SERVICE – Soviet military, licensed copies produced by Warsaw Pact and Communist countries.
In 1940-1941 the Soviet Union engaged in extensive testing to come up with a new submachinegun design. The requirement of earlier designs for extensive metal working to make the weapon was a major drawback as the German military was smashing its way into Russia. Factories and manufacturing facilities either fell to the Germans or were hastily packed and moved East. Accepted in 1941 was a design by George S. Shpagen for a submachinegun made almost entirely from heavy-gauge sheet metal stampings. The basic design was of a drum or box-magazine fed carbine-like weapon with a wooden stock. Manufacture of the new weapon did not get rolling until mid-1942, but it picked up speed quickly. Estimates are that between 8 to 10 million specimens were made before manufacture was suspended in the early 1950s. The numbers manufactured and employed make the PPSh-41 the most recognized submachine in Soviet hands during WWII.
The PPSh-41 has a one-piece upper receiver with an integral compensator and muzzle brake. The lower receiver is also a heavy sheet-metal stamping shaped and welded as needed. Many of the internal parts are either made of metal stampings or from limited machining. The two major parts that are produced by machine tools are the barrel and bolt. Original production weapons had a standard-style tangent rear sight. This was soon replaced by a much simpler “L” type flip sight. The drum magazines were a requirement for acceptance of the design, but were problematical throughout their service life. For positive functioning, magazines (2) were matched to an individual weapon and serial numbered to that gun. The box magazine that came later was never as difficult to use as the drums. The PPSh-41 was crude and had a high rate of fire. But for a military that had originally rejected submachine guns as “gangster weapons,” the PPSh-41 became very close to being the standard weapon of the Soviet infantry. Whole units went into combat against the Germans armed with little more than the PPSh-41. Any inaccuracy of fire by the troops with their submachine guns were eliminated by the sheer volume of fire from hundreds of troops firing full automatic weapons. Variations of the weapon were soon seen in the hands of Communist governments throughout the world, the weapons either being supplied by the Soviets outright or a native variation of the gun being produced.
