From the musket to the machine - crazy century, part 3/3

So, the last of the three parts of the story about the evolution of small arms from the musket to the machine.

Terms used

USM - trigger mechanism

Metric designation of the cartridge - consists of two numbers, the first of which means caliber, the second - the length of the sleeve. For example, 9x19 says that 9mm is a caliber, and sleeve length is 19mm. But this designation is still largely nominal.

Pistol cartridge - a small cartridge with a short, blunt-pointed bullet and with a charge of quick-burning powder less than 0.5 g. For example 9x19, 7.62x25, 9x18, etc.



A rifle cartridge, also known as a rifle-machine-gun cartridge, is a large-sized cartridge, most often introduced initially for service for magazine or self-loading rifles, later widely used in machine guns. Bottle-shaped sleeve, charge of slowly burning powder approx. 3 y.

Ex. 7.62x54R, 7.62x51, 7.92x57.



Intermediate, transitional cartridge - cartridge intermediate in power between pistol and rifle. Designed for machine guns, but is widely used in light machine guns. Bottle-shaped sleeve, powder charge approx. 1.5 g of powder with an average burning rate.

For example 7.92x33, 7.62x39.



Low pulse cartridge - conditional type of intermediate cartridge, which appeared for the first time in the M16 rifle. It is an intermediate cartridge, but with a further reduction in size and size of approx. 5.5mm. Received its name due to the reduced recoil momentum. Powder charge weight approx. 1.5 g, gunpowder usually of the same type as in the intermediate cartridge.

For example 5.56x45, 5.45x39, 5.8x42.



The last time We settled on the fact that the armies of the leading countries of the world were armed with magazine rifles. However, I did not mention that before the First World War another interesting modernization took place. Let's look at the cartridges, which were then used:


German cartridge mod. 1888.

As can be seen, the cartridge had a metal sleeve of a completely modern bottle shape and a blunt-pointed bullet, which is often called a cylinder-oval. Pointed bullets are called cylinder-lancet.



If someone remembers the first part, he will surely remember that Minier’s or Peters’s bullets had sharp tips. After the removal of the bullets of this type from service, the main type of bullet for several decades remained a blunt-pointed bullet. The reason for this was the opinion that the shape of the bullet tip had almost no effect on ballistics, which was relatively true for subsonic bullets. With the growth of the power of gunpowder, the bullet received noticeably greater initial velocities and it became possible to improve its ballistics by giving it a more rational form. Therefore, at the very end of the 19th century, two rival countries — France and Germany — were actively working to create a pointed bullet. In 1898, France adopts a new cartridge for the old Lebel rifle; The main difference from the previous sample was a bullet. The author is Puli Colonel Desalue (respectively, the name of the bullet D). The new pointed bullet had a smaller weight (12.8 g versus 15) and was made entirely of bronze. The initial speed increased slightly from 630 to 700 m / s, the bullet received significantly better ballistics, the direct shot range increased markedly. Here it is worth making a small remark about the flatness / steepness of the bullet's flight path. Consider an AK machine gun and a SVD rifle. Their bullets have the same caliber (7.9mm), but different length, therefore, slightly different geometry and mass. AKM bullet is lighter; as a result, it will lose speed faster than a bullet fired from a SVD (a heavier stone loses energy more slowly when it is thrown than a lighter one). The initial speed increased slightly from 630 to 700 m / s, the bullet received significantly better ballistics, the direct shot range increased markedly. Here it is worth making a small remark about the flatness / steepness of the bullet's flight path. Consider an AK machine gun and a SVD rifle. Their bullets have the same caliber (7.9mm), but different length, therefore, slightly different geometry and mass. AKM bullet is lighter; as a result, it will lose speed faster than a bullet fired from a SVD (a heavier stone loses energy more slowly when it is thrown than a lighter one). The initial speed increased slightly from 630 to 700 m / s, the bullet received significantly better ballistics, the direct shot range increased markedly. Here it is worth making a small remark about the flatness / steepness of the bullet's flight path. Consider an AK machine gun and a SVD rifle. Their bullets have the same caliber (7.9mm), but different length, therefore, slightly different geometry and mass. AKM bullet is lighter; as a result, it will lose speed faster than a bullet fired from a SVD (a heavier stone loses energy more slowly when it is thrown than a lighter one). Their bullets have the same caliber (7.9mm), but different length, therefore, slightly different geometry and mass. AKM bullet is lighter; as a result, it will lose speed faster than a bullet fired from a SVD (a heavier stone loses energy more slowly when it is thrown than a lighter one). Their bullets have the same caliber (7.9mm), but different length, therefore, slightly different geometry and mass. AKM bullet is lighter; as a result, it will lose speed faster than a bullet fired from a SVD (a heavier stone loses energy more slowly when it is thrown than a lighter one).



Now imagine that our target is set at a certain distance. Suppose 400 meters. Obviously, the sight allows us to shoot at such an angle that the target at a distance of the sight was hit. The sight is set at 400 meters.



As you can see, AKM will have to be raised at a greater angle than the SVD, and the trajectory of its bullet will describe a steeper arc. Substitute the pectoral target



As you can see, suddenly it turns out that although the sight is set at 400 meters, targets from AKM at 2/3 of the shooting distance are not affected. They are only affected at 1/3 of the sighting distance from the shooter and actually at 400 meters, with just 400 meters that require minimal aiming errors. Let us now look at the trajectory of the bullet from the SVD. Throughout the target distance, the target is hit; if an error is made in determining the range, or aiming, the bullet will still hit the target. From this we can conclude that there is some ultimate aiming range, after which it is necessary to rearrange the sight, and all targets to the specified distance will not necessarily be hit. And vice versa - within this distance, all targets will be hit. This distance is called the direct shot distance. It decreases with decreasing target growth and increases with increasing. Accordingly, it is very difficult to hit the target the size of a seated person at certain distances without shifting the sight. Regarding ballistics of fittings and the initial generations of breech-loading rifles, whose bullets had a very steep trajectory, it was a very difficult task, requiring not only composure for rearrangement of the sight, but also an excellent ability to determine distances to the eye. Here you can see a significant advantage of the breech-loading weapon over the muzzle-loading one - you can shoot while lying down, which extremely reduces the chance of hitting the shooter himself. Although there have been such attempts for fittings - a caricature of the mid-19th century on the methods of shooting. Accordingly, it is very difficult to hit the target the size of a seated person at certain distances without shifting the sight. Regarding ballistics of fittings and the initial generations of breech-loading rifles, whose bullets had a very steep trajectory, it was a very difficult task, requiring not only composure for rearrangement of the sight, but also an excellent ability to determine distances to the eye. Here you can see a significant advantage of the breech-loading weapon over the muzzle-loading one - you can shoot while lying down, which extremely reduces the chance of hitting the shooter himself. Although there have been such attempts for fittings - a caricature of the mid-19th century on the methods of shooting. Accordingly, it is very difficult to hit the target the size of a seated person at certain distances without shifting the sight. Regarding ballistics of fittings and the initial generations of breech-loading rifles, whose bullets had a very steep trajectory, it was a very difficult task, requiring not only composure for rearrangement of the sight, but also an excellent ability to determine distances to the eye. Here you can see a significant advantage of the breech-loading weapon over the muzzle-loading one - you can shoot while lying down, which extremely reduces the chance of hitting the shooter himself. Although there have been such attempts for fittings - a caricature of the mid-19th century on the methods of shooting. the bullets that had a very steep trajectory, getting into a sitting or lying opponent was a very difficult task, requiring not only composure for rearranging the sight, but also an excellent ability to determine distances by eye. Here you can see a significant advantage of the breech-loading weapon over the muzzle-loading one - you can shoot while lying down, which extremely reduces the chance of hitting the shooter himself. Although there have been such attempts for fittings - a caricature of the mid-19th century on the methods of shooting. the bullets that had a very steep trajectory, getting into a sitting or lying opponent was a very difficult task, requiring not only composure for rearranging the sight, but also an excellent ability to determine distances by eye. Here you can see a significant advantage of the breech-loading weapon over the muzzle-loading one - you can shoot while lying down, which extremely reduces the chance of hitting the shooter himself. Although there have been such attempts for fittings - a caricature of the mid-19th century on the methods of shooting.



Since the basis of the armies at the end of the 19th century was the mass of infantry with magazine rifles, it is easy to understand that even a small advantage in the distances, even a direct shot, gave a significant advantage to the whole army. An example is the battle for San Juan during the Cuban War of Independence (1898). In its course, 750 Spanish soldiers, armed with more modern Mauser rifles for ammunition with better ballistics, managed for some time to hold off the attack of 15 thousand American soldiers, inflicting about 1.4 thousand people damage in a few minutes. The Americans were armed, albeit quite modern, but still the worst Krag-Jorgensen rifles.

Similar examples unequivocally indicated that any savings on rifles are fraught with defeat. Therefore, after the French, the Germans were quick to determine their pointed-pointed bullet, the first models of which began to appear in 1898, and the variant was finally adopted in 1904. The German peaked bullet was noticeably lighter than the previous one (9.9 g versus 14.6, now each soldier could carry 20 rounds more without increasing the weight), its cartridge contained a greater amount of better quality powder, its device was more traditional - a lead core in a soft shell. The speed increased very noticeably - from 620 m / s to 860. The author of the bullet is A. Gleinich. The firing range (in squares, of course) increased even more, but the punching action somewhat decreased due to the greater deformation of the bullet and its smaller mass. Also in all countries taking a pointed bullet, there was a slight decrease in accuracy at close range. Although the new cartridge (designation S Patrone) was a head taller than the old one, the ballistics of the bullet caused criticism, and the Gleinich bullet was considered a temporary solution. By the beginning of the First World Major Torbek, a cartridge with a 12.8 g bullet was developed, which was used only in machine guns during the war, but by 1933 it was put on mass armament (designation sS Patrone) and was the main German patron of the Second World War.

The tsarist government actively monitored weapons development not only among the allies, but also among potential enemies. In 1906, several samples of the new German cartridges were obtained by bribing from the side of intelligence; For about two years, attempts were made to develop a similar cartridge, but the main difficulty was already obsolete Mosin rifles. In particular, the German rifle arr. 1898 maintained an increase in pressure in the cartridge from 2.5 to 3 thousand atm., However, 2.75 thousand atm was considered the limit for the three-way cartridge for Mosin rifles. against the previous 2.5 thousand. Development of a new sight also took several years and was completed only from 1910. As a result, the initial speed of a pointed bullet, in fact, a copy of a German Mosin rifle rifle, reached 880 m / s, although some criticism of the cartridge remained.



You can end up with a non-automatic weapon and go to automatic.

An automatic weapon is a weapon in which recharging is performed automatically. Two modes of fire can be distinguished - semi-automatic, when the weapon reloads after a shot, but to shoot again, you need to press the trigger again, and automatic, when the weapon fires while the trigger is clamped. The technical difference between the modes is actually small, and in most cases it is easy to turn semi-automatic weapons into automatic ones and vice versa - everything depends only on the trigger mechanism. Therefore, in modern machines there are not only semi-automatic and automatic, but also shooting mode in short bursts, the transition between which is very simple.

Why do you need automatic weapons?

1. To increase the rate of fire, because time will no longer be spent on manual recharge. Given that the rate of fire directly enters the formula in the power of the weapon (see above, in the 2nd part), the power of the weapon will also increase in proportion to it.
However, here you can make a small remark. There are types of weapons in which, due to their use, the rate of fire is limited only by the capacity of the magazine or something else. Experiments on the comparison of revolvers and new, then self-loading pistols, conducted at the beginning of the 20th century, gave an interesting result. It turned out that, provided the target moves to the arrow, there is no significant difference between the revolver and the pistol, since no matter how fast the reloading of the gun is, it is still not enough to produce more shots. Occasionally one shot more, but no more. This example shows that simply increasing the rate of reloading or the rate of fire practically does not always increase the rate of fire.

2. To improve accuracy. Compared to rifles using manual reloading, the shooter will not need to look away from the target.

Although some magazine rifles (eg Lee-Enfield) had a reload handle bent and beveled to the arrow ergonomic shape. An example of shooting without rifle from shoulder


In the case of the Mosin rifle, no matter how you twist it, you will have to tear it from the shoulder


3. Reducing fatigue. Shooting from the shops of the 19th century is quite tiresome, and the shooter very quickly begins to hurt his shoulder. If part of the energy is spent on recharging, then recoil decreases. Plus the rifle box can be made more ergonomic. It is enough to recall an example when, on the tests of the American M1 Garand self-loading rifle, one of the soldiers, on his own proposal, made about a hundred shots without a shirt to show how firing a weapon is not tedious.

The advantage of automatic weapons is clearly there; how to make the weapon recharge after the shot? I propose to take my eyes off the monitor and to fantasize.

One of the oldest schemes of operation of automation, which is still common among modern pistols, is a free-gate scheme. Imagine a barrel, in the chamber of which there is already a cartridge.



Before the shot, the cartridge is held in place by a spring through a steel cylinder - the bolt. Ignite the cartridge in any way. During the shot, the pressure of the powder gases grows; almost the same forces act on the sleeve and the bullet. However, the liner still holds the inertia of the bolt and the spring force while in place, while the bullet can safely move forward. The shutter slowly begins to retreat, but by this time the bullet has already left the barrel.



By the time the shutter is already moving backwards, the pressure of the powder gases has dropped to safe values, and all that remains is to throw the sleeve out of the weapon, attaching, for example, a part that performs this function to the shutter.



To organize the power of such weapons is easy with the store, in the last stage of the cycle it is enough to add the seizure of the cartridge from the store. The new cartridge will be in the chamber, and you can shoot again.

It is not necessary to strictly preserve the above scheme; for example, the bolt can be opened altogether all the time, except for the moment of ignition of the cartridge, or you can make a single part from the bolt and part of the weapon body. For example, in pistols, the bolt and bolt cover are very often one piece. There are a lot of options here, for good reason this scheme has been used since the first samples of automatic pistols and in the famous submachine guns like PPSh-41, MP-18, MP-40, STEN, etc.

It turns out that this is a universal scheme for any automatic weapon, and you just need to choose the desired mass of the bolt, the spring force - and you can construct any type of weapon, even an automatic, even a rifle? No, it is not.

In this type of weapon, the main parameter is the speed of opening the shutter. And it depends on the mass of the bolt, the spring force and the friction between the moving surfaces. If the inertia of the bolt is too large, the weapon simply will not be able to reload. If the inertia is too small, it will open too early and the weapon will simply shoot in two directions - now in the direction of the shooter with the sleeve. This is usually accompanied by the destruction of weapons. The easiest case of destruction of weapons under the most low-power cartridge


From the above it can be concluded that the functioning of such weapons depends entirely on the selected mass of the bolt, the spring force, the state of the rubbing surfaces, the length of the barrel, the type of powder. Now imagine that we want to design such a weapon under a sufficiently powerful rifle cartridge. Compared with the pistol, it has two main differences:

1. A large mass of gunpowder.
2. Slower burnout powder. This condition is necessary so that the powder burns while the bullet moves along the barrel, and not just at the very beginning of its path. For this reason, in the weapon under the rifle cartridge barrel and has a greater length.

To get an automatic rifle under the free gate, we begin to pick up the force of the spring and the mass of the bolt. But this will only lead to the following situation: for the shutter to be closed at the time of the shot, the shutter mass must be very large, as well as the spring force. The weapon will be extremely heavy, and it will be difficult to cock the bolt. Opening the shutter in the automation cycle may not happen at all or strongly depends on the friction force of the shutter. Finally, it will have to be limited to a very short barrel, in which the powder will not burn down completely. Thus, the construction of an automatic rifle according to this scheme is generally impossible. If we talk about the machine gun cartridge, then in the 20th century there were several experiments using the free gate for them, but they all did not come out of the design workshops. In particular, the competition in which the Kalashnikov assault rifle won a draft of a weapon with an automatic, identical to the PPSh-41 automatics, was submitted, however, using a full-fledged automatic cartridge. The shutter, of course, had to be weighed down. The weapon functioned extremely unsatisfactory, the machine gun shook the vibration when firing. And the weight of the charged sample exceeded 6 kg.

What could be the way out of the situation? Obviously, it is necessary in some way to ensure that the opening of the shutter is slowed down until the pressure of the powder gases drops to a safe one. With varying success, this task was solved throughout the first half of the 20th century. The most common answer was to adapt to the gate of some mechanism, which accumulated some of the recoil energy and only after that released the bolt and allowed it to open. This type of shutter is called semi-free. In search of a suitable version of the mechanisms, a lot was invented, and there is no point in describing them. Most often it was a leverage system. It can only be noted that by the beginning of the First World a variant of a self-loading rifle suitable for mass armament did not exist, although pistols and machine guns with a semi-free-bolt had already been developed.

In addition, systems with a movable barrel — with a long barrel stroke, when the recoil moves the barrel back with a bolt the length of the cartridge, and a short stroke — when the movable barrel gives only a boost for the operation of automation, have been widely studied. Although a number of machine guns and less frequently pistols belonged to this type of weapon, these systems themselves slowly but surely faded into the past. Their main drawback is low reliability due to the complexity and large areas of rubbing surfaces.

By the beginning of World War I, there were already many types of automatic weapons, in short:
1 Pistols. Because of the simplicity of designing systems for a pistol cartridge, there were already many perfect pistols. A significant part of the armies was armed with pistols instead of revolvers, officers everywhere acquired pistols in private.

2 Machine guns. Due to the fact that the machine gun at that time was considered as something similar to a very light artillery gun, there were no strict requirements for its weight and dimensions, and this greatly facilitated the work of the designers. By 1899, the American H. Maxim began mass production of machine guns of his design in the UK, and at the same time their licensed production began in Germany. Subsequently, Maxim machine guns went through both world wars. However, initially it was bulky devices (weight deep for 20 kg). In the process of adopting and upgrading the machine gun body weight decreased, but the reliability still left much to be desired, the pre-war instructions recommended to put two machine guns side by side, if that was possible - in case of failure of one. Only later, during the global first world and mass release,

Around the same time, the first working models of light machine guns, designed for firing from a bipod, appear. The first was the construction of the Danish Madsen; although his machine gun could have been carried by one person and had food from box stores, it was still unreliable and massive (9 kg).

In general, this period can be described as the period of the appearance of the first heavy machine guns and light machine guns, but still extremely unreliable and expensive.

3. Self-loading rifles. The most important task for designers of automatic weapons in all leading countries at that time was the design of an automatic rifle. Although competitions for it were announced in almost all countries, and several samples were even at the stage of military trials, in the end none was suitable. The first mass samples of this type of weapon refer only to the interwar period, if not to the period of the Second World War. Actually, why is that?

In their demands, the military saw a self-loading rifle similar to the previous store. Those. the rifle was supposed to be long (according to French requirements, a length of 130 cm), simple in design and maintenance, while retaining the same weight of the shop (which was already considered large). However, any automation already represents an excessive weight of heavy steel parts, plus also a long barrel, which always constitutes a very noticeable fraction of the mass of the entire weapon. Speaking about the automation itself, it can be noted that at that time no simple system was available that is accessible to any ordinary servant. The most reliable systems like the Maxim and Madsen machine guns were cumbersome, difficult to maintain and to manufacture. Therefore, objectively, at the beginning of the First World War, the armament of a large army with self-loading rifles could not be resolved.

Russia

Secretary of the Armory Department of the State Agrarian University, V.G. Fedorov from 1906 led the work on the creation of an automatic rifle. As a result, by 1915, having bypassed both domestic competitors and foreign ones, his sample reached the final of the competition. Together with Fedorov’s rifle, a sample came out of the finale provided by J. Browning. It was the Remington Autoloading Rifle, subsequently known as the Remington Model 8 (the only historical event associated with this weapon was the murder of Bonnie and Clyde of them). By 1914, Fedorov’s rifle had successfully passed all field tests, and a batch of these weapons was ordered for military tests. The beginning of the First World War stopped all work on a self-loading rifle in Russia, by the end of the war these works were resumed, several hundred Fedorov’s rifles were assembled under the Japanese cartridge from Arisaka rifles already during the Civil War.

One of the central figures of the GAU is N.M. Filatov - suggested the name “automatic” for Fedorov’s rifle, and thanks to the resounding word, it went down in history precisely as automatic Fedorov. This gave rise to a certain number of myths.

Germany

In Germany, the development of a self-loading rifle was very active; the chief designer was the Mauser design bureau. If the prospect of arming the entire enormous Tsarist army with a technically sophisticated self-loading rifle looked adventurous (at least from a modern point of view, since there were only a few state-owned arms factories in the country), in the case of Germany, the entire army would have self-loading rifles, at least , for one company in a few months, it looked very real. This caused paranoia in the royal and French military. Works on the construction of a self-loading rifle (Mauser Selbstlader, literally a self-loading Mauser) have been going on at least since the beginning of the 20th century, and by the beginning of the First World War, a sample that had passed field testing was already ready. Although this stage corresponds to the development stage of the Fedorov rifle, it can be assumed that the German rifle was ahead of the Russian. In particular, a small batch of Mauser rifles managed to serve in German aviation at the initial stage of the war, while Fedorov’s rifles caught only a civilian period. The attention that the Germans paid to the rate of fire of their weapons is interesting - with intensive firing from any rifle after a certain number of shots a wooden bed begins to smolder (in the case of a Mosin rifle it is 100 shots, in the case of SVT, which has a much better cooling - three hundred), the Mauser rifle should have had a gasket of asbestos between the barrel and the lodge, in order to protect the latter. At the same time, a sock ammunition on the battlefield was tested using cloth ribbons. The Germans were seriously preparing to increase the rate of fire. a small batch of Mauser rifles managed to serve in German aviation at the initial stage of the war, and Fedorov’s rifles caught only a period of civilian. The attention that the Germans paid to the rate of fire of their weapons is interesting - with intensive firing from any rifle after a certain number of shots a wooden bed begins to smolder (in the case of a Mosin rifle it is 100 shots, in the case of SVT, which has a much better cooling - three hundred), the Mauser rifle should have had a gasket of asbestos between the barrel and the lodge, in order to protect the latter. At the same time, a sock ammunition on the battlefield was tested using cloth ribbons. The Germans were seriously preparing to increase the rate of fire. a small batch of Mauser rifles managed to serve in German aviation at the initial stage of the war, and Fedorov’s rifles caught only a period of civilian. The attention that the Germans paid to the rate of fire of their weapons is interesting - with intensive firing from any rifle after a certain number of shots a wooden bed begins to smolder (in the case of a Mosin rifle it is 100 shots, in the case of SVT, which has a much better cooling - three hundred), the Mauser rifle should have had a gasket of asbestos between the barrel and the lodge, in order to protect the latter. At the same time, a sock ammunition on the battlefield was tested using cloth ribbons. The Germans were seriously preparing to increase the rate of fire. which the Germans devoted to the rate of fire of their weapons - after intensive shooting from any rifle after a certain number of shots a wooden bed begins to glow (in the case of a Mosin rifle it is 100 shots, in the case of a SVT, which has a much better cooling of three hundred), the Mauser’s rifle should have nominally gasket of asbestos between the barrel and the lodge, to protect the latter. At the same time, a sock ammunition on the battlefield was tested using cloth ribbons. The Germans were seriously preparing to increase the rate of fire. which the Germans devoted to the rate of fire of their weapons - after intensive shooting from any rifle after a certain number of shots a wooden bed begins to glow (in the case of a Mosin rifle it is 100 shots, in the case of a SVT, which has a much better cooling of three hundred), the Mauser’s rifle should have nominally gasket of asbestos between the barrel and the lodge, to protect the latter. At the same time, a sock ammunition on the battlefield was tested using cloth ribbons. The Germans were seriously preparing to increase the rate of fire. Mauser’s rifle was supposed to have a gasket of asbestos between the barrel and the lodge, in order to protect the latter. At the same time, a sock ammunition on the battlefield was tested using cloth ribbons. The Germans were seriously preparing to increase the rate of fire. Mauser’s rifle was supposed to have a gasket of asbestos between the barrel and the lodge, in order to protect the latter. At the same time, a sock ammunition on the battlefield was tested using cloth ribbons. The Germans were seriously preparing to increase the rate of fire.

During the war, the extremely labor-intensive self-loading rifle had to be forgotten, and machine guns began to appear in aviation. After the First World War, a machine gun emerged as an automatic weapon. Nevertheless, Mauser Selbstlader - in many respects one of the main secrets of pre-war Germany - despite all the efforts of tsarist intelligence, the exact structure of the rifle became known only after the war. There was information about the release, approximate about the combat characteristics, but the device could be guessed only by the patents that Mauser took.

The main secret of the German army in 1914:

France

In France, the development of a self-loading rifle began before all other countries, at the end of the 19th century. By the beginning of the First World War, E. Miniera’s system was ready for a new cartridge, a small party was tested during the war.


Already in military conditions, a group of designers (Ribeirol, Sutte and Shosh) developed a self-loading rifle, which used a significant part of the parts from the Lebel rifle and its cartridge, known as RSC Modele 1917. in a more or less mass setting on a self-loading rifle, belongs to France. However, the rifle was crude, with a small magazine capacity, with inconvenient charging and unreliable. After the war, the remaining rifles were converted to manual.

Great Britain

The main priority of the British military on the eve of the First World War was the creation of a more modern magazine rifle to replace the flagrant Lee-Enfield. For the mass introduction of weapons prepared arr. 1913 (Pattern 1913 Enfield), with a Mauser-type gate and a new patron, however, the outbreak of war did not allow this to happen. Britain went through both world wars with various upgrades of the old Lee-Enfield. Regarding the self-loading rifles sluggish work was carried out only during the war itself, and without much success. In 1918, Farquhar-Hill's rifle was put into service, but its mass production did not have time to begin.


After the war there was an unsuccessful attempt to convert the remaining copies into light machine guns.

Summarizing the above, we see that neither by the time of the First World War, nor in its course, was there an adequate sample of a self-loading rifle. The main weapon of an infantryman was a magazine rifle. In the interwar period, there was a very strong decline in interest in military equipment in general, and especially in self-loading rifles. Looking retrospectively, now let us ask the question: was it possible to put into mass production of automatic rifles at the beginning of the 20th century? Let's say, start the First World for a couple of years later.

The answer here must be given unequivocally negative. Even if the country had the highest level of industrial development, like Germany, and started producing self-loading rifles in peacetime, in the military it would still have to return to simpler and cheaper shops. Let's look at an example from the future - the production of the Soviet self-loading rifle SVT-40 during the Second World War was 800 rubles. The DP-27 light machine gun is 787 rubles, and the Mosin rifles are only 90 rubles. At the same time, the SVT-40 was highly technological for its time, and its design and process of its production absorbed the experience of about 30 years of development of a self-loading rifle. But it turns out that it is much more profitable to arm the gunner of the machine gun with a machine gun, and his assistant with a shop than with two soldiers of the infantry department with self-loading rifles; the firepower of the DP-27 will be noticeably higher

We can say that because of this we did not see the complete replacement of magazine rifles with self-loading in the fields of the Second World War. Passing briefly by country, you can say the following:

the USSR

In the USSR, during the interwar period, the development of an automatic rifle went slack. In 1936 a rifle designed by S.G. Simonov - ABC-36. The fighting during the Winter War showed its low reliability, which was not in the last degree contributed both to frost and to the low level of training of the soldiers (Stalin’s purges of officers). The rifle production was discontinued, and Tokarev's rifle, SVT-38, was adopted instead. She, in turn, did not quite meet the requirements, and after modifications her next copy, SVT-40, was adopted. Despite a fairly massive circulation of 1.6 million, she never gained popularity in the Soviet troops. Why - the question is extremely difficult, because rifle deserves high reviews from modern owners, especially compared to the Mosin rifle. Maybe,

USA

The USA, which had an extremely small army in peacetime, could afford to adopt anything at all. In 1936, the United States adopted the rifle by J. Garand (officially US rifle, .30 caliber, M1), but until 1940 its production advanced extremely slowly, with the first installments having a low reliability and demanding refinement. Although the United States entered World War II, mostly with shops, during the war, the production of M1 rifles reached enormous proportions; a total of approx. 5.4 million copies. Perhaps, the US Armed Forces are the only of all the participants in the Second World War who really went through the war with an automatic rifle.

One may ask the question - why did this happen in the USA, but not in the USSR, Germany or Great Britain? The answer here is not complicated - the United States entered the war already possessing industrial power comparable to the rest of the world, and the transition to new methods of managing the wartime economy further strengthened industrial superiority. Finally, hostilities did not take place in the United States, and the United States itself participated in limited ground battles, as a result of which the level of weapon losses was relatively small. As a result, the United States could afford the M1.



German soldiers with American M1; judging by the number of rifles, three more soldiers of the infantry department survived. We

compare the two most massive self-loading rifles of the Second World War - the Soviet SVT-40 and the American M1 Garand:


You should pay attention to the difference in reloading time from the store and from the clip, as well as the problems of feeding cartridges from the probably not very suitable SVT store. The SVT clearly needed to be loaded from the Mosin rifle holder with one well-ammunition magazine.

Germany

After World War I, self-loading rifles continued only in 1940, since The Wehrmacht placed extreme emphasis on single machine guns in the sense of automatic infantry weapons. After testing in the war in 1942, the G-41 (W) rifle was adopted, which was subsequently modified and saw a massive release in the form of a G-43. Reviews of the G-41 variant were unsatisfactory, about G-43 - moderately satisfactory, the release amounted to 400 thousand copies. In addition, the Wehrmacht actively used the Soviet SVT-40 (SiGewehr 259 / 2®) captured in 1941, captured in the later stages by the American M1 (7.62mm Selbstladegewehr 251 (a)), the Czechoslovak ZH-29, etc.

All three systems described — Soviet, American, and German — unlike the systems of the First World War, turned out to be more or less functional even in the conditions of the treatment of conscripts with wartime preparations. What is the difference between them and their predecessors 30 years earlier? Of course, it’s very important for a weapon to improve the quality of machining parts, which in turn is associated with the equipment used. But still the main difference will be here in a different scheme of automation, namely, in automation, in which the energy of the powder gases discharged from the barrel of the powder is used - gas-removal automation. The pressure of the powder gases in the barrel is very high, therefore, they can do a lot of work in addition to pushing the bullet. Adding a piston that can change position depending on the pressure of the powder gases in the barrel, we get a reliable part,



Compared to automatics, which use recoil of one or another part of the weapon, here we can be sure that the shutter will open not earlier and no later than the moment when the bullet passes a certain part of the barrel. In the case of using cartridges more powerful pistol, this scheme was the most suitable, most of the weapons of the second half of the 20th century, designed with its use.

So, summing up on self-loading rifles, we can say that they never became the main weapon of the infantry in the two world wars. But according to Fedorov’s memoirs, the transition to a self-loading rifle was felt as a very close event on the eve of the First World War. Paradoxically, this war gave a lot of new types of weapons, but it was not a self-loading rifle. By the way, one of these types of infantry weapons was an anti-tank gun.

And of course, one of the new types of weapons that appeared in the First World War was a submachine gun.

In 1914, the Italian gunsmith A. Revelli designed a twin machine gun (Villar-Perosa M1915) for use in aviation. An unusual weapon innovation was the use of a weak pistol cartridge (9 × 19 Glisenti, the usual 9 × 19 Parabellum with a lower powder charge) instead of a full rifle one. This has reduced the weight of the weapon and increase the rate of fire. However, this weapon did not receive positive reviews and conceptually belonged to the machine guns. In 1915, in Austria-Hungary, probably the world's first PP was created - Standschützen Hellriegel M1915. Nothing is known about this weapon, only 3 of its photographs have been preserved; PP was made only in one copy, the author - someone Hellrigel. Apparently, it was a water-cooled weapon with a free gate, according to the concept of a hybrid of a submachine gun and a light machine gun.



Alas, nothing more or less exact about this weapon is unknown, and it suddenly gained fame only thanks to the game Battlefield 1.


By the end of the war, the Italian T. Marengoni, using half of the Villar-Perosa M1915 in the box of a standard infantry rifle, created the software package Beretta M1918 - already a full-fledged first-generation submachine gun. In Germany, the work proceeded at the same pace — the H. Schmeisser submachine gun (MP-18) in 1918 managed to take part in the last desperate German offensive.


The weapon used the very simple free gate described above. Due to the characteristics of the used cartridge, the new weapon was an excellent means for close combat; in the interwar period, almost all countries created their own PPs and put them into service, however, they were produced by extremely small parties due to the high cost of living. It is interesting that almost all of them had a rather same type of construction and differed only in ergonomics. These PPs were also characterized by massive drum shops with low reliability, high cost and lack of interchangeability between different submachine guns.


Already during the Second World War, PP suddenly began to come to the fore as a widely used class of weapons. Without a significant change in the principles of operation, the design of submachine guns was actively revised in favor of improving manufacturability. Example. A typical PP of the interwar period, PPD-40, required 13.7 machine hours and cost approx. 1350 rub. (cf. above with the cost of the Mosin rifle). However, extremely similar to it and according to the scheme (and in appearance) PPSH-41 required only 7.3 machine hours and 13.9 kg of metal. Even more technologically advanced PPS-43 required 2.7 machine hours and 6.2 kg of metal. And this is without any requirement for alloyed steel. There was also a tendency to maximally simplify sights and shops — instead of drum PPs, box-shaped stores, much more versatile, were obtained. The process of reducing the cost of PP occurred in almost all the warring countries; In general, by the end of the war, PP became, if not cheaper, shopping in terms of value, then comparable to it. The result was a well-known infantry supply chain from the Second World War - the best gunners become machine-gunners with a single machine gun, the rest receive machine-guns and shops.

It should be noted the obvious shortcomings of submachine guns, especially the described period. It was a rough wartime weapon with very low ergonomics. In particular, in terms of the dimensions of the Second World War period PP, most often noticeably more cumbersome than a modern machine gun, has uncomfortable protruding parts for a weapon profile - for example, a long box magazine. In order to save wood and time, the PP butt was most often made of thick wire or tube and was metal, which does not contribute to the convenience of shooting or accuracy (PPS-43, STEN, MP-40, M-3, etc.) . In addition, the PP most often did not have a forearm (listed above), the grip was intended for the store, and it is difficult to call it convenient, all the more so with an unergonomic center of gravity of the weapon.


However, PP became a symbol of the Second World War and was definitely more popular than a magazine rifle. From what?

There is one interesting fact that is rarely voiced in the media, but it is known to the military. It can be stated simply: in the conditions of a firefight, a soldier cannot aim and shoot. This concerns at least 3/4 of the servicemen, and most likely more. Most often, the person simply shoots without aiming, setting the weapon approximately in the direction of the target. The angle at which the weapon is held is determined by its shape; for each type of weapon this angle is slightly different; track. in a firing battle, there is a certain dangerous where "everyone shoots." This was known from about the epoch after the Napoleonic wars, i.e. immediately with the birth of military science as a scientific discipline, which in itself alludes to the evidence of a fact. At the same time, relatively cold weapons have never recorded such problems.

A shocked man loses almost every ability to control his gun. Only exceptional shooters - people of unselfish courage, tremendous willpower - are able to perform an aiming technique that is terribly difficult in a combat atmosphere. The rest of the mass of shooters fires only shots, absolutely not worrying about aiming and setting the sight. The rifle is raised in the shoulder, strengthened in the most comfortable position and immediately twitches for the descent. The need to take the most comfortable position and to keep the thing most advantageously belongs to the category of instinctual needs, with special force speaking when consciousness and will are suppressed ...

N. Volotskaya. (1842-1905), according to the results of the Austro-Prussian, Franco-Prussian and Russian-Turkish wars 1877-78

After 70 years, the US Army Brigadier General S. Marshall, based on the results of US participation in World War II, concluded that 75% of military personnel would not shoot at the target (Men Against Fire: 1947). D. Grossman (On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society, 1996) indicates the share of American soldiers shooting World War II at 15–20%.
In Vietnam, in general, shot in battle, less than 30% . Indirectly, this is indicated by the number of shots in Vietnam per hit - according to some data 52 thousand shots / hit, on the other approx. 10 thousand. The

same applies to the rearrangement of the sight.

Many combatants indicate that the rearrangement of the sight as it approached the enemy, if commanded, was hardly performed in most cases.
In the battle of Mukden in the first army, a fact was noticed, confirming that the Japanese also did not carry out such a rearrangement of the sight. After the Japanese attack, repulsed by one of the East-Siberian infantry regiments, up to 100 killed and wounded with Japanese rifles near the trenches, the scope turned out to be 2000 meters, ie absolutely not interchanged from the very beginning of the movement and the opening of fire.

- V.G. Fedorov

Considering these data, a lot of things fall into place, in particular:

1. Why did the concept of firing from a close system hold in military doctrines to the end? When shooting from a close formation in front of the shooters, a space is formed with an extremely high probability of hitting the enemy, regardless of the aiming and in general the desire of the shooters to hit or not.

2. The transition to machine guns and their wide distribution in the First World War was not accidental. If you select from among all the soldiers those who can really aim and shoot, and provide them with rapid-fire automatic weapons, they will be extremely effective compared to the rest of the infantry.

3. Weapons with enemy visualization are generally the most effective. In World War I, almost half of all defeats were on artillery - it is obvious that gunners absolutely do not care where to shoot. In World War II, aviation was joined to the artillery. Huge losses among the population during strategic bombardments, of course, would have been impossible if the pilots would have seen their targets directly. During the war in the Persian Gulf, the US Armed Forces actively used night-vision devices through which people look completely unrealistic.


Thermal imagers, through which a person looks just like a lighter figure, are slowly but surely gaining popularity; the electronic display is included in the prospective infantry outfit, etc.

4. In the case of unarmed shooting of infantry which, no doubt, will be the type of shooting of the majority of soldiers, the effectiveness of the weapon will depend little or not at all on the sight. However, it will depend on the rate of fire. each bullet fired increases the chance of hitting the target, albeit randomly. Therefore, a submachine gun with its high rate of fire and ammunition (light cartridge) gained such high popularity during World War II.

However, what about those who will still aim and who will shoot further 50-100 meters? Before the fight to select such people is impossible. Probably, this is the concept of introducing a machine gun. I listed the main features of the automaton above, however, without which it is impossible, its main feature is an intermediate cartridge. The intermediate cartridge, equipped with a pointed bullet, allows you to fire on the PP, but it has certain positive features of the pistol cartridge itself - less weight, compactness, low cost. If most of the infantry will be armed with machine guns, those who cannot aim will fire with almost the same efficiency as from the PP, but those who can, will get into the hands anyway effective weapons. However, is a glass full of water half or half empty? US military, giving an estimate of the first mass machine gun, the German Stg.44, they asserted that, compared with a self-loading rifle, it had insufficient range, and compared with PP, it had a small ammunition load and was overweight. Now it is accepted to say that the machine has a large ammunition load, less weight compared to a rifle, and a long range of fire compared to the PP.
So who owns the primacy in the creation of the machine? As already stated above, it is not Fedorov. By the end of the First World War in France, P. Ribeirolieu (see above about the French self-loading rifle) a weapon was created, resembling future machine guns primarily as a used cartridge and having an automatic fire mode. A specially designed cartridge 8x35mm was used. The weapon (Carabine Mitrailleuse 1918) used a full-fledged rifle bullet from a Lebel rifle weighing 12.8 g (for comparison. AKM bullet weight 7.9 g), accelerated to a speed of 570 m / s, which gave 2 KJ muzzle energy. However, the overweight of the automaton and the presence of bipods clearly indicated its role, as the role of support weapons, and not as an automaton in the modern sense. After the war, there was no interest in Carabine Mitrailleuse 1918,


Alas, the first machine gun, the Carabine Mitrailleuse 1918, can now be judged for the most part only by pictures and games.

The first real machine gun that actually gave the name "assault rifle" to a weapon class was the notorious German Stg.44. In Germany, the idea of ​​creating an intermediate cartridge, which could be used instead of rifle and pistol infantry in the entire spectrum of small arms, matured by 1938. In the early 1940s, the development of the sample was entrusted to the firms Haenel and Walther; as a result of a long period of testing and major improvements, the sample of the first company created by H. Schmeisser won. It was adopted in 1943; to circumvent Hitler’s ban on introducing fundamentally new types of weapons in wartime, the machine gun was called a submachine gun mod. 1943 (MP-43). Already in the spring of 1944, Hitler himself most likely christened the MP-43 for propaganda purposes with an assault rifle, the Sturmgewehr, model of 1944, now Stg.44. The release of this weapon was 420-440 thousand copies; Such a significant circulation is due to the undoubtedly improved processability of the sample, in which stamping, welding and rivets were widely used. Of course, Stg.44 became the prototype for all the automata of the second half of the 20th century - the energy of the bullet, the dimensions of the cartridge, the layout of the weapon’s parts, the use of a vapor engine, the extensive use of stamped parts - all this can be seen again and again, including in modern patterns. wide use of stamped parts - all this can be seen again and again, incl. in modern patterns. wide use of stamped parts - all this can be seen again and again, incl. in modern patterns.


Shooting from Stg.44. As you can see, not so comfortable as it seems in words.

So, summing up, we can do simple arithmetic. In the early 1840s, Dreise's rifle was adopted in Prussia, and a choke with an expansion bullet was introduced in France. At the beginning of the 1940s, Germany was being finalized, and by 1944 the first prototype of the machine gun was being mass-produced. Only a century took the transition from the musket to the machine, which is why the article itself is called that. The century really was crazy. Given the previous rate of progress, one would expect to see something like manual annihilators in service by 2018. However, this we do not see. What happened next?

Long, long afterword

What happened with the gun later

Germany

In the conditions of total defeats on all fronts, the loss of resources and the bombing of industrial facilities, the requirements for weapons manufacturability in Germany continuously increased. By 1943, Mauser’s engineers were able to create an extremely simplified version of the semi-free-shutter. The development used in the course of constructing the MG.42 machine gun experience. The machine gun was adopted under the name Stg.45, but until the defeat of Germany, the release did not take place, the British only got a few dozen sets of parts, of which the machines were assembled.


One of the last pieces of the latest Nazi technology. The weapon is clearly uncomfortable when firing a burst, but the camera didn’t jerk at the beginning because of the monstrous recoil - the cartridge hit it. But it looks cool anyway.

In terms of manufacturability, the launch of the Stg.45 promised to almost double the output of automatic machines - from 14 machine hours for Stg.44 to 7.4. After the defeat of Germany, the designer of the machine gun L. Forgrimler was in the French occupation zone and for several years took part in designing weapons for the French. By 1950, he was able to get into Frankist Spain, which, although not taking part in World War II, ideologically always supported the Axis. There, working in the arms firm CETME, he essentially repeated the construction of Stg.45, creating CETME modelo A. Over time, the design was sold back to Germany by Heckler & Koch and became known worldwide as G3, being widely exported until recently .


G3, which would be worth seeing in shooters

However, it was not a complete machine, because rifle cartridge was used - 7.62х51. Here you need to add a few words about the NATO patron. One of the main conditions for NATO membership is standardization; Immediately after the Second World War, Western European states rather actively engaged in the construction of automatic machines for the transitional cartridge. The sample most often served as 7.92x33 - the cartridge used in Stg.44. However, by the early 1950s, an improved rifle cartridge 7.62x51 was developed in the USA, and a conflict arose between the USA and Western Europe. The Europeans wanted to standardize an automatic cartridge in NATO, the Americans - rifle cartridge. Thus, the choice essentially lay between the machine gun (Europe) and the self-loading rifle (USA). The reason for this lies in the fact that the United States did not have a meaningful experience of land battles, which cannot be said of the British. Now the situation is unthinkable for the US to dictate anything to the EU, and even more unthinkable are attempts to impose something on the Europeans, even if within the framework of NATO - Europe will act exclusively in its own way. However, after World War II, the situation was completely different, and the political center of gravity was definitely in the United States; The USA carried out their rifle cartridge without any problems, and the NATO bloc turned out to be armed with self-loading rifles instead of a machine gun for several decades, albeit modern ones. The situation changed only after the Vietnam War, when the transitional low-impulse cartridge 5.56x45 was standardized. Only then were the NATO members able to arm themselves with fully-fledged machine guns. The G3 in the armed forces of the Bundeswehr replaced the automatic G36 produced by the same company. It continues to be the main German machine gun to this day, incl. and in some other countries.

Between the G3 and G36 in Germany were very interesting development of weapons under the sleeveless cartridge, which resulted in the birth of G11. Actually, the benefit of removing the cartridge case from the cartridge is obvious:

1. Cheaper cartridge; no metal is wasted on the part of the cartridge that will be thrown out of doubt in the war.

2. Relief of the cartridge and a very noticeable increase in ammunition.

3. Because in the cycle of automatics, the removal of the sleeve disappears, it is possible to make the weapon very rapid.

At the end of the 1960s, the manufacture of caseless weapons, with an appropriate technological level, of course, became more than real. On the one hand, the development of chemistry has made it possible to massively produce a propellant with high mechanical properties, which is not hygroscopic and has a high ignition temperature. On the other hand, the development of the metalworking technology made it possible to massively manufacture parts of the weapon with sufficient accuracy to provide the necessary obturation. This prompted the Germans from 1970 until the early 1990s to lead the development of a cartridgeless cartridge and machine for it. For 1992, the G11 passed the entire test cycle and was ready for production, however, the German government showed no interest in the prospect of re-equipment on the G11.


G11 advertisements; shooting is at a rate of 2000 shots / min with a cutoff of 3 rounds.

Great Britain

Having a huge experience of fighting in the Second World War, second only to the experience of the USSR and Germany, the British immediately after the war began to design a new transitional cartridge and rifle to it. Initially, experiments were conducted with the German 7.92x33, later its 7x43 was developed. Of the systems, the choice was presented between the proprietary EM-2 and the Belgian FN FAL. You can appreciate the progressive design and views on the weapons of the British in the early 1950s.


A sample is presented for a NATO rifle cartridge, so this is not a machine gun.

As a result of pushing the United States of their choice in the block, the former British Empire had to go to FN FAL for rifle cartridge, i.e. to self-loading rifle. In the 1970s, the British were actively developing their own 4.85x49 cartridge and their own system for it, but still had to switch to NATO standard ammunition - 5.56x45. As a result, the SA-80 family of weapons appeared, constantly evoking and, apparently, continuing to cause complaints. Anyway, for modern Great Britain, the quality of infantry weapons is really insignificant, which cannot be said about the post-war period (let us recall the “Unthinkable” plan).

USA

During the Second World War, the United States used a Garand M1 rifle converted to a reduced cartridge called the M1 carbine. However, the used cartridge was close to a powerful revolving, and carbines were used only as a weapon of self-defense for drivers, artillery maids, etc. It was only by 1944 that the carbine version appeared with the possibility of automatic fire, which took part in the Korean War.

Nevertheless, the United States firmly headed for a semi-automatic rifle. Under a single NATO cartridge - 7.62х51 - in 1957 an improved version of the Garand, M14 rifle, was developed.

It was a typical post-war semi-automatic rifle with a detachable magazine. During the Vietnam War, the AK's superiority over the M14 and the M2 carbines became apparent. In the first case, the AK had the best characteristics of automatic fire, in the second - the best ballistic qualities. In 1957, a competition for a light rifle (literally Lightweight Military Rifle) was finally announced with the requirements of a 3 kg weight of the loaded weapon, an automatic fire and a 20-round magazine. The AR-15 rifle by Y. Stoner and J. Sullivan definitely entered the finals, however, its adoption took place in terrible bureaucratic torment throughout the late 1950s - the first half of the 1960s. Suffice it to note that the 1962 investigation showed the existence of a conspiracy among army generals with a view to denigrating the AR-15; in the same year it is adopted. The first military experience of using the M16 now was unfavorable - as a result of a series of glaring blunders, the weapon seemed extremely capricious. The main thing was probably the lack of cleaning weapons and cleaning kits, because by misunderstanding, it was assumed that M16 does not require cleaning. However, any weapon requires thorough cleaning, especially after firing, in particular, it is recommended to clean the barrel and parts in contact with the powder gases immediately after the shooting, then another cleaning and daily cleaning for 3-4 days. During hostilities, Soviet unauthorized access forces demand to clean their weapons in the lull after the battle. In this scenario, it is surprising even how uncleared and corroded in the conditions of the jungle M16A1 were shot. Over time, the problems were more or less eliminated, but the bitter sediment remained; probably, even more in the USSR and in the post-Soviet space than in the USA itself. As an amusing historical evidence can be found inthe 1968 comic, the main meaning of which is the service weapon to be cleaned. Based on military experience, the rifle was slightly modified - it received a cut-off of 3 rounds, lost automatic fire, and the bullet of a regular cartridge was weighted - in this variant, the M16A2 was put into service in 1982. In the early 1990s, based on the experience of the Gulf War, two were adopted The last modifications of the M16 are M16A3 and M16A4. Since 1965, active work was carried out on the creation of a shortened carbine based on the standard M16; slightly different models were created in large quantities, until in 1994 the final version, the M4 carbine, was generally adopted. Despite its name, the M4 has a trunk of medium length (several cm shorter than AK) and generally corresponds to the modern concept of the automaton. The main weapon of certain linear US armed forces at the moment are M4 carbines and M16 rifles.


The full power of M16A1. The rifle is really comfortable for automatic shooting.

In the postwar period, the United States was not at all what it is now; At that time, the United States could afford all sorts of expenses and the most ambitious high-priced projects (for comparison. At modern prices, landing on the moon would cost $ 140 billion; with the annual budget of NASA, it is now an order of magnitude less). The military also were not deprived, and in the United States constantly went to work on finding some fundamentally better weapons of infantry. From the 1950s to our time, half a dozen programs flowed smoothly from one to another; in total, an enormous number of weapons ideas were worked out, ranging from ammunition with several bullets (they were tested in Vietnam) and ending with a grenade launcher as the main infantry weapon. In general, the United States has left little to gun maniacs, and if you suddenly have an interesting idea to improve small arms, the first thing you need to turn to the American experience - your idea is probably already there, and it also indicates there why it cannot be implemented on a large scale. It can only be stated that nothing fundamentally better than the M4 carbine with a set of additional equipment (SOPMOD) from what can really be realized has not been found. A large number of weapons and completely functional samples were somehow considered, but none of them replaced the M16 and M4.

the USSR

The USSR seized the first samples of Stg.44 even during their front-line tests, the new weapon quickly attracted attention, especially since the weapon issue remained open in general (the project of a self-loading rifle by that time clearly failed, SVT-40, I recall, was unpopular in the army and not suitable for wartime). Having considered the captured sample and recognizing that in combat, the fire from individual weapons is indeed not farther than 400 meters, the Technical Council of the People's Commissariat of Weapons issued the design task for the cartridge and the complex for it, consisting of a self-loading rifle, machine gun and machine gun. Here the Soviet military turned out to be more perspicacious than the Germans, who were still developing only automatic weapons (self-loading rifles for 7.92x33, of course, existed, but in small numbers, not to mention the machine gun). The cartridge was originally designed 7. 62x41, and Degtyarev manual machine gun RD-44 for him. Subsequently, the sleeve was slightly shortened to 7.62x39, and the machine gun was adopted in 1948 under the name of the RPD. This cartridge, later used in the AK and AKM and SKS carbines, is certainly one of the most massive military ammunition, and in the civilian market it is extremely attractive due to its low price. Simonov, the author of the previously adopted ABC-36, designed the SKS carbine for 7.62x39, adopted for service in 1945, by 1944. In fact, the family lacked only an automatic rifle. The competition for the machine had several stages, and in the first stage, which was held back in 1944, all samples were rejected, because inferior in quality in service with PPSh-41 and PPS-43. The leader in the competition turned out to be the automatic system of Sudayev, but the latter died in 1946. In the same year, a new competition was announced for an automatic machine; among others, a sketch of M.T. Kalashnikov, however, according to the results of the competition, the winner was not again identified; the system then presented by Kalashnikov did not even get the 3rd place (the 2nd and 3rd got the Rukavishnikov and Korobov systems). In 1947, the next competition was held, in the final of which three systems were already running - Kalashnikov, Dementieva and Bulkin. At the beginning of 1948, all three machines turned out to be unsatisfactory, the Kalashnikov assault rifle did not satisfy the task for accuracy, Bulkin and Dementiev for other parameters. Therefore, only AK was recommended for military trials. Finally, in 1949, the AK after some modifications (for example, the automaton lost the muzzle brake) it is put into service and its production begins. About the good awareness of automatic fire in real combat is already evidenced by the above quote from the ACM for AK; I repeat

An automatic or single fire is fired from the machine gun (shooting with single shots). Automatic fire is the main type of automatic fire; it is fired in bursts - short (up to 5 shots), long (up to 10 shots in a queue) and continuously.

Given that AK and AKM are far from good at firing in bursts, we see that the Soviet military quite sensibly perceive the situation. Another affected the bitter results of the Second World War.

How many myths are not only connected with AK ...





In the 1950s, quite competitive models of machine guns began to appear, which were better than AK in manufacturability or in firing bursts. Since AK, however, did not fully meet the requirements, a new competition for automatic was announced. Kalashnikov presented to him a slightly modernized AK. As a result of the tests, the Konstantinov and Korobov system showed the best results, two of them and Kalashnikov were recommended to refine their systems. As a result, the systems of Korobov and Kalashnikov turned out to be almost equal, despite the fact that the Korobov machine gun required a third less machine-hours, and Konstantinov by 11%. It seemed that the scales leaned not towards the Kalashnikov system. However, in the conclusion of the commission NIPSMVO about the Korobov and Konstantinov machines, it was said that they "cannot have any significant advantages over the light samples of the Kalashnikov design, which are a further modernization of the standard AK machine gun, sufficiently mastered in production and tested in the troops"; AKM worked AK, and the Kalashnikov system won the competition.

At the very end of the 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s, tests of the future M16 were conducted in the USA, and the captured experimental samples quickly fell into the USSR and were forced to start work on a similar cartridge of reduced caliber. By the mid-1960s, a 5.45x39 cartridge was ready, and it turned out even noticeably better than its American design. The new cartridge featured:

1. The widespread use of non-deficient materials. In particular, most of the bullet was occupied by a steel core - a piece of wire. Sleeve made of steel. At the same time, 5.56x45 initially contained the usual shell lead bullet and brass sleeve.
2. Small mass of the cartridge, its small dimensions. One person has become more or less realistic to bear the transcendental number of ammunition.
3. Small caliber gave a very large direct shot distance - 440m, which is even higher than that of the rifle cartridge.
4. Increasing the muzzle velocity of the bullet to 900 m / s from 715 m / s in AKM significantly increased accuracy.

At the competition for a new automatic machine for a low-pulse cartridge, many modern samples of that time were presented, including and with balanced automation, where the recoil and oscillations of the weapon were somehow compensated. The Kalashnikov group was presented to the competition by a revolved AKM with minor modifications, it seemed that everything that could be squeezed out of the system was possible, including turning out the grooves in the butt for weight reduction. Three submachine guns reached the final - Kalashnikov, Yu.K. Alexandrova and A.S. Konstaninova and S.I. Koksharova. The Konstantinov-Koksharova machine gun won the competition - Kalashnikov lost. However, the Kalashnikov assault rifle was still recommended for adoption by virtue of its similarity with AKM, for the release of which there was a huge fleet of equipment. The second reason was the development of AKM in the army - indeed, in the presence of multi-million dollar turnover of recruits, the adoption of a new machine gun meant the need to retrain the entire army, the presence of a long time of two different types of weapons, etc. Be that as it may, the AK74 at the time of adoption was a very modern model, because most of the NATO armies were still armed with self-loading rifles, and only the elite units were armed with the M16. And still the situation turned out when the adopted cartridge is at a higher technical level than the weapon that uses it. Therefore, the USSR Ministry of Defense almost immediately, namely in 1978, announced a competition for a new automatic, who would fully exploit the potential of 5.45x39. AK74 was considered as a temporary solution, and the very fact of announcing the competition 4 years after adopting the previous model, of course, does not speak in favor of AK-74. Alas, in Russia there is nothing more permanent than temporary solutions, and there is nothing more temporary than decisions made "forever." AK74, adopted in 1974, is already the 44th year, breaking AKM records. Some 10-15 years old, and the AK74 will beat the record of the Mosin rifle, after which only the flint musket will remain. than decisions made "forever." AK74, adopted in 1974, is already the 44th year, breaking AKM records. Some 10-15 years old, and the AK74 will beat the record of the Mosin rifle, after which only the flint musket will remain. than decisions made "forever." AK74, adopted in 1974, is already the 44th year, breaking AKM records. Some 10-15 years old, and the AK74 will beat the record of the Mosin rifle, after which only the flint musket will remain.

The competition for a new automatic machine, in which 8 models were admitted to direct tests, was called OCR “Abakan”. By the end of 1987, two systems emerged - G.N. Nikonov and I.Ya. Stechkina. In addition, the Korobov machine gun was recommended for military testing. The era of the Kalashnikov system is clearly over; the machine, represented by the Kalashnikov group, lost. As a result of tests, which took place in 1991, the Nikonov machine gun was recognized as the best, which was put into service in 1997 under the symbol AN-94. Nikonov's system is very interesting in itself - the whole firing aggregate moves directly in it; The first two shots are performed with a rate of fire of 1800 shots / min, after which the machine switches to the usual rate of 600 shots / min. Unfortunately, the story of a truly advanced machine, perhaps after finishing one of the best in the world, ended badly. Nikonov died in 2003, the Defense Ministry of the Russian Federation has never shown any particular interest in the issue of small arms in general, especially in the idea of ​​replacing the state machine gun in the army with a new model. Equipment for the production of AN-94 was in the possession of NPO IZHMASH (now the Kalashnikov Concern), until in 2010 it was destroyed by the decision of the plant management. A significant part of the new AN-94 was converted by the concern into models and sold at exorbitant prices.


However, not the best fate befell AK74. In the 1980s, a small modernization was developed (replacement of fittings with plastic and modified muzzle brake), adopted later under the name AK-74M. In 2011 , the purchase of Kalashnikov assault rifles of the Defense Ministry of the Russian Federation was discontinued, the era of AK production for the army was completed.


Given the range of Soviet developments on firearms of the second half of the 1980s, it can be concluded that an interesting modernization was being prepared. Most likely, the experience of the Afghan war, on the one hand, and developments in NATO - on the other, prompted this. In addition to adopting a promising modern machine at the Abakan competition, sights were being developed. A family of EKP-1 open collimator sights was developed, which subsequently appeared only on the civilian market.



For all models of weapons in service, ranging from a single machine gun and ending with an automatic weapon, their own minor modifications of the sight were created. The USP-1 was assumed as a single optical sight (4X, the angle of view is larger than that of the PSO-1).


As a result, it can be assumed that by the end of the 1990s, the Soviet army would receive a new assault rifle, supplemented by the AK-74M, RPK-74M light machine guns, the PCM would remain a single machine gun, but all with the mass supply of modern-type sights.

It remains to ask the question - what next? For some time, the modernization of the AK-74M, which eventually came to life in the form of the AK-12 and AK-15, was conducted sluggishly.


However, both samples will hardly ever be produced in large quantities, because at the moment they are not allowed even to state tests. The place of the new machine for the Russian army is vacant. Maybe the reader will invent something, who knows ...

The problem of the situation is as follows:

1. There is a large contingent of recruits, which provide essentially the best machine does not make sense. Contract soldiers - yesterday's draftees - also do not show special learning abilities. One of the reasons for the wear and tear of modern weapons is their frequent disassembly and assembly (as a result of wear, the weapon literally falls apart from the impact), and not the actual shooting, after which proper care is taken of the weapon. Maybe for the current century there will be enough of those millions of AK-74 that were stored in the USSR?
2. The rearmament of the enormous army of the new machine will cost huge public money. Given the crisis of current times, is it not better to reserve money?
3. The role of the automaton in the modern war is not so significant; Will the benefit of introducing a new sample be proportional to the investment?

Silently, the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation supports approximately this position. However, it is easily criticized:

1. The opinion about the division of armaments, depending on the quality of training of military personnel, is not new, as are many of the problems in Russia that seem new. A similar opinion was expressed about the arming of all soldiers with rifled weapons in the middle of the 19th century (from Fedorov).

Opponents of the new weaponry showed that a rifle could only be assigned to selected troops, of which there would always be a minority in the whole army; the benefits of adopting rifled weapons for all line infantry and cavalry would not have turned out to the desired degree and would not reward either the costs of cutting rifles, nor the loss of time and effort to train line soldiers little prepared for good shooting. The defenders of the new weaponry objected to them that if the line soldier was armed with a firearm, he should fire well, at least he should strive for it; but in order to shoot straight, he also needs an accurate weapon; Consequently, the task is not whether the gun (smooth-bore), which is in the hands of a soldier, corresponds to his art, but to give a shooting weapon to a soldier, train him and act properly out of these weapons. If we assume that shooting training is done diligently and correctly, and if a sufficient number of training supplies are released for this, then with a smooth-bore weapon there can be two reasons for the unsatisfactory firing of troops: the inability of a soldier and a badly firing gun; in the case of rifled weapons, only one is the inability of the soldier.

After the disputes, on the one hand, about the benefits, and on the other - about the uselessness of armament with rifles of all the infantry were silenced to meet modern requirements, a new controversial question arose about the sight to the infantry rifles. The former opponents of rifled weapons, convinced finally by obvious arguments about the benefits of universal introduction in the army, began to argue that a rifle gun assigned to infantry of a closed formation must be adopted by the simplest or so-called withers, having only one aiming height; among the advocates of this opinion were those who argued that the line infantry did not need a sight at all, on the supposed basis that an infantryman in a closed formation usually shoots without aiming, partly because of his undevelopedness and is unable to understand the use of the sight, partly because of the smoke in the battles that interferes with aiming. But such opinions in all states were completely or partly rejected by actually adopting the same sight as rifle rifles for infantry rifles, as for rifle rifles, with no change or with a slight simplification in its design.

The need for a rifle gun, assigned to the line infantry, was already evident from the fact that in wartime, line soldiers could easily happen to operate in loose formations or enter rifle units to replenish the kit in place of retired shooters, and in this case without prior training to use the sight satisfactory shooting was impossible. It also followed from this that it is more advantageous to have a rifle of a linear infantry sight of the same device as that adopted for rifle guns, so that the method of training in aiming can be as similar as possible in rifle units and in line troops.

New handguns of the European armies, S. Vorobyov, issue 1 of the Artillery Committee, 1864

2. As early as the interwar period, one of the central economists of the 20th century, J. Keynes, remarked that it is the reduction of state spending that leads to the impoverishment of the population and the crisis, and not excessive spending and living on credit. To confirm the classic Keynesian conclusions, it suffices to refer to the recent history of Russia, namely the reforms of the 1990s. In the course of reducing spending on the military industry, the Yeltsin government hoped that the freed people’s money would be spent on some more suitable goals and people would become richer, and the standard of living would improve. After all, such enormous means and forces are spent on the production of military goods, for which there is still no use, would it not be better to direct them to the production of consumer goods? However, in fact, The reduction in defense industry spending caused the destruction of the economy of literally the whole country, since the entire population was employed in it anyway. The factories stopped paying wages, people left without wages stopped buying the goods that people usually bought, those who made these goods to them (first of all, cooperatives that established their activities during the Gorbachev era — times when government spending was not reduced) went bankrupt. , the people who worked there, in the same way, stopped buying the goods that they bought, etc. The result was a classic systemic crisis of the Keynesian type with the complete replacement of the productive forces within the country by foreign ones. who usually bought, those who manufactured these goods to them (primarily the cooperatives that had established their activities in the time of Gorbachev - the times when government spending was not reduced) went bankrupt, the people who worked there, just stopped buying the goods that they bought, etc. The result was a classic systemic crisis of the Keynesian type with the complete replacement of the productive forces within the country by foreign ones. who usually bought, those who manufactured these goods to them (primarily the cooperatives that had established their activities in the time of Gorbachev - the times when government spending was not reduced) went bankrupt, the people who worked there, just stopped buying the goods that they bought, etc. The result was a classic systemic crisis of the Keynesian type with the complete replacement of the productive forces within the country by foreign ones.

From this we can conclude that the state should invest money and overcome the desire for savings. And the question of what to invest in is secondary here, the main thing is to occupy the population. The money invested by the state in the production of automata will not fall into a black hole - they will be spent working; people who sell their products will also get more and spend more, etc. As a result, the money will be returned to the budget in the form of taxes. Moreover, it is a shame to have idle huge city-factories. It is also necessary to mention that the loss of personnel skills always happens very quickly.

3. The role of the automaton was secondary from the standpoint of the global conflict of the Cold War times, but nobody knew exactly how such a conflict would have been even then. At the moment, the rapid growth in the number of local wars unequivocally indicates that the role of small arms not only does not decrease, but also increases. Now again, the requirements for increasing the efficiency, simplicity and quality of small arms.

Further, I would like to mention the related topic of personal protection.


Summing up the final result, we systematize the generations of infantry infantry weapons.

1st generation
Smooth - bore muskets, a rare use of fittings with a tight bullet.
2nd generation
quick charge fittings due to expanding bullet.
Increased firing range.
3rd generation
Rechargeable rifles for a paper cartridge.
Increasing the rate of fire, the weapon can be reloaded lying and sitting.
4th generation
Rifle chambered with a metal sleeve.
A slight increase in the rate of fire, more weather conditions and storage do not affect ammunition.
5th generation
Rifles, equipped with a magazine with charging with a clip.
Increase the rate of fire and accuracy of weapons.
6th generation
Joint service of self-loading and magazine rifles, submachine guns.
Increased firepower in melee due to PP. The rate of fire increases due to automatic weapons.
7th generation
Automatic under a full intermediate cartridge.
Cheaper weapons and ammunition, a further increase in practical rate of fire.
8th generation
Automatic under the low-pulse cartridge.
Cheaper weapons, automatic fire has become more efficient.
9th generation
Probably taking samples with better auto fire options and accessories.

As we see, development is far from always linear, and certainly not exponential. There are moments, of course, a sharp increase in the level of technology, but they can be replaced by long periods of calm.