Small Arms

Small Arms is a term describing a category of weapons. Small Arms are small enough to be carried by a person without the assistance of vehicle transportation, and fire bullets less than 12.7mm in diameter (.50 caliber). This category includes all Assault Rifles, Automatic Rifles and Light Machine Guns, Shotguns, Pistols, and even Medium Machine Guns.

Small Arms are carried by pretty much every single combatant, whether for actual combat or simply self defense (e.g. in the case of pilots or tank crews). Some Infantrymen carry two or more such weapons. Small Arms and their ammunition are light enough that a single infantryman may carry hundreds of rounds for his weapon, typically loaded into magazines for automatic or semi-automatic fire.

Small Arms are primarily used against enemy infantry. Most small-arms caliber rounds are powerful enough to penetrate wood, glass, and even thin layers of metal, such as tin or aluminium walls. Therefore, they can be used to kill the crew of unarmored vehicles (Trucks, Jeeps, etc.) and are seen as effective weapons against such threats as well.

Small Arms are not seen as effective against armored vehicles. An infantryman may occasionally be able to get a lucky shot through the vision slits of a BTR, or shoot an exposed commander out of his tank turret, but these are special circumstances that do not present themselves often.

Note that some weapons carried by infantry, such as Grenade Launchers, Light Anti-Tank Launchers, or team-operated weapons (Heavy Machine Guns, Mortars, etc.) are not Small Arms. They fire a much larger caliber projectile, and may be able to get through quite a bit of armor with ease.

List of Small Arms Categories
Below is a list of all weapon categories (and sub-categories) featured in ShackTac videos that are considered to be Small Arms. This list may not be comprehensive; Please add any missing links.


 * Assault Rifles
 * Bolt-Action Rifles
 * Battle Rifles
 * Automatic Rifles
 * Light Machine Guns
 * Medium Machine Guns
 * Shotguns
 * Pistols
 * Submachine Guns