(FORTUNE Magazine) – ALL GUNS are born innocent. There's no such thing as a gun designed for criminal use. Everything that goes bang -- pistols, revolvers, rifles, and shotguns -- begins life as a response to the legitimate demands of hunters, marksmen, collectors, frightened citizens, law enforcement officers, and the military. What these constituencies want determines the kinds of guns criminals eventually get. In 1989 -- the most recent year for which figures are available -- U.S. manufacturers pumped out more than four million nonmilitary firearms (down from a peak of 5.8 million in 1974). That's 1,376,000 pistols, 622,000 revolvers, 1,382,000 rifles, and 688,000 shotguns. These weapons constitute the headwaters of a river of guns that flows, by twists and turns, into criminals' hands. For many years the weapon of choice for consumers, law enforcement officers, and criminals alike was the Smith & Wesson .38 revolver. But in 1985 the U.S. Department of Defense adopted as its standard sidearm a 9-mm semiautomatic pistol made by the U.S. subsidiary of Italy's Beretta. Civilian pistol sales took off, and the 9-mm soon pushed the .38 out of the spotlight. Compared with revolvers, pistols hold more ammunition (up to 16 shells, vs. a revolver's six). And the 9-mm size, being compact, makes such guns more easily concealable. Women like them, since they fit comfortably into a small hand. At retail better ones cost anywhere from $500 to $1,000. Because 9-mm's have been standard-issue military weapons in Europe since before World War II, manufacturers in Switzerland, Italy, and Belgium have long experience making them. When U.S. demand took off, the Europeans started to storm into the U.S. in a big way, picking up both market share and companies. Among the famous American names now foreign-owned are U.S. Repeating Arms (formerly Winchester), which belongs to FNNH of Belgium, and Smith & Wesson, acquired by Tomkins of Britain. The only U.S. company still making all four types of firearms sounds foreign-owned but isn't: Sturm Ruger & Co. of Southport, Connecticut, ranks second in total weapons produced, after Smith & Wesson. How do good guns go bad? In the movies Al Capone's men heist them as they leave the factory, en route to Gats ''R'' Us. That has happened, but not often. Manufacturers safeguard their shipments very, very carefully. Ron Stilwell, president of Colt's Manufacturing in Hartford, says his company spends hundreds of thousands of dollars more each year on product security than would a manufacturer of comparable size in another industry. Colt's coordinates its largest shipments with law enforcement, so that trucks travel with squad car escorts, sometimes even helicopters. Such precautions aren't prescribed by regulation. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (BATF), which oversees gunmaking, requires little more of manufacturers than scrupulous record keeping. The location of every weapon, from its first assembly until it leaves the factory, is tracked by means of its unique serial number. BATF also levies an excise tax on guns (10% to 11% of the retail price) that goes to pay for restoration of wildlife areas. In 1989 that tax produced over $134 million. This year: maybe $89 million. Says David Guthrie, an industry analyst at Morgan Keegan & Co.: ''The U.S. gun business is hurting right now -- not from legislation but from the economy. Guns are a discretionary purchase, like an outboard motor. When times are tough, buyers cut back.''

GOOD TIMES OR BAD, though, criminals have little trouble getting what they need. The practical reason they don't heist gun shipments is that they don't need to. They can steal or buy whatever they require from family, neighbors, and other criminals -- or go shopping. In a widely cited (albeit limited) survey of prison inmates, more than a fifth (21%) said they had gotten their latest weapon by buying it at retail from a store. And the store needn't be a gun store. Let's say, for instance, you decide to combine your next criminal act with some Western sightseeing. You, your moll, and the kids are driving through Elko, Nevada, running a little behind schedule. It's good to know that at the local Pay Less drugstore you can walk in, drop off your film for developing, and pick up a 12-gauge shotgun right at the same counter -- the one marked ''Cameras & Sports.'' To do this, of course, you'll need to show the clerk a driver's license. And it has to look like a valid license. But that's it, in terms of ID. Buying a handgun will be tougher. There you'll need a valid Nevada driver's license. And for either type of purchase you must sign a form, standard in all 50 states, declaring you are not a felon (convicted or indicted), mental defective, dishonorably discharged veteran, hophead, or turncoat. For all this, Pay Less takes your word. The clerk records your gun's serial number (and the data on your license) for BATF; you're on your way. Buying a gun is this easy in more than half the states in the Union. Customers encumbered with a criminal record (which would prevent their buying guns legally) have only to lie, show fake ID, or use a ''straw man'' -- a confederate with a clean record -- to effect a purchase. The Brady bill, which recently passed the House, would impose a seven-day waiting period nationally for handgun sales. Comparably restrictive legislation is pending in some 15 states. Where state and local laws are already tough, the black market kicks in. In New York City, for example, a customer wanting to buy a gun must first obtain a permit from the police, who check to see if she has a record. The process takes several weeks. A lot of buyers can't . . . er . . . wait several weeks. Nor could they survive a background check. For them, the Morales family stands ready to enter the breach. Or stood ready, until David Morales was arrested in December. According to a complaint filed by the U.S. Attorney, he and his siblings Steven and Lisa sold guns to anyone with cash. Their biggest asset was Lisa's driver's license, issued in Florida, where buying guns is every bit as easy as in Nevada. The Morales brothers up north took orders; Lisa, down south, filled them, delivering customers' guns by car. Some were sold at Lexington Avenue and 76th Street -- a tony Manhattan neighborhood whose other merchants, such as Ann Taylor and Givenchy, might well have envied the Moraleses' markups of 200% to 500%. Anthony Voelker, chief of the New York Police Department's Organized Crime Control Bureau, says 90% of the guns his bureau confiscates were purchased out of state, most of them in Florida, Texas, Ohio, and Virginia. Mom and pop runners bring in five to 20 at a time. Incredible as it may sound, Voelker says many runners do not think they are breaking the law. They think they have stumbled on a straightforward, profitable business and are shocked to learn, upon arrest, that it carries with it five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

LIKE ANY MARKET, the gun market has fads and trends, many driven by movies. After Dirty Harry's .44 magnum first cleared its throat, everybody wanted one. Before Rambo, who'd heard of an assault rifle? Alexander Jason, ballistics expert and producer of three gun-intensive videos -- Deadly Weapons; Deadly Force; and Deadly Effects: Wound Ballistics (What Bullets Do to Bodies) -- says first-time shoppers, be they criminals or legitimate consumers, pick a gun the way they would a car or a suit: ''It feels good, it looks good, it fits their image.'' Since the pool of legitimate guns is the ultimate source of guns used by criminals, what are the chances of its ever drying up? Small. Guns, unlike many other products, have no built-in obsolescence. Many of the 200 million or so in circulation now will still be circulating in 50 years, maybe longer. Their staying power, however, rests on sterner stuff than mere physical durability. They're popular. The average gun store patron owns three handguns, two rifles, and two shotguns. Anyone fitting this description isn't buying out of practical need. Nor is he a Don Knotts, terrified of burglars. He likes guns -- for their own sake and for the pleasure they provide. So how strong is that pleasure? Michael Zirmo, 34, a brash, bespectacled gun shop owner in lower Manhattan, thinks about the question a minute, then answers this way: ''Go to Coney Island. What do you see? Everybody wants to shoot the ducks.'' Dr. E. Wayne Sanders Jr., a Berkeley, California, psychiatrist, agrees that shooting ranks among the most deeply seated atavistic pleasures.

THE KICK comes less from possession than use. Owning isn't really necessary; firing is. Smart operators like Zirmo are building ranges, both as a hedge against further legal prohibitions on private ownership and because retailers make more money selling ammo, accessories, and services than selling guns. Zirmo's range, the Downtown Rifle and Pistol Club, near Wall Street, is located two flights underground. Memberships start at $500 for individuals, $3,500 for corporations. The club stocks all major brands of handgun, so members (40% of whom are female) don't need to own a gun themselves. Manager Dana Brickman, puffing happily on a pipeful of Captain Black, points out the range's clubby features: leather couches, hors d'oeuvres, a cable television tuned most afternoons to PBS's Joy of Painting with Bob Ross. ''We're civilized down here,'' says Brickman, as Bob Ross, in the background, knocks off an entire cloud bank with a pallet knife. Brickman doesn't point to the row of members' favorite videotapes, whose & titles include The Exterminator, Kill and Kill Again, The Hit, The Killing Fields, and Colt Firearms Legends, Narrated by Mel Torme (he's a big collector). The range gets its heaviest workout Tuesday evenings -- ''doctor night'' -- when a group of 20 physicians comes down from Lenox Hill Hospital to unwind. ''They shoot,'' says Brickman. ''Then they go out to eat.''