Hey E,
I believe he does, as weapon manufacturers actually license them... For instance, 21st Cent. Toys paid for the "Thompson" name when used, or Dodge for the Weapons Carrier when they used that... I believe I recall the same issue of licensing coming up on the use of "Barret" for the .50 sniper rifle from a BBI figure. That's actually a more common thing than people know.
Our one question in the Q&A even pertained to this issue, and Hasbro simply borrows from reality and doesn't consider their gear scale representations and such. Interesting wording there I thought.
And the Dragunov Sniper Rifle at Marauder Inc. is quite cool, I highly recomend that piece... I prefer just arming up Cobra soldiers with Kalishnakov's of different variety though, since Dragunov's aren't all that practical by comparison for footsoldiers. I just dig AK's and things for the grunts.