The Gun: The Story of the AK-47.

• Author: Fenton, Damien
• Position: Book review

THE GUN: The Story of the AK-47

Author: C.J. Chivers

Published by: Penguin, London, 2012, 481 pp, 9.99 [pounds sterling].

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C.J. (Christopher John) Chivers, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, war correspondent and former US Marine, presents us with a comprehensive history of the AK-47 Kalashnikov assault rifle, a weapon so famous--or infamous--as to have crossed over into popular culture as an artistic reference point for guerrilla war, revolution, terrorism or totalitarian oppression--take your pick. That distinctive silhouette of a stunted rifle in miniature with a pistol grip and a long banana shaped magazine jutting out beneath it can be found on everything from t-shirts to album covers to flags: Zimbabwe's national flag has one in its centre and Hizbollah, the Lebanon-based terrorist organisation, depicts one on its flag being held aloft by an outstretched arm. In fact the Kalashnikov's silhouette has become the world's de facto logo for the term 'assault rifle' full stop.

In this book Chivers attempts to tell us why. It is a convincing account that canvasses all aspects of the weapon's development and subsequent use around the world. By some estimates there are 100 million AK-47s and their variants in use around the world today. This includes the direct successors to the AK-47, the AKM and AK-74 assault rifles, and the bewildering number of foreign-made knock offs and variants, such as the Type 56, still manufactured by Chinese weapons giant Norinco (and briefly sold here in New Zealand in the late 1980s before the gun laws were changed). In that sense it is better to speak of the Kalashnikov--as opposed to AK-47--weapons family. Chivers points out that Kalashnikovs have killed more human beings than any other single weapons family since the end of the Second World War. What is more, even if production ended tomorrow they are such robust weapons that they could continue killing for another 100 years before the last one falls to bits.

Chivers does his best to untangle the AK-47's origins, where the waters have been well and truly muddied by 40 years of Soviet myth-making. AK stands for Avtomat Kalashnikova, the 'automatic by Kalashnikov'. Kalashnikov is the last name of the man who, at least during the Soviet period, was credited as the creator of the AK-47 assault rifle. Mikhail Timofeyevich Kalashnikov is still alive today and still feted by the Russian government as a national hero for his weapon. Perhaps this...