The Obama-run Washington bureaucracy has classified a common and reliable rifle, the M1 Garand, as a “threat to public safety in the U.S.,” and the State Department has canceled plans by the Republic of Korea to return tens of thousands of surplus rifles to the U.S. for sale in the consumer market.

The stunning classification of an ordinary gun that was used in the U.S. military for two decades and issued to thousands of soldiers and Marines during World War II and Korea as a threat came in a document by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

It is being publicized by Examiner gun rights writer David Codrea, who said the federal agency appeared alarmed that there would be “no more controls [over imported Garands] than any other firearm.”

“If I read this right, what they’re saying is, every gun poses a threat to public safety in the U.S.,” he wrote. “This is the same rationale used in model-specific ‘assault weapons’ bans – the type of gun is somehow deemed relevant, even though untold numbers of such firearms are already peaceably owned in this country, and even though no supporting evidence for this conclusion exists beyond agenda-promoting speculation.”

A source who sought confidentiality because of his current status in the industry told WND that the document posted by Codrea is at least an accurate draft, if not the final version, of the document assembled by the ATF.

According to the document itself, it came about because of this scenario: The State Department in May 2009 approved a “request by the Government of the Republic of Korea (ROK) to transfer 87,310 M1 Garand rifles and 770,160 M1 carbine rifles to U.S. private entities for subsequent commercial resale in the United States.”

But the ATF contacted the State Department and argued the stock of rifles “poses a threat to public safety in the U.S.” As a result, the State Department reversed its decision.

The transfer of such weapons would raise the number of guns available and, therefore, lower the price, making them more generally available, the agency found.

“They may be legitimately sold, trafficked or otherwise transferred. The only controls are the ones in the [Gun Control Act of 1968] and, while these controls require federal firearms licensees to keep certain records and place some restrictions on their firearms sales, such as requiring a background check and limiting interstate shipments to licensees, very few records are required to be provided to ATF and ATF is specifically prohibited from maintaining any form of a firearm registry,” the argument said.

The ATF also expressed concern that anyone who can purchase seven separate parts for the gun and install them correctly – or those individuals who can machine their own steel parts for guns – probably could convert the carbine into a machine gun.

The Garand, once praised by Gen. George S. Patton, arrived as a service rifle in the military in 1936 and was issued routinely until 1957, when it was replaced.

The gun expert who acted as a source for WND said the implications of the case are significant for several reasons. One is that a “5-year-old” could figure out that if the government classifies one type of rifle as a “threat,” there could be similar designations for other kinds of firearms.

Further, he said a team of ATF managers actually took the initiative in writing the agency’s condemnation of the Garand. He noted the agency from 2003-2009 traced an estimated 1.8 million guns for various reasons.

But of those, only some 1,900 were Garands.

“It’s a very select core of old-school ATF narcissists who have just become too powerful and too arrogant,” the source reported.

By: Bob Unruh, WorldNetDaily