Automatic PPSh - the weapon of victory

The PPSS automatic, which is a symbol of the Soviet warrior of the Second World War, is familiar to virtually everyone in numerous films about the war. Designed in the fall of 1940 by the designer Shpagin, this simple, reliable and trouble-free submachine gun with a kind of circular disk magazine and a sloping cut shell for all the war years became the main small arms of the Red Army and Belarusian partisan formations.

In the pre-war years in the USSR, the only weapon of the infantry was a shop rifle. Mass production of automatic weapons was complicated by the fact that the design features of the then produced PPD-40 provided for large volumes of machining of various parts. All of its parts were quite complex configuration with extremely rigid tolerance tolerances. Production of such a machine in the Kremlin was considered an unacceptable luxury for the belligerent country - since 1939, the Soviet Union was, in fact, it was. In general, automatic weapons were required , which could be produced in millions of copies in the shops of any machine-building plant.

Then the People's Commissariat of Armament instructed weapons designers to create such a simple and reliable machine that it was possible to set up its mass production in the shortest possible time at any enterprise. In late 1940, Shpagin introduced his design of a submachine gun. Polygon tests and technological assessments have shown that the PPSS automatic machine has high combat qualities, reliability and simplicity.

On December 21 of the same year, the PPSh was adopted, and he immediately began to enter the troops. So the automatic machine PPSh, the device of which is somewhat similar to the PAP-40, became the main small arms of the Victory. Its automation is based on the principle of a movable shutter, and the trigger mechanism is adapted to conduct both automatic fire and single shots. The shooting mode is switched by means of a flag translator, which also performs the function of a fuse.

To improve durability and performance, the automatic pistol is equipped with a special damper bolt, and high accuracy and accuracy of fire is achieved through the use of an original brake-compensator barrel, which is both the front surface of the casing. Such a design solution prevents the outgoing propellant gases from throwing the barrel upward.

PPSh is an automaton that made a significant contribution to the victory over the enemy and came to the hands of a Soviet soldier to Berlin itself. For all difficult war years this submachine gun became a reliable and faithful companion not only for infantrymen, but also tankmen, scouts, artillerymen, sappers, signalmen, paratroopers. The high adaptability and simplicity of the design of the PPSh allowed it to be mass-produced in difficult evacuation conditions, when the machines began to work directly under the open sky.

The PPSS automatic machine has excellent service and operational characteristics that allow it to remain a universal and reliable weapon in any conditions. During the war years, more than six million copies of this submachine gun were produced. For comparison, fascist Germany for the same period managed to produce only 934.5 thousand of similar weapons. The PPSS automatic was one of the most massive weapons, with Mosin's rifle losing only this indicator .