Quoted: FUCK!
So they are not just behind on production, they have stopped it?
Fucking Romanians...where there is money to be made they don't want to make it. |
Romania wants to join NATO and the European Union, so they can use the Euro which will bost their economy. They haven't been allowed to do so because selling AKs all over the world violates anti-weapons-proliferation bullshit that the EU has in place. For years this has been the case, but they needed the money from selling AKs so desperately that they were willing to give up the EU membership in order to keep the Cugir factories running, just so their industry wouldn't totally shut down. It was an ugly situation, but its what they had to do.
Then, earlier this year (if I recall correctly) a Euro car manufacturer approached the AK factories with a fantastic offer-- they could switch over and make car parts instead of AKs, and they would all keep their jobs and current pay rates. This would remove Romania from the "naughty weapons-proliferator" list and pave the way for the country to join the EU, and, later on, NATO. The Romanians accepted and the AK production lines shut down. They are now making car parts like alternators, frame bits, etc. Its great for the Romanians and the economic future of their country, and bad for American gun collectors who want a cheap beater AK built with Romanian peasant labor.
This has all been discussed here on arfcom before. Its well known that the era of the $300 Romanian AK is now at an end. In another two years AKs will cost as much as AR15s through simple supply and demand, assuming of course that an Obama presidency doesn't make things much, much worse than that. In addition, the removal of these bargain-priced firearms may cause prices to rise with other firearms, since the traditional cheaper alternative is no longer present.
Look at it this way, how many times have you heard someone say, "Why would I pay $900 for an AR15 when I could buy 3 AKs for that much?" The price of the cheap AKs meant that other guns needed to be priced low enough that they would still attract buyers. But when the cheap alternative is gone and AK prices rise, first to the $500-$600 level where they are now, and in another year to the $700-$800 level, what will happen to the price of other, similar long guns? Its simple economics, really.