Czechoslovakia - Forgotten Weapons

Origins of the Legendary CZ-75: Short Rail and Pre-B Models

November 28, 2025 Ian McCollum 4

Find something cool for Black Friday at Headstamp Publishing! https://www.headstamppublishing.com The CZ-75 began development in the late 1960s as a commercial project. It was not intended for Czechoslovak military use, but instead for export sales […]

Project PRAK: Converting the CZ50 Pistol to 9x18mm Makarov

October 31, 2025 Ian McCollum 7

In 1966, CZ undertook Project PRAK (“Slingshot”) to investigate the possibility of converting the CZ50 pocket pistol to 9x18mm Makarov. The PM Makarov was adopted in the 1950s and used throughout the eastern bloc, but […]

ZK-466: CZ Makes a Folding Submachine Gun

October 17, 2025 Ian McCollum 14

The ZK-466 was one of the post-war submachine guns developed in Czechoslovakia as part of the competition for a new Czech military SMG. Developed by Josef Koucky (who was also designer of the ZK-383 before […]

Prototype vz.38 “Nutcracker” in 9x19mm

September 19, 2025 Ian McCollum 19

Check out Headstamp Publishing’s extensive catalog of excellent books: https://www.headstamppublishing.com/home-forgotten The Czechoslovakian military adopted the vz.38 pistol as a simple blowback action chambered for .380 ACP (well, the Czech military version of .380 ACP). Other […]

Czechoslovakian Flare Pistols: vz 44/67 and vz 44/81

September 12, 2025 Ian McCollum 12

In 1951, Czechoslovakia received the technical data package for the Soviet SPSh flare pistol. This was a simple single shot break-action 26.5mm signal flare launcher, and they put it into production from 1952 through 1958. […]

ZK 381: Czech Pre-War Prototype Battle Rifle

July 28, 2025 Ian McCollum 7

The ZK-381 was designed by Josef Koucký, his first design of 1938 (hence 381). This is one of the last of the Czech pre-war self-loading rifle projects, of which there were quite a lot. It […]

Fox .32: Police Prototype of CZ’s First Pistol

July 18, 2025 Ian McCollum 24

Alois Tomiška, best know for the Little Tom pistol, was one of the original founders of the South Bohemia Armory, which became CZ of Strakonice. The first pistol produced by the company was his “Fox” […]

CZ247: Experimental Swivel-Action SMG

July 16, 2025 Ian McCollum 11

The CZ247 was developed for Czechoslovakia’s post-war submachine gun trials, where it was pitted against the ZB47. It was a simple blowback 9x19mm SMG with a number of interesting elements, most notably the ability to […]

URZ: Czech Prototype Universal Modular Weapon

July 7, 2025 Ian McCollum 24

The URZ (Univerzální Ruční Zbraň, or Universal Hand Weapon) was a 1966 project designed by Jiří Čermák (designer of the vz.58 rifle). He envisioned a weapons system family with largely interchangeable elements that could be […]

Samopal vz 38: Czechoslovakia’s Interwar Drum-Fed SMG in .380

June 25, 2025 Ian McCollum 25

Military interest in a submachine gun was late in Czechoslovakia, but by the late 1930s a development program was put into place. Interestingly, the main use case for an SMG was seen as being a […]