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Originally Posted by Oberleutnant
Kalashnikov once aspired to design farm equipment. But even though his most famous invention - the AK-47 assault rifle - sowed havoc instead of crops, he often said he felt personally untroubled by his contribution to bloodshed.
"I sleep well. It's the politicians who are to blame for failing to come to an agreement and resorting to violence," he said in 2007.
The moment that firmly set his course was in the 1941 battle of Bryansk against Nazi forces, when a shell hit his tank. Recovering from wounds in the hospital, Kalashnikov brooded about the superior automatic rifles he'd seen the Nazis deploy; his rough ideas and revisions bore fruit five years later.
"Blame the Nazi Germans for making me become a gun designer," said Kalashnikov. "I always wanted to construct agricultural machinery."
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I believe he claimed the exact inspiration was hearing wounded infantry soldiers complain about the Mosin Nagant (old bolt action rifle), PPSh-41 (horrible accuracy and range) and the SVT-40 (semi-auto rifle, but very hard to maintain in the field). He then set out to build a better infantry weapon and his initial design, which was not accepted for service, was for a new submachine gun.
FWIW, the Germans did not field any automatic rifles (semi or full) in any quantity until the adoption of the Gewehr 43 in 1943 (The FG42 was around in late 1941, but it was built in extremely small numbers and only for paratroopers). The Gewehr 41(W) saw limited production and use on the Eastern Front early on, but it was not widespread enough to be a game changer or influencer. The vast majority of German troops were armed with bolt-action Kar 98k's or MP38/40's.
It was the German's who were surprised at the outset of the war by the performance of the Soviet SVT-40. Many SVT-40's found their way into the hands of German soldiers in the early stages of the war and it was quite a prized weapon, better than any of the standard issue German infantry weapons. The major hit was that it was difficult to produce and that inexperienced troops had difficulty keeping them maintained which led to frequent breakdowns.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Slater
There's still some debate about whether the AK-47 design was influenced by the German StG-44, even though Kalashnikov always strongly denied it.
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It's a little murky, but there was certainly some influence. The Soviet Union started studying the StG44 (MP43/44) as soon as they got their hands on a few captured examples. Kalashnikov headed one of those groups. When a competition was held to choose a service weapon for the new 7.62x39mm round in 1944, Kalashnikov's entry was heavily influenced by the StG44's that he had been studying. His entry lost out to the rifle that became the SKS-45, which was a more traditional semi-automatic rifle.
After the war the Soviets took control of the main production facility of StG44's, along with all of its intact machinery, in Stuhl. With it they captured Hugo Schmeisser, the designer of the STG44, as well as piles of technical drawings and schematics. These, as well as freshly made examples, were sent back to the Soviet Union. Eventually Schmeisser with four other German small arm designers were sent to work in the Soviet Union at the Izmash facility. It just so happens that Kalashnikov was also based there.
During that time Kalashnikov was working on refining his design from the 7.62x39mm competition (which had been based on the StG44) to be entered into an assault rifle competition. Kalashnikov had access to the technical drawings of the StG44 that had been captured during this time. His heavily revised entry won the competition. He then proceeded to make dozens of prototypes and revisions that culminated in the AK-47. During the refining process he has admitted that he collaborated with and shared ideas with Schmeisser and the other German gun designers.
Now, in practical terms, while the StG44 and the AK47 look a lot alike, they have many internal differences. However, it is rather obvious that the design of the one influenced the design of the other as it was adapted to Soviet standards and incorprated Kalashnikov's own ideas. Kalashnikov himself finally openly stated in print in 2009 that he received influence from the StG44 and input on the AK47's eventual design from Schmeisser, the other Germans and his own Soviet team.
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