Russia - Forgotten Weapons

PSM Shooting: 5.45x18mm vs 7.62x25mm on Soft Armor

July 1, 2017 Ian McCollum 32

Following up on yesterday’s history and disassembly of the PSM, today we are taking it out to the range for some shooting. In addition, wehave some generic Level IIIA soft body armor to test. We […]

Soviet PSM Pistol History: Really a KGB Assassination Gun?

June 30, 2017 Ian McCollum 37

The PSM is a Soviet pistol from the late 1970s which has gotten itself quite the fanciful reputation here in the US, thanks to extreme rarity and some imaginative magazine articles. Common lore would have […]

Dragunov Variations: Military SVD, Izhmash Tiger, Chinese NDM-86

April 20, 2017 Ian McCollum 28

The SVD Dragunov was the Soviet marksman’s rifle that finally replaced the failed attempt to issue the SVT-40 as a precision rifle. It was introduced in 1963, after about 5 years of development, and its […]

Rocket Surgery: Inside the Russian Nikonov AN94 (Video)

April 11, 2017 Ian McCollum 75

https://youtu.be/gtMssTSnRHU Armament Research Services (ARES) is a specialist technical intelligence consultancy, offering expertise and analysis to a range of government and non-government entities in the arms and munitions field. For detailed photos of the guns […]

Review: Semiauto DPM by SMG Guns

March 7, 2017 Ian McCollum 11

I have had a parts kit for a Soviet DPM light machine gun (actually a Polish one, but the design is identical) stashed away for many years now, with the hope to eventually have it […]

American Mosin Nagant Rifles (Video)

January 30, 2017 Ian McCollum 12

Everyone is aware of the Mosin Nagant rifle, but not everyone realizes that about 2 million of them were actually manufactured in the United States. Russia had been producing M91 Mosin Nagant rifles in their […]

Finnish Mosin Nagant Overview (M91/24, M27, M28, M28/30, M39)

January 22, 2017 Ian McCollum 24

Finland found itself with nearly 200,000 Mosin Nagant rifles in its possession after breaking away from Russian rule in 1917, and those rifles would for the basis of Finnish infantry arms until the adopted of […]

Slabs and Waffles and Bakes, Oh My! A Brief History of AK Mags

December 13, 2016 Ian McCollum 32

In recent months, a couple of interesting developmental varieties of AK mags have appeared on the market here in the US, and I figure folks might be interested in learning about the history of where […]

Vintage Saturday: Austrian Prisoners

October 29, 2016 Ian McCollum 43

This photo is an original color picture, not a modern colorization – taken by Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorsky, a pioneer of color photography. Also of interest, note that the Russian guard on the far left is […]

Book Review: The Makarov Pistol – Soviet Union & East Germany

October 25, 2016 Ian McCollum 16

Until recently, the only good reference book on the Makarov pistol has been Volume 16 of Fred Datig’s Soviet Arms series – which is hampered by the lack of public information available to the author […]