Who invented ak 47 rifle

Mikhail Kalashnikov, who died last month aged 94 , designed the weapon that became synonymous with killing on a sometimes indiscriminate scale.

He was seen in the Soviet Union as a national hero and symbol of Moscow's proud military past. However, Kalashnikov had said he never intended for the rifle to become the preferred weapon in conflicts around the world. He wrote to the head of the Russian Orthodox Church in May , wondering if he was responsible for the many deaths caused by the weapon he had created.

In his letter to the Russian Patriarch, Kalashnikov wrote that one question was causing pain to his soul. In his letter, Kalashnikov said that he first went into a church at the age of 91 and was later baptised.

The paper quotes a spokesman for the patriarch as saying that when weapons serve to defend the fatherland, the Russian Orthodox Church supports those who created them as well as the soldiers who use them. AK's name stands for "Kalashnikov's Automatic" and the year it was designed, Also called the "Kalashnikov", the rifle and its variants are the weapons of choice for dozens of armies and guerrilla groups around the world. Russian Mikhail Kalashnikov invented the weapon that bears his name in the middle of the 20th century.

Born on Nov. While still in the military, he produced several designs that lost out to competitors before eventually producing the first AK In , the AK became the assault rifle of the Soviet Army. Later adopted by other nations in the Warsaw Pact, the weapon quickly spread around the world, becoming a symbol of revolution in such far-flung lands as Vietnam, Afghanistan, Colombia and Mozambique, on whose flag it figures prominently. Over the course of his long life, Kalashnikov continued to tweak his classic design.

He also developed the cartridge-fed PK machine gun. Modified AKs are still in production in countries around the world. It is relatively inexpensive to produce, short and light to carry, and easy to use, with little recoil. It also boasts legendary reliability under harsh conditions ranging from waterlogged jungles to Middle Eastern sandstorms, in both extreme cold and heat. Kalashnikov was fitted with a pacemaker at a Moscow hospital in June and had been in hospital in Izhevsk since November 17, state media reported.

Shortly after fighting in World War Two, he created the AK, whose number stands for the year But Kalashnikov said pride in his invention was mixed with the pain of seeing it used by criminals and child soldiers. As well as being embraced by armies, anti-Western revolutionary movements and leftist leaders around the world, the relatively cheap and simple rifle has been used by gangsters, drug traffickers, militants and rebels of all stripes.

General Augusto Pinochet. The automatic rifle he designed became one of the world's most familiar and widely used weapons. Its comparative simplicity made it cheap to manufacture, as well as reliable and easy to maintain. Although honoured by the state, Kalashnikov made little money from his gun. He once said he would have been better off designing a lawn mower.