Wow! How Do I Get a "Terrorist-Grade" Rifle?!?

(Via SayUncle)

Another piece of laughably bad gun control propaganda disguised as straight news reporting, this time from our supposed allies at FOX News. (Actually, you can blame it on the NY Post, FOX just regurgitated it):

Illegal Arms Shipment Seized En Route to U.S.

A Turkish ship headed for New York — and stuffed with thousands of AK-47s and other Kalashnikov assault rifles — was seized en route in Italy, authorities said Tuesday.

Hmm... Other Kalashikov's? Would that mean AK-74's? I hate it when they aren't forthcoming with more details.

The ship's deadly hoard of more than 7,500 terrorist-grade rifles and machine guns worth more than $6 million was discovered illegally hidden under piles of properly labeled arms in several massive cargo containers, Italian officials said.

Wow! "Terrorist-grade!"

Um, wait.

Does that mean "In generally poor, banged-up and rusty condition because terrorist assholes don't know how to take care of their guns"? Looking at how they were stored, I think so.

Never mind. I don't want one after all.

Oh, and $6 million? That's $800 per rifle. I don't think so, unless they were planning to unload the entire shipment in Chicago. I can buy a Romanian AK clone from Florida Gun Works for $439. That's just over half price! And the SAR wouldn't have been bouncing around in a shipping container in a pile, either.

The ship MS Adnan Bayraktar, which bears a Turkish flag, had come from the Romanian port of Constanta and was on its way to a stopover in New York when the bust was made, the authorities said.

Documents showed the cargo containers were ultimately headed to a large U.S. company based in Georgia.

Officials refused to identify the business, citing security concerns and the ongoing investigation.

"We know that the [ship's] destination was North America, but we don't effectively know if that's where the [suspect] arms were going," one customs official told Italian state television.

The ship's cache of combat-style weapons was uncovered several days ago during a routine customs inspection at the Calabrian port of Gioia Tauro in southern Italy, officials said. They said they didn't reveal the bust at the time because of the continuing probe.

The weapons were confiscated by the Italian authorities because of problems with the ship's customs forms. For example, the arms had been described on some of the forms as "common guns" instead of assault-style.

The smuggled firearms included the lightweight combat Kalashnikov rifles, AK-47 assault rifles and SKA and Mauser rifles, authorities said.

Were the Mausers 98's? And what the hell is a "SKA"? Could they have meant an AKS? That would be the AKS-74, the paratrooper folding-stock carbine.

And just as an aside, the 98 Mauser bolt-action rifle is a "combat-style weapon." It even accepts a bayonet.

The weapons' bayonets were still affixed to them, as were cartridges that can hold up to 30 rounds, they said.

(*sigh*) Such ignorance.

So, they shipped the rifles with bayonets attached and a magazine seated in the mag well. (A "cartridge," you NYP moron, is the "round" the magazine holds thirty of.)

The AK-47s had been tampered with so they couldn't be rapidly fired, but the modification was one that could easily have been reversed, authorities said.

So we're talking about semi-auto AK "machineguns" then? Killer reporting, dude.

The assault weapons are a favorite with terrorists: Usama bin Laden sported one in the now-infamous footage of him taken after 9/11.

Wow. Now that's reporting! NEWSFLASH! Terrorists like AK-47 assault rifles! I'd have never known.

And, actually Osama Bin Missing favors a Krinkov - a short-barreled, folding stock version of the 5.45x39 caliber AK-74. (Stephen Hunter knows his guns.)

AK-47s also have been the weapon of choice for some infamous military-minded wackos, such as the teens who shot up Columbine HS in Littleton, Colo., in 1999.

BZZZZZT! So sorry. You've been caught in an out-and-out lie! Harris and Kliebold carried a Tec-9 pistol, a Hi-Point 9mm carbine, and two sawed-off shotguns! - No AK-47, AKS, or Mauser "assault rifle" of any kind!

The United States has banned such military-style semiautomatic weapons since 1994. The law preventing them from being manufactured, imported or sold here expires in September.

BZZZZZZT! Lie number two! The law limits the number of features such rifles may have, and it does severely limit what can be imported, but it doesn't prevent all importation, nor does it prohibit sales of guns meeting the limitations. Now, according to the report, these guns had bayonets attached, so that's obviously a no-no, and the shipment method certainly does raise eyebrows, but I wonder if somebody was trying to import parts and the shipper decided to pass on the irritating dissassembly procedure.

But it's a journalistic requirement to get in a shot about the "Assault Weapon Ban" sunset whenever remotely possible. Note, however, that these guns were supposedly destined for "the street" in violation of the law.

Hey, it's entirely possible that this entire shipment was meant for 7,500 Al Qaeda operatives in Georgia, and the Italians caught it, but somehow I find it doubtful.

Update: Curmudgeonly & Skeptical has a picture of the "30 round cartridge."

UPDATE, 4/23: Via AlphaPatriot, the gun importer involved was Century International Arms.

This would be the second large firearms importer to get nailed trying to bring in verboten weapons, after Interarms was busted for importing improperly demilled Ppsh 41's.

Something smells here.