uring the 1920s and 1930s, the Soviet Union underwent extensive industrial and military expansion and modernization. Although no expert in the fields in question, Stalin understood that one of Russia’s most persistent problems, technological and industrial inferiority, played strongly against it during World War I, and if the burgeoning Soviet Union were going to survive, it would have to catch up. Some of the more secret projects undertaken in the interwar period such as aircraft and tank design and production, often in quiet cooperation with other countries, is still not widely studied or understood. However, the series of firearms developed shortly before WWII became almost iconic by default through their issue and performance under abysmal conditions on the
