Reply #15: This is why

[freethought]

American Soldiers/Marines are not issued AK-47s. They carry the current model of the M-16 Rifle, I don't know what it is called now, but that uses a .223 bullet.
However they have handed over AKs to what passes for the Iraqi security forces, and lots of them.
Reason being is quite simple. AKs are easy to manufacture and therefore quite cheap. The AK is the most used and most produced paramilitary gun in history. That is one of the genius aspects of its design. It is not made with "aerospace" precision or with ultra-tight tolerances. Certain parts of the gun can stamped which makes it easy to manufacture and those parts that are machined do not have to be machined to extreme tolerances. The AK was made to be easy to produce, cheap to make, able to tolerate punishment, function reliably on the battlefield and it does all of those swimmingly. China, Russia can produce them faster than hotcakes.
This often makes them the first choice when you have to buy arms in bulk and with little time. AKs are easy to come buy and not expensive. For instance, many years ago I had to do some gun training for a job. We were given the opportunity to try and AK and another military type rifle
from a corp. called Heckler & Koch. This was before the assault weapons ban. You could get an AK for a few hundred dollars retail, the Heckler & Koch would cost you over $1000.00 and that was nearly twenty years ago.
U.S. military does not actually use the AK, but when they arm someone else it is often their first choice for its availability and cheap price.