What if the nazis invented the AK-47?

Meh. That's like saying the Nazis designed both the MiG 15 and F-86, just because one of their prototypes on the drawing board, not only had swept wings, but also had the same general design. There are certain engineering principles that are semi-universal.

Actually Kalashnikov actual said about as much himself.
 
AK-47 significance

One critical feature of the AK-47, IMVHO, was its reliability, and that it's soldier proof. Easy to maintain, reliable when mistreated. Previous assault rifles, starting with the Federov Avtomat (Great War era Russian assault rifle) were finiky and involved much more work to keep them shooting. A weapon with a small, missing spring is an unbalanced club, no matter its normal rate of fire and all that. The German military at that time built overly-complex equipment, and paid a price for it.
 
As has been said before, a German "AK47 analogue" would have cause more problems than it would have solved. If you introduce a new weapon that blows through a new kind of ammunition at a faster rate than any other high caliber small arm of the time you cause yourself a number of problems:

1.) you now have to ship all new ammunition to the front and lots more of it. Even if you use a currently used round from another rifle, you still get the second problem now. And as has also been already said, the Germans had plenty of logistics problems, between their own shitty planning and the tendency of their railroads to get bombed into smitherenes by Allied airstrikes.

2.)As reliable and "soldier proof" as it may be, it would still require time for all of the soldiers being issued it to get used to and farmiliar with how to service and operate one.

3.) as great as it is, you still need to manufacture tons of them to replace all the older weapons that the soldiers were already using, this will draw much needed manufacturing capacity and resources away from something else.

4.)If it was made by the Reich, there is very little chance that it would be a real AK-47 analogue, because the Germans had this nasty little tendency to make everything incredibly over-engineered and overly expensive, which is the exact opposite of just what the AK-47 became known and loved for IOTL. In which case you get either a different version of the STG 44 or a german assault rifle version of the Thompson Submachine gun. Which is to say that it is an awesome but impractical weapon.
 
As has been said before, a German "AK47 analogue" would have cause more problems than it would have solved. If you introduce a new weapon that blows through a new kind of ammunition at a faster rate than any other high caliber small arm of the time you cause yourself a number of problems:

1.) you now have to ship all new ammunition to the front and lots more of it. Even if you use a currently used round from another rifle, you still get the second problem now. And as has also been already said, the Germans had plenty of logistics problems, between their own shitty planning and the tendency of their railroads to get bombed into smitherenes by Allied airstrikes.

2.)As reliable and "soldier proof" as it may be, it would still require time for all of the soldiers being issued it to get used to and farmiliar with how to service and operate one.

3.) as great as it is, you still need to manufacture tons of them to replace all the older weapons that the soldiers were already using, this will draw much needed manufacturing capacity and resources away from something else.

4.)If it was made by the Reich, there is very little chance that it would be a real AK-47 analogue, because the Germans had this nasty little tendency to make everything incredibly over-engineered and overly expensive, which is the exact opposite of just what the AK-47 became known and loved for IOTL. In which case you get either a different version of the STG 44 or a german assault rifle version of the Thompson Submachine gun. Which is to say that it is an awesome but impractical weapon.


Thanks dude, thats the answer i was looking for!
 
We don’t do conspiracy theories round here and Kalashnikov’s development of the AK-47 is well documented.

Well, there's still some debate about whether he had a major role or not. But it was definately a Soviet design.

Maybe I'll have to order "The Gun". That would probably put alot of AK myths to rest.
 
4.)If it was made by the Reich, there is very little chance that it would be a real AK-47 analogue, because the Germans had this nasty little tendency to make everything incredibly over-engineered and overly expensive, which is the exact opposite of just what the AK-47 became known and loved for IOTL. In which case you get either a different version of the STG 44 or a german assault rifle version of the Thompson Submachine gun. Which is to say that it is an awesome but impractical weapon.

Uh, right. Have you ever handled an StG44 or even SEEN one? Or what about the MG 42? Those are the exceptions from the rule. The StG44 pioneered the assault rifle (hell, it's even the name giver of a whole class of weapons, imagine that) and the MG 42 is simply the best, deadliest GPMG of all time. There's a reason it's still in service around the world today and only now in the process of being replced in the German Army by the MG121 should tell you something.

The AK 47 was at least partly based on the StG44. Mikhail Kalashnikov didn't just pull the design out of his butt. He said so himself, no matter what the Soviets would have the world believe.

But even an earlier introduction would not have made an inch of a difference. Zum Glück...
 
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It makes no difference... the Germans already had demonstrated superiority at the squad and platoon level with their GPMG's and fire team doctrines. Increasing this small unit superiority means nothing versus their choice of taking on 80 percent of the world's industrial power
 
Well, there's still some debate about whether he had a major role or not. But it was definately a Soviet design.

Maybe I'll have to order "The Gun". That would probably put alot of AK myths to rest.
I have read The Gun. Though nothing is designed in a vacuam, the book supports that the AK-47 is largely Kalishnikov's independent creation.

As a side note, the design of the AK-47 is only half the equation regarding the success of the weapon. The other half of the equation is the design of the cartridge. Like the AK-47, the 7.62 X 39mm is a marvel of compromises that combines the best attributes of several different cartridges. The AK-47 and the 7.62 X39mm paired each other brilliantly.

NO IT WASN`T!:mad: The internal mechanisms were entirely different.
I agree.
 
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Well, there's still some debate about whether he had a major role or not. But it was definately a Soviet design.

Maybe I'll have to order "The Gun". That would probably put alot of AK myths to rest.

The Gun is excellent. Chivers goes in depth in the selection process and development of the AK in the early chapters. There's a lot of contradiction in Kalashnikov's story that blurs the lines between fact and legend- the myth became very important to Soviet Union itself. In all likelihood the AK-47 was designed by a team headed by by him, and it was an amalgamation of many ideas. What does that mean? The StG-44 certainly influence the design of the AK-47, but it was not a clone. Indeed it took ideas from a lot of modern designs at the time, including the M-1 Garand and M-1 carbine.
 
This thread is completely stupid... it might as well be what if Hitler had a constantly dialated anus? Would that make D-Day fail?:mad::mad:
 
This thread is completely stupid... it might as well be what if Hitler had a constantly dialated anus? Would that make D-Day fail?:mad::mad:

Actually it might...

If he was constantly dilated then there is little chance of him getting a good nights sleep, think of all the cr@p leaking out. He could well have to wake early to clean himself up after the night, leading to a habit of early morning meetings with his staff.

His officers would then not have worried about waking him in order to get approval to unlease the Tanks on the invading allies and that could have changed the overall outcome.....

There you go, a (semi) plausible explanation for you lol
 
A German analogue to the AK-47 would probably have been used far too late and in too little quantity to alter anything, and research to make one would have been counterproductive. Just like with ballistic missiles and jets as opposed to aircraft and weaponry that could have been made and would have narrowed within a few extents OTL gaps dramatically aided by Nazi attempts to enter the 1950s.
 
A German analogue to the AK-47 would probably have been used far too late and in too little quantity to alter anything, and research to make one would have been counterproductive. Just like with ballistic missiles and jets as opposed to aircraft and weaponry that could have been made and would have narrowed within a few extents OTL gaps dramatically aided by Nazi attempts to enter the 1950s.
You posted without reading the damn thread didn't you:rolleyes:
 
Uh, right. Have you ever handled an StG44 or even SEEN one? Or what about the MG 42? Those are the exceptions from the rule. The StG44 pioneered the assault rifle (hell, it's even the name giver of a whole class of weapons, imagine that) and the MG 42 is simply the best, deadliest GPMG of all time. There's a reason it's still in service around the world today and only now in the process of being replced in the German Army by the MG121 should tell you something.

The AK 47 was at least partly based on the StG44. Mikhail Kalashnikov didn't just pull the design out of his butt. He said so himself, no matter what the Soviets would have the world believe.

But even an earlier introduction would not have made an inch of a difference. Zum Glück...


Perhaps the word 'impractical' wasn't the most apt, but the STG 44 was still not as easy and cheap to produce as the AK. I never said that it was a bad weapon though, in fact as I recall, I used the word 'awesome.'

My main point was that a German 'AK-47' would not be known for the same things that the RL AK-47 is known for, so it wouldn't really be an ATL AK-47.
 
You posted without reading the damn thread didn't you:rolleyes:

I do know about the gun that people are claiming "is" the AK-47. It didn't change anything for the Germans IOTL, so I'm answering the question as to whether or not they'dve manufactured an earlier exact version of Kalashkinov's weapon. That could not possibly reverse what happened with Operation Overlord, given the extent to which Germans were still buying into Fortitude three weeks after the fact, the degree to which the Soviets were already tearing them new ones, and that by D-Day all the Western allies so outgunned them it wasn't even funny.

A different type of small-arms fire won't change that one way or the other.
 
The nearest thing to a WW II German AK-47 was the StG 45(M), whose roller-delayed blow back action became the basis for the famous post-war Heckler & Koch G3, used by the West German military and exported into many countries.

It used the same ammunition as the StG 44, but was much cheaper to produce.
Parts for only 30 rifles of this type were made at the end of WW II.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StG_45(M)
 
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