American Gun

April 1, 2023

Wall Street Journal reporters McWhirter and Elinson track the history of the AR-15 from its 1950s invention as an easy-to-use replacement for World War II's M1s through its use (as M16s) during the Vietnam War to its current notoriety as the weapon favored by mass shooters. Along the way, they seek to clarify the U.S. gun culture, explaining why the weapon appeals to some even as others demand its ban, given the bloodshed it has wrought. With a 75,000-copy first printing. Prepub Alert.

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June 19, 2023
Wall Street Journal reporters McWhirter (Red Summer) and Elinson tell a captivating tale of unintended consequences in this deeply researched history of the AR-15. When machinist Eugene Stoner developed a lighter automatic rifle in a garage in Long Beach, Calif., in the 1950s, his goal was to enable American infantrymen to move more quickly on the battlefield—thus maximizing their safety. His employer, ArmaLite, became the first producer of the weapon, marketing it as a counter to the similarly lightweight Soviet AK-47. Bushmaster, the most prominent manufacturer of the AR-15 after Stoner’s patents expired in the 1970s, cosmetically altered the weapon’s design to evade the 1994 federal assault weapons ban, feeding the “sustained and unprecedented demand” counterintuitively caused by the ban. Over the past 20 years, the AR-15 has become the gun of choice in mass shootings, including the 2017 Las Vegas shooting, the deadliest in U.S. history; the shooter’s many AR-15 rifles, easily modified to be fully automatic with bump stocks, “made the ghoulish feat easy.” Weaving together interviews with Stoner’s family, politicians, law enforcement officials, and survivors of mass shootings, the authors put a human face on a politically charged story. The result is a fascinating genealogy of a weapon that has become the flash point of the contemporary gun control debate.

August 1, 2023
In the 1950s a largely self-taught inventor named Eugene Stoner designed a new lightweight rifle for American soldiers. The AR-15, designated M16 by the US military, was a revolutionary leap forward in arms design and represented both American ingenuity and military prowess. McWhirter and Elinson detail all of the obstacles faced by its inventor and his weapon, making the first half of American Gun a combination biography and history of technical, political, and military affairs centering on the AR-15. The authors then pivot to the rifle in civilian life, as both a symbol of fear and death at the center of mass shootings, and that of freedom and manliness among its enthusiasts. This is an excellent, thoroughly researched synthesis of the two topics, presented in an even-handed manner that has the potential to bridge the divide between all but the most committed partisans. Such a highly charged subject deserves a well-written analysis, grounded in facts and presented with journalistic detachment, and McWhirter and Elinson deliver on all counts.

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Starred review from July 15, 2023
How an influential gun design became central to debates over Second Amendment rights. In this superb history of an innovative weapon, McWhirter and Elinson, who both cover the gun industry for the Wall Street Journal, track the invention of the AR-15 rifle in the 1950s, adoption by the American military in the 1960s (where it was known as the M16), and gradual rise to notoriety toward the end of the 20th century and into the 21st as it became, in the semiautomatic form in which it was sold to the public, a favored choice of mass shooters. The authors begin with an exploration of the life and career of Eugene Stoner (1922-1997), a gifted engineer who sought to create a weapon superior to those used by American soldiers in World War II. The authors then give insightful commentary on the evolution of Stoner's signature creation, disastrous deployment in Vietnam after ill-considered modifications, slow introduction to civilian gun aficionados and gradually rising profile in pop culture, provocation of outrage after being used in notorious crimes, and eventual transformation into a symbol of freedom embraced by the National Rifle Association and hard-line gun-rights advocates. This is a meticulously researched and impressively informed book; despite careful explanations of technical details, the narrative moves along briskly and engagingly. Furthermore, McWhirter and Elinson clearly and fairly handle the sometimes-complex motivations of those seeking to promote the AR-15 along with the frequently base impulses of those looking to profit without moral concern. What emerges, too, through accounts of individuals who have fallen victim to gun violence, is a harrowing sense of the enormous suffering wrought by this invention and the seemingly insurmountable political resistance to mitigating it in any significant way. Ultimately, readers gain an unsettling and timely understanding of how "a device created to protect America [is] wounding it." A riveting exploration of the cost of the nation's fascination with an iconic weapon.

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