What is an assault rifle?

[Jack Gilbert]

I interviewed a local paper recently, and specifically stated that an assault rifle is by definition a fully automatic firearm. That is what I have been led to believe.

When the article came out in the paper, here is what it stated: "Assault Weapon: Any firearm THAT LOOKS LIKE or fits the profile of a weapon used in combat."

Does just looking like a fully automatic assault weapon make an AR-15 an M-16?  Is a semi-auto AK an assault weapon, like a fully automatic AK?

Am I wrong?  I also commented at length about the so-called "semi-auto assault weapons ban" that Clinton instituted, and that every night to confuse the public the major news networks continually showed full auto firearms being fired.

I need some expert help here. Even with a careful definition of terms I don't believe the reporter for the paper grasped what she was being told.

Thanks.

Jack

[GRIMJIM]

She understood just fine but the real truth rarely sells papers. It sounds a lot moire like real journalism if you muddle up the facts to make the story more interesting to people that don't know any better. People that know nothing about firearms judge them by the way they look whereas people that do know about them know that a rifle is a rifle is a rifle no matter what it looks like. A 30-06 is just as dangerous as an ak if you put it in the hands of someone that's willing to use them on other people.

[dukkillr]

This seemed reasonable, from Wikipedia:

An assault rifle is a selective fire rifle or carbine firing ammunition with muzzle energies intermediate between those typical of pistol and battle rifle ammunition. Assault rifles are categorized between light machine guns, intended more for sustained automatic fire in a support role, and submachine guns, which fire a handgun cartridge rather than a rifle cartridge. Assault rifles are the standard small arms in most modern armies, having largely replaced or supplemented larger, more powerful battle rifles, such as the World War II-era M1 Garand and Tokarev SVT. Examples of assault rifles include the AK-47 and the M16 rifle. Semi-automatic rifles, including commercial versions of the AR-15, and "automatic" rifles limited to firing single shots are not assault rifles as they are not selective fire. Belt-fed weapons or rifles with very limited capacity fixed magazines are also generally not considered assault rifles.

The term assault rifle is a translation of the German word Sturmgewehr (literally meaning "storm rifle"), "storm" used as a verb being synonymous with assault, as in "to storm the compound". Sturmgewehr was coined by Adolf Hitler to describe the Maschinenpistole 44, subsequently re-baptized Sturmgewehr 44, the firearm generally considered the first widely-used assault rifle and served to popularize the concept. The translation “assault rifle” gradually became the common term for similar firearms sharing the same technical definition as the name giver StG 44. In a strict definition, a firearm must have all of the following five characteristics to qualify as an assault rifle:[1][2][3]

Is a carbine sized individual weapon with provision to be fired from a shouldered position.
Barrel length is usually 400 mm to 500 mm (16” to 20”)
Is capable of selective fire.
Fires from a locked breech.
Utilizes an intermediate powered-cartridge.
Ammunition is supplied from a large capacity detachable box magazine.
Most common is a capacity of 30 rounds, sometimes 20 rounds.
The following features are commonly found on assault rifles, but those are not exclusive to assault rifles, as those features are shared with many submachine guns, battle rifles, automatic rifles and machine guns:

Protruding pistol grip.
Folding, retractable or otherwise collapsible shoulder stock.
Bipod
Muzzle device like a muzzle brake or a flash suppressor.
There are commentators who use the expression “assault rifle” more loosely to include other types of arms, particularly arms that fall under a strict definition of the battle rifle, or civilian semi-automatic off-shoots of military rifles for commercial or political reasons. Some militaries of nations outside of the English-speaking world also have a different definition of assault rifle. For instance, the analogous term in the Swedish Armed Forces is automatkarbin (literally "automatic carbine") which includes both assault rifles and battle rifles.

[~Ace~]

An assault rifle is Very Simply Any Rifle used in an assault, nothing more and nothing less. Attaching menacing sounding names to describe weapons is mearly a tactic used by the Anti American gun Grabbers. 

[Savage]

+1 on Ace's definition of assault rifle.------------
It's a moot point anyway, as assault is a behavior and not an object.
Savage

[blinddog]

Modern new reporting = distort facts to push a personal agenda. By talking to that reporter and not insisting she  print exactily what you said, you fell into the liberal/secular progressive/ politiacl correct trap. I would contact the "reporter" and insist on a retraction or reprint of exactilly what you told her. They changed what you said to reflect what they want to push. And that is simply firearms control. Limiting the avalibility of  what the citizenry may own, in order to be able to better contol them. In the last sixty years we have gone from the people who "may keep and bear arms" to a people who might be able to, if licensed, and who can meet all the regulations enacted by a bunch of bureaucrats, get somthing, if it meets the currant agenda, and if we jump trhough all the hoops, and are politically correct enough, we may be allowed to protect ourselves.

[S.S.]

Unfortunately it was shooters that labeled Civilian versions of military rifles as "assault rifles"
The name came from Hitler Himself in re-naming one  of the German "Machine Pistols".
There was a magazine that was printed back in the Late 1970's or early 1980's
that was called "Full Auto". They ran an article  named "Assault Rifle Roundup" and an old name came into common usage from there concerning civilian weapons. Technically, an assault rifle must be select fire, Fire an intermediate power cartridge with an effective range of at least 300 meters, and have a high capacity magazine. Appearance has nothing to do with it really.