The History of PKM, the Most Common Machine Gun In the World. Part 4

By Vladimir Onokoy

In Part 1 of this article, I wrote about the beginning of the Kalashnikov machinegun story, Part 2 was dedicated to the bureaucratic hoops he initially had to jump through, Part 3 described the technical triаls and competition between the Kalashnikov and his rivals, Nikitin and Sokolov. In this chapter, I will go into the story of troop trials that determined the destiny of Kalashnikov GPMG.The troop trials began in the summer of 1960. Four military units were chosen to test new machine guns. The first one was the officer school near Moscow called “Vistrel” (meaning “Shot”).The second unit was based in the modern territory of the Baltic states (Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia). The third was located in the desert of Central Asia (now Uzbekistan). The last one was located in Odesa, modern-day Ukraine.

PK manual: soldier using ski poles to shoot the GPMG in deep snow

This was the first time during the trials when both GPMGs were

Source: The Firearm Blog