#7 would be, ‘because they told me I couldn’t have one.’ I do hear that frequently.

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You design a new gun, then try to sell it to three markets: civilian, LE, military. Beretta created the 92F/FS, scored some police contracts, then later hit the jackpot with the M9 contract. SIG had to settle for the civilian market table scraps. Ruger’s Mini-14 never had a chance vying with the AR-15 for a US military contract, but enjoyed good sales with LE, notably prison guards and a few foreign police.

It used to be the same with aircraft design. The B-17 was a scaled up adaptation of Boeing’s 247 passenger airliner. The C-47 transport was the DC-3 airliner. The KC-135 refueling tankers that sometimes fly over my head are modified Boeing 707s.

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There’s also the fashion trend of ‘tacticool.’ A buddy of mine embodies these elements. All his guns are black polymer. He puts a red dot on everything (without ever zeroing them in), swaps out triggers, etc. He traded in a nice Mossberg, very accurate with a peep, for a Kel-Tec (which we dubbed ‘The Space Blaster’) which continually jammed in alarmingly dangerous ways. He traded that in for another Space Blaster. We had a session where I shot his AR and he shot my Mini. He admitted the Mini was a bit nicer to shoot, but looked “boring.”

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Thanks. This detail may help bolster my point that the line between “military” and “civilian” firearms has always been blurry.

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David,
There were various .222ish cartridges in the early 1950s for sport/varmint hunting. The 222 Remington is closest and I think was upscaled to become 223. IIRC there were some faster ‘magnum’ variants too – but remember really really fast cartridges esp at higher twist rates are barrel burners. (I think this is one reason the “WSM” (Winch. Short Magnum) loadings have never really taken off even for bolt guns.
Bill

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Wow, thanks for sharing are of these nuances to the story. One question, if I may: you say the .223 Remington was developed from a common sporting round? This is interesting. What was the round? Do you know of a source on that?

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Rather, part of this is due to the market shifting to domestically-produced rifles due to the late ’80s/early ’90s bans on ‘evil features’ on imported rifles (requiring, for example, thumbhole ‘butthole’ stocks, etc.), Chinese rifle import bans, etc. [This was all before the 1994 Fed AW ban.] The other US 223 semiauto contender, the Ruger Mini-14, was not known for accuracy, magazines were not plentiful, etc.]

[N.B. – Somewat later, a 1990 era import ban – which had requirement of “10 or less key foreign parts” to allow importation of semiauto rifles – backfired and created a thriving small industry in “922(r) US compliance parts” – so people could legally modify or build such firearms in a configuration they desired but which wasn’t importable.]

USA has always had a commercial/sporting market at the trailing end of military supply chain/outdated stocks. It’s a tradition, not an exception! M1 Garand semiautos & M1903 Springfield 30-06 bolt action guns were the bulk forerunners into postwar personal inventories, but even things like surplus Krag rifles entered US personal inventories before that – and even others preceding that. (Post-WW2, hardware stores throughout US would even have bins of surplus 1911 45ACP pistols, in at least moderate shape, for just a few bucks each – similar conditions for surplus M1917 .45ACP revolvers as well, plus imported Lugers, P38s, and Nambus).

223/5.56 ammo is also cheaper/lighter than heavier calibers (and cleaner/more accurate than surplus ComBloc 7.62×39 or 5.45×39 ammo). 223/5.56 is cheap and relatively easy to reload; its origins were from a US commercial sporting round anyway. 20- and 30-round AR/M16 surplus magazines were treated like dollar store items at sporting goods stores- almost like disposable commodities: ‘packaging’, if you will – until onset of 1994 Fed ‘Crime bill’ gun ban.

Original AR15s had a 1-in-12″ twist barrel which was not suitable for heavier bullets (just for under-55gr ‘varmint’ rounds). As 1-in-9″ twist and 1-in-7″ twist barrels came into being in the commercial market somewhat after the introduction of the M16A2 in the 1980s, the AR15 rifle became more usable/desirable to a larger constituency. And once the unwieldy fixed carry handle upper receivers changed (post M16A4 introduction, and as the M4 ramped up) to ‘flattop’ ones with detachable carry handles, scopes were far more easily mountable.

The ’90s were also the era where ‘cheap’ CNC machinery allowed small businesses to do quality, smaller production runs on aluminum, without huge labor costs: everyone had a new idea for a rail or stock or other specialty/ergonomic part, and experimenter/tinkerer gunnies liked to try out new products that didn’t break their wallet and yet didn’t require a gunsmith’s services either. [There are many similarities to the US pickup truck and accessory market here.]
In fact the prices were low enough – due to original Stoner/Sullivan design-for-manufacturing with new materials & vastly reduced costs – that many gunnies just got or built an extra AR: one a carbine, one perhaps an accurized scoped rifle … why waste time swapping parts on one rifle?

All the above coalesced into volume demand for an easy-to-shoot, easy-to-fix low cost accurate rifle. Add the politicization of the antigun movement and by the mid/late 90s onward the AR had enough cachet to be a political talisman, and attempts to further ban it or restrict it made it even more desirable.

-Bill

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For me – I would own any firearm because I can – but why I own an AR over any other rifle – 10 years in the Army, most of them carrying an M16 (though when I rose in rank sufficiently to choose what to carry, I went with an M3). Grew to love it for its ease of use, from light recoil to easy to use controls. As my own personal rifle(s) it is highly fixable, imminently customizable and easy to maintain. It is good at what it does and fun to use.

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1. I can buy the parts and build it myself. This lets me configure it just how I want it.
2. Since I built it myself, I can also repair it myself if it breaks. Unlike most guns, I can even replace the barrel without expensive tools (like a big metal turning lathe).
3. Compared to other center fire rifles, ammo is cheap and easy to find.

There are other reasons as well, but those are the main ones.

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Note, the other answers are all valid too. In a CC permit class in my state, the instructors (one Federal the other local LEO’s) both said they and most other police keep an AR as their home defense gun, provided it’s loaded with appropriate ammunition.

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