OTL, the Soviets didn't get to cranking out shoulder-mounted infantry projectors en masse until after the war. There are reasons that range from the general 'emergency survival' mode, to the issues with developing domestic shaped charges/HEAT, to the need to equip millions and millions of soldiers that brings up the cost-effectiveness issue of OTL WWII projectors being not that much better in the grand scheme of things than hand-mines, grenades, and other expedients.
So, getting to a viable projector that can be fielded en masse in 1941 has a lot of issues, even without the problem that it will probably come at the expense of something else that's unambiguously important. Kurchevsky escaping the purge has been mentioned, but I think he's more of a hindrance than a help. The guy, instead of perfecting a few viable designs in niches where they'd be useful, went on a manic quest to make everything from aircraft guns to artillery to naval guns recoilless, holding up conventional artillery that worked in the process. You'd have to nudge him out of the way or change his basic personality.
Even with the politics and just-right level of resources being allocated, there's still a big technological hurdle to be overcome. If the penetrator warhead problems stay the same, and there's a hold up in designing, and more crucially manufacturing them in great quantity, it has to rely on brute power. The OTL Gustav M42 recoilless gun is an example of that path--and it's not that much, if any better than the anti-tank rifles the Soviets used historically.
So, the alternate challengers have to make a weapon that's unambiguously better than the heavy anti-tank rifles of OTL (which, after all, could break through early war tanks), and make it cheap and easy to build enough that it can equip enough to the overexpanding Red Army to make its presence felt, and make it user-friendly enough that the soldiers of said overexpanded army in 1941 can use it effectively, and have its development cycle finish quickly enough and be in the right place so that it can be revved up and not lost or dislocated in the post-Barbarossa scramble. That requires a lot of skill and luck, and might need a certain flying mammal to come by for a bit.
Now, with that criteria met, the net result might, and probably would just be a bit different statistical noise to OTL. The (insert name) recoilless rifle becomes remembered as the anti-tank weapon of the war the same way the PTRD and PTRS were OTL, there's a few more losses of AFVs here, maybe something worse here due a butterfly due to resource allocation (if it comes at the expense of T-34s or artillery, both of which matter more).
However, even slight attrition helps, especially since this isn't the Axis changed weapon battling the Allies who have the production and manpower to shrug off increased losses, this is an Allied weapon digging (just a little) deeper into the already shallow German resource pool.
So, with this path outlined, how (im)plausible is it and how much of an effect would the small tactical advantages of this super-projector and any increased attrition have on wearing down the Axis war machine?
So, getting to a viable projector that can be fielded en masse in 1941 has a lot of issues, even without the problem that it will probably come at the expense of something else that's unambiguously important. Kurchevsky escaping the purge has been mentioned, but I think he's more of a hindrance than a help. The guy, instead of perfecting a few viable designs in niches where they'd be useful, went on a manic quest to make everything from aircraft guns to artillery to naval guns recoilless, holding up conventional artillery that worked in the process. You'd have to nudge him out of the way or change his basic personality.
Even with the politics and just-right level of resources being allocated, there's still a big technological hurdle to be overcome. If the penetrator warhead problems stay the same, and there's a hold up in designing, and more crucially manufacturing them in great quantity, it has to rely on brute power. The OTL Gustav M42 recoilless gun is an example of that path--and it's not that much, if any better than the anti-tank rifles the Soviets used historically.
So, the alternate challengers have to make a weapon that's unambiguously better than the heavy anti-tank rifles of OTL (which, after all, could break through early war tanks), and make it cheap and easy to build enough that it can equip enough to the overexpanding Red Army to make its presence felt, and make it user-friendly enough that the soldiers of said overexpanded army in 1941 can use it effectively, and have its development cycle finish quickly enough and be in the right place so that it can be revved up and not lost or dislocated in the post-Barbarossa scramble. That requires a lot of skill and luck, and might need a certain flying mammal to come by for a bit.
Now, with that criteria met, the net result might, and probably would just be a bit different statistical noise to OTL. The (insert name) recoilless rifle becomes remembered as the anti-tank weapon of the war the same way the PTRD and PTRS were OTL, there's a few more losses of AFVs here, maybe something worse here due a butterfly due to resource allocation (if it comes at the expense of T-34s or artillery, both of which matter more).
However, even slight attrition helps, especially since this isn't the Axis changed weapon battling the Allies who have the production and manpower to shrug off increased losses, this is an Allied weapon digging (just a little) deeper into the already shallow German resource pool.
So, with this path outlined, how (im)plausible is it and how much of an effect would the small tactical advantages of this super-projector and any increased attrition have on wearing down the Axis war machine?