fact that it also happens to have the same kind of utility, durability, and simplicity as the 90s Corolla. This thing would last forever. As Military Times would put it, quote, forget that this gun's furniture, the stock grip, etc., is often just a step above perfection.

plywood, that the receiver is often stamped and riveted rather than forged, and that its blunt configuration has more in common with a super soaker than something you'd expect a warrior to carry.

Again, that is a harsh description, but the AK was cheap to make and it could go through just about anything. Which is honestly great for a weapon to be. That then brings up the first big point of the gun, which I said at the beginning of this video. The price. So then, you may be wondering, how cheap was it exactly? Well, that, unfortunately, is a question that is really hard to answer, because that entirely depends upon where and when you got it, as well as who made it.

For reference on the screen right now here, I'm going to place a chart for global production that includes price ranges from legit and illegitimate sources, along with homemade cottage industries from the 1980s going into the early 2000s. You can probably see from this chart as to just how drastic a difference we are talking about. You could get one of these guns for potentially just a couple hundred dollars to maybe several thousand. It entirely depends upon who makes it, where you get it, and the quality between all of those different variants is going to be massive.

Why, though, you may wonder. Well, for about a decade after being adopted, Russia would make and then share its new rifles with like-minded communist states, such as China. It would also order its Warsaw Pact vassal states to go and produce them, which meant that many, many, many, many guns were going to be created over these years.

Towards the end of the 1950s, the Soviet Union had this kind of franchising model in place for many of its weapons, providing factories run by other communist governments the specifications for the manufacture of countless numbers of Kalashnikovs. That in turn guaranteed that the AK was going to be produced every

Now, of course, not every country is going to have the same industrial capacity or ability, but that didn't really matter for the AKs. Because of just how incredibly easy they were to manufacture, more and more and more of these communist rifles were built with, again, varying levels of quality and price. By the 1960s, the planned economies of the socialist bloc were stockpiling them by the millions.

Why, though, you may wonder. Well, primarily, it's because of this kind of mentality that many of the nations carried. That one must always be ready for war and to continue the revolution. That there was a constant threat that come from the West, which meant that arms production was a core component of socialist planned economies.

So yeah, millions of these rifles were being produced, which was awesome for them at the time, but simultaneously, as time went on, this became a bit of a risk. By the 1970s and 1980s, with loose security and blatant corruption that would exist within many of these communist countries that were holding onto them, the rifles gradually became more and more available to anyone, any kind of fighter for any kind of cause, not just communist ones.

This would grow even worse because after the Warsaw Pact would completely fall apart and the Soviet Union would collapse in the early 90s, many of the successor governments that had taken things over afterwards would lose large amounts of their surplus which had been stored over the years.

which provided an almost endless new supply to flood the black markets around the globe. As an example of this, in some countries such as Somalia, Rwanda, Congo, Mozambique, and Tanzania, the price of a black market AK could be extremely varied, something that is as little and cheap as $30 or $125 per weapon. In Kenya and other states, barter systems would even take precedence and not use cash.

with five heads of cattle being sufficient to buy a gun. Go and compare that to the M4 carbine of the US military that in the 2010s was being bought for over 600 US dollars per unit, and you can probably see then the difference and why many militant groups around the world would prefer the AK-47.

This would help to fuel violence and instability as time went on, and more and more and more non-state actors got access to greater numbers of weapons. Some of the AK-47s would be supplied to proxy forces and arms dealers. Some would just be outright stolen from weapons depots after being

raided that either were not being protected or due to the corruption of the people that operated them allowed the weapons to disappear from their control. As time went on, these weapons would gradually be smuggled into other countries, eventually reaching as far as the cartels of Mexico. The AK-47 would be brought to the doorstep of the United States itself.

Following that happening, the guns could be used to fight in just about any kind of terrain and country imaginable, because of the second point of the AK-47 and how it became so big, just how incredibly durable they are. The thing that one has to understand about this gun is

is that with as few as eight moving parts, depending upon the version that you have, an AK-47 could be field-stripped and reassembled by a child after less than an hour of training. Something that, unfortunately, has been rather used extensively by different warlords in Africa and other regions, where they utilize child soldiers.

In fact, my friends, the AK-47 is so incredibly simple that it's oftentimes referred to as being soldier-proof. There is nothing, practically nothing, that any kind of careless Russian conscript with two weeks of training, an Islamist militant who lived in a cave the better part of a decade...

or some gangster punk can do to break, harm, or jam it. It is basically fighter or soldier proof. Whether you drag it across a sandy desert, whether you submerge it in a river, whether you plunge it into a muddy swamp, if you forget to clean it for months at a time, it does not really matter. The AK-47's clearances and mechanisms are coarse enough that they just shrug off filth that would instantly clog a more sophisticated weapon like the M14 in Vietnam.

The AK-47 was so resilient that numerous reports during the Vietnam War would tell of AKs being found half-buried for months in the soggy Vietnamese jungle that, just after having their rusty bolt be freed with a kick, were ready to fire and go. These things could go through just about anything.

And so when you have varying different militant and rebel forces that are in hiding from the government, that are not able to go and get their vehicles and weapons and other things easily repaired and taken care of, that kind of resilience and durability means that it's an easy sell. But...

All of that then brings us in turn to our third and arguably one of the greatest parts about the AK-47, its ease for logistics. Think about it this way, my friends. When you have a gun that is cheap to produce and can take a hell of a beating in just about any kind of environment, it makes them very easy to stockpile and transport between different theaters of conflict and war. As an example of the global reach of the AK, look at El Salvador back in the 1980s.

Communist guerrillas that were operating in the country were initially waging war using leftover local weaponry and whatever surplus they could find. However, as time went on, the groups became significantly better armed.

Government forces fighting the guerrillas eventually started to find AK variants from other countries, such as North Korea, Yugoslavia, East Germany, all in rebel hands. Along with that, they would find ammunition that would originate from Cuba and Fidel Castro, who of course, if you look at his history, was always ready to supply communist groups around the world with whatever it is that they needed.

This supply network showcased the sheer effectiveness of the Soviet model of exporting small arms and their manufacturer specifications to socialist nations around the world back in the 1950s and 60s. It showcased just how well this had worked.

Because so many governments at different points used or produced the rifle, the AK had a worldwide network of different producers and suppliers to pull from. You were never too far from getting a contact that would be able to supply you with something that you needed for your gun. And one of the most insane parts about all this is that it's not just from the countries that actually went and adopted the rifle. Those that fought against them would even produce and obtain them.

As an example, just look at the Soviet-Afghan War. Mujahideen forces that were fighting against the Soviet-backed communist government had initially started their struggle using swords and weapons as dated as the Boer rifle from the British-Afghan War. For anyone who is not sure what it is that I am talking about, just check this out. There have been multiple accounts to this day of soldiers going and encountering Islamists in Afghanistan fighting with black powder weapons from the 1700s and 1800s.

Like, there are people who describe using their grandpappy's rifle, and then there are people who are using their grandpappy's grandpappy's grandpappy's rifle. In fact, at that point, it's not even a rifle. It's literally a smoothbore black powder weapon. In comparison to that, the Soviet-backed government in Afghanistan was supplied with AKs and other Warsaw Pact weapons prior to the war. In response to this, the CIA and a number of others who wanted to see Moscow fail would in turn go and provide a steady flow of additional arms, which largely included

AKs as they were just that incredibly easy to obtain for a cheap price in order to be able to fight them. In other words, this war went and turned the Kalashnikov against the army that it was actually made for. After years of fighting, eventually when the dust would settle, thousands of these weapons would be left remaining behind in

country which in turn would give warlords the tools to go and install the taliban and lead to the trouble that we would see later in the region similar results have been seen in many other countries and regions around the world over the past several decades as these guns don't simply disappear after being made there is always someone that is ready to pick it up and use it

And my friends, use it they would. As AKs spread throughout Africa and Southeast Asia, they took on an almost comical, dark role. Rebel leaders like warlord Charles Taylor, who helped to overthrow Liberian president Samuel Doe back in 1990, would go and recruit followers by offering them AKs with which they could use to plunder and kill to enrich themselves.

In fact, this association with plunder and obtaining wealth became so common that eventually the AK-47 would gain the nickname in Africa of being the African credit card. In Pakistan, suppliers reportedly went and rented AKs by the hour, and buyers would acquire them by posting a down payment and then using the weapon to rob or attack someone in order to be able to obtain the funds in order to pay their balance.

The more of these weapons that were used over time, the more that they were being made and sold for similar purposes. And as I said,

And as I said before, oh boy, were a lot of these things made. Honestly, when we go and describe this here, Soviet arms manufacturer often brings to mind the phrase, perfection is the enemy of good enough. Whether we are talking about the T-34 tank of World War II, the MiG-15 jet fighter, or the AK-47 assault rifle, which we are speaking about here now, every single one of these things are prime examples of the need to create weapons that are good enough rather than wasting time on making something that is perfect.

Each of these weapons was designed and built quickly, cheaply, and in vast numbers. Quantity rather than quality was the name of the game. And in the case of the AK-47, this kind of proliferation of arms would lead to unintended consequences as time went on.

As I explained in the beginning and also then over the course of this video, the worldwide availability and durability of the AK-47 made it the perfect weapon for any kind of terrorist, militia force, or other illegal paramilitary organization. Whether they're trying to take over a military base in the frozen tundra of some kind of remote region or overthrowing a government in Sub-Saharan Africa, the AK-47 would work well in any kind of environment.

It was always available, usually at a very cheap price, and would still work even if it fell into water, mud, sand, or some other kind of muck. It could do anything. Keep in mind, when I describe all this, the average lifespan of a terrorist or other militia fighter in a gunfight is not very long considering how poor their training is overall. So that rifle is more than likely going to change hands many different times, while after the person who is utilizing it gets taken down, it changes.

goes onto the ground, likely gets dirty, and thus needs to be able to be easily cleaned and maintained before being used by the next person. Militia and terrorist forces around the world need cheap replacements, both in the sense of manpower and simultaneously equipment. The AK-47 is most certainly that.

Of course, at this point in the video, one may wonder about whatever happened to the man Kalashnikov himself, the guy who invented the weapon. Was he rewarded for his efforts and how does he feel about the weapon to this day? Well, to explain that, for his labors, the Soviet Union would award him the Stalin Prize, the Red Star, and the Order of Lenin. Kalashnikov is to this day considered a national hero in Russia for the design of the AK-47.

But at the same time, interestingly enough, despite the weapon being the most produced in the world, he and his family, in fact, did not profit nearly as much as you would expect financially from the AK-47, and would live modestly in Izhevsk.

which is an industrial town around 800 miles east of Moscow. For Kalashnikov himself, this didn't really matter. He dismissed the importance of money, insisting that he had always been motivated by service to his country and not the idea of gaining wealth for himself. He was a member of the proletariat in the classic Soviet Union. He was the prime example of the everyday man who designed a great tool for his nation. He was a hero that the Soviet Union would wish to push up to the highest echelons.

A few years before his death, in an interview with the Russian government newspaper, Rosaskaya Gazeta, he would say, and I quote, "...in my 90 years, I feel myself to be a happy man. Of course, like anyone else, there are things to regret, but I can say one thing. I would not have chosen to lead my life any other way if I had the opportunity."

Back in the year 2007, President Vladimir Putin would single out the Kalashnikov rifle as a, quote, symbol of the creative genius of our people. And so it was then, throughout the majority of his life, that Kalashnikov would refuse any attempts of journalists or activists or anyone around the world to try and saddle him with the guilt over the vast number of killings and injuries that were inflected with his invention. He would insist that he had developed it for defense, not offense.

As an example, when a reporter asked in 2007 how he could sleep at night, he replied, quote, Yet, all that being said, in his final year of life, just before dying, Kalashnikov may have actually experienced a kind of change of heart. He would write in a letter to the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, and in this letter, he would state, quote,

The pain in my soul is unbearable. I keep asking myself the same unsolvable question. If my assault rifle took people's lives, that means that I, Mikhail Kalashnikov, am responsible for people's deaths. The longer I live, the more often that question gets into my brain. The deeper I go in my thoughts and guesses about why the Almighty allows humans to have devilish desires of envy, greed,

and aggression." The note is penned on Kalashnikov's personal writing paper and signed "A slave of God, the designer Mikhail Kalashnikov." These would be his final thoughts, and he would die a national hero of Russia in 2013 at the age of 94. So it is then, my friends, that in the end, the AK has become more than just a weapon. In many countries and cultures around the world, it is a symbol and a social statement.

Whether that is a symbol of freedom, resistance, power, or some other abstract concept entirely depends on who is utilizing it. But because of the proliferation and use, the Kalashnikov is the most recognizable weapon in the world. When Hollywood wants to go and mark a character as being a bad guy, they give him an AK, and anyone that watches that kind of movie understands it.

As Gordon Rotman would put in his book, The AK-47, quote, End quote.

And honestly, from everything you've probably seen from this video, this is perhaps the most accurate description of the fate of the AK. To be remembered then as one of humanity's greatest, and yet at the same time, most terrible weapons. It is the king of global conflict.

Whether that title will fall to another weapon at some point in the future remains to be seen. But as it stands, I would not be surprised if the AK continues its dominance in small arms throughout all the 21st century as well, maybe even moving into the 22nd. Who knows, perhaps 100 years from now someone else is going to make a video explaining the transition of just how the AK-47 was replaced. But until then, it will continue to dominate.

And that is the end of today's video. My friends, thank you so much for watching this here today. I appreciate all of you. If you can like, comment, subscribe, and let me know what other kinds of videos it is that you all would like to see. I'm trying to do other kinds of videos despite just geopolitical context and other things, so if you want deep dives into the history behind weapons, armor, and other kinds of things, please, by all means, let me know. If there is something, some kind of tank or

other vehicle that you would like to know about, some kind of big mega project, anything else, let me know in the comments and I will look at some of those here and like the ones that you think are good. And from that, I will go and create more content. I appreciate all of you for watching. Make sure to check me out on Patreon here if you can in order to support the actual podcast. As if you want deep dives into genuine, random, historical topics, then that is where you can find it. And ad-free for that matter.

And on that note, if you want deep dives into random historical topics, then make sure to go ahead and check out my actual podcast, which I have a link for down in the description. If you want to know the history of potatoes and every single thing that is involved in that, because I know it sounds weird, but the story itself is actually quite wild, then definitely click the links down in my description. Anything you all can do to help is greatly appreciated. Goodbye, my friends, and I will see you all here next time.