[Webstral]

Kato, allow me to propose a very different scale of thinking when it comes to ROI regarding sales of AK-74 to the US and their resale domestically.

First, the PRC finds herself in possession of 100,000 of these rifles. They aren’t going to let them lie around on the battlefield for someone to pick up. They aren’t especially useful to the Chinese without the right ammunition. Someone with a bit of business acumen remembers that up through 1994 the PRC sold several million SKS rifles to civilian dealers in the US. Profits weren’t huge (I bought my first SKS retail for $99 in Macon, GA in late 1994), but profit is profit. If the PRC can sell these 100,000 rifles for $100 each to a US distributor, the proceeds amount to $10 million. This is not big money when compared to the trade deficit the US has with the PRC prior to the start of the war; nor is it big money compared to the debt the PRC is accumulating by buying everything that isn’t nailed down. But it is $10 million to be made by moving a few shipping containers of captured materiel to the US. Double the price to the US distributor, and we’re talking $20 million. Again, it’s not big money on the scale of Sino-Soviet trade. It doesn’t have to be. Not every profitable idea has to be worth the gross domestic product of the Netherlands to be worth doing to the participants.

Getting this idea passed in Congress in the context of the Sino-Soviet War shouldn't be that much more difficult, really. The US distributor contacts his Congressman, arranges a luncheon, and appears with a briefcase with $25,000 and a request to let American collectors show their patriotism and help the Chinese war effort by buying genuine Soviet AK-74s. The Congressman pockets his bribe and goes back to Congress to get the import of captured AK-74s into the US attached as a rider to any of the bills now moving through the subcommittee(s) overseeing US involvement in the Sino-Soviet War; i.e. arranging to have as much US gear sold to China as China is willing to buy and arranging to lend China more money lest the Chinese coffers empty before US arms manufacturers have supped their fill. Someone who is not in on the deal notices that the rider involves weapons that fire on automatic and puts the kibosh on it. US arms manufacturers get wind of this matter through their representatives in the respective subcommittees, and further negotiations ensue over golf. The various parties agree that the best thing to do is mandate removal of the auto fire capacity and rebuilding the weapons to fire 5.56 NATO. If the rifles don’t sell, then the distributor eats the loss. In the end, a few more palms are greased to the tune of a paltry sum by the standards of arms deals but which is meaningful enough to individuals, and the rider is attached to a high priority bill.

On the floor of both Houses, the rider is defended as a means of helping the Chinese offset their growing debt and as a means of helping Americans own a piece of Soviet setback. When someone with a head for figures points out that the total profit to China of selling these rifles is a veritable drop in the bucket, the retort is that any debt repayment is good, and why is the Congressman from California opposed to helping our Chinese friends pay down their debt to us by selling whatever they have to sell? Because it is a small sum on the scale of arms trade, the debate over the rider is brief. There are, after all, tens of thousands of ATGM to be sold and delivered with proceeds to US manufacturers measured in the billions of dollars. Surely, ladies and gentlemen of the Senate, we’re not going to fail to pass this important bill because the Chinese are selling us military curios captured from the Soviet Union to the tune of 5% of the value of our sales to the Chinese in this one bill alone. The BATF has already signed off on the modifications mandated in the bill, so can we get a vote on this already?