Second World War, which became the finest hour of tanks, acutely posed the problem of effective anti-tank defense (ATD) to the armies. Anti-tank guns - towed or self-propelled, as well as anti-tank (AT) close combat weapons were assigned a special role during this period. Before the outbreak of hostilities, the infantry had anti-tank rifles, bunches of grenades and heavy high-explosive grenades. However, tanks became more and more “strong” and “thick-skinned”, and to cope with them, the infantry needed new, more powerful anti-tank weapons.
An attempt at improvisation
Disputes about the significance of anti-tank rifles (ATR) largely delayed their development, but nevertheless, by the beginning of World War II, this type of weapon was nevertheless introduced and even entered service with a number of armies. The common features of the PTR were a long barrel and a powerful cartridge, which provided armor-piercing and armor-piercing incendiary bullets with high initial velocities. However, views on the purpose of anti-tank rifles, their place in the battle order and the requirements placed on them varied widely. For example, Polish designers were one of the first in 1935 to adopt the anti-tank rifle of the so-called “normal” rifle caliber, but with a cartridge much more powerful than a rifle cartridge, and produced the UR wz.35 anti-tank rifle according to the design of a magazine rifle with a rotary bolt. The Germans preferred a single-shot version with automatic unlocking of the wedge bolt after a shot (by analogy with an anti-tank gun), and for the powerful 7.92 mm cartridge they used a 15 mm aircraft machine gun casing. The German 7.92-mm single-shot anti-tank gun Pz.B.38 (Panzerbuhse 1938), developed by Bauer at Gustlov-Werka, was quite compact, but rather heavy. And then the designer lightened his PTR. He introduced manual control of the bolt to simplify it, installing a more effective muzzle brake to reduce recoil - this is how the Pz.B.39 appeared.
In 1941, Czech designers also created the MSS-41 magazine-launched 7.92-mm PTR, which was distinguished by its layout with the magazine itself located behind the pistol grip. Reloading in it was carried out by moving the barrel back and forth.
In addition, there were models whose caliber was directly adjacent to the guns. These were self-loading anti-tank guns for various types of 20-mm cartridges - the Japanese Type 97, the Finnish L-39 Lahti system (characteristically, both of these anti-tank guns were created on the basis of aircraft guns) and others. Faced in 1940-1941, first with the British Mk II Matilda tanks with armor thickness up to 78 mm, then with the Soviet T-34 and KV with armor up to 45 and up to 75 mm, the Germans realized the futility of the 7.92 mm PTR- Pz.B.39 and converted it into a Gr.B.39 grenade launcher with a 30-mm rifled muzzle mortar. By the end of 1941, the “heavy PTR” 2.8/2 cm s.Pz.B.41 with conical drilling of the barrel appeared. The idea of “conical” barrels was also developed a long time ago; in the previous decade, the German engineer Hermann Gerlich was actively working on them, who managed to attract wide attention. By gradually reducing the diameter of the bore from the breech to the muzzle, he tried to increase the level of average pressure in the bore and thereby more rationally use powder gases to accelerate the bullet, without significantly increasing the maximum pressure. A specially designed bullet was compressed as it passed the conical section of the barrel, increasing its mass per unit area and acquiring a high initial velocity. The result is a significant increase in the flatness of the trajectory and the penetrating effect of the bullet. The s.Pz.B.41 barrel had a caliber of 28 mm in the breech and 20 mm in the muzzle; two conical transitions were made in the barrel bore, that is, the projectile was crimped twice. The “heavy anti-tank rifle” itself was more like a smaller cannon (a fragmentation projectile was even included in the ammunition load), and besides, the production of conical rifled barrels and the shells for them were quite expensive, so this weapon, like heavier anti-tank guns with a conical barrel, was used to a limited extent. A much more popular method of achieving high initial velocities has become sub-caliber projectiles, the impact core of which is significantly smaller in diameter than the caliber of the barrel.
In the USSR, work on anti-tank rifles of caliber from 20 to 25 mm was carried out since 1936, until a decision was made to revise the very requirements for anti-tank rifles, which were finally formulated in November 1938 by the Artillery Directorate and provided for a large, but still “small” caliber. Since 1940, serial production of a 14.5 mm cartridge with an armor-piercing incendiary bullet began. Nikolai Rukavishnikov developed a self-loading anti-tank rifle for this cartridge, which was put into service as the PTR-39. But the troops did not receive serial anti-tank rifles at the beginning of the war.
A subjective factor intervened, often determining the fate of military weapons. At the beginning of 1940, intelligence reported on “the newest types of German tanks” with significantly enhanced armor and armament. Poorly versed in military industry Deputy People's Commissar of Defense, Chief of the GAU, Marshal Grigory Kulik, apparently expecting the imminent appearance of a large number of such tanks on the German side, ordered the removal of the Rukavishnikov PTR from service (serial production never began), as well as the cessation of production of 45-mm anti-tank guns. As a result, the Red Army infantry was deprived of an effective close-combat anti-tank weapon, having only high-explosive hand grenades. And there weren’t enough of them - anti-tank grenades were considered a special weapon. The harmfulness of such decisions was confirmed in the very first weeks of the war. Hastily formed units of infantrymen - “tank destroyers” usually had only bundles of hand grenades and incendiary bottles, and to use both, the tanks had to be brought within 20 meters. Losses grew.
And then the improvisations began. An attempt to produce the German 7.92 mm Pz.B.39 in-house did not yield results - in addition to technological problems, insufficient armor penetration also affected it. Although the German army still used light tanks, medium vehicles with armor thickness of up to 30 mm began to play the main role.
At the suggestion of engineer V.N. Sholokhov as a temporary measure in July 1941 in the workshops of the Moscow Higher Technical School named after. Bauman and other engineering and technical universities in Moscow have established the assembly of a single-shot anti-tank rifle chambered for the 12.7 mm DShK cartridge. The simple design with some improvements was copied from the old German Mauser PTR and did not provide the required parameters, although a 12.7-mm cartridge with an armor-piercing BS-41 bullet was produced specifically for these PTRs.
The same Kulik demanded the earliest possible start of production of the Rukavishnikov anti-tank rifle, but its production and fine-tuning required a lot of time. According to the memoirs of Marshal Dmitry Ustinov, Stalin at one of the GKO meetings proposed entrusting the development of PTR to “another, and for reliability, two designers.” Vasily Degtyarev and Sergei Simonov received the task in early July 1941, and a month later they presented samples.
The development of the cartridge continued. On August 15, a version of the 14.5 mm cartridge with a BS-41 bullet containing a carbide core made using powder technology was adopted. And two weeks later, without waiting for the end of the tests (the issue was of particular urgency), the single-shot version of Degtyarev’s PTR and Simonov’s self-loading PTR were put into service. Both types were called “14.5 mm anti-tank rifle model 1941.” - PTRD and PTRS, respectively.
PTRD developed by Degtyarev and his KB-2 at Plant No. 2 named after. Kirkizh, was one of the examples of combining maximum simplicity - to speed up and reduce the cost of production - with efficiency. To increase the rate of fire, the rotating bolt is made “quarter-automatic.” When the barrel and receiver shifted under the action of recoil relative to the butt, the bolt handle ran up against the copier and unlocked the bolt. When the system returned forward, the spent cartridge case was removed and ejected, the bolt came to a stop, opening the receiver window for inserting the next cartridge.
On an industrial scale
Production of PTRD began at the plant named after. Kirkizh, later Izhmash and part of the TOZ production unit evacuated to Saratov got involved.
First combat use The PTRD was received near Moscow in Rokossovsky’s 16th Army. The most famous battle then was the battle of a group of tank destroyers from the 1075th regiment of the 316th rifle division Panfilov at the Dubosekovo crossing on November 16, 1941. Of the 30 attacking tanks, 18 were knocked out, but the losses were also great: a quarter of the entire company survived. This battle showed not only the effectiveness of anti-tank rifles, but also the need to cover their positions with riflemen and support them with at least light artillery. The integrated use of anti-tank weapons using anti-tank artillery, armor-piercing gunners (as the PTR crews were called), tank destroyers with grenades and bottles, machine gunners, riflemen, and, if possible, sappers, in anti-tank strong points not only strengthened the anti-tank fire, but also reduced losses. Already by December 30, 1941, 17,688 PTRDs were produced, and over the next year - 184,800. The self-loading PTRS, created on the basis of Simonov’s experimental self-loading rifle with a gas automatic engine, received a permanent burst-loading magazine (among the creators of the PTRS, in addition to Simonov himself, they mention also Vasily Volkhin). Despite its novelty, the PTRS showed fewer delays in tests than the Rukavishnikov PTR, with the same ballistics, weight and magazine capacity. For ease of transportation, the gun was disassembled into two parts. The PTRS was 1.5-2 times superior to the PTRD in terms of combat rate of fire, which greatly increased the likelihood of hitting the tank. In terms of production complexity, it was between the PTRD and the Rukavishnikov PTR: in 1941, only 77 PTRS were produced, and a year later there were already 63,308 (production was set up in Saratov and Izhevsk). Based on the combination of combat and operational qualities, the PTRS can be considered the best anti-tank gun of the Second World War.
At the position, the PTR crew, consisting of a gunner and his assistant, prepared grenades and incendiary bottles for battle in addition to the gun. PTRD and PTRS, capable of fighting enemy medium tanks at a range of up to 300 m, played an important role in the anti-tank missile system in 1941-1942. German tank crews recalled the Soviet anti-tank rifles as a “respectable” weapon, giving credit to their crews as well. And General Friedrich Wilhelm von Mellenthin wrote: “It seemed that every infantryman had an anti-tank rifle or anti-tank gun. The Russians are very skillful in disposing of these means, and it seems that there is no place where they are not there.”
Despite all the technology, the deployment of mass production of anti-tank rifles in wartime conditions required a certain period of time. And the shortcomings of the hastily created systems - tight cartridge case extraction in the PTRD, double shots in the PTRS - had to be corrected during production. The needs of the troops began to be sufficiently met only in November 1942. But already at the beginning of the next year, the effectiveness of anti-tank guns decreased due to the increase in the armor of German tanks and assault guns over 40 mm. The new “panthers” and “tigers” turned out to be simply too tough for the “armor-piercing” weapons.
The following figures indicate the intensity of the use of anti-tank rifles in the Red Army: in defensive operation near Kursk, the Central Front spent 387,000 rounds of PTRD and PTRS (or 48,370 on the day of the battle), Voronezh - 754,000 (68,250 on the day), and during the entire Battle of Kursk 3.6 million such rounds were spent.
And yet PTRD and PTRS have not left the scene. But now their targets have become light armored vehicles, lightly armored self-propelled guns, firing points - especially in urban battles, embrasures of pillboxes and bunkers at ranges of up to 800 m, as well as aircraft at ranges of up to 500 m.
The troops even made handicrafts for anti-tank rifles. anti-aircraft installations, the anti-aircraft tripod for PTR created in Kovrov was not put into production. Anti-tank rifles were often used by snipers to hit distant targets or shooters behind armored shields - forty years later this experience would be revived in the form of large-caliber sniper rifles. Production of 14.5 mm PTRs continued until January 1945; in total, about 471,500 of them were produced during the war.
But the service life of the 14.5 mm cartridge turned out to be much longer.
The proliferation of light armored vehicles and increasing the security of aviation operating at low altitudes required a machine gun with the ability to destroy lightly armored targets at ranges of up to 1,000 m, accumulation of manpower and equipment, firing points up to 1,500 m, as well as combat against air targets. Such a machine gun was developed in Kovrov by a group of designers led by Semyon Vladimirov. The design was based on the 20-mm B-20 aircraft cannon. Already in 1944, “Vladimirov heavy machine gun model 1944” (KPV-44) went into small-scale production, and after the war spawned a family of infantry, tank and anti-aircraft 14.5 mm machine guns.
Of course, they tried to create more powerful anti-tank guns. For example, Mikhail Blum’s 14.5 mm PTR with a reinforced cartridge (based on a 23 mm cartridge case) and with an initial bullet speed of 1,500 m/s, 20 mm RES PTR by Rashkov, Ermolaev, Slukhotsky, and other developments. But in 1945, Anatoly Blagonravov stated: “In existing form this weapon (anti-tank rifle) has exhausted its capabilities.”
Jet systems
The new stage of anti-tank weapons was associated with a combination of the reactive or recoilless principle of throwing a projectile with a cumulative warhead. Jet weapons have been known for almost as long as firearms: gunpowder firecrackers and rockets appeared in China and India between the 10th and 13th centuries. Another revival of interest in military missiles occurred at the end of the First World War. At the same time, work began on recoilless, or “dynamo-reactive”, as they were called then, guns (although their designs were proposed back in the 1860s). The greatest attention in artillery was attracted to powder rockets and dynamo-reactive systems with damping of recoil energy by the reactive force of part of the powder gases of the propellant charge, discharged through the breech. Work was carried out in a number of countries and most intensively in the USSR, Germany and the USA. Among other areas were light anti-tank weapons. In the USSR, say, in 1931 they tested a 65-mm Petropavlovsky “rocket gun”. And two years later, Leonid Kurchevsky’s 37-mm “dynamo-reactive anti-tank guns” were adopted. However, two years later they were abandoned due to unsatisfactory armor penetration and poor maneuverability. Kondakov, Rashkov, Trofimov, and Berkalov were also involved in recoilless systems. But the actual failure of Kurchevsky's most acclaimed works undermined confidence in this topic. In addition, the armor-piercing effect of the shells was based on kinetic energy and, at the low speeds provided by recoilless and rocket systems, was insufficient.
The cumulative effect of “hollow charges” has also been known for a long time - its research was started in Russia by Mikhail Boreskov back in 1865. Abroad, this effect is better known as the “Munro effect.” Study practical application shaped charges in the construction business in the USSR were carried out in the 1920s by M.Ya. Sukharevsky. By the beginning of the war, the USSR and Germany had samples of engineered shaped charges for destroying concrete and armored caps. Briefly, the principle of operation of a shaped charge looks like this. In the front hollow part of the charge there is a funnel with a thin metal lining. When an explosive detonates, the shock waves seem to be focused and a “pestle” is formed from the outer layers of the lining, and a “needle” is squeezed out from the inner layers in the form of a narrow stream of gases and molten metal with a high temperature and a speed of up to 10,000 - 15,000 m/s. Under the influence of such a jet at a pressure of more than 100,000 kg/cm2, the armor, like a liquid, “spreads” to the sides and, following the “needle,” a “pestle” bursts into the hole. The armor-piercing (“armor-piercing”, as it was not entirely correctly called then) effect of a shaped charge does not depend on the speed of the projectile, and therefore on the firing range and initial speed. High temperature and gas pressure give a strong “armor-protected” destructive effect. The practical implementation of the effect requires not only the precision of the warhead, but also special fuses - it was their development that delayed the creation of artillery and cumulative rocket projectiles. The detonation of such charges was calculated so that the cumulative jet had time to form before the warhead touched the armor.
In arming armies with a new type of weapon - a hand-held anti-tank grenade launcher (RPG) with a finned cumulative grenade - Great Britain was ahead of everyone else. However, the grenade launcher, developed under the leadership of Colonel Blakker according to the designs of engineers Jeffrey and Wells and put into service in 1942 under the designation PIAT Mk I (Projectile Infantry Anti-Tank Mark I - “infantry anti-tank projectile, brand one”), did not use any rocket, no dynamo-reaction circuit. The propellant charge burned before the grenade left the grenade launcher tray, and the recoil was extinguished by the massive bolt-impactor, its spring and the shock absorber of the butt. Under the influence of recoil, the bolt-impactor rolled back and was cocked, and the grenade launcher was ready to load and fire. This weighed the weapon down to 15.75 kg with an effective range of only 100 yards (91 m). The only advantage of the PIAT was the absence of a gas jet behind the RPG and the ability to fire from close quarters.
Legendary Faust cartridges
By the middle of the war, the German infantry turned out to be almost as helpless in the face of new Soviet tanks, like the Soviet one - before the German ones at the beginning of the war. It is not surprising that the Infantry Weapons Program adopted in 1943 gave particular importance to anti-tank weapons. The main ones were the reusable rocket-propelled grenade launcher and the disposable dynamo-propellant (recoilless) RPG. The first was created on the basis of the experimental rocket device “Schulder 75” to combat tanks of all types. A grenade with a rigid tail was inserted into the launch tube by the grenade launcher's assistant from the breech, firing was carried out from the grenade launcher's shoulder, and the grenade engine was ignited by a pulsed electric generator. In addition to the official designation 8.8cm R.Pz.B.54 (“Raketenpanzerbuchse 54”), the RPG received the “nickname” “Ofenror”. Otherwise - a “stove chimney”, so powerfully did flames and smoke burst out from its breech end. To protect from the engine flames of a flying grenade, the grenade launcher wore a gas mask and a steel helmet. Therefore, the modification R.Pz.B.54/1 “Panzerschrek” (“thunderstorm of tanks”) was equipped with a shield. It is characteristic that “arctic” - for the Eastern Front and “tropical” - for North Africa - modifications of the grenade were created. "Ofenror" and "Panzerschrek" were quite powerful weapons, but rather bulky to carry and difficult to manufacture.
Disposable “Panzerfausts” turned out to be more mobile and cheaper (they are also “faust cartridges”; the name Panzerfaust, “armored fist”, is associated with the 16th century German legend about a knight with a “steel arm”). The Panzerfaust models F-1 and F-2 (“system 43”), F-3 (“system 44”) and F-4 turned out to be the simplest recoilless devices with an over-caliber grenade and a simple trigger mechanism. A charge of black gunpowder ejected a grenade from the launch tube, the tail of which opened in flight. The target firing range of the F-1 and F-2 reached 30 m. The grenade's flight path was quite steep, so when firing the Panzerfaust was often taken under the arm, aiming at the hole in the sighting bar and the rim of the grenade.
The F-3 model (or Panzerfaust-60) had a 150-mm grenade, an increased propellant charge and an effective range of up to 75 m. Samples with a longer range were developed, but were not put into production. When fired, a stream of hot gases and a cloud of smoke burst out behind the RPG, making it difficult to shoot from shelters and rooms and unmasking the shooter. But the Panzerfausts were very easy to use and produce. In addition to the troops, they were given in large numbers to the Volkssturm and boys from the Hitler Youth. Standardization, traditional for German industry, made it possible to quickly connect several companies to production. And from July 1944 to April 1945, more than 7.1 million Panzerfausts were produced. They turned out to be especially effective in urban battles - during the East Pomeranian operation, for example, in the 2nd Mechanized Corps of the 2nd Guards Tank Army, 60% of the lost tanks were hit by Panzerfausts. To combat the “faustniks,” it was necessary to allocate special groups of machine gunners and snipers (the war generally aggravated the problem of interaction between tanks and infantry and their mutual cover for each other). Soviet soldiers, not having their own similar means, willingly used captured Panzerfausts to fire not only at armored vehicles, but also at pillboxes and fortified buildings. Colonel General Vasily Chuikov even proposed introducing them into the troops under the humorous name “Ivan the Patron.”
According to a number of experts, the Panzerfaust was “the best hand-held infantry anti-tank weapon of the war.” True, immediately after the war this type attracted less attention than reusable grenade launchers and recoilless rifles.
The American reusable 60-mm RPG M1 "Bazooka", developed under the leadership of Colonel Skinner, gained combat experience earlier than the German "Ofenror", was lighter and more mobile than it, but was inferior to it in armor penetration and reliability. Nevertheless, “Bazooka” (this nickname, which has become a household name, is associated with the external similarity of the RPG with the brass of the same name musical instrument) became the main AT weapon for small units, and their production was diligently increased. At the end of the war, they created the 88.9-mm RPG M20 "Bazooka" with a firing range of up to 150-200 m and armor penetration of 280 mm. But it only entered service during the Korean War in the early 1950s.
In fact, the American 57-mm recoilless rifle M18, weighing only 20 kg, which was fired from the shoulder or from a support at a range of up to 400 m, which arrived at the front in March 1945, also belonged to the infantry AT weapons. However, the armor penetration of its projectile was no longer sufficient.
The Germans used a heavier version of the “easel grenade launcher” - the 88-mm “Pupchen” (otherwise known as “doll”, so nicknamed for its resemblance to a toy gun) of 1943, which was active-reactive. The barrel bore was locked with a bolt, the grenade was thrown out like a regular projectile, and in flight it was accelerated by a jet engine. With armor penetration up to 160 mm, the Pupchen had an effective firing range of no more than 200 m, weighed 152 kg and required a crew of 4-6 people. On March 1, 1945, the Wehrmacht had 139,700 Panzerschrecks and 1,649 Pupchen.
Original grenades
The low effectiveness of high-explosive anti-tank grenades against the rapidly growing armor protection of tanks became clear already at the beginning of the war. For example, the Soviet RPG-40 grenade with a mass of 1.2 kg (it is clear that its accurate throw required considerable skill) “broke through” armor no thicker than 20 mm. Heavy grenades (nicknamed “Tanyusha”) and bundles of ordinary hand grenades were usually thrown under the tracks, under the bottom or onto the rear of the tank with the expectation of immobilizing the vehicle. Since the middle of the war, high-explosive grenades were replaced by cumulative grenades. In 1943, the PWM1 (L) appeared in the German army, and the RPG-43, developed by N.P., appeared in the Red Army. Belyakov in KB-20. After appearing on Kursk Bulge German heavy tanks began to use the more powerful RPG-6, developed at NII-6 M.Z. Polevikov, L.B. Ioffe and N.S. Zhitkikh. The tape stabilizer ensured that the grenade approached the target with its head part forward, and the impact inertial fuse ensured that it was detonated immediately upon meeting the target. The armor penetration of the RPG-43 was 75 mm, the RPG-6 - 100 mm, and the PWM - up to 150 mm.
The original combination of a grenade and a mine was the German magnetic grenade NN.3. It was “placed” on the enemy tank as it passed over the trench. Similar to it was a sticky grenade with an adhesive layer on the bottom of the body. During the war, by the way, infantry began to be trained in handling anti-tank mines - the Soviet Infantry Combat Manual of 1942 introduced anti-tank landmines and mines among the “means of infantry warfare.”
Cumulative grenades also came into rifle grenade launchers. For the German rifled 30-mm rifle grenade launcher, for example, they adopted caliber “small” (G.Pz.gr.) and over-caliber “large” (Gr.G.Pz.gr.) cumulative grenades with armor penetration of 25 and 40 mm, respectively. The Germans generally tried to adapt any means to anti-tank weapons - a cumulative grenade was even created for firing from a rifled signal pistol.
The VKG-40 grenade with armor penetration up to 50 mm, fired with a special blank cartridge, was also developed for the Soviet Dyakonov rifle grenade launcher. However, both the Red Army and the Wehrmacht used anti-tank rifle grenades to a limited extent. Serdyuk's VPGS41 ramrod rifle anti-tank grenade, initially ordered by the Red Army in large quantities, was withdrawn from production and service already in 1942.
Work on a special light grenade launcher for firing the RPG-6 grenade was never completed. The work on rocket-propelled grenade launchers, which began in the middle of the war under the impression of the appearance of German models, yielded results only after the war. In 1949, the RPG-2, created at GSKB-30, entered service, and a year later, the mounted SG-82, developed at SKB No. 36. As a result, in the last period of the war, hand grenades again turned out to be the only effective anti-tank weapon for close combat of the Soviet infantry.
Of the various rifle grenades used during World War II, perhaps the most promising were the American ones (anti-tank M9-A1, fragmentation M17, smoke M19-A1WP), equipped with tails and fired with a blank (propellant) cartridge from a small muzzle attachment. After the war, feathered rifle grenades proved to be very popular. NATO even established a standard for the outer diameter of the muzzle or flash suppressor of a rifle - 22 mm. True, France, Belgium and Israel have already become leaders in the creation of new rifle grenades.
Bottles - for battle!
The idea of using incendiary weapons against tanks originated in the First World War, and after it this idea was developed and refined. The fire mixture, of course, cannot burn through the armor, but, flowing into the cracks and blinds, it can cause a fire inside the tank (especially in the engine compartment), the flames and smoke blind the tankers, forcing them to stop and leave the vehicle. In fact, incendiary weapons fall under the purview of the chemical forces. Molotov cocktails became incendiary weapons widely used by infantry. If there is a shortage or complete absence of close combat anti-tank weapons in initial period Great Patriotic War The production and supply of fire bottles expanded widely. The simplest incendiary bottles were used against tanks back in Spain; Soviet tank crews had to face them during the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940.
In the first months of the Great Patriotic War, this simple weapon went through a unique development path. At first, the bottles had a fuse in the form of a match or a rag soaked in gasoline, but preparing such a bottle for throwing took a lot of time and was dangerous. Then chemical fuses appeared in ampoules: breaking together with the bottle, they gave off a “ray” of flame. Fuses from hand grenades were also used. Bottles with self-igniting liquid “KS” or “BGS” became the pinnacle - they ignited on contact with air, burned for 2-3 minutes, giving a temperature of 800-1,000 ° C and abundant white smoke. It was these liquids that received the well-known nickname “Molotov cocktail” from the enemy. The bottle just had to be removed from the cap and thrown at the target. When facing tanks with only incendiary bottles, infantry usually suffered heavy losses, but in combination with other anti-tank weapons, the “bottles” had a good effect. During the war, they accounted for 2,429 destroyed tanks, self-propelled guns and armored vehicles, 1,189 bunkers and bunkers, 2,547 other fortified structures, 738 vehicles and 65 military warehouses. The Molotov cocktail remains a unique Russian recipe.
New experience - new requirements
The Second World War provided a bloody, but rich experience in the use and development of weapons and military equipment, and forced a significant reconsideration of various types of weapons. All this formed the basis of a new generation of weapons, including infantry weapons.
Anti-tank weapons have become an integral part of weapons at the squad-platoon-company level. Moreover, it was supposed to hit all types of tanks at ranges of up to 500 m (and according to other experts, up to 1,000 m).
The new complex of infantry anti-tank weapons, as well as the infantry weapon system as a whole, was practically formed by the spring of 1945. According to many researchers, German specialists developed them most fully. Fortunately, the rapid actions of the Red Army and the rapidly depleting resources of German industry did not allow German designers to “finish” a number of samples.
Guided rocket weapons were used for the first time in World War II. In the field of anti-tank weapons, the matter was limited to the experienced German X-7 “Rotkaphen” (“Little Red Riding Hood”) rocket with manual control by wire. A decade and a half later, a whole series of various first-generation anti-tank missile systems appeared.
In terms of small arms, the war experience revealed the need to solve many problems: increasing the maneuverability of weapons in connection with the increased mobility of infantry on the battlefield; increasing fire efficiency by optimizing the ratio of density, fire accuracy and bullet lethality; choice of cartridge power; unification of weapons by cartridge and system, full automation of weapons, etc.
The need for new light and mobile short-range air defense systems stimulated the development of large-caliber machine gun mounts. In Germany, by the end of the war, they managed to produce an experimental batch of the first portable anti-aircraft gun missile system, which, however, has not yet related to “ precision weapons": "Fliegerfaust" was a kind of reactive system volley fire for shoulder-launching nine unguided 20-mm missiles with an effective range of no more than 500 m.
During the war, the range of infantry weapons increased significantly. The integrated use of various means with the increased dynamism of combat required better training of commanders and soldiers. And this, in turn, required ease of development and operation of each type of weapon separately.
To be continued
Anti-tank single-shot rifle mod. 1941 Degtyarev system (PTRD)- Soviet anti-tank rifle of the Degtyarev system, adopted for service on August 29, 1941. It was intended to combat medium and light tanks and armored vehicles at distances of up to 500 m. The gun could also fire at pillboxes, bunkers and firing points covered by armor at distances up to 800 m and at aircraft at distances up to 500 m.
| TACTICAL AND TECHNICAL CHARACTERISTICS ANTI-TANK RIFLE DEGTYAREV | |
|---|---|
| Manufacturer: | Zlatoust: plant No. 385 Izhevsk: plants No. 74 and No. 622 Kovrov: plant No. 2 |
| Cartridge: | |
| Caliber: | 14.5 mm |
| Weight without cartridges: | 17.3 kg |
| Weight with cartridges: | 17.5 kg |
| Length: | 2020 mm |
| Barrel length: | 1350 mm |
| Number of rifling in the barrel: | 8 left-handed |
| Trigger mechanism (trigger): | Impact type |
| Operating principle: | Longitudinal sliding valve with automatic extraction |
| Fuse: | Trigger safety cock |
| Aim: | Open, with two range settings at 400 m and from 400 m to 1000 m |
| Effective range: | 800 m |
| Sighting range: | 1000 m |
| Initial bullet speed: | 1020 m/s |
| Armor penetration at a meeting angle of 90°: | at 300 m - 35 mm, at 100 m - 40 mm |
| Type of ammunition: | Single shot |
| Number of cartridges: | 1 |
| Years of production: | 1941–1944 |
History of creation and production
At the beginning of July 1941, J.V. Stalin set the USSR People's Commissariat of Armaments the task of creating an effective, simple and cheap PTR chambered for a fully developed 14.5 mm cartridge within a month. Gunsmiths N.V. Rukavishnikov, V.A. Degtyarev and S.G. Simonov were involved in the work on the creation of anti-tank rifles.
On July 16, 1941, a 14.5 mm cartridge with an armor-piercing incendiary bullet with a hardened steel core was adopted by the Red Army under the designation “14.5 mm B-32 cartridge.”
The development of the PTRD took place in KB-2. Working projects V. A. Degtyarev and S. G. Simonov completed simultaneously. Both designers took 22 days to develop and manufacture prototypes.
The first pre-production prototype of the PTRD was manufactured and sent for testing in mid-August 1941.
By decree of the State Defense Committee of August 29, 1941, V. A. Degtyarev’s anti-tank rifle was adopted by the Red Army.
The gun was very technologically advanced in production; it could almost entirely be manufactured on lathes, so mass production of PTRDs was mastered earlier than mass production of PTRS.
The production of PTRDs was started at the Kovrov Arms Plant; at the end of November 1941, the production of PTRDs and PTRSs was also mastered by the Izhevsk Machine-Building Plant (to which drawings, technical documentation and part of the parts blanks were delivered), but until the beginning of 1942 the total production of anti-tank rifles in Izhevsk did not exceed 20 pcs. per day.
Serial production of the first PTRDs began on September 22, 1941, in October the first pilot batch of 50 guns was assembled, a total of 17,688 were produced in 1941, and 184,800 PTRDs in 1942. In October 1943, the assembly of PTRD began in Zlatoust at plant No. 385. Production of PTRD was discontinued in December 1944, a total of 281,111 units were produced. guns.
After the end of the Great Patriotic War, PTRDs were removed from service with the Soviet Army, but remained in storage. In the mid-1950s - 1960s, a number of stored PTRDs were transferred free of charge from the mobilization reserve warehouses of the USSR Ministry of Defense to the hunting grounds of the Far North where they were used for whale hunting.
Design and principle of operation
The barrel has a channel with eight rifling, curling from left to top to right, a muzzle brake to reduce recoil, in the middle there is a handle for carrying the weapon and a groove for attaching a bipod. At the front of the barrel there is a front sight base (on which the front sight is mounted), and at the rear there is a sight bracket.
On the receiver there is a bolt stop on the left, and a trigger mechanism on the bottom. On the outside, it has: an upper window (for inserting a cartridge), a lower window (for ejecting a spent cartridge case), a platform with a protrusion (for connecting to the butt), a cutout (for moving the bolt handle when locking and unlocking the barrel bore). Inside the receiver has: a channel for placing the bolt, two longitudinal grooves and two supporting protrusions.
The trigger mechanism consists of a trigger, a trigger lever, a sear and two springs (for the sear and the trigger lever).
The sight consists of a bracket, a rear sight with a slot and a spring. In early samples, the bracket has a hole through which the rear sight moves up and down. In the lower position, the rear sight corresponds to shooting distances of up to 400 m, and in the upper position - from 400 m to 1000 m. In the later position, the rear sight rotates on its axis by 90°, also having two positions for shooting at distances up to 400 m and from 400 m to 1000 m.
The front sight is pushed into the groove of the front sight base and can move left and right when the PTRD is brought to normal combat.
The bolt consists of a bolt frame and a firing mechanism. The bolt body has: a handle, a cup with a rim (for placing the cartridge head), a channel (for the passage of the firing pin), a groove (for placing the ejector), a socket (for the reflector and its spring), two lugs (for locking the barrel), beveled a cutout (retracting the firing pin when the bolt is opened), an annular groove (into which the annular protrusion of the coupling fits to engage the striking mechanism with the bolt frame) and two holes (discharging powder gases if they break through inside the bolt). The striker mechanism consists of a striker (having a protrusion with a firing pin), a connecting coupling (connecting the striker mechanism with the bolt), a mainspring (sending the striker to the forward position), a restrictive tube (limiting the retreat of the striker back), a striker coupling (protecting the striker from disengaging with striker) and striker (breaking the capsule).
An anti-tank crew with a PTRD-41 anti-tank rifle in a combat position during the battle for Stalingrad. A Mosin rifle is visible in the foreground.
The butt is attached to the receiver and consists of a shoulder rest (pillow) with an outer tube and a trigger box with an inner tube. The shock absorber spring is located in the outer tube, and on the left there is a stop for the gunner’s cheek. On the right there is a tide with a curved edge for opening the shutter after a shot. A wooden rest is attached to the pad and outer tube for holding with the left hand while shooting. The trigger box with an inner tube houses the trigger mechanism. A pistol grip is attached to the inner tube for ease of shooting. The trigger box has a platform for connecting the buttstock to the receiver, a hole for a pin (which secures the trigger box to the receiver) and a trigger guard (protecting against accidental pressing of the trigger).
Accessories for the PTRD: a composite cleaning rod, a wrench, a screwdriver, a double-neck oil can and a brush. Also for each gun there are two canvas cartridge bags (for 20 rounds each), two canvas covers (for the breech and muzzle of the gun) and a form (with the results of the battle check, the number of shots, delays and methods for eliminating them).
To load the PTRD, you must perform the following steps:
- Turn the bolt handle to the left (the bore is unlocked);
- Pull the bolt back all the way (the bolt stop rests against the rear plane of the left lug of the bolt and holds it in the receiver);
- Place the cartridge on the guide bevel of the upper receiver window and send it into the chamber;
- Send the bolt forward (the bolt moves the cartridge into the chamber, and the firing pin cocking, hitting the sear of the trigger mechanism, stops the firing pin, keeping it cocked);
- Turn the bolt handle to the right until it stops (the barrel bore is locked, the mainspring receives the greatest tension, the ejector hook slides into the sharpening of the case head, the reflector is recessed into its socket by the case head).
After this, to fire a shot you only need to press the tail of the trigger. Wherein:
- The trigger rotates the trigger lever, causing the sear to drop and come out from under the firing pin.
- The mainspring, expanding, presses on the firing pin coupling and forcefully sends the firing pin forward with the firing pin, breaking the cartridge primer.
- The barrel with the receiver and trigger boxes and the bolt move back under the pressure of the powder gases to the bottom of the sleeve, which causes the shock absorber spring to compress. The shutter handle, having reached the curved edge of the tide of the outer tube, begins to slide along it and turn to the left. The lugs of the bolt extend from behind the supporting lugs of the receiver and stand against the longitudinal grooves. The bolt, moving backward by inertia, is separated from the rear edge of the barrel, and the ejector hook removes the cartridge case from the chamber. When the cartridge case stands against the lower window of the receiver, the reflector pushes it out from under the ejector hook.
- The bolt stops in the rear position, hitting the bolt stop with the left lug.
- The shock absorber spring returns the moving parts to their most forward position.
To set the hammer to the safety cock, you need to pull the firing pin hook back as far as it will go and turn it to the right.
Combat use
The PTRD anti-tank rifle was a powerful weapon - at a distance of up to 300 m, its bullet penetrated armor 30–40 mm thick. The incendiary effect of the bullets was also high. Thanks to this, it was successfully used throughout the Second World War.
Video
Shooting from PTRD, handling weapons, etc.:
PTRD-41 compilation in HDIn the fall of 1941, a new soldier’s specialty appeared in the Red Army - armor-piercing officer. This is how fighters with anti-tank rifles (PTR) began to be called. the creation and use of PTR is worthy of a separate and fairly detailed story.
For the first time, anti-tank rifles - single-shot 13.37 mm Mauser Tankgewehr - were used by the German Reichswehr in 1918, at the final stage of the First World War. This experience turned out to be rather negative, so in subsequent years the armies of the leading countries of the world intended to hit the enemy with the help of light cannons and “universal” heavy machine guns. However, the scale of troop mechanization made the idea of a light infantry anti-tank weapon with a firing range of several hundred meters increasingly tempting. In the 30s, work on PTR intensified, including in our country. By the way, the term “anti-tank gun” was apparently borrowed from the German Panzerbüchse - after all, we are actually talking about rifled weapons.
In 1936-1938, 15 different PTR systems of caliber from 12.7 to 25 mm were tested, until it became clear that the requirements for an anti-tank rifle were initially too high. On November 9, 1938, the Artillery Directorate of the Red Army formulated a new task, which included the development of a 14.5-mm self-loading anti-tank rifle, which could constantly be with units of a rifle company on any terrain and in any battle conditions. Work on a new 14.5 mm caliber cartridge began at the Small Arms Research Testing Range (NIPSVO) and continued at one of the Moscow factories.
With this ammunition in mind, an employee of the same training ground, N.V. Rukavishnikov, designed an anti-tank rifle, which was put into service on October 7, 1939. And yet, by June 22, 1941, the troops did not have serial anti-tank rifles. This dramatic situation is often explained by the position of Marshal G.I. Kulik, who headed the Main Artillery Directorate before the war and declared in the spring of 1940 about the ineffectiveness of light anti-tank weapons in the fight against the “newest German tanks.” The marshal's opinion probably contributed to the delay in work on the anti-tank gun (as, by the way, the discontinuation of 45-mm anti-tank guns), but did not stop it. Technical reasons played a much larger role - plant No. 2, which was entrusted with the production of the first batch, used its main capacities for the production of PPD in the winter of 1939-1940. In addition, repeated tests of the Rukavishnikov PTR showed its high sensitivity to contamination, unmasking the position by dust raised by gases from the muzzle brake. The gun needed improvement and was withdrawn from service on July 26, 1940. Tests of the converted PTR took place in June 1941, and the NIPSVO report on the results is dated the 23rd - the second day of the Great Patriotic War.
BULK SAMPLES
The urgent establishment of the production of anti-tank rifles in the conditions of the outbreak of war, when all the capacities of the existing enterprises of the People's Commissariat of Armaments were loaded, required the solution of many organizational and technological problems. In the meantime, in July 1941, temporary measures were taken to quickly supply the army with anti-tank rifles.
One of them is an attempt to urgently organize the production at the Tula Machine Tool Plant (plant No. 66) of a 7.92-mm gun modeled on the captured German Pz.B.39. Its armor penetration (at a distance of 300 m the bullet pierced armor up to 23 mm thick) was sufficient to combat light tanks Wehrmacht Yes, and it could hit enemy medium tanks when firing at the side. Plant No. 66 was supposed to produce 5 thousand of these PTRs. But even in September there were still problems with the operation of the gun’s mechanisms. In October, the machine tool plant was evacuated. According to some sources, up to 1 thousand were received by the troops; according to others, only 426 of these anti-tank rifles were received. In any case, 7.92 mm guns were used in the defense of Tula (the Tula Workers' Regiment received several pieces).
At that time we also remembered 12.7 mm single-shot guns, similar in type to the German Mauser Tankgewehr - in the 30s they were manufactured in small quantities in Tula to test the 12.7 mm cartridge, and NIPSVO in 1938 - proposed to develop a store-bought anti-tank rifle on this basis. Now a proposal has arisen to produce a single-shot anti-tank rifle chambered for the 12.7-mm DShK cartridge by small workshops (its initiator is said to be engineer V.N. Sholokhov). Semi-handicraft production began in Moscow in the workshops of the Mechanical Engineering Institute named after. Bauman, then to OKB-16. The simple design of the German Mauser anti-tank rifle was supplemented with a muzzle brake, a stock shock absorber and a folding bipod. Especially for these guns, 12.7 mm cartridges with an armor-piercing bullet were produced, which made it possible to penetrate 20 mm thick armor at a distance of 400 m.
The development of the 14.5 mm cartridge also continued: in August, its version with the BS-41 bullet with a solid core was adopted. This core is often called metal-ceramic, although we are not talking about ceramics, but about the use of powder metallurgy. If the 14.5 mm B-32 bullet penetrated 21 mm thick armor at a distance of 300 m, then the BS-41 - 35 mm.
Putting the Rukavishnikov PTR into production continued to be a problem. To speed up work on a more technologically advanced 14.5-mm PTR, according to the memoirs of D. F. Ustinov, Stalin at one of the State Defense Committee meetings proposed entrusting the development to one more, and for reliability - to two designers. V. A. Degtyarev and S. G. Simonov received the task at the beginning of July. Soon samples ready for testing appeared - only 22 days passed from setting the task to the first test shots. The new anti-tank rifles were supposed to fight medium and light tanks and armored vehicles at ranges of up to 500 m.
Degtyarev and his KB-2 employees at tool plant No. 2 in Kovrov developed two options with varying degrees of automation. Already on July 14, working drawings were transferred to production. On July 28, Degtyarev’s PTR project was reviewed at a meeting at the Small Arms Directorate. On July 30, in order to speed up the organization of mass production, Degtyarev was offered to simplify one of the samples, turning it into a single-shot one, because it is the power system that usually gives the greatest number of problems when fine-tuning the weapon. A few days later this option was presented.
On August 28-29, the Degtyarev PTR was tested at NIPSVO. And on August 6-12, Simonov’s self-loading anti-tank rifle (created on the basis of his experimental self-loading rifle of 1938) and Rukavishnikov’s modified anti-tank rifle were jointly tested here. Simonov's sample showed the best results.
On August 29, 1941, Degtyarev’s single-shot gun and Simonov’s self-loading gun were put into service under the designations PTRD and PTRS, respectively. This was done even before the end of the PTR tests (survivability tests took place on September 12-13, and the final ones on September 24).
The rotating longitudinally sliding bolt of Degtyarev's gun had two lugs in the front and a straight handle in the back. The impact mechanism is of the striker type with a screw mainspring; the tail of the striker came out behind the bolt and looked like a hook. The firing pin was cocked when the bolt was unlocked. The PTRD barrel was equipped with an active muzzle brake, which absorbed up to 2/3 of the recoil energy. The tubular stock housed the shock absorber spring. An ingenious feature of the design was the principle of automatically unlocking the bolt during recoil, creatively borrowed from artillery. After the shot, the barrel and receiver moved back, the bolt handle ran onto the carbon profile mounted on the butt and turned, unlocking the bolt. After the barrel stopped, the bolt moved back by inertia and stood on the bolt stop, the bolt reflector pushed the spent cartridge into the lower window of the receiver. The moving system was returned to the forward position by a shock absorber spring. The shutter remained open, and in preparation for the next shot it was necessary to insert new cartridge into the upper window of the receiver, insert and lock the bolt. This made it possible to increase the combat rate of fire with coordinated work of a crew of two people. The sighting device was moved to the left on brackets and included a front sight and a flip-over rear sight at ranges of up to 600 m and beyond (in the first releases of the PTR, the rear sight moved in a vertical groove).
The butt had a soft cushion, a wooden rest for holding the weapon with the left hand, a wooden pistol grip, and a cheek rest for the shooter. A folding stamped bipod and a carrying handle were attached to the barrel. The accessory included two canvas bags holding 20 rounds each. The total weight of the PTRD with ammunition was about 26 kg. In battle, the gun carried one or both crew numbers. Let's imagine the load on the crew on the march and in battle.
A minimum of parts and the use of a stock pipe instead of a frame simplified the production of anti-tank rifles, and this was of decisive importance in those conditions. Production of PTRD began at Kovrov Plant No. 2: in early October, the first batch of 50 guns was assembled here, and on October 28, specialized production was created - the task for anti-tank weapons was a priority. The first batch of 300 PTRDs was produced in October and in early November sent to the 16th Army of Lieutenant General K.K. Rokossovsky. Later, plant No. 74 (Izhevsk Machine-Building) was connected to the production of PTRD. By December 30, 1941, 17,688 PTRDs were manufactured, and for the entire 1942 - 184,800. The main production of PTRDs was carried out in Kovrov until November 1943, when plant No. 2 ceased production. But in October 1943, the assembly of PTRD began in Zlatoust at plant No. 385.
The self-loading PTRS had automation based on the removal of powder gases through a transverse hole in the barrel wall. The barrel bore was locked by tilting the bolt frame downwards. The impact mechanism is hammer-type, with a screw mainspring. A two-row magazine with a lever feeder was hingedly attached to the receiver and was equipped with a clip (pack) of 5 rounds with the lid folded down. The accessory included 6 clips. When the cartridges were used up, the shutter was delayed. The sighting device included a front sight with a safety catch and a sector sight, notched from 100 to 1500 m. The PTR had a wooden butt with soft pillow and shoulder pad, pistol grip. The neck of the butt was used to hold it with the left hand. The barrel was equipped with a muzzle brake, and a folding bipod and a carrying handle were attached to it.
The production of the PTRS was simpler than the Rukavishnikov PTR (one third fewer parts, 60% fewer machine hours), but much more complex than the PTRD. It was planned to produce PTRS in Tula, but after the evacuation of part of the production of plant No. 66 in Saratov, the production of PTRS was established there, at plant No. 614 (formerly Traktorodetal). There was not enough equipment or capacity to quickly organize production. A solution was found in the cooperation of enterprises: the production of the magazine box was entrusted to the combine plant, and the striker was entrusted to the mechanical workshops of the local university. On November 7, the first PTRS successfully passed tests, and its serial production began in December in Saratov. Izhevsk Plant No. 74 was also involved in the production of PTRS: on November 6, it received the task of organizing the production of PTRS, and already on November 11 - in addition to the production of PTRS. In November, Izhevsk residents manufactured 36 PTRDs, and the first two PTRDs were only able to be delivered in December. At first, the production of PTR parts was distributed among the plant’s workshops, then separate wooden barracks were built. The evacuated production facilities of the Tula Arms and Podolsk Mechanical Plants were used. On July 1, 1942, on this basis, Plant No. 622 (later Izhevsk Mechanical Plant) was separated from Plant No. 74, which also produced anti-tank rifles of both systems, and from mid-1943 - only PTRS.
In 1941, only 77 PTRS were produced, in 1942 - 63,308. The establishment of mass production made it possible to reduce the cost of PTRS - from the first half of 1942 to the second half of 1943, it almost halved.
Since PTRs were adopted urgently, the shortcomings of the new systems - tight cartridge case extraction for PTRDs, double shots for PTRSs - had to be corrected during production. Due to the tight extraction of cartridges, it was recommended to lubricate the PTR chamber before firing and every 10-12 shots. This, as well as the rather sensitive recoil, reduced the actual combat rate of fire compared to that stated in the manuals. The deployment of mass production in war conditions still required a certain period of time - the needs of the troops began to be sufficiently satisfied only in November 1942.
Production of PTRD was stopped in Izhevsk at plant No. 622 in July, and in Kovrov at plant No. 2 in November 1943, in Zlatoust at plant No. 385 in December 1944. PTRS were produced in Saratov at plant No. 614 until June 1944, in Izhevsk at plant No. 622 - until December of the same year. In total, the above five plants produced 471,726 anti-tank guns - 281,111 anti-tank rocket engines and 190,615 anti-tank missile systems. 469,700 anti-tank missiles of both systems were delivered to the troops. The peak of production - 249,642 units - occurred in 1942, when the role of anti-tank missiles in the anti-tank defense system was most significant. The number of 14.5 mm cartridges produced in 1940-1945 is estimated at 139.8 million, with peak production in 1942-1943.
COMBAT EXPERIENCE
With fairly high ballistic data, the 14.5 mm PTRs were distinguished by maneuverability and manufacturability. They, of course, were not a replacement for even light anti-tank guns, but they bridged the significant gap between the “anti-tank” capabilities of infantry and artillery. Although in 1941, the PTR had to play exactly the role of the latter - back in August, 45-mm guns were removed from the battalion and division levels and transferred to the formation of anti-tank destroyer regiments and brigades.
The troops were the first to receive new anti-tank rifles Western Front, defending Moscow (here, by the way, a number of Rukavishnikov’s anti-tank rifles were also used). The directive of the front commander, General of the Army G.K. Zhukov, dated October 26, 1941, speaking about sending 3-4 anti-tank rifle platoons to the 5th, 33rd and 16th armies, demanded “to take measures for the immediate use of this weapon, which is exceptional in strength and effectiveness. .. giving them to regiments and battalions.” And in his order dated December 29, Zhukov pointed out the shortcomings in the use of anti-tank rifles: the use of their crews as shooters, the lack of interaction with groups of tank destroyers and anti-tank artillery, cases of leaving anti-tank rifles on the battlefield.
The most famous battle during the defense of Moscow was the battle at the Dubosekovo crossing on November 16, 1941 of the 4th company of the 2nd battalion of the 1075th regiment of the 316th Infantry Division under Major General I.V. Panfilov. Out of 30 German tanks 18 who took part in the attacks were shot down, but of the entire company at the front of which the attack took place, less than 20% of the Red Army soldiers survived. This battle showed not only the ability of PTR crews (there were only 4 crews in the battalion) to fight tanks, but also the need to cover them with riflemen, machine gunners and support with anti-tank and regimental artillery. A form of organizing close interaction between anti-tank artillery, anti-tank guns, tank destroyers and automatic weapons infantry became anti-tank strong points.
From December 1941 to rifle regiments PTR companies were introduced (27, then 54 guns each), and from the fall of 1942, PTR platoons with 18 guns were introduced into the battalions. In January 1943, the PTR company was included in the motorized rifle and machine-gun battalion of the tank brigade, where the PTR companies would exist until March 1944. PTR companies were also introduced into artillery anti-tank destroyer divisions, and PTR battalions were added to anti-tank destroyer brigades. Anti-tank rifles together with light machine guns, they ensured the self-defense of artillery batteries from sudden enemy attacks.
It should be noted that the effectiveness of the combat work of anti-tank crews is assessed differently; in recent Russian literature, it is customary to focus on their shortcomings and consider that they had only “psychological significance” in conditions of a clear shortage of anti-tank artillery. However, former Wehrmacht Lieutenant General E. Schneider wrote: “In 1941, the Russians had a 14.5-mm anti-tank rifle... which caused a lot of trouble for our tanks and the light armored personnel carriers that appeared later.” Former Major General F. von Mellenthin noted: “It seemed that every infantryman had an anti-tank rifle or anti-tank gun. The Russians were very clever in disposing of these funds and, it seems, there was no place where they were not found.” In general, in a number of German works about the Second World War and memories German tank crews Soviet anti-tank rifles are mentioned as “respectable” weapons, but credit is also given to the courage of their crews. Already in 1942, Soviet commanders noted new features of the Germans’ attacks involving tanks and assault guns - they sometimes stopped 300-400 m from the forward trenches and supported their infantry with fire from the spot. And these are the ranges from which Soviet anti-tank rifles opened fire. As you can see, the fire of anti-tank rifles had more than just “psychological significance.”
Having played a large role in anti-tank defense in 1941-1942, anti-tank rifles from mid-1943 - with the increase in armor protection of tanks and assault guns over 40 mm - lost their positions. If in January 1942 the number of anti-tank rifles in the troops was 8,116, in January 1944 - 142,861, that is, it increased 17.6 times in two years, then in 1944 it began to decline and by the end of the war the active army had only about 40,000 PTR.
On October 30, 1944, the chief of staff of the 1st Baltic Front, Colonel General V.V. Kurasov, reported: “The experience of using anti-tank rifles during the Patriotic War shows that greatest effect they had in the period before July 1943, when the enemy used light and medium tanks, and the battle formations of our troops were relatively less saturated with anti-tank artillery. Starting from the second half of 1943, when the enemy began to use heavy tanks and self-propelled guns with powerful armor protection, the effectiveness of anti-tank guns decreased significantly. The main role in the fight against tanks is currently performed entirely by artillery. Anti-tank rifles, which have good fire accuracy, are now used mainly against enemy firing points, armored vehicles and armored personnel carriers.” Unit commanders successfully used the main advantages of the PTR - maneuverability, the ability to constantly be in the battle formations of small units, ease of camouflage - both in 1944 and in 1945. For example, during a battle surrounded by populated areas, when capturing and securing bridgeheads when it was not possible to use artillery.
PTRs were used to fight not only tanks and armored vehicles. Armor-piercers often silenced enemy bunkers and pillboxes. Snipers used PTR instead sniper rifle to defeat the enemy at long ranges or behind cover (attempts to install an optical sight on the PTR were unsuccessful due to the weapon’s recoil being too strong). Anti-tank rifles were also used to combat low-flying aircraft - here the self-loading PTRS had advantages.
The film “The Ballad of a Soldier” begins with a scene full of tragedy. A Soviet soldier-signalman is being pursued by a young soldier who has not been shot at and has nowhere to hide, he is running, and a steel colossus is about to overtake him and crush him. The soldier sees Degtyarev abandoned by someone. And he takes advantage of the unexpected chance for salvation. He shoots at the enemy car and knocks it out. Another tank is approaching him, but the signalman is not lost and burns him too.
“This couldn’t happen! - other “experts” will say today military history". - You cannot penetrate tank armor with a gun!" - "Can!" - those who are more familiar with this subject will answer. There may be some inaccuracy in the film narration, but it concerns not the combat capabilities of this class of weapons, but the chronology.
A little about tactics
Anti-tank rifles were created in the thirties of the 20th century in many countries. They seemed to be a completely logical and reasonable solution to the issue of confronting armored vehicles of that time. Artillery was supposed to become the main means of combating it, and anti-tank missiles - auxiliary, but more mobile. The offensive tactics involved striking with tank wedges involving dozens, even hundreds of vehicles, but the success of the attack was determined by whether it would be possible to create the required concentration of troops without the enemy noticing. Overcome well-fortified defense lines, equipped with armor-piercing artillery, with a strip of minefields and engineering structures(gouges, hedgehogs, etc.) was an adventurous undertaking and was fraught with the loss of a large amount of equipment. But if the enemy unexpectedly strikes a poorly protected section of the front, then there will be no time for jokes. We will have to urgently “patch up the holes” in the defense, transfer guns and infantry that still need to dig in. It is difficult to quickly deliver the required number of guns with ammunition to a dangerous area. This is where an anti-tank rifle comes in handy. PTRD is a relatively compact and inexpensive weapon (much cheaper than a gun). You can produce a lot of them, and then equip all units with them. Just in case. Soldiers armed with them may not burn through all enemy tanks, but they will be able to delay the offensive. Time will be gained, the command will have time to bring up the main forces. Many military leaders thought so at the end of the thirties.
Why did our fighters lack PTR?
There are several reasons why in the USSR the development and production of anti-tank rifles in the pre-war years was practically curtailed, but the main one was the exclusively offensive nature of the Red Army. Some analysts point to the supposedly poor awareness of the Soviet leadership, which overestimated the degree of armor protection of German tanks, and therefore made the wrong conclusion about the low effectiveness of anti-tank guns as a class of weapons. There are even references to the head of the Glavartupra G.I. Kulik, who expressed such an opinion. Subsequently, it turned out that even the 14.5-mm Rukavishnikov PTR-39 anti-tank rifle, adopted by the Red Army in 1939 and abolished a year later, could easily penetrate the armor of all types of equipment possessed by the Wehrmacht in 1941.
What did the Germans come with?
Hitler's army crossed the border of the USSR with over three thousand tanks. It is difficult to appreciate this armada without using the method of comparison. The Red Army had much fewer new tanks (T-34 and KV), only a few hundred. So, maybe the Germans had equipment of approximately the same quality as ours, with quantitative superiority? This is wrong.
The T-I tank was not just light, it could be called a wedge. Without a gun, with a crew of two, it weighed slightly more than a passenger car. Degtyarev's anti-tank rifle, put into service in the fall of 1941, pierced it right through. German T-II was little better, it had bulletproof armor and a short-barreled 37 mm cannon. There was also a T-III, which could withstand the impact of an PTR cartridge, but only if hit in the frontal part, but in other other areas...
The Panzerwaffe also had Czech, Polish, Belgian, French and other captured vehicles (they are included in total number), worn out, outdated and poorly supplied with spare parts. I don’t even want to think about what Degtyarev’s anti-tank rifle could have done to any of them.
The Germans acquired “Tigers” and “Panthers” later, in 1943.
Resumption of production
We must pay tribute to the Stalinist leadership; it skillfully corrected mistakes. The decision to resume work on the PTR was made the day after the start of the war. This fact refutes the version that the Headquarters is poorly informed regarding the armored potential of the Wehrmacht; it is simply impossible to obtain such information in a day. Urgently (it took less than a month to manufacture experimental units), a competition was held for two samples, almost ready for launch into mass production. Simonov's anti-tank rifle showed good results, but in the technological aspect it was inferior to the second tested PTR. It was more complex in design and also heavier, which also influenced the commission’s decision. On the last day of August, Degtyarev's anti-tank rifle was officially adopted by the Red Army and put into production at an arms factory in the city of Kovrov, and two months later - in Izhevsk. Over three years, more than 270 thousand of them were produced.
First results
At the end of October 1941, the situation at the front was catastrophic. The vanguard units of the Wehrmacht approached Moscow, two strategic echelons of the Red Army were practically destroyed in giant “cauldrons”, vast spaces of the European part of the USSR found themselves under the heel of the invaders. Under these circumstances, the Soviet soldiers did not lose heart. Lacking artillery in sufficient quantities, the troops showed massive heroism and fought tanks using grenades and Molotov cocktails. New weapons arrived at the front straight from the assembly line. On November 16, soldiers of the 1075th Infantry Regiment of the 316th Division destroyed three enemy tanks using PTRD. Soviet newspapers published photos of the heroes and the fascist equipment they burned. A continuation soon followed; four more tanks, which had previously conquered Warsaw and Paris, began to smoke near Lugovaya.
Foreign PTR
Newsreels of the war years repeatedly captured our soldiers with anti-tank rifles. Episodes of battles with their use were also reflected in feature films (for example, in S. Bondarchuk’s masterpiece “They Fought for the Motherland”). Documenters recorded much fewer French, American, English or German soldiers with PTRD for history. Does this mean that WWII anti-tank rifles were mostly Soviet? To some extent, yes. These weapons were produced in such quantities only in the USSR. But work on it was carried out in Britain (Boyce system), and in Germany (PzB-38, PzB-41), and in Poland (UR), and in Finland (L-35), and in the Czech Republic (MSS-41) . And even in neutral Switzerland (S18-1000). Another thing is that the engineers of all these, without a doubt, technologically “advanced” countries were never able to surpass Russian weapons in its simplicity, elegance of technical solutions, and in quality too. And not every soldier is capable of cold-bloodedly shooting at an approaching tank from a trench. Ours can.
How to penetrate armor?
PTRD has approximately the same performance characteristics, like the Simonov anti-tank rifle, but it is lighter (17.3 versus 20.9 kg), shorter (2000 and 2108 mm, respectively) and simpler in design, and therefore requires less time for cleaning and is easier to train shooters. These circumstances explain the preference given by the State Commission, despite the fact that the PTRS could fire at a higher rate of fire due to the built-in five-round magazine. The main quality of this weapon was still its ability to penetrate armor protection from various distances. To do this, it was necessary to send a special heavy bullet with a steel core (and, as an option, with an additional incendiary charge activated after passing through an obstacle) at a fairly high speed.
Armor-piercing
The distance at which Degtyarev’s anti-tank rifle becomes dangerous for enemy armored vehicles is half a kilometer. It is quite possible to use it to hit other targets, such as pillboxes, bunkers, and also aircraft. The caliber of the cartridge is 14.5 mm (brand B-32 regular armor-piercing incendiary or BS-41 with a ceramic super-hard tip). The length of the ammunition corresponds to an air cannon shell, 114 mm. The hitting distance of a target with armor 30 cm thick is 40 mm, and from a hundred meters this bullet penetrates 6 cm.
Accuracy
The accuracy of hits determines the success of firing at the most vulnerable spots of enemy equipment. Protection was constantly being improved, so instructions were issued and promptly updated for soldiers recommending how to most effectively use an anti-tank rifle. The modern idea of fighting armored vehicles also takes into account the possibility of hitting the most weak spots. When firing tests from a hundred-meter distance, 75% of the cartridges hit the 22-centimeter vicinity of the center of the target.
Design
No matter how simple the technical solutions may be, they should not be primitive. WWII weapons were often produced in difficult conditions due to forced evacuation and the deployment of workshops in unprepared areas (it happened that for some time they had to work in the open air). The Kovrov and Izhevsk plants, which produced PTRDs until 1944, avoided this fate. Degtyarev's anti-tank rifle, despite the simplicity of its design, absorbed all the achievements of Russian gunsmiths.
The barrel is rifled, eight-way. The sight is the most common, with a front sight and a two-position rail (up to 400 m and 1 km). The PTRD is loaded like a regular rifle, but the strong recoil is due to the presence of a barrel brake and a spring shock absorber. For convenience, a handle is provided (one of the carrying fighters can hold it) and a bipod. Everything else: the sear, the firing mechanism, the receiver, the butt and other attributes of the gun are thought out with the ergonomics for which Russian weapons have always been famous.
Service
IN field conditions Most often, incomplete disassembly was carried out, which involved removing and disassembling the bolt, as the most contaminated unit. If this was not enough, then it was necessary to remove the bipod and butt, then disassemble the trigger mechanism and separate it. At low temperatures, a frost-resistant lubricant is used, in other cases, ordinary gun oil No. 21. The kit includes a cleaning rod (dismountable), an oiler, a screwdriver, two bandoliers, two moisture-resistant canvas covers (one on each side of the gun) and a service record, which records cases of training and combat use, as well as misfires and failures.
Korea
In 1943, German industry began producing medium and heavy tanks with powerful ballistic armor. Soviet troops continued to use PTRDs against light, less protected vehicles, as well as to suppress firing points. At the end of the war, there was no longer a need for anti-tank rifles. Powerful artillery and other effective weapons were used to combat the remaining German tanks in 1945. The Second World War is over. It seemed that the time of the PTRD was irrevocably gone. But five years later, the Korean War began, and the “old gun” began to shoot again, albeit at former allies - the Americans. It was in service with the DPRK and PLA armies, which fought on the peninsula until 1953. American tanks The post-war generation most often withstood hits, but anything could happen. PTRDs were also used as an air defense weapon.
Post-war history
The presence of a large number of high-quality weapons with unique qualities prompted us to look for some kind of useful application. Tens of thousands of units were stored in lubricant. What can an anti-tank rifle be used for? Modern protective armor of tanks can withstand even a hit, not to mention a bullet (even if it has a core and a special tip). In the 60s they decided that with PTRD it was possible to hunt seals and whales. The idea is good, but this thing is too heavy. Also, from such a gun you can conduct sniper fire at a distance of up to a kilometer, the high initial speed allows you to shoot very accurately if you have it. The armor of an infantry fighting vehicle or armored personnel carrier is easily penetrated by the PTRD, which means that today the weapon has not completely lost its relevance. So it lies in warehouses, waiting in the wings...
At the beginning of the Second World War, those in service with the infantry were high-explosive hand grenades and anti-tank rifles, that is, weapons that originated in last years First World War. “Anti-tank rifle” (ATR) is not an entirely accurate term - this weapon would be more correctly called an “anti-tank rifle.” However, this happened historically (apparently as a translation of the German word “panzerbuhse”) and has firmly entered our vocabulary. The armor-piercing effect of anti-tank rifles is based on the kinetic energy of the bullet used, and, therefore, depends on the speed of the bullet at the moment of meeting the obstacle, the angle of contact, mass (or rather, the ratio of mass to caliber), the design and shape of the bullet, the mechanical properties of the bullet material (core) and armor. The bullet, having pierced the armor, causes damage due to its incendiary and fragmentation action. It should be noted that the lack of armor action was the main reason for the low effectiveness of the first anti-tank gun - the single-shot 13.37 mm Mauser developed in 1918. A bullet fired from this anti-tank rifle was capable of penetrating 20 mm armor at a range of 500 meters. During the interwar period, PTR was tested in different countries, however, for a long time the attitude towards them was more like a surrogate, especially since the German Reichswehr adopted the Mauser anti-tank rifle as a temporary replacement for the TuF machine gun of the corresponding caliber.
In the 20-30s years easy a small-caliber cannon or a large-caliber machine gun seemed to most specialists the most successful and universal solution to two problems - air defense at low altitudes and anti-tank at short and medium ranges. It would seem that this view was confirmed by the Spanish Civil War 1936-1939 (although during those battles, both sides, in addition to the 20-mm automatic cannon, used the surviving 13.37-mm Mauser anti-tank guns). However, by the end of the 30s it became clear that the “universal” or “anti-tank” machine gun (12.7 mm Browning, DShK, Vickers, 13 mm Hotchkiss, 20 mm Oerlikon, Solothurn ", "Madsen", 25-mm "Vickers"), due to the combination of its weight, size and efficiency, cannot be used at the front line by small infantry units. During World War II, large-caliber machine guns were, as a rule, used for air defense needs or for shelling fortified firing points (a typical example is the use of the Soviet 12.7-mm DShK). True, they armed light armored vehicles, along with anti-aircraft guns attracted to anti-tank forces, even included in anti-tank reserves. But the heavy machine gun did not actually become an anti-tank weapon. Note that the 14.5-mm Vladimirov KPV machine gun, which appeared in 1944, although it was created for the cartridge of an anti-tank rifle, at the time of its appearance could not serve as an “anti-tank” one. After the war, it was used as a means of combating manpower at considerable ranges, air targets and light armored vehicles.
Anti-tank rifles used during World War II differed in caliber (from 7.92 to 20 millimeters), type (self-loading, magazine, single-shot), size, weight, and layout. However, their design had a number of common features:
- high muzzle velocity was achieved through the use of a powerful cartridge and a long barrel (90 - 150 calibers);
Cartridges with armor-piercing tracer and armor-piercing incendiary bullets were used, which had armor-piercing and sufficient armor-protecting effect. Note that attempts to create anti-tank guns for the developed cartridges of large-caliber machine guns did not give satisfactory results, and the cartridges were specially developed, and converted cartridges for aircraft guns were used in 20-mm anti-tank guns. 20-mm anti-tank guns became a separate branch of “anti-tank machine guns” of the 20-30s of the last century;
To reduce recoil, muzzle brakes, spring shock absorbers, and soft butt pads were installed;
To increase maneuverability, the dimensions of weight and anti-tank guns were reduced, carrying handles were introduced, and heavy guns were quickly disassembled;
In order to quickly transfer fire, the bipod was attached closer to the middle, for uniformity of aiming and convenience, many samples were equipped with a “cheek”, a shoulder pad for the butt, most samples used a pistol grip for control, and it was possible to hold a special handle or butt with the left hand when shooting;
Maximum reliability of the mechanisms was achieved;
Great importance was attached to ease of development and production.
The problem of rate of fire was resolved in combination with the requirement of simplicity of design and maneuverability. Single-shot anti-tank rifles had a rate of fire of 6-8 rounds per minute, magazine-loaded ones - 10-12, and self-loading ones - 20-30.
12.7 mm single-shot "Sholokhov PTR" chambered for the DShK cartridge, manufactured in 1941.
In the USSR, a government decree on the development of an anti-tank rifle appeared on March 13, 1936. The design of 20-25 mm shotguns weighing up to 35 kilograms was entrusted to S.A. Korovin M.N. Blum and S.V. Vladimirov. Until 1938, 15 samples were tested, but none of them met the requirements. So, in 1936 at the Kovrov plant No. 2 named after. Kirkizh produced two prototypes of the 20-mm “company anti-tank rifle” INZ-10 of the M.N. system. Blum and S.V. Vladimirov - on a wheeled carriage and on a bipod. In August 1938, eight company-level anti-tank weapons systems were tested at the Small Arms Research Site in Shchyurovo:
- 20mm anti-tank rifle INZ-10;
- 12.7 mm anti-tank rifle, converted by NIPSVO from the German Mauser;
- 12.7 mm Vladimirov anti-tank rifle;
- 12.7 mm TsKB-2 anti-tank rifle;
- 14.5 mm anti-tank rifle of the Vladimirov and NIPSVO systems (14.5 mm cartridge developed by NIPSVO);
- 25-mm self-loading gun MTs (43-K Tsyrulnikov and Mikhno systems);
- 37 mm recoilless rifle DR.
The INZ-10 light self-loading gun showed unsatisfactory armor penetration and accuracy. The weight of the weapon in the combat position was also large (41.9 - 83.3 kg). The remaining systems were also either considered unsatisfactory or needed serious improvements. At the beginning of 1937, NIPSVO tested an experimental Tula self-loading 20-mm anti-tank gun (gun) TsKBSV-51 developed by S.A. Korovin. This gun had a tripod and optical sight. However, it was also rejected due to insufficient armor penetration, high weight (47.2 kg) and poor design of the muzzle brake. In 1938, B.G. proposed his light 37-mm anti-tank gun. Shpitalny, head of OKB-15, but she was rejected even before the tests began. An attempt to convert the Shpitalny and Vladimirov automatic 20-mm cannon (ShVAK) into a “universal” anti-aircraft anti-tank weapon also failed. In the end, the requirements for anti-tank rifles themselves were considered inappropriate. On November 9, 1938, the Artillery Department formulated new requirements. We have modified a powerful 14.5-mm cartridge that has an armor-piercing incendiary bullet B-32 with a hardened steel core and a pyrotechnic incendiary composition (similar to the B-32 rifle bullet). The incendiary composition was placed between the shell and the core. Serial production of the cartridge began in 1940. The mass of the cartridge was 198 grams, the bullet - 51 grams, the length of the cartridge was 155.5 millimeters, the cartridge case - 114.2 millimeters. A bullet at a range of 0.5 km at an impact angle of 20 degrees was capable of penetrating 20 mm cemented armor.
14.5 mm PTR Degtyarev mod. 1941
N.V. Rukavishnikov used this cartridge to develop a very successful self-loading gun, the rate of fire of which reached 15 rounds per minute (the self-loading 14.5-mm anti-tank gun developed by Shpitalny was again unsuccessful). In August 1939, it successfully passed the tests. In October of the same year it was put into service under the designation PTR-39. However, in the spring of 1940, Marshal G.I. Kulik, head of the GAU, raised the question of the ineffectiveness of existing anti-tank weapons against " Germany's newest", about which intelligence information has appeared. In July 1940, the PTR-39 was put into production by the Kovrov plant named after. Kirkizh was suspended. Erroneous views that in the near future the armor protection and firepower of tanks would significantly increase had a number of consequences: anti-tank guns were excluded from the weapon system (order dated August 26, 1940), the production of 45-mm anti-tank guns was stopped, and an order was issued for the urgent design of 107- millimeter tank and anti-tank guns. As a result of this, the Soviet infantry lost an effective close-combat anti-tank weapon.
In the first weeks of the war, the tragic consequences of this mistake became visible. However, on June 23, tests of Rukavishnikov’s anti-tank rifles showed a still large percentage of delays. Finishing and putting this gun into production would require considerable time. True, individual Rukavishnikov anti-tank rifles were used in parts of the Western Front during the defense of Moscow. In July 1941, as a temporary measure, the workshops of many Moscow universities began assembling a single-shot anti-tank gun chambered for the 12.7-mm DShK cartridge (this gun was proposed by V.N. Sholokhov, and it was considered back in 1938). The simple design was copied from the old German 13.37 mm Mauser anti-tank rifle. However, a muzzle brake, a shock absorber on the back of the butt, and a lightweight folding bipod were added to the design. Despite this, the design did not provide the required parameters, especially since the armor penetration of the 12.7 mm cartridge was insufficient to combat tanks. Especially for these anti-tank rifles, a cartridge with an armor-piercing BS-41 bullet was produced in small series.
Finally, in July, a 14.5-mm cartridge with an armor-piercing incendiary bullet was officially adopted. To speed up work on a technologically advanced and effective 14.5-mm anti-tank rifle, Stalin at a meeting of the State Defense Committee proposed entrusting the development to “one more, and for reliability - two designers” (according to the memoirs of D.F. Ustinov). The task was issued in July to S.G. Simonov and V.A. Degtyarev. A month later, the designs were presented, ready for testing - only 22 days passed from the moment the task was received to the test shots.
V.A. Degtyarev and employees of KB-2 plant named after. Kirkizha (INZ-2 or plant No. 2 of the People's Commissariat of Armaments) on July 4 began developing a 14.5-mm anti-tank rifle. At the same time, two store options were developed. On July 14, working drawings were transferred to production. On July 28, Degtyarev’s anti-tank rifle project was discussed at a meeting at the Red Army Small Arms Directorate. On July 30, Degtyarev was offered to simplify one sample, converting it into a single-shot one. This was necessary to speed up the organization of mass production of anti-tank rifles. A few days later the sample was already presented.
At the same time, work was underway to fine-tune the cartridge. On August 15, a version of the 14.5 mm cartridge with a BS-41 bullet having a powder metal-ceramic core (bullet mass was 63.6 g) was adopted. The bullet was developed by the Moscow Hard Alloy Plant. The 14.5 mm cartridges differed in color: the B-32 bullet nose was painted black and had a red belt, while the BS-41 bullet was painted red and had a black nose. The cartridge capsule was covered with black paint. This coloring allowed the armor-piercer to quickly distinguish between cartridges. A cartridge with a BZ-39 bullet was produced. Based on the BS-41, an “armor-piercing-incendiary-chemical” bullet with a capsule with a gas-forming composition of the HAF in the rear part was developed (the German “armor-piercing-chemical” cartridge for the Pz.B 39 served as a model). However, this cartridge was not accepted. Acceleration of work on anti-tank guns was necessary, since the problems of anti-tank artillery units of rifle units worsened - in August, due to a lack of anti-tank artillery, 45-mm guns were removed from the divisional and battalion level for the formation of anti-tank artillery brigades and regiments, the 57-mm anti-tank gun was removed from production due to technological problems.
On August 29, 1941, after a demonstration to members of the State Defense Committee, Simonov’s self-loading model and Degtyarev’s single-shot model were adopted for service under the designations PTRS and PTRD. Due to the urgency of the issue, the guns were accepted before the end of the tests - survivability tests of anti-tank guns were carried out on September 12-13, the final tests of the modified anti-tank guns were carried out on September 24. The new anti-tank rifles were supposed to fight light and medium tanks, as well as armored vehicles at a range of up to 500 meters.
14.5 mm Simonov anti-tank rifle mod. 1941
Production of PTRD was started at plant No. 2 named after. Kirkizha - in early October, the first batch of 50 guns was put into assembly. On October 10, a special unit was created in the Chief Designer's Department. documentation development group. A conveyor was urgently organized. Equipment and tools were prepared out of turn. On October 28, a specialized production of anti-tank rifles was created under the leadership of Goryachiy - at that time the task for anti-tank weapons was a priority. Later, Izhmash, the production of the Tula Arms Plant, evacuated to Saratov, and others joined the production of anti-tank rifles.
Degtyarev's single-shot anti-tank rifle consisted of a barrel with a cylindrical receiver, a longitudinally rotating sliding bolt, a butt with a trigger box, trigger and impact mechanisms, a bipod and sighting devices. The barrel bore had 8 rifling with a stroke length of 420 millimeters. The active box-shaped muzzle brake was capable of absorbing up to 60% of recoil energy. The cylindrical bolt had a straight handle at the rear and two lugs at the front, which housed a striking mechanism, a reflector and an ejector. The impact mechanism included a mainspring and a firing pin; the tail of the striker looked like a hook and went out. The bevel of its frame, when the bolt was unlocked, moved the firing pin back.
The receiver and trigger were connected rigidly to the inner tube of the butt. An inner tube with a spring shock absorber was inserted into the butt tube. The moving system (bolt, receiver and barrel) moved back after the shot, the bolt handle “ran” onto the carbon profile mounted on the butt, and when turned, unlocked the bolt. After stopping the barrel, the bolt moved back by inertia, standing on the bolt stop (the left side of the receiver), while the cartridge case was pushed by the reflector into the lower window in the receiver. The shock absorber spring returned the moving system to the forward position. Inserting a new cartridge into the upper window of the receiver, chambering it, and also locking the bolt was done manually. The trigger mechanism included a trigger, a release lever and a sear with springs. Sights were placed to the left on brackets. They included a front sight and a reversible rear sight at ranges of up to and over 600 meters (in the first releases of anti-tank rifles, the rear sight moved in a vertical groove).
On the butt there was a soft cushion, a wooden rest designed to hold the gun with the left hand, a wooden pistol grip, and a “cheek.” Folding stamped bipods were attached to the barrel using a collar with a wing. A handle was also attached to the barrel, with the help of which the weapon was carried. The accessory included a pair of canvas bags each holding 20 rounds. The total weight of Degtyarev's anti-tank rifle with ammunition was approximately 26 kilograms. In battle, the gun was carried by the first or both crew numbers.
A minimum of parts, the use of a butt pipe instead of a frame greatly simplified the production of an anti-tank rifle, and the automatic opening of the bolt increased the rate of fire. Degtyarev's anti-tank rifle successfully combined simplicity, efficiency and reliability. The speed of production was of great importance in those conditions. The first batch of 300 PTRD units was completed in October and already in early November it was sent to Rokossovsky’s 16th Army. On November 16 they were used in combat for the first time. By December 30, 1941, 17,688 Degtyarev anti-tank rifles were produced, and during 1942 - 184,800 units.
The Simonov self-loading anti-tank rifle was created on the basis of the experimental Simonov self-loading rifle of the 1938 model, which worked according to a scheme with the removal of powder gas. The gun consisted of a barrel with a muzzle brake and a gas chamber, a receiver with a butt, a trigger guard, a bolt, a reloading mechanism, a trigger mechanism, sights, a bipod and a magazine. The bore was the same as that of the PTRD. The open-type gas chamber was secured with pins at a distance of 1/3 of the barrel length from the muzzle. The receiver and barrel were connected by a wedge.
The barrel bore was locked by tilting the bolt frame downwards. Locking and unlocking was controlled by the bolt stem, which had a handle. The reloading mechanism included a three-position gas regulator, a rod, a piston, a tube and a pusher with a spring. A pusher acted on the bolt stem. The bolt return spring was located in the stem channel. The hammer with a spring was placed in the channel of the bolt frame. The bolt, having received a movement impulse from the pusher after the shot, moved backward. At the same time, the pusher returned forward. The spent cartridge case was removed by the bolt ejector and reflected upward by the protrusion of the receiver. After the cartridges ran out, the bolt stopped in the receiver.
A trigger mechanism was mounted on the trigger guard. The trigger striking mechanism had a screw mainspring. The design of the trigger mechanism included: a trigger sear, a trigger lever and a hook, while the axis of the trigger was located at the bottom. The magazine and lever feeder were hinged to the receiver; its latch was located on the trigger guard. The cartridges were placed in a checkerboard pattern. The magazine was equipped with a pack (clip) of five rounds with the lid folded down. The rifle included 6 clips. The front sight had a fence, and the sector sight had notches from 100 to 1500 meters in increments of 50. The anti-tank rifle had a wooden butt with a shoulder pad and a soft cushion, and a pistol grip. The narrow neck of the butt was used to hold the gun with the left hand. A folding bipod was attached to the barrel using a clip (swivel). There was a handle for carrying. In battle, the anti-tank rifle was carried by one or both crew numbers. The disassembled gun during the hike - the receiver with the butt and the barrel - was carried in two tarpaulin cases.
The production of Simonov's self-loading anti-tank gun was simpler than Rukavishnikov's gun (the number of parts is one third less, machine hours are 60% less, time is 30%), but much more complicated than Degtyarev's anti-tank gun. In 1941, 77 Simonov anti-tank rifles were produced, in 1942 the number was already 63,308 units. Since anti-tank rifles were adopted urgently, all the shortcomings of the new systems, such as tight cartridge case extraction in the Degtyarev PTR or double shots in the Simonov PTR, were corrected during production or “adjusted” in military workshops. Despite all the manufacturability of anti-tank rifles, the deployment of their mass production in war time required some time - the needs of the troops began to be met only in November 1942. The establishment of mass production made it possible to reduce the cost of weapons - for example, the cost of the Simonov anti-tank rifle from the first half of 1942 to the second half of 1943 decreased by almost half.
Anti-tank rifles bridged the gap between the "anti-tank" capabilities of artillery and infantry.
Since December 1941, companies armed with anti-tank rifles (27, and later 54 rifles) were introduced into the rifle regiments. Since the fall of 1942, platoons (18 rifles) of anti-tank rifles were introduced into the battalions. In January 1943, the PTR company was included in the motorized rifle and machine gun battalion (later - the submachine gun battalion) of the tank brigade. Only in March 1944, when the role of anti-tank rifles decreased, the companies were disbanded, and the “armor-piercing men” were retrained as tank crews (since they were re-equipped with the T-34-85, whose crew consisted of not four, but five people). Companies were assigned to anti-tank destruction divisions, and battalions were assigned to anti-tank destruction brigades. Thus, attempts were made to ensure close interaction between PTR units and infantry, artillery and tank units.
The troops of the Western Front, engaged in the defense of Moscow, were the first to receive anti-tank rifles. Directive of Army General G.K. Zhukov, commander of the front forces, dated October 26, 1941, speaking about sending 3-4 platoons of anti-tank rifles to the 5th, 16th and 33rd armies, demanded “to take measures for the immediate use of this exceptionally effective and powerful weapon... giving their battalions and regiments." Zhukov's order of December 29 also pointed out the disadvantages of using anti-tank rifles - the use of crews as shooters, lack of interaction with anti-tank artillery and groups of tank destroyers, cases of leaving anti-tank rifles on the battlefield. As you can see, the effectiveness of the new weapon was not immediately appreciated; the command staff simply had little idea of the possibilities of its use. It is necessary to take into account the shortcomings of the first batches of anti-tank rifles.
Degtyarev's anti-tank rifles were first used in combat in Rokossovsky's 16th Army. The most famous fight There was a clash on November 16, 1941 at the Dubosekovo crossing during the defense of Moscow, between a group of tank destroyers of the 2nd battalion of the 1075th regiment of Panfilov’s 316th Infantry Division and 30 German tanks. 18 tanks that took part in the attacks were knocked out, but less than a fifth of the entire company remained alive. This battle showed the effectiveness of anti-tank grenades and anti-tank rifles in the hands of “tank destroyers”. However, he also revealed the need to cover the “fighters” with riflemen and support them with light regimental artillery.
To understand the role of anti-tank rifle units, it is necessary to remember tactics. In battle, the commander of a rifle battalion or regiment could leave a company of anti-tank rifles entirely at his disposal or transfer it to rifle companies, leaving at least a platoon of anti-tank rifles in the regiment’s anti-tank area as a defensive reserve. A platoon of anti-tank rifles could operate in full force or be split into half-platoons and squads of 2-4 rifles. The anti-tank rifle squad, acting independently or as part of a platoon, in battle had to “choose a firing position, equip it and camouflage it; quickly prepare for shooting, and also accurately hit enemy armored vehicles and tanks; during the battle, covertly and quickly change the firing position.” Firing positions were chosen behind artificial or natural obstacles, although quite often the crews simply took cover in bushes or grass. The positions were chosen in such a way as to ensure all-round fire at ranges of up to 500 meters, and a flank position was taken to the direction of movement of enemy tanks. Cooperation was also organized with other anti-tank formations and rifle units. Depending on the availability of time at the position, a full profile trench with a platform was prepared, a trench for all-round firing without or with a platform, a small trench for firing in a wide sector - in this case, shooting was carried out with the bipod removed or tucked in. Fire at tanks from anti-tank rifles was opened, depending on the situation, from a distance of 250 to 400 meters, preferably, of course, in the stern or side, however, at infantry positions, armor-piercing soldiers quite often had to “hit them head-on.” Anti-tank rifle crews were divided in depth and along the front at distances and intervals from 25 to 40 meters at an angle back or forward, and during flanking fire - in one line. The front of an anti-tank rifle squad is 50-80 meters, that of a platoon is 250-700 meters.
During the defense, “armor-piercing snipers” were deployed in echelon, preparing the main position and up to three spare ones. An observer-gunner on duty remained at the squad position until the enemy armored vehicles began to advance. If the tank was moving, it was recommended to concentrate the fire of several anti-tank rifles on it: when the tank approached, fire was fired at its turret, if the tank overcame a barrier, a scarp or embankment - along the bottom, if the tank was moving towards a neighbor - along the engine part, side and external tanks, in if the tank is removed - to the stern. Taking into account the increased armor of tanks, fire from anti-tank rifles was usually opened from a distance of 150-100 meters. When they approached directly to positions or when breaking into the depths of the defense, armor-piercing fighters and “tank destroyers” used anti-tank grenades and Molotov cocktails.
The commander of an anti-tank rifle platoon could allocate a squad participating in the defense to destroy enemy aircraft. This was a common task. For example, in the defense zone of the 148th Rifle Division (Central Front) near Kursk, 93 heavy and light machine guns and 65 anti-tank rifles were prepared to destroy air targets. Anti-tank rifles were often placed on improvised anti-aircraft installations. A tripod machine created for this purpose at plant No. 2 named after. Kirkizh was not accepted into production, and this is perhaps fair.
In 1944, staggered placement of anti-tank rifles in depth and along the front at a distance of 50 to 100 meters from each other was practiced. At the same time, mutual shooting of the approaches was ensured, and dagger fire was widely used. In winter, anti-tank rifles were mounted by crews on drags or sleds. In closed areas with non-shootable spaces for anti-tank rifle positions, groups of fighters with incendiary bottles and grenades were positioned in front of them. In the mountains, anti-tank rifle crews were, as a rule, located at road turns, entrances to valleys and gorges, and when defending heights - on tank-accessible and most gentle slopes.
During the offensive, a platoon of anti-tank rifles moved in rolling formations in the battle formation of a rifle battalion (company) in readiness to meet enemy armored vehicles with fire from at least two squads. The anti-tank rifle crews occupied positions in front between the rifle platoons. During an offensive with an open flank, armor-piercing units are usually kept on this flank. A squad of anti-tank rifles usually advanced on the flanks or in the gaps of a rifle company, and a platoon of anti-tank rifles - a battalion or company. Between positions, crews moved under cover of mortar and infantry fire along or hidden approaches.
During the attack, anti-tank rifles were located at the attack line. Their main task was to defeat enemy fire (primarily anti-tank) weapons. If tanks appeared, the fire was immediately transferred to them. During the battle in the depths of the enemy’s defense, platoons and squads of anti-tank rifles supported the advance of rifle units with fire, ensuring its protection “from surprise attacks by enemy armored vehicles and tanks from ambushes,” destroying counterattacking or dug-in tanks, as well as firing points. The crews were recommended to hit armored vehicles and tanks with flanking and crossfire.
During battles in the forest or populated areas, since the battle formations were dismembered, anti-tank rifle squads were often attached to rifle platoons. Moreover, a reserve of anti-tank rifles remained mandatory in the hands of the regiment or battalion commander. When advancing, anti-tank rifle units covered the rear and flanks of rifle regiments, battalions or companies, firing through vacant lots or squares, as well as along streets. When occupying defenses within the city, positions were placed at street intersections, squares, basements and buildings in order to keep alleys and streets, breaches and arches under fire. When defending a forest, the positions of anti-tank rifles were placed in depth, so that roads, clearings, paths and clearings were fired upon. On the march, a platoon of anti-tank rifles was attached to a marching outpost or followed in constant readiness to meet the enemy with fire in the column of the main forces. Anti-tank rifle units operated as part of forward and reconnaissance detachments, especially in rough terrain that made it difficult to carry out more heavy weapons. In the advanced detachments, armor-piercing detachments perfectly complemented the tank brigades - for example, on July 13, 1943, the advanced detachment of the 55th Guards Tank Regiment successfully repelled a counterattack of 14 German tanks with fire from anti-tank rifles and tanks in the Rzhavets area, knocking out 7 of them. Former Wehrmacht Lieutenant General E. Schneider, an arms specialist, wrote: “The Russians in 1941 had a 14.5-mm anti-tank rifle, which caused a lot of trouble for our tanks and light armored personnel carriers that appeared later.” In general, in some German works about the Second World War and the memoirs of Wehrmacht tank crews, Soviet anti-tank rifles were mentioned as weapons “worthy of respect,” but tribute was also paid to the courage of their crews. With high ballistic data, the 14.5 mm anti-tank rifle was distinguished by its manufacturability and maneuverability. Simonov's anti-tank rifle is considered best weapon of this class of the Second World War based on the combination of operational and combat qualities.
Having played a significant role in anti-tank defense in 1941-1942, anti-tank rifles had already lost their position by the summer of 1943 - with the increase in armor protection of assault guns and tanks over 40 millimeters. True, there were cases of successful combat between infantry anti-tank formations and heavy enemy tanks in previously prepared defensive positions. For example, a duel between the armor-piercing gunman Ganja (151st Infantry Regiment) and the Tiger. The first shot to the forehead did not produce any results, the armor-piercing officer put the anti-tank rifle in the trench and, letting the tank pass over him, fired at the stern, immediately changing position. While the tank was turning around to move to the trench, Ganzha fired a third shot into the side and set it on fire. However, this is the exception rather than the rule. If in January 1942 the number of anti-tank rifles in the troops was 8,116 units, in January 1943 - 118,563 units, in 1944 - 142,861 units, that is, in two years it increased 17.6 times, then in 1944 it began to decline. By the end of the war, the Active Army had only 40 thousand anti-tank rifles in service (their total resource as of May 9, 1945 was 257,500 units). The largest number of anti-tank rifles was supplied to the army in 1942 - 249,000 units, but already in the first half of 1945 there were only 800 units. The same picture was observed with 12.7 mm and 14.5 mm cartridges: in 1942 their production was 6 times higher than the pre-war level, but by 1944 it had decreased noticeably. Despite this, production of 14.5 mm anti-tank rifles continued until January 1945. A total of 471,500 units were produced during the war. The anti-tank rifle was a front-line weapon, which explains significant losses - during the war, 214 thousand anti-tank rifles of all models were lost, that is, 45.4%. The highest percentage of losses was observed in 41 and 42 - 49.7 and 33.7%, respectively. Material losses corresponded to the level of personnel losses.
The following figures indicate the intensity of the use of anti-tank rifles in the middle of the war. During the defense on the Kursk Bulge on the Central Front, 387 thousand rounds of anti-tank rifles were spent (48,370 per day), and on Voronezh - 754 thousand (68,250 per day). During the Battle of Kursk, more than 3.5 million rounds of anti-tank rifle ammunition were used. In addition to tanks, anti-tank rifles fired at firing points and embrasures of bunkers and pillboxes at a range of up to 800 meters, and at aircraft - up to 500 meters.
In the third period of the war, anti-tank rifles of Degtyarev and Simonov were used against light armored vehicles and lightly armored self-propelled guns, which were widely used by the enemy, as well as to combat firing points, especially in battles within the city, right up to the storming of Berlin. Often, guns were used by snipers to hit targets at a considerable distance or enemy shooters located behind armor shields. In August 1945, Degtyarev and Simonov's anti-tank rifles were used in battles with the Japanese. Here this type of weapon could come in handy, especially considering the relatively weak armor of Japanese tanks. However, the Japanese are against Soviet troops tanks were used very little.
Anti-tank rifles were in service not only with rifle units, but also with cavalry units. Here, to transport Degtyarev's gun, they used packs for cavalry saddles and pack saddles of the 1937 model. The gun was mounted above the horse's croup on a pack on a metal block with two brackets. The rear bracket was also used as a swivel support for firing from a horse at ground and air targets. At the same time, the shooter stood behind the horse, which was held by the handler. To drop anti-tank rifles to partisans and paratroopers, an elongated UPD-MM parachute bag with a shock absorber and a parachute chamber was used. Cartridges were quite often dropped from strafing flight without a parachute in closures wrapped in burlap. Soviet anti-tank rifles were transferred to foreign formations that were formed in the USSR: for example, 6,786 guns were transferred to the Polish Army, 1,283 units were transferred to Czechoslovak units. During Korean War 50-53 years, soldiers of the North Korean army and Chinese volunteers used Soviet 14.5-mm anti-tank rifles against light armored vehicles and hitting point targets at a considerable distance (this experience was adopted from Soviet snipers).
The improvement of anti-tank rifles and the development of new schemes for them continued continuously. An example of an attempt to create a lighter anti-tank rifle can be considered the Rukavishnikov single-shot 12.7-mm anti-tank rifle, tested in February 1942. Its mass was 10.8 kg. The shutter system allowed it to fire at speeds of up to 12-15 rounds per minute. It was possible to replace the barrel with a 14.5 mm one. Lightness and simplicity prompted the range specialists to recommend Rukavishnikov’s new gun for mass production. But the increase in armor protection of enemy assault guns and tanks required a different approach.
The search for anti-tank weapons that would be capable of operating in infantry units and fighting the latest tanks , went in two directions - “enlargement” of anti-tank rifles and “lightening” anti-tank guns. In both cases, ingenious solutions were found and quite interesting designs were created. Blum's experimental single-shot anti-tank rifles and "PEC" rifles (Rashkov, Ermolaev, Slukhodky) aroused great interest from the GBTU and the GAU. Blum's anti-tank rifle was developed for a 14.5 mm cartridge (14.5x147) in which the muzzle velocity was increased to 1500 meters per second. The cartridge was created based on the cartridge case of a 23-mm aircraft cannon shot (at the same time, a 23-mm shot was developed based on a standard 14.5-mm cartridge to lighten the aircraft cannon). The gun had a rotary, longitudinally sliding bolt with two lugs and a spring-loaded reflector, which ensured reliable removal of the cartridge case at any speed of movement of the bolt. The barrel of the gun was equipped with a muzzle brake. The butt had a leather pad on the back of the head. Folding bipods were used for installation. RES anti-tank rifles were developed for a 20-mm shot with a projectile having an armor-piercing core (without explosives). The RES barrel was locked by a horizontally moving wedge bolt, which was opened manually and closed by a return spring. The trigger mechanism had a safety lever. The folding stock with a buffer resembled Degtyarev's anti-tank rifle. The gun was equipped with a muzzle brake-flame arrester and a wheeled machine with a shield. In April 1943, at the GBTU training ground, a captured Pz.VI "Tiger" was fired upon, which showed that Blum's anti-tank rifle was capable of penetrating 82 mm tank armor at a range of up to 100 meters. On August 10, 1943, both anti-tank guns were fired at the “Vystrel” course: this time they recorded the penetration of 55-mm armor by a bullet from a Blum anti-tank gun at a distance of 100 meters, and from the “RES” 70-mm armor was penetrated (at a distance of 300 meters the projectile RES penetrated 60 mm armor). From the commission’s conclusion: “in terms of armor-piercing action and power, both tested samples of anti-tank guns are significantly superior to the anti-tank guns of Degtyarev and Simonov, which are in service. The tested guns are a reliable means of combating medium tanks of the T-IV type and even more powerful armored vehicles.” Blum's anti-tank rifle was more compact, so the question of its adoption was raised. However, this did not happen. Small-scale production of 20-mm RES was carried out in Kovrov - in 1942, 28 units were produced at plant No. 2. , and in the 43rd – 43 units. This is where production ended. In addition, at plant No. 2, Degtyarev’s anti-tank rifle was converted into a “double-caliber” one with an increased initial speed chambered for a 23-mm VYa cannon (the production of the gun at the plant began in February 1942). Another version of the Degtyarev anti-tank gun with an increased initial speed used the principle of sequential firing of charges along the length of the barrel, according to the multi-chamber gun scheme theoretically calculated in 1878 by Perrault. At the top, approximately in the middle of the barrel of the anti-tank rifle, a box with a chamber was attached, which was connected by a transverse hole to the bore. A blank 14.5 mm cartridge was placed in this box, locked with a conventional bolt. Powder gases ignited the charge when fired blank cartridge, and he, in turn, increased the speed of the bullet, maintaining pressure in the barrel. True, the weapon’s recoil increased, but the system’s survivability and reliability turned out to be low.
The increase in armor penetration of anti-tank rifles did not keep pace with the increase in armor protection. In a journal dated October 27, 1943, the GAU artillery committee noted: “The anti-tank rifles of Degtyarev and Simonov often cannot penetrate the armor of a German medium tank. Therefore, it is necessary to create an anti-tank gun capable of penetrating 75-80 millimeters of armor at 100 meters, and nailing 50-55 millimeters of armor at an angle of 20-25°.” Even the “two-caliber” Degtyarev anti-tank rifles and the heavy “RES” had difficulty meeting these requirements. Work on anti-tank rifles was virtually curtailed.
Attempts to “lighten” artillery systems to the parameters of infantry weapons corresponded to the 1942 infantry combat regulations, which included anti-tank guns among infantry fire weapons. An example of such an anti-tank gun would be the experimental 25-mm LPP-25, developed by Zhukov, Samusenko and Sidorenko in 1942 at the Artillery Academy named after. Dzerzhinsky. Weight in combat position - 154 kg. The crew of the gun is 3 people. Armor penetration at a distance of 100 meters - 100 millimeters (sub-caliber projectile). In 1944, the airborne 37-mm ChK-M1 cannon of Charnko and Komaritsky was adopted. The original recoil damping system made it possible to reduce the combat weight to 217 kilograms (for comparison, the weight of the 37-mm gun of the 1930 model was 313 kilograms). The height of the line of fire was 280 millimeters. With a rate of fire of 15 to 25 rounds per minute, the cannon with a sub-caliber projectile penetrated 86 mm armor at a range of 500 meters and 97 mm armor at 300 meters. However, only 472 guns were manufactured - they, like the “reinforced” anti-tank guns, were simply not needed.
A source of information:
Magazine "Equipment and weapons" Semyon Fedoseev "Infantry against tanks"
