The Sun's recent articles and editorials pertaining to a ban on "assault rifles" are patently absurd ("Democrats stage sit-in on House floor in dispute over guns," June 22). The confused focus of the rash of rants recently published since the Orlando tragedy is on the "assault rifle." Seemingly, a deep gulf of ignorance divides your reporters and readership from the correct knowledge as to what a "military arm" or "weapon of war" is.
Many most likely believe that the "AR" in AR-15 is an abbreviation for "assault rifle," whereas it is a designation for the original manufacturer, "Armalite." A weapon of war in modern militaries is an automatic rifle (a "machine gun" to the layman). No army currently issues a semi-automatic rifle to its troops as the primary battle arm. The M-4, the current version of the M-16 automatic rifle, is indeed an automatic: if the trigger is depressed and the selector switch is set to "auto," then the rifle will fire until the magazine of cartridges is empty (or there is a jam or stoppage).
The AR-15 is semi-automatic and fires each time the trigger is squeezed, but then only one round at a time. The public can purchase a semi-automatic rifle in gun shops and sporting goods stores, but unless the purchaser possesses a Federal Firearms License (and several thousand dollars for the price, let alone the ammunition), he or she cannot purchase an automatic firearm.
Is an AR-15 "military style?" Perhaps, but only in appearance, not in operation. One (with the proper background checks and vetting by the appropriate law enforcement organs ─ the Maryland State Police in our case) may purchase a true "weapon of war," an M1 Garand semi-automatic rifle that was described as "the greatest battle implement ever devised" by General George Patton. Again, with the proper, law-abiding bona fides, one can purchase an M1903 Springfield bolt action rifle, or a Krag-Jorgensen rifle, a "Trapdoor" Springfield rifle, or even a percussion rifle musket: all "weapons of war" over the life of the republic. So, what is a "weapon of war" or an assault rifle (as these antiquated arms could be considered, especially with the proper bayonet fixed)?
The tragedies that occur at the hands of terrorists and lunatics are reprehensibly atrocious affronts to humanity and morality: sheer wanton acts of evil perpetrated on the innocent and unsuspecting by disturbed individuals who never should have been able to purchase a water gun if the "gun laws" actually prevented any violence. We grieve for the victims, we express our sympathy for their families and we hope that there will be a deliverance from these slaughters of the innocent. If there were no guns in their hands, they would still kill and kill indiscriminately, without remorse, without a shred of humanity in their diseased minds. And they would kill with whatever weapon that would shed the most blood. That weapon would also be a weapon of war, from further in the past — a sword, a club, a stone.
John Reid, Sparrows Point