Repeating and Multi-Fire Weapons: A History from the Zhuge Crossbow Through the Ak-47

ISBN-13: 9781476666662 / Angielski / Miękka / 2018 / 434 str.

Gerald Prenderghast

Opis

From the earliest days of organized warfare, combatants have been anxious to develop weapons with more firepower. This inevitably led a wide variety of repeating weapons, capable of a degree of sustained fire without reloading. Based largely upon new research, this book explores the history of repeating and multi-fire weapons, beginning with the Chinese repeating crossbow in the 4th century BCE, and ending with the world's most common firearm, the Kalashnikov AK-47--the ultimate "Woolworth's gun." The author describes the potency of the machine gun in World War I, the development of the semiautomatic pistol and the role of the sub-machine gun in improving the effectiveness of the infantryman.