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5 Terrifying Weapons That Are 100% Legal

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5 terrifying weapons that are 100 legal lead
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Talk of weapons restrictions brings out passion and vitriol in the American populace. The issue of gun rights in particular is a polarizing topic, with citizens on both sides of the issue (the issue being regulation, to put it in the simplest terms) pouring out time, money, and profanity in support of their beliefs.

Related: The Bulletproof Briefcase

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But anyone from an NRA diehard devotee to the most peace-loving pacifist* can probably agree that it’s batshit crazy that the weapons we’re talking about today are 100% legal to own right here in the United States of America. I mean, sure, we’re a country of positive freedoms… but a goddamn tank?

tavkA GODDAMN TANK

Yes, a goddamn tank. You can own a  tank. In fact, you can own all sorts of tanks. From a German Leopard Model 1A5 Main Battle Tank to a U.S. 1944 M-18 Hellcat to a British Scorpion Model FV101. And while many of the tanks for sale will cost you a quarter of a million bucks or more, some can be had for as little as $50,000. So… should you get a 2016 Ford Shelby GT350, or should you get a tank? Note that your tank’s gun will have to be rendered permanently inoperable, or the ATF is going to want to have words.

M82A1_barrettTHE .50 BMG RIFLE

If you need to shoot the engine block right out of a semi at a range of well over a mile, then you may want to take a step back and examine the life choices that you’ve made leading up to this moment. But you’re definitely going to want to choose the Barrett M82A1 BMG rifle, a firearm that propels a half-inch diameter bullet as far as 4,400 yards and uses about the same powder load as most hand grenades to do it. Oh, and it’s a semiautomatic weapon, so if you have multiple trucks to disable or concrete walls to shoot right through, this is a great way to handle both issues.

medieval_trebuchetA TREBUCHET

The very same siege engine that has helped besieging armies bring down castle walls for centuries can be yours. And you can even make it a fun DIY project! There are in fact countless YouTube videos and WikiHow-type articles that give step-by-step chunkininstructions on how to build a trebuchet, and while most of them are rather compact (many are even desktop models), there’s no reason you can’t scale up a trebuchet’s design, creating a siege weapon large enough to smash through the walls of Antioch! Or you could just use it to throw pumpkins around like these blithering idiots.

speargunSPEARGUNS

Most people have a perfectly legitimate reason to own a speargun, namely they are going out to hunt–er, spearfish–underwater. And that’s the funny thing about a speargun: its use is 100% legal and almost entirely unrestricted as long as its user is 100% submerged underwater when they fire off that spear. There are a few other regulations, such as not using a speargun near a swimming beach and making sure your spear has a tether on it, but the fact is that anyone can buy a speargun. And despite those regulations, the damn thing will still fire a spear above the water, FYI…

x15-flamethrower-6-970x647-cA FLAMETHROWER

Ah, the unspeakable cruelty of a good old flamethrower! The United States military decided to stop using these horrific weapons decades ago, but why should you, Mr. John Q. Public, not have access to one of the worst things ever created? You can order an X15 Flamethrower off the web for about $1700, and your new flamethrower will send out a beam of flaming horror as far as 50 feet for up to 60 consecutive seconds. But hey, you only want a flamethrower for peaceful purposes like clearing old crops or brambles, right? Right…?

* For the record, I don’t actually consider NRA membership (or gun ownership) as equitable to an aversion to peace. I was going for alliteration.

Steven John
Steven John
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Steven John is a writer and journalist living just outside New York City, by way of 12 years in Los Angeles, by way of…
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