#AA-12

The AA-12 – Originally designed in the 1980’s (with an M16A1 handguard no less), the Atchisson Assault-12 has been tried out by a few military/LE customers.  It has been seen mostly on film, as no semiautomatic variant ever existed for sale.  However, TFB’s own version of Nostradamus, Nathaniel F. noted changes to this situation back in 2016 with this excellent article on the work of Mr. Boje Cornils to make a semiautomatic version.  The hard work of Mr. Cornils has finally come to fruition, per the press release below from Sol Invictus Arms.

At the 2017 Association of the United States Army annual meeting, Korean optics maker DI Optical was showing off many of their familiar products, but also had on display an interesting looking rifle attachment from a company called Jammer Korea. The attachment, named the “DRONE SNIPER”, is a familiar multi-frequency radio jammer, but in a slick underbarrel package that weighs much less than current standalone launchers.

It’s no secret that the field of war is changing, and that fact is just as true for the infantryman as it is the F-35 Lightning II pilot. Increasingly, small, inexpensive, expendable drones are being used as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) assets, as well as delivery platforms for light ordnance as well as kamikaze weapons. Today, the use of drones in this manner is in its infancy, but the next generation of purpose-built light combat drones is being designed and built right now. Israeli firms like Duke Robotics and UVision have already created armed and kamikaze (respectively) drone systems, and combatants in the Iraqi and Syrian Civil Wars famously used drones as delivery platforms for 40mm grenades. The use of civilian light drones as “snooping” devices has already spurred the development of anti-drone weapons for security forces, including both electromagnetic “rifles” that zap drones to take control of them, as well as more crude (but still effective) anti-drone shotgun payloads.

Dear reader, are you a manufacturer looking to expand your lineup? Here’s a suggestion: How about entering the fully automatic shotgun market by buying the rights to the successor of the famous Atchisson AA-12? That’s what the below video published by BC Engineering Co of Russellville, Tennessee asks, regarding their BC Jaeger, the descendant of Atchisson’s famous automatic shotgun design: