1200x-1

“Just hours before a summit in Minsk that could decide the fate of eastern Europe for a generation, Vladimir Putin had a gift for the president of Egypt: an assault rifle,” the gun-loving news hounds at bloomberg.com report. “A photo of the rifle, with its wooden stock and accompanying gun case, along with a smiling President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, was posted on the website of Egypt’s state-controlled MENA news agency. The rifle was identified as an AK-47, according to the state-run Russia Today’s Arabic website.” When an American president gives a foreign leader a firearm for a personal prezzie, well, there’s your sign.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

84 COMMENTS

  2. Should an American president give an M4 or go a little more classic…M14, M1, 1903, Winchester 1873, 1911A1, colt single action…….

    • When someone asks for a kleenex, do you turn to them and yell “Its not a kleenex! Its a paper facial tissue!”?
      When someone asks for a band aid, do you adamantly demand they call it an adhesive bandage?

      This crap is worse than the clip vs mag bs.

      • Actually the clip vs. mag thing is like saying that a school bus and motorcycle are interchangeable. Clips and magazines are completely different. If the difference is lost on you than you really need to find a new hobby.

      • No. It’s more than ignorance to call an AKS, or AKM an AK47 and not mere pedantry to point out the distinction. A Passat and a “Bug” are both Volkswagens, but just like with the AK47 vs AKM, the differences are more than subtle.
        If you argue that they both fire the 7.62×39 cartridge, then I’d point out that so does the Mini 30….
        But what I’d really find funny is if Putin gave him a Galil….

        • I made this same comment in regards to differentiating between the AK-47 and semi-automatic sporters based off the AKM on another TTAG article where some anti’s were referring to said semi-auto firearms as ‘The AK-47’. Anyone with a rudimentary understanding of the English language could have followed and understood what I was saying. But alas, as always, there’s usually one or two who read through what is written and conjure a meaning or understanding not put forth by what is in plain sight. I like TTAG because there’s a lot of folk who are sharp as a Hanzo running around here. However, every now and then you’ll run into a handful of people on here who are as sharp as a bowling ball. Thankfully these ‘bowling balls’ are outnumbered by the Hanzo’s.

      • When you gas up a tractor trailer, do you put in gas or diesel? It’s kind of important to distinguish things sometimes.

    • AK-103 with custom wood stock since the 100 series of AK’s use only polymer. I would also assume it to be in 7.62×39 since there is a lot of it in Egypt since they use Maadi mfg. AKM’s.

  6. No, we give them a “reset” button. It’s like amateur hour at the state department. Absolutely pathetic.

    • A misspelled reset button stolen from a hotel hot tub. The State Department aspires to amature hour. It is more like the elementary talent show during the special education class showcase.

  7. U.S. presidents used to give beautifully engraved firearms as gifts to foreign heads of state. Probably stopped with Ike in the 1950’s

    • Well, not completely. President Reagan gave Mexican President Lopez-Portillo a rifle, I think it was a Winchester lever-action. And yes, he was criticized for it. L-P gave Reagan a saddle, BTW…

  8. I wish Putin would come visit my house and present me with a free AK. He might try to annex my 1.4 acre plot as a Russian exclave, but still. Lucky SOB.

    • That’s what I was thinking too. It would be nice if Putin (evil man that I think he is) dropped by my house and gave me an AK to keep my Saiga and Mosin company.

    • As a fellow josh I say we take over the United States and claim it for all josh’s everywhere. We are a little outnumbered but i think we can do it… we just really need to have an element of surprise and maybe one box of .22lr.

  10. Say what you want about Putin. (and most of you will) He’s got more style in his left ear than Obama has in his entire body. Russia “elected” a slavic James Bond. America “elected” a whiny pussy. No wonder we’re the laughingstock of the planet and everyone shits bricks at the idea of Russia deciding to take the kid gloves off.

    • At least Putin loves his country. When he stated that Russia would stay Russian and not adapt to meet the “politically correct” nature of immigrants or visitors, that showed someone for his country.
      Unlike the U.S. where we put 5 languages on a cup of coffee and kiss ass to everyone anywhere by changing everything we hold dear to accommodate everyone.

      Basically he said something like “in Russia we speak Russian, eat Russian food, perform Russian customs, if you don’t like it, leave”

      • Because Russia and its associated territories is not known to be a highly diverse nation consisting of many diverse cultures.

        • It very much is, but the actual quote can best be translated as…

          “Russia does not change to accommodate minority special interests. Minority special interests change to accommodate Russia.”

          That’s the difference. Russians are many things, but at the end of the day they are all simply Russian. None of this “asian-russian or african-russian” bullshit.

        • Unless you’re Chechen. Or Centrial Asian. Or Jewish. Or ethnic Caucasian.

          Russia sure does treat non-Russians nicely!

        • Would those be the same Chechens that were blowing up apartment buildings and massacring schools? The same Chechens that wanted to turn a majority Orthodox region into an Islamic state? Yeah… My heart bleeds for them.

          Did you know that Russia has an entire autonomous region that is run as a miniature Jewish state?
          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Autonomous_Oblast

        • Good role model? Depends on your point of view. Effective leader who unapologetically champions the good of this country? Definitely. Can either be said about Obama?

    • I can’t say I disagree. He is immensely popular in Russia, and he is a much more capable, intelligent and cunning leader than Obama could ever hope to be. They don’t even belong in the same conversation of world leaders. While Putin is making moves all over the globe to at least try to better his country, Obama is making lame “jokes” about how Putin is just the wannabe cool kid from high school.

      • So Putin’s the “Wannabe Cool Kid” who actually ends up fighting for a chunk of the world and Obama’s the “Cool Kid” who winds up working fast food, handing out cheeseburgers, fighting patiently for his shift to end. Yea we all get it………….up the wazoo!

    • Somewhere in the U.N., a coffee table conversation :

      US diplomat: our president got the Nobel Peace Prize for stuff he did in office, before he even did them. What did your president get?

      Russian diplomat: Our president got Russian Piece Prize. Specifically, piece formerly known as Ukraine.

      US diplomat: (shuffles toe) (looks down) oh yeah? Well … My president can beat up your … Um, well, our drones can out-drone your drones! So there!

      • Not if China keeps stealing our IT tech and selling it to Russia. (Don’t forget who developed the best airframes throughout the cold war. HINT: A MIG-31 can mop the floor with any pre-F-22 US air superiority fighter.)

        • Depends entirely on your definition of ‘mop the floor’.

          The MiG-31 has the edge on speed but is limited to an around 5g turn rate.

          Super Hornet can turn 7g-9g depending on config.

        • Yeah, I don’t know where you’re being informed but the MiG-31 is an interceptor and recon plane, not an air superiority fighter. Big hulking beast of a plane, would be a death knell to slow her down and try a turning fight.

          If you want to talk Su-27 and her updated sister variants, now we’re cooking with fire.

    • Last I heard, Obama has 300 million “friends” outside of the United States that he wanted to “gift” a firearm. Your confiscations, oops, contributions to making his dream come true are welcomed.

    • If you knew what you were looking at, you’d know that this particular AK is a unique build. I’m not saying that it’s super expensive, but it’s not something built on the mass production lines.

      • Well, in all honesty I don’t know what I’m looking at.q

        So, please elaborate, just what does make this one special and not an off-the-rack item?

        • It’s an AK-103 rifle with both the left-side folding stock and Izhmash/Molot pistol grip and handguards made of wood, not current production polymer.

          Although the photo isn’t very high-res, all of the wooden furniture looks like walnut to me. For an AK, it’s a pretty fancy build.

          I also wouldn’t be surprised if the steel is blued, as it doesn’t look like the typical flat grey paint used by Izhmash.

          Again not something super expensive, but it was definitely specially made, and is not something that Izhmash produces for commercial/military sales.

        • It symbolizes Russia which is another reason why it was chosen. It is the most widely known item coming from Russia besides vodka and caviar.

          The same reason George W. Bush received a CZ bolt gun from the Czech president back when he was in office because of its Czech origins.

      • Progress is progress baby.

        200 years of our history, we put a ma on the moon. Progress ~meh time will tell right? 🙂

        2000+ years of their history, and they are still drawing food and water, bathing, washing their clothes, pissing, sh_tting, burying their dead in the same f-ing river. Progress? N O

        Arabs gave us Algebra (yes, the bane of H.S. students) and useful portions of physics and astronomy, then they killed off those people. Young shepherds from those countries call you the devil and run off half-crazed into the desert when you hand them an ice-cold bottle of water from your cooler, because they cannot understand your black-magic. Sheepish old men approach you with a dimly-lit used chem-light and ask if you can make it light up again, and, when you ask them where they got it, they tell you it was in an explosion defilade along a highway and you had thrown it in there some hours earlier to instruct following vehicles that it was a potential i.e.d.

        When you complain about them wiping their post-defecating butt with their left hand they retort, ‘well, which hand do you wipe your butt with’, and when you reply “the one holding the toilet paper stupid” they still don’t get it, because the toilet paper roll is only seen by them as just the most absorbent spot inside a port-o-potty (provided by the DOD thru KBR) to pee on.

        When you can hear their rape of children over the muezzin, you just say to yourself, W T F.

  15. Its a AKM, just like the MISR rifle the Egyptian Army uses as there standard rifle. AKM was the first standard issue select fire assault rifle in there’s use in the 1andard today. Analog with imported AKMs and SKSs where there infantry’s rifles in there wars against Israel. It didn’t do them any good against Israeli M-60A1s, and Centurion tanks though LOL.

    • To be fair, it’s a long road from a power reactor to a bomb. Look at Japan and South Africa. Both have extensive nuclear power programs and no nukes.

      • They don’t have nukes in RSA and JPN because they don’t want them. Maybe Egypt doesn’t want them either. I can’t say if they do or don’t.

        • Those were just two example I am personally familiar with. Worldwide, there are dozens of nations with nuclear power programs and only a tiny handful with nukes.

        • The previous RSA admin disavowed them…..because ANC. ANC would take them in a heartbeat if it were now remotely plausible.

      • The Japanese have something like 20 tons of plutonium scavenged from their nuclear fuel re-processing.

        I have full confidence they could turn them into weapons in short order if they were motivated.

      • I prefer digital automatics. All the fun of a manual with none of the headaches when you’re trying to get to work after barely sleeping off a full weekend bender.

  20. I would’ve liked to have seen him receive a M3A1 Greaser. An a 1911A1 service type pistol show some American military arms ingenuity..
    Not some AK knock off..

  22. I think it was the Czech Republic president some years ago that presented Bush with a bolt action CZ rifle in the oval office. That was cool. I can’t imagine anyone presenting Obama with a firearm, let alone a CZ rifle from another country.

Comments are closed.