Towards the XXVII Congress of the CPSU
During the Great Patriotic War, when I was one of the deputies of the People's Commissar of Armaments of the USSR, I was assigned to produce small arms and aircraft weapons. Past events and days that are deeply etched into the memory should, in my opinion, be reflected in the press as they were presented to their participants.
1. The day before
I was sent to the Izhevsk Plant after graduating from the Mechanical Industrial technical school in Novgorod in 1928. He started his career as a timekeeper; joined the Communist Party at the factory; continued working in production, and graduated from the Institute. The plant at that time was a huge combine that had its own metallurgy, rolling production, cast steel, made rifles, hunting rifles, produced Udmurt lathes, motorcycles, wire, metal tape, had a powerful woodworking shop and its own power plant, which supplied electricity not only to the plant, but also to the entire city. At the disposal of the plant was a gas station, which, processing wood, provided gas to steel shops, a blacksmith shop, thermal and a number of other industries. The plant also had its own logging facilities, as it consumed about 100 wagons of firewood per day in peacetime, and 300 wagons in wartime. Railway tracks with a length of more than 150 kilometers were laid in the forest. It had its own fleet of locomotives and wagons. Internal transport of the plant was provided by 300 horses, and more than 4 thousand more horses worked in the forest.
At the beginning of 1939. Izhevsk plant was divided into machine - building plants (this included machine-building production-the manufacture of rifles, hunting rifles, machine tools, motorcycles) and metallurgical (production of steel, rolled products, tape, wire, blacksmith shop of large forgings and all energy). I was appointed director of the engineering department. About two months after the division, the People's Commissar of Armaments of the USSR, B. L. Vannikov, came to us. After a detailed review of the plants, Boris Lvovich pointed out some shortcomings in their work, noting that both metallurgists and machine builders still have significant unused reserves. At the machine-building plant, it is necessary to reduce the labor intensity of rifle production, think about whether it is possible to create automatic lines for some parts. We asked the People's Commissar to pay attention to the poor supply of abrasive materials, especially grinding wheels, diamonds for refueling, as well as railway transport for exporting timber. Boris Lvovich promised to help, but said that he gives out diamond "pencils" only from his safe personally in the hands of plant directors, and suggested that we find a way out of the situation ourselves. Vannikov was a peculiar person: he liked to joke, tell a joke. For the identified shortcomings in the consideration of production and other issues, I tried not to scold, but as if somewhat ironic. If you were convinced that the employee was not suitable for this job, you helped them find another job without offending them. The main thing in his work is a skillful selection of personnel. He often took the initiative in organizational matters of interest to the Ministry of Education and Science.-
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other industries, did not take on small issues, entrusting it to others.
Back in 1934, the Izhevsk plant was commissioned, together with the designer S. G. Simonov, to finalize an automatic rifle of its design. Sergey Gavrilovich was an extremely hardworking man, he could make any part of the rifle himself, but his hotness and sharp reaction to small comments created an atmosphere of tension when prototypes and small series of automatic rifle products were being manufactured. In 1936, this rifle was adopted by the Red Army. Until 1940, the plant produced 65,800 AVS. In world practice and in the domestic defense industry, an automatic rifle was manufactured in mass quantities for the first time. In 1939, a group of factory workers were awarded orders and medals. Sergey Gavrilovich was awarded the Order of the Red Star, and I was also awarded this order.
During the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940, such an episode took place. On one of our automatic rifles, the spring that feeds the cartridge from the magazine to the receiver burst. As soon as we were informed of this, we sent our specialists to the front. It turned out that the rifle was hanging at the entrance to the room in the cold minus 40° and burst not in combat conditions. A small, almost microscopic scratch was found in the spring at the point of failure. Conventional spring steel loses 20 to 30% of its strength at minus 40° C, and almost 50% of its strength is lost at minus 60° C. Experimentally, within a few days, it was determined that a small percentage of nickel and very little vanadium should be added to steel. These events and the elimination of their consequences cost the plant managers many sleepless nights. The issue was resolved, and new data was added to our knowledge.
In 1939, the S. I. Mosin rifle was discontinued at the Tula Arms Factory and instead the production of the F. V. Tokarev self-loading rifle (SVT) was organized. The process of organizing the production of this product was very difficult, which was compounded by the fact that the factory had to reduce the weight of the rifle; in mass production, this always requires a lot of effort. At the beginning of 1940, Izhevsk gunsmiths were offered to stop producing Simonov rifles and also master SVT, without stopping making the Mosin rifle. The change in the production cycle is huge: you need to make hundreds of complex devices and dies anew, thousands of types of new cutting and measuring tools, master new grades of steel, rolled profiles, belts, wires, etc.
Although the highest military circles debated the question of which is better - ABC or SVT, in the end it was decided to produce a self-loading Tokarev rifle, which, according to some sources, had advantages over the ABC. I did not care about the advantages of one rifle over another: the difference in combat properties of these rifles was almost insignificant. I was thinking about something else: do I need to equip the army with rifles of three different designs? This complicated the training of fighters and could cause a failure in the supply of troops for a long time. About six months later, Izhevsk gunsmiths began to produce SVT. By the end of 1940, their output reached 500 rifles per day, and in 1941, more than 250 thousand SVT units were manufactured.
Looking ahead, I will say that in the following years, when the production of submachine guns was organized by V. A. Degtyarev and especially G. S. Shpagin (SHIP), the military's interest in automatic and self-loading rifles disappeared: almost in 1942 they were discontinued. The Mosin rifle and submachine guns were easy to handle. Millions of soldiers during the Great Patriotic War fought mainly with these types of small arms.
In 1940, B. L. Vannikov summoned me to Moscow. An urgent task was given to make a batch of machine guns designed by Ya. G. Taubin for arming aircraft. They gave me two bags of drawings and told me to make five machine guns within a month. At the factory, we studied the drawings down to the smallest detail. The design of the machine gun, which was designed for 800 rounds per minute, did not arouse our enthusiasm due to a number of difficult and dubious places. Decided to make a pool-
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metas on universal machines with minimal tooling with the help of the most qualified locksmiths, shapers and mechanics. Neither they nor the management team left the factory day or night. After a month and ten days, the machine guns were ready. Vannikov inquired about the case almost every other day. The machine guns were tested with a relatively small number of shots (200-300 pieces per machine gun) and then reported to the People's Commissariat that the machine guns were ready. Three days later, Vannikov, Deputy People's Commissar of Armaments P. N. Goremykin, and Deputy Head of the Air Force Department I. F. Sakrier arrived at the plant. Each machine gun was loaded with a tape of 100 rounds. We shot all five machine guns in turn, worked perfectly, not a single delay. They all have happy faces. Vannikov gave the command to charge the second stage. However, not a single machine gun completed the tape. There were delays in firing and even breakdowns, after 20-70 shots the machine gun stopped. It turned out that the breakdowns were mainly related to the shutter. To find out the reasons for this situation, they called me alone. As a result, they were given the task to make 10 more machine guns within two to three months.
Late at night, I gathered my colleagues and specialists, told them what they were criticizing us for and what they were demanding of us. The designers spoke at the meeting and all unanimously declared that such a design was not suitable and the machine gun would not work. Three days later, Boris Lvovich called the plant, asking about the progress of work at the plant. I asked the People's Commissar to let me fly to Moscow for a day or two. Consent was given. Upon arrival in the capital, I decided first of all to go to the designer of the machine gun Taubin. We sat with him for three hours and sorted out every defect in the design. Taubin, after much deliberation and careful inspection of the defects, was forced to agree with me and said that it would take him four to five months to make adjustments and make a good machine gun. I asked Taubin to write a note to Vannikov and explain the situation. I put this note in front of the People's Commissar. And when he read it, I asked: "Boris Lvovich, what should I do?" "What do you suggest?" "No," he said. I said that I had information that the same purpose and almost at the exit machine gun designer M. E. Berezin. In the meantime, let Taubin improve his machine gun, and we'll try to work with Berezin. Vannikov asked I. V. Stalin to accept it. After that, the command was given to call Comrade Berezin. In the morning-a meeting with the People's Commissar. We listened to Berezin, who spoke about the state of development of his machine gun, and decided that he should take the drawings from his design bureau and fly with me to the Urals. We were given the task to make five or ten new machine guns in the shortest possible time, using factory designers if necessary.
The factory has started a friendly team work on the new car. Berezin was a very simple man, without any conceit, carefully listened to the opinion of factory designers. After 40 days, three machine guns were manufactured. During training, they fired a lot of them. When the designer discovered flaws, he quickly tried to correct them. Finally, they invited me to the shooting gallery as if for a general testing. The machine guns were loaded four times for 100 rounds. They worked flawlessly. Then it was necessary to make the maximum number of shots from at least one machine gun in order to test its strength and survivability. During the week, 4 thousand shots were fired from one machine gun. After that, small breakdowns began to appear, which, according to the military, made the machine gun insufficiently suitable for the Air Force. The breakdowns were such that we quickly managed to find a solution to get rid of them: either by using a different steel for the part, or by better heat treatment, and sometimes by making adjustments to the design. In any case, we were able to tell the People's Commissar that the machine gun can be submitted for state testing in a short time. And with the designers of the aircraft, all issues were coordinated during the completion of the machine gun. It was important to agree with the aviators on how and where to place the machine gun, place the machine gun belt, which side is more convenient to ensure the supply of ammunition, etc. Two weeks after testing the Berezin machine gun at the Air Force training ground, the decision of the Defense Committee of the USSR Council of Defense came out to put it on mass production at the Izhevsk Machine-Building Plant.
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A new stage of work - mastering the production of a machine gun. The factory staff was mobilized to quickly give these weapons to the army. The party organization of the plant and the district party committee played a huge role in creating a new product that was still unusual for the plant. They found rooms at the factory where machine guns were assembled, as well as their shooting during debugging. To speed up the decision on the production of products, a large wooden barrack was temporarily built on the bank of the river, which flowed through the territory of the plant from a huge factory pond. The river is small, but beyond it is the old riverbed, and beyond that is the mountain behind which the city was located. A new assembly building was built in 10 days, and the shooting gallery extension took 20 days.
The release of new products has begun. Three days after the shooting, a phone call rang out: "Comrade director, please shoot carefully, otherwise bullets fly into the city, and people get them between the summer and winter frames." The shooting stopped and began to understand what was going on. It turned out that a lot of bullets ricocheted off the water and flew into the city, of course, already in a weakened state. They hit the walls of buildings, but people did not have time to notice this yet, and only noticed those bullets that penetrated the houses through the windows. There was no time to rebuild the shooting gallery. Within three days, a log wall about six meters high was erected, and a mountain of earth was poured behind it. We tried to shoot-the bullets that ricocheted off the code now hit the created "fortress". Thus, the incident was resolved. Work on the production of machine guns continued with a daily increase in their number. The tension in the factory was increasing. In addition to developing a self-loading rifle and a Berezin machine gun for aviation, they were assigned to increase the production of conventional rifles from 1200 to 2 thousand per day.
In 1940, the teams of Izhevsk machine-building and metallurgical plants were suppliers not only of weapons, but also of rolled metal, wire and tape, and forging blanks to dozens of factories that produced products for the army. We were especially closely connected with the aviation industry, the production of ammunition and related industries. We and our metallurgical neighbors were flooded with requests to change the profiles of rolled products, wire, casting, and forging blanks. This was explained by the fact that due to the complication of the international situation and the beginning of the Second World War, many factories began to replace some types and types of military equipment with others. At first, our machine-building plant began to receive increased tasks to increase the production of large-caliber machine guns, because now they not only began to produce new aircraft equipped with more powerful weapons, but also put it on already mass-produced aircraft.
Those who worked directly in the factories had to quickly produce new or modify old machines and other equipment, make new equipment, introduce technological innovations into production, replace many of the materials used for our products, and all this had to be done in such a way as to avoid gross mistakes or miscalculations. The party and the Government had such control over the progress of tasks that any result of our actions in the factories, whether good or bad, was immediately known to the Government. Of course, it is especially clear to production workers that the work being carried out to master many types of new equipment, if everything starts with drawings, could not pass in a short time. New ideas, new suggestions and clarifications were born from designers, technologists, and innovative workers. In addition, it was necessary to pick up the pace of production of products in the required quantities. Therefore, the work that was launched in 1940 continued into 1941.
For us, who are still relatively young specialists, those years of the country's life were and still are a huge school for learning new things, for being able to unite and direct the team to implement these innovations in industry, to instill in them a sense of responsibility to the country and to the Soviet people for fulfilling their tasks. Back then, I came to the conclusion that the team leader must be an honest, objective, courageous person in making decisions, feel the elbow of his comrades, their friendship, should not hide behind someone else's back, not offend people, but convince them, see in everyone first of all positive, and this is the main thing.
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it will give them the opportunity to choose the appropriate job for their abilities. If this was observed, even the most difficult task of a manager was performed by people quickly, with love, and not out of fear of their superiors, but in order not to let down their team.
2. At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War...
In the first days of the war, we were all so affected by the urgency of the situation that no special words were needed for a person to give their full strength to the cause, without unnecessary reminders. Tens of millions of people have shown heroism in their work, and this is why our Motherland is strong. The first impulse of the people is to go immediately to the front. Almost all employees of the party committee, the head committee, the Komsomol committee, the editorial office of the factory newspaper Metallurg, and many others voluntarily joined the Active Army. More than 2 thousand people joined the people's militia. Instead of those who went to the units, women and teenagers got up. Pensioners returned to the factory.
I didn't have enough days. Every day I had to visit every shop, every construction site. All the workshops are on the move: equipment was moved everywhere to accommodate more machines to increase capacity and increase output. In the first days of July, I received instructions from the People's Commissariat to be in Moscow on July 7. It turned out that there was a decision of the Central Committee of the party to appoint me Deputy People's Commissar of Armaments. The Central Committee recommended that I go to the People's Commissariat as soon as possible and meet People's Commissar Dmitry Fyodorovich Ustinov, who was appointed to this post a few days ago.
The new assignment was a serious challenge for me. Dmitry Fyodorovich greeted me affably. He informed about the state of affairs in the People's Commissariat, said that the situation at most factories is difficult due to the fact that many enterprises have not yet completed the transition to new types of military equipment, and the volume of production for a particular type of military equipment has not been determined. I was entrusted with the management of all factories that produce small arms and aircraft weapons. The leadership of the People's Commissariat was quickly completed. Many were still quite young, under the age of 40. V. M. Ryabikov, who had previously worked in Leningrad at the Bolshevik factory and became the first deputy of B. L. Vannikov before the war, had the greatest experience in the work of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs.
The system for the production of the aforementioned small arms included the Tula Arms Factory, Izhevsk arms and steel plants, Kovrov Mechanical Plant and a number of others. The state of affairs at almost all the factories was similar: either the production of previous products was increased in a short time, or in parallel with this, testing was still being completed and new weapons were being introduced into production. At several factories, the Shpagin submachine gun was mastered, and at the same time the pace of its production increased along with the continuation of the production of the Degtyarev submachine gun. Civilian factories were also connected to the production of PPSH (for example, ZIS produced more than 1 million PPSH units, and the millionth sample was presented to the commander of the Western Front V. D. Sokolovsky), Moscow industry, including the factories of the People's Commissariat of Armament, gave the front 3.5 million submachine guns during the war years. The production of 20 mm aviation guns grew in addition to the large-caliber 12.7 mm aviation machine guns produced; the production of the maxim heavy machine gun was replaced by a more advanced Degtyarev machine gun. A number of types of small arms and aviation weapons were modernized, and new, more powerful systems were created. It was necessary to launch mass production of anti-tank guns of 14.5 mm caliber. Famous designers (V. A. Degtyarev, F. V. Tokarev, A. E. Nudelman, B. G. Shpitalny, S. G. Simonov, V. G. Grabin, F. F. Petrov, etc.) showed great creative energy and worked in contact with the military from the Main Artillery Directorate (GAU) and the Air Force.
The work of the Izhevsk factories was known to me; the Kovrov factory worked steadily; at one of the Tula factories the Maxim machine gun was discontinued
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and the Degtyarev heavy machine gun was mastered; at another plant, it was necessary to sharply increase the production of the Tokarev self-loading rifle, which took place with great difficulty. To better understand the situation in Tula, I went to the place. As it turned out, the Degtyarev machine guns produced there work quite well, but still periodically they have problems: there is no shot, the bullet remains in the barrel, the powder is scattered over the heated receiver. To check, they fired at the shooting range for about a day, and it was found that a number of machine gun components required serious refinement. Degtyarev saw that the machine gun needed to be improved. When considering such an acute issue, Vasily Alekseevich proved to be an objective person who puts the interests of the Motherland and the Red Army above all else. He was unusually modest, listened carefully to the comments of other designers, although they were much younger than him, and willingly helped less experienced weapon designers refine the weapons systems they created.
- How much time will it take to refine the machine gun? I asked Vasily Alekseevich. "I think 3-4 months," he said. What should we give the army so far? It was necessary to temporarily return to the production of the Maxim machine gun, and continue to refine the Degtyarev machine gun, stopping its production for some time. When he arrived in Moscow, he immediately reported to Dmitry Fyodorovich about the state of affairs at the Tula factories. He replied that the decision I had made was probably the right one, but the Degtyarev machine gun was put into production by a decision of the State Defense Committee signed by Stalin, and this decision should not be arbitrarily canceled. We went together with Dmitry Fedorovich to the head of the State Agrarian University N. D. Yakovlev. Although without enthusiasm, they agreed with my decision. A letter to the GKO on this issue signed by Ustinov and Yakovlev was sent. Two days later, we receive a decision to agree to temporarily restore the production of Maxim machine guns. The creation of a new machine gun to replace the Maxim was delayed until 1943, when the Goryunov machine gun was adopted, but at that time the Maxim production was already deployed in the Urals at full capacity. Degtyarev's work was not in vain: his more advanced machine guns were later installed on tanks, armored personnel carriers, self-propelled artillery units and other vehicles.
From the very first days of my work in the People's Commissariat, I began to receive continuous phone calls from factories, design and technological organizations, the State Agrarian University and the Air Force: burning issues of supply, acceleration of construction, testing of manufactured products, resolving disagreements on certain points between weapons designers and consumers, etc. were raised. The usual mode of our work then was as follows: from 10 o'clock. in the morning until 6 o'clock. in the evening, then a break until 9 o'clock. in the evening, then from 9 o'clock. evenings until 3 o'clock. nights, and often up to 5 o'clock. morning. Such a schedule existed in almost all central departments; the leaders of the party and government, as well as the government apparatus, worked according to this schedule. At the beginning of my acquaintance with the work of the People's Commissariat, I realized that our People's Commissariat produces not only complex, but also the most complex products. In addition to supplying weapons directly to the army, it was supposed to provide the aviation industry with military equipment (guns, machine guns), optics, some types of blanks for engine crankshafts, gearboxes, wire, tape of special quality, etc. it should supply weapons to tanks, and in the future, self-propelled artillery installations that needed guns of various calibers and machine guns. Arming military vessels was also assigned to the People's Commissariat. It was our responsibility to help the factories that were under the jurisdiction of the civilian People's commissariats, which mastered military equipment. The People's Commissariat was obliged to provide the army with new weapons and supply these funds to other People's Commissariats in advance, since no type of military equipment is produced without weapons. Much trouble was taken to the people's Commissariat of ammunition production: the need for cartridges not already counted in the hundreds of millions and billions.
Since Izhevsk became in those months the center for the production of the already mentioned small arms and there was metallurgy, which also provided metal to many other factories of our People's Commissariat, I asked Ustinov to allow me to create a small headquarters for the People's Commissariat in this city. Permission has been granted.
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In the first years of the war, and especially during the evacuation period, the main burden associated with the work of all factories for the production of small arms and aviation weapons fell on Izhevsk factories. From here, it was necessary to supply all types of high-quality steels to newly organized and restored factories, as well as many civilian factories involved in the manufacture of small arms, to provide them with drilled blanks for barrels (their number grew to more than 1,500 thousand pieces per year). It was necessary to help many factories with cutting tools, calibers and devices. And most importantly-to organize the rhythmic release of unprecedented quantities of small arms in Izhevsk. This was the situation; therefore, naturally, from December 1941 to mid-1943, I was in Izhevsk practically without leaving. This did not interfere, but helped me manage other factories, which I flew to for 3 - 4 days as needed. There were many problems at the Udmurt factories at that time; it was necessary, in particular, to increase the production of steel, rolled products, tape, wire and stamping at the Izhevsk Metallurgical Plant, because the country lost many metallurgical plants due to the enemy's advance in the south. The need for weapons was growing extremely fast, and it was necessary to organize the production of weapons and equipment evacuated to Izhevsk from Tula. Production of the Berezin heavy machine gun has increased dramatically. Izhevsk's role as a weapon forge has grown enormously.
3. About the Russian rifle
In 1941-1942, while the USSR was not established in sufficient quantities the production of automatic weapons, the production of rifles and carbines, although they had a low rate of fire, was an urgent, vital necessity. At the end of the first quarter of 1942, the production of rifles at the Izhevsk Machine-building Plant was already 5 thousand units per day, of which 4,500 were 7.62 mm Mosin rifles and 500 were self - loading. It was necessary to increase the production of rifles to 12 thousand units per day in the shortest possible time. How to do it? Almost 20 thousand workers were engaged in the production of Mosin rifles on more than half of the plant's premises. In peacetime, there would be only one way out - to build a new factory. During the war, it was necessary to look for other ways.
The factory carried out a huge amount of work to improve the production technology of rifles and accelerate their production cycle. There were thousands of inventive proposals from talented self - taught workers. Tool fitter M. A. Kalabin developed a machine method for stamping one part and thereby increased labor productivity at this operation by 30 times. The locksmith Kondakov proposed an original design for clamping parts and only one shop freed up 40 machines and 100 workers. There are many such examples. Already in the first months of the war, the hard work and ingenuity of the workers of the Izhevsk Machine-building plant led to the fact that the time spent on the production of one rifle was reduced by 35%. But this was still not enough to reach the production of 12 thousand rifles per day. The labor intensity of the production of the Russian rifle was small - about 13 hours, semi-automatic - more than 20 hours.
The factory management made every effort to increase the production of rifles. Factory areas for machine tools were used to the limit. It was recalled that in recent years, starting from 1936, many proposals have accumulated on rifle technology and its simplification from technological services and individual inventors. We raised this documentation and implemented many of the proposals. Only the replacement of obtaining rifling in the barrel channel by squeezing instead of cutting reduced the production time from 50 minutes. up to one minute. Savings on the rifle as a whole only on this operation amounted to 16-17 minutes. The effect was significant, as one worker served three rifling machines. Improvements were made to the production of the sighting front sight, the so-called powder test of barrels was canceled (it was replaced by a reinforced cartridge when firing from a ready-made rifle). At the same time, there were no operations for making threads in the breech of the barrel, homemade rods instead of bullets, etc.
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It was decided to varnish and polish the rifle bed instead of three times once, because now the rifle went not to the storage warehouse, but directly to the case. As the Deputy People's Commissar of Armaments, I, on my own responsibility, allowed all these reasonable changes to be made to the design and manufacturing technology of the rifle. The adoption of these proposals and the huge scope of the Stakhanov movement made it possible to increase the production of rifles in the second half of 1942 to 12 thousand units per day. At the same time, it was necessary to strictly observe the schedule, which required constant tension. Not for a single day, not for an hour, not for a single minute, the struggle for a clear implementation of the schedule did not weaken, there was not the slightest decline, but there was no relief. Sometimes there was a lag in the production of the rifle barrel, then critical situations were created with other parts. At one time, the production of the receiver was stalled. There is a threat to under-supply the army with about 40 thousand rifles. The way out was found by the oldest employees of the plant. They recalled that in the basements of the plant since pre-revolutionary times there were at least 60 thousand ready-made painted receiver boxes. Apparently, these boxes had small deviations in size, they did not dare to throw them away, but kept them, as they say, for a rainy day. We picked up workers who were instructed to collect 20 rifles with forgotten boxes, bring them to the shooting stage and determine what deviations they have from the boxes produced now. The deadline is two days. It was confirmed that deviations from the drawings in the boxes of the old release were insignificant.
I immediately gathered the factory management, who explained what was revealed and what the tests showed. In the receiver shop, two conveyors were built along the walls overnight, polishing machines were installed to give the discovered boxes the appearance of new ones, and their shelf life was checked. He informed the military representative about the decision, who insisted on an additional check. I agreed, but on the condition that this was done without prejudice to the release of additional boxes received. Verification by the military representative confirmed the validity of the receiver boxes. There was no longer any doubt that we would increase the production of rifles in the next month and a half. On the third day, the military representative comes to the office of the shop manager, where we were then. He looks confused and asks for help.: "Vladimir Nikolaevich, I understand everything and I will accept rifles when you approve the document, but there is one request: polish off the stamp with the royal eagle from the boxes!". Of course, this was done. Of the 60,000 boxes found, 58,000 were used. This helped us get into the right working rhythm and additionally equip at least six infantry and cavalry divisions across the wartime states.
The role of the rifle, especially in the first two years of the Great Patriotic War, is difficult to overestimate. I recall two rifle-related episodes that occurred in late 1942 and early 1943. At a meeting in the People's Commissariat, someone spoke positively about the work of the Izhevsk Machine-building Plant, emphasizing that the plant achieved an excellent rhythm of production with a very stressful program. This rhythm was achieved with great difficulty. Realizing that it is very difficult to accurately withstand the delivery of 12 thousand rifles per day, we agreed with the director to create a reserve of approximately 6 thousand ready-made rifles. And the delivery of ready-made rifles was regulated by the delivery of boxes at exactly 12 thousand. This rhythm was maintained.
In 1942, a member of the GKO K. E. Voroshilov arrived in Izhevsk, who was then engaged in the formation of new military units. He reviewed the military units created in our region. The next morning Kliment Yefremovich expressed a desire to inspect the plant. We started with the shops that produced rifles. When he came to the assembly, the rifles flowed on two conveyors (the width of the conveyor belt was about a meter) literally like a river. Operations were broken down into very small ones in order to teach people how to build faster. Voroshilov stood and watched for a long time, then said to me: "Comrade Novikov, can rifles really be produced by the river?". I said that this is how production goes around the clock. He shook his head and suggested that we continue exploring the other workshops. At 6 o'clock. In the evening, Kliment Efremovich unexpectedly asked me to return to the assembly shop with him once again. They came - and again the river of rifles. He said, " Miracles!"
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On January 18, 1942, Izhevsk Machine-Building Plant was awarded the Order of Lenin for its exemplary performance of the party and government tasks in the production and development of new types of products. 193 employees of the enterprise were awarded high government awards. On October 20, 1944, the plant was awarded the Order of the Red Banner for its services in organizing production, creating new product samples, and celebrating its 185th anniversary. 143 employees of the plant were awarded orders and medals of the Soviet Union.
By the end of 1941, two more factories were established in Izhevsk. One of them manufactured Maxim machine guns, and the other, taking the equipment received from Tula, produced Tokarev pistols (TT), re-organized the production of anti-tank rifles and other types of weapons. This second factory was built on the outskirts of the city and housed in huge, newly constructed wooden barrack-type buildings, hence the name "wooden factory". It was necessary to place not only equipment, but also evacuated workers. They were moved into the families of local factory workers and other local apartments, occupied a number of schools, and forced to build housing. These were new independent factories that had their own tool and repair shops, transport facilities and everything necessary for production. Each of them already had thousands of teams. The city, whose population exceeded 200 thousand people, also grew.
Simultaneously with the construction of new factory buildings in the first days of November, the development of anti-tank guns began, first PTRD (designed by Degtyarev), then PTRS (designed by Simonov) - semi-automatic. It was necessary to establish the production of TT pistols. We received machines and equipment for them, so we managed to start their production in two weeks after the arrival of the trains. A large group of friends who came from Tula worked on their production. To speed up the start of production of anti-tank rifles, I instructed the Izhevsk Machine-Building Plant to make the most time-consuming parts (the barrel and receiver) until we equip the wooden factory with equipment. As a result of temporarily organized cooperation, it was possible to achieve such a situation at the new plant that anti-tank guns went to the front at the end of November 1941.
If Ustinov was in Moscow, I called him almost daily, informing him in detail about the situation: Dmitry Fyodorovich paid special attention to the growth rate of production of rifles, Maxim machine guns, and anti-tank guns. A total of 12 million rifles were produced for the Red Army during the war. Of this number, 11145 thousand rifles were manufactured by Izhevsk gunsmiths. The production of weapons was steadily gaining momentum every day. Production of all types of small arms has increased. The average monthly output of semi-automatic and automatic weapons in the first half of 1942 increased 3.5 times compared to the second half of 1941. During 1943, the defense industry significantly increased the production of military equipment and weapons; and the production of PPSH submachine guns increased significantly, which made it possible to slightly reduce the production of rifles.
4. Weapons for airplanes
During the Great Patriotic War, active work was also carried out to create weapons for aviation. Soviet aviation began the war armed mainly with a machine gun designed by B. G. Shpitalny and I. A. Komaritsky (SHKAS) with a 7.62 mm cartridge and a rate of fire of 1800 rounds per minute. Before the war began, aviators began receiving 20 mm Shpitalny and SV Vladimirova guns (SHVAK) with a rate of fire of 800 rounds per minute and a 12.7 mm Berezin heavy machine gun. In the first period of the war, the A. A. Volkov and S. A. Yartsev cannon was also produced (caliber 23 mm, rate of fire 600 rounds per minute).
The People's Commissariat was given the task of creating a 37 mm aviation cannon with a muzzle velocity of 900 m per second. and a rate of fire of 250 (later 400) rounds per minute. These weapons were intended for attack aircraft and fighters. Of all the types of weapons, the most difficult is weapons for aviation:
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the barrel develops a pressure of up to 3 thousand atmospheres. Aircraft designers, together with weapons designers, also had to solve the problem of avoiding vibration of the weapon when firing, which led to a large scattering, and as much as possible compensate for the recoil from the shot on the aircraft. In addition, many other problems were solved. During the Great Patriotic War, 112.1 thousand aircraft were produced. To them, guns and heavy machine guns had to be given at least 250-300 thousand pieces, because the designers put two or three firing points on the plane.
In order to more reliably solve the issues of creating new aircraft weapons, Ustinov established the following order: the task was performed by at least two, sometimes three design bureaus; each was headed by a chief designer. The People's Commissariat had four design bureaus, which mainly specialized in the production of aviation weapons. One was headed by A. E. Nudelman; the second-TsKB-14; the third design bureau was headed by B. G. Shpitalny. Much was done in the fourth-Degtyarev Design Bureau. Nudelman managed to create a close-knit team of talented employees-A. S. Suranov, A. A. Richter, P. P. Gribkov, mechanic mechanic A. F. Senechkin and others. Employees of this design bureau worked closely and amicably with factory designers and technologists, listened carefully to their advice, did not hide the existing shortcomings in the created equipment (37 and 45 mm air guns), and this always caused a desire to help them solve complex technical problems.
Already in the first period of the war, a creative competition developed between the creators of aircraft guns for the best version of weapons that would give the greatest effectiveness in the fight against enemy aircraft, hit ground targets and more reliably protect bombers from enemy fighter attacks. At first, the production workers were not satisfied with the Volkov - Yartsev cannon, which was far from technologically advanced. The Berezina machine gun in combination with other types of weapons was put on almost all aircraft, so that the production of this weapon was maintained until the end of the war. The SHVAK-20 gun was extremely difficult to manufacture. It was widely used on almost all types of aircraft in the pre-war period and the first war years; only in the second half of the war did the Berezina cannon under the B-20 index appear in service. This gun, similar in characteristics to the SHVAK, was much lighter, and also more technologically advanced in production. A special achievement was the creation of the Nudelman and Suranov aviation cannon of 37 mm caliber with the NS-37 index, the initial velocity of the projectile is 900 m per second. and a rate of fire of 250 rounds per minute. This gun was much lighter than the gun of the same caliber created by Shpitalny, more technologically advanced and easier to manufacture. Enemy fighters avoided engaging Soviet fighters armed with a 37 mm cannon.
From the end of 1941 to the beginning of 1942, the People's Commissariat supplied the aviation industry mainly with guns and heavy machine guns. One Izhevsk machine-building plant gave 7130 only 37 mm air guns designed by Nudelman and Suranov during the war, and this was done for 3-3.5 years. During the counteroffensive during the Battle of Stalingrad, beginning in November 1942, our aviation showed a complete advantage over Hitler's air forces, which was the result of the heroism and skill of our pilots and their commanders, the high skill of factory workers who manufactured aircraft, as well as the increased power of weapons achieved thanks to the talent of our designers of aviation weapons and optical dedicated work at the factories that produced weapons. Even more impressive were the successes of our aircraft in subsequent operations, up to Berlin.
5. About armed metallurgists
The first steel in Izhevsk was produced in 1763. At that time, the Izhevsk iron-making manufactory was considered one of the largest in the Urals. Izhevsk arms and steel plants were known in the country and abroad-
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been running for decades. At the beginning of my career at our factory, I often timed the work of steelworkers of crucible furnaces, electric furnaces and rolling mills. I have always been surprised and admired by steelworkers. Their hard work requires great skill, knowledge, and precision. I was amazed at the virtuosity of the rolling mill workers, who, as if playing with metal, directed the hot fire-breathing tape into the next stream of the rolling mill. It was a dangerous job, but it was done with extraordinary ease. The dexterity and strength of each distributor was amazing. As the chief technologist and chief engineer of the plant, I often worked together with metallurgists.
Due to the temporary occupation of the south of the country in the first period of the Great Patriotic War, many factories that produced metal were lost. The front demanded weapons. This caused a huge strain in the metallurgical industry. Izhevsk plant received 50-100 telegrams a day with urgent demands to ship metal.
After all, in the quarter it was necessary to produce about 40 thousand grades of metal in the form of rolled products, tape, wire. In the initial period of the war, it was difficult to find an enterprise that did not turn to Izhevsk for metal. At the plant, there was a real struggle to increase the production of metal and, in parallel, what distinguished Izhevsk residents-to create new high-quality grades of metal, whether it was rolled products, tape, wire or forging blanks.
The heroism of the factory workers during the Great Patriotic War cannot be overestimated. This concerned both increasing output and developing new grades of steel, rolled products, and types of wire, such as silverware, which was previously obtained from abroad. When the battle of Moscow was under way, dozens of work collectives of Izhevsk factories joined the competition for the title of front-line brigades. Great success was achieved by the steelworkers of the Elektromartenovsky workshop. They mastered the new furnace and quickly brought steel production to its design capacity. The rolling mills were working hard. The advanced bluming teams of Chashchikov and Leskov, ham distributors, and Obukhov persistently sought to increase labor productivity and met the standard by 140-150%.
Orders for the front continued to grow, and there was no longer enough capacity. One December evening in 1941, I asked the chief mechanic of the Izhevsk Metallurgical Plant, Ya.F. Anokhin, to come to me and told him that the distributors were asking to make a mill-400: they were suffocating from orders, there was a room in one of the flights of blooming. I received an answer: it is almost impossible to cast such large parts as stand frames on our equipment, and their processing is even more difficult, and the mechanical repair shops are overloaded. I still asked you to think about how to make a camp. The workers did their best. Repairmen, of course, got it: after all, there was no free space for assembling large stands of the mill, so they had to assemble them outside in the cold, their hands were numb, stuck to the metal. Four months later, the mill was ready and installed in the fourth span of the blooming building. It was quite a feat.
At the beginning of 1943, a telegram came to the factory from the Central Committee of the CPSU (b). It proposed to speed up the implementation of a new important order for aviation, while determining the production time - several days. Steel for such products was cast in electric furnaces, but due to objective reasons, there was not enough electricity, and the electric furnaces worked intermittently, and reducing the supply of electricity to other plants was excluded. Then they decided to cast steel in open-hearth furnaces, which contradicted the technological rules established at that time. However, at the beginning of the war, the plant conducted experiments on casting such steel in open-hearth furnaces, and it turned out to be no worse than elektrostal. And on the night of February 23, 1943, an order was issued for the plant: "Cast high-alloy steel for the needs of the front on the old and new open-hearth furnaces." Qualified engineering and technical workers and experienced steelworkers were involved in this case. The entire command staff, who took part in the execution of a responsible order, moved to the barracks position. The City Committee of the party and the party committee were constantly interested in the progress of swimming trunks. After a few days, the steel was cast, the forgings were forged, heat-treated and tested in co-
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in accordance with the technical specifications. Some parts were subjected to additional tests to ensure quality. The order was completed.
There were difficulties of a different order. So, the supply of ferroalloys has become bad due to the shortage of vanadium, molybdenum, tungsten, nickel, etc. The plant sent telegrams, called all authorities. The point was that the casting of steel would have to be stopped. This could not be allowed. Then I gave (of course, illegal) order-to take ferroalloys from the mobilization reserve. 10 days later, Ustinov called me and said that "I will be taken apart" at the T-bills about unauthorized rebooking of mobilization reserves. The First Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, N. A. Voznesensky, demanded that I be severely reprimanded. Another GKO member said: "What was Novikov supposed to do? Either stop the plant or disrupt the order. It was verified that only Novikov sent 17 telegrams to different addresses and did not receive a single response. Could he have done otherwise?" As a result, no decision was made, but I was warned not to allow such cases in the future.
The defeat of Hitler's troops near Moscow inspired the workers ' collectives of Izhevsk factories. Orders for blacksmiths and heavy hammers grew. It was necessary to increase forgings for aviation-gear shafts, large gears, etc. This required a five-ton punching hammer. Where can I get it? The factory found imported from some evacuated factories cylinder five-ton hammer and spare upper half of the shab (anvil) 13-ton hammer. The designers designed the hammer "hybrid". Of course, it was risky to be left without a spare shab, but we did it. The created hammer was already working in March 1942. It also turned out that orders for military factories were under threat of failure due to a shortage of large stamps. Then, regardless of the repair and mechanical shop that prepared these stamps, they decided to create a special workshop for the production of large stamps. The area was picked up in the blooming shop. Three high-performance semi-automatic copying and milling machines were needed. They were harassed by hook or crook. Throughout the war, this special workshop continuously provided the blacksmith shops with stamps and helped the repairmen in the manufacture of rolls for rolling mills.
The heroic work of the metallurgists of Izhevsk was a response to the May Day appeal of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), addressed to the metallurgists of the country in 1942: "Comrades metallurgists! More metal for tanks, planes, guns, machine guns and shells." In 1942, the output of the plant's metallurgists increased by more than 30% compared to 1940. In 1943-1944, the plant continued to increase its capacity. New grades of steel, new types of rolled products, new grades of wire and tape were being developed. The plant supplied the factories of our People's Commissariat and other departments, especially the aviation industry, with the necessary forgings and forgings without fail. In October 1944, for their selfless work during the war, the team of Izhevsk metallurgists was awarded the Order of Lenin, 326 employees of the plant were awarded orders and medals.
The work of the country's defense industries was difficult, tense, and nervous. But this is not the front: there was no shooting or killing here. Understanding the needs of the front, employees of defense factories spared no effort or energy, achieving better results in the supply of military equipment. Sometimes some comrades write that in 1942 the defense industries had already gained such a pace that it became easier for them. But this is a deep mistake. 1943 was actually not much easier than 1942. Just the character and direction of moving forward have become different. The rate of production of weapons was constantly growing, and the requirements for improving equipment were also increasing every year. If, for example, the production of Maxim heavy machine guns was previously organized in sufficient quantities, then when the Goryunov machine gun appeared, it was necessary to increase the production of this machine gun as quickly as possible. Or: the production of excellent 76 mm tank guns has been established; but 85 mm guns for the same tanks have appeared, and immediately we need to rebuild, give more new guns. The air force was armed with 37 mm cannons; by the end of the war, more powerful 45 mm cannons had appeared; rebuild again and give more new guns. And so - until the very end of the Great Patriotic War!
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Finishing the story about individual events on the creation of weapons for the Red Army, it would be wrong not to name a few more heroes of the rear, who spared no effort to create these weapons. "Rallying around the party and displaying unprecedented heroism, the Soviet people and their Armed Forces inflicted a crushing defeat on the shock detachment of world imperialist reaction." 1 The whole country lived by one desire - to defeat the enemy! The Soviet man had no other thoughts. Working in factories, design bureaus, and institutes, we have always felt the firm leadership of the party. Such local party leaders as V. G. Zhavoronkov, A. P. Chekinov, and N. S. Patolichev left the biggest mark on my memory. Through the party organizations of factories and workshops, they were able to create a working environment in factories, workshops, and workplaces. During the war years, no one thought about bonuses, housing amenities, and nutritional deficiencies. Everything was given for the front, for Victory. I had to work for 11 hours. a day - worked; if you need 16-worked; if you do not leave the factory for a week or two - did not leave. Unforgettable are the names of Izhevsk workers A. Sultanova, M. A. Kalabin, A. Parshakov and many others who invested both their strength and labor ingenuity in increasing the output of individual parts tenfold.
Izhevsk metallurgists, understanding the difficult situation of the country with metal, worked literally miracles. Foreman of steelworkers A. A. Maslenikov was the first to step over the line of steel removal (from one square meter). m open-hearth furnace) from 3.5 to 7.5 tons. K. R. Alemasov reached the removal of 8.2 tons. Even more striking results were achieved by steelworkers L. A. Tebenkov and M. M. Gorbunov. Thousands of front-runners followed suit.
Talented production organizers, alas, are not trained either in technical schools or universities. The ability to lead a team, large and small, to mobilize it to overcome difficulties, to be its recognized leader is not given to everyone. During the war years, there was no shortage of such people at different levels and different ages. Talented factory directors such as F. K. Charsky, V. I. Fomin, M. M. Ivanov, B. I. Pastukhov, P. A. Sysoev, and N. P. Poletaev quickly emerged. But this is only in one branch of armament! Workers, chief designers, technologists, shop managers, craftsmen V. I. Lavrenov, B. F. Fayzulin, A. Ya. Fischer, V. P. Boltushkin, I. F. Beloborodoe, S. S. Gindinson, and dozens of others-these are those who forged the weapon of Victory. And it was they who solved the great task by common labor.
1 Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. (New version). Project, Moscow, 1985, p. 8.
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