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The USAS-12 is a 12ga variant of the ROK's Daewoo assault rifle.

In the same sense that the Saiga-12 is a 12ga variant of the AKM.

 

History of USAS-12 shotgun is rather interesting. Its design grew up from 1980's vintage designs of Maxwell Atchisson (see Atchisson assault shotgun AA-12). In about 1989, Gilbert Equipment Co (USA) decided to bring up the selective fired weapon, broadly based on principles, employed in Atchisson shotguns. The design of new weapon was produced by someone John Trevor Jr. Since Gilbert Equipment Co had no manufacturing capabilities, it started to look for possible manufacturers. It turned out that the only maker that agreed to produce this weapon was South Korean company Daewoo Precision Industries, a part of high-tech DAEWOO conglomerate. Daewoo engineers adopted the new weapon to their manufacturing techniques, and mass production commenced during early 1990s. This gun sold well to military and security forces of several (unspecified) countries in Asia, and more than 30 000 of USAS-12 shotguns were made by mid-1990s. During the same timeframe Gilbert equipment Co tried to bring semi-automatic version of USAS-12 to US market, but BATF promptly classified this weapon as "having no sporting purpose", so it became "Class III destructive device" under US 1934 Gun Control Act. This greatly restricted its civilian use. During late 1990s, RAMO Defence Co began to assemble USAS-12 shotguns from Korean and US-made parts for sale on domestic market, but then again, sales of this weapon were limited to government agencies only. Today, this gun is generally not available in USA, but it is probably still is being manufactured by Daewoo in Korea.

Quoted:


Supposedly, there is a new variant of the S-12 coming, with a factory magwell, rather than rock-n-lock...

Of course, that won't do much for those who already own rock-n-lock S-12 gear...



 

Quoted:


No it hasn't.