Mosin–Nagant
The Mosin–Nagant is a five-shot, bolt-action, internal magazine–fed military rifle. Known officially as the 3-line rifle M1891, in Russia and the former Soviet Union as Mosin's rifle and informally just mosinka, it is primarily chambered for the 7.62×54mmR cartridge.
Developed from 1882 to 1891, it was used by the armed forces of the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union and various other states. It is one of the most mass-produced military bolt-action rifles in history, with over 37 million units produced since 1891. In spite of its age, it has been used in various conflicts around the world up to the present day.
History
Initial design and tests
During the Russo-Turkish War, Imperial Russian troops armed mostly with single-shot Berdan rifles suffered heavy casualties against Ottoman troops equipped with Winchester 1866 repeating rifles, particularly at the bloody Siege of Pleven. This showed Russian commanders the need to modernize the general infantry weapon of the army.Various weapons were acquired and tested by GAU of the Ministry of War of the Russian Empire, and in 1889 the Lebel Model 1886 rifle was obtained through semi-official channels from France. It was supplied together with a model of the cartridge and bullet but without primer or smokeless powder. Those problems were solved by Russian scientists and engineers.
In 1889, three rifles were submitted for evaluation: Captain Sergei Ivanovich Mosin of the imperial army submitted his "3-line" caliber rifle; Belgian designer Léon Nagant submitted a "3.5-line" design; and a Captain Zinoviev submitted another "3-line" design.
When trials concluded in 1891, the evaluators were split in their assessment. The main disadvantages of Nagant's rifle were a more complicated mechanism and a long and tiresome procedure of disassembling. Mosin's rifle was mainly criticized for its lower quality of manufacture and materials, due to "artisan pre-production" of his 300 rifles. The commission initially voted 14 to 10 to approve Mosin's rifle. At this point the decision was made to rename the existing commission and call it Commission for creation of the small-bore rifle, and to put on paper the final requirements for such a rifle. The inventors obliged by delivering their final designs. Head of the commission, General Chagin, ordered subsequent tests held under the commission's supervision, after which the bolt-action of Mosin's design was ordered into production under the name of 3-line rifle M1891.
The colloquial name "Mosin-Nagant" used in the West is persistent but erroneous, as established in
Nagant's legal dispute.
Technical detail
Like the Gewehr 98, the 1891 Mosin uses two front-locking lugs to lock up the action. However, the Mosin's lugs lock in the horizontal position, whereas the Mauser locks vertically. The Mosin bolt body is multi-piece whereas the Mauser is one piece. The Mosin uses interchangeable bolt heads like the Lee–Enfield. Unlike the Mauser, which uses a controlled feed bolt head in which the cartridge base snaps up under the fixed extractor as the cartridge is fed from the magazine, the Mosin has a push feed recessed bolt head in which the spring-loaded extractor snaps over the cartridge base as the bolt is finally closed similar to the Gewehr 1888 and M91 Carcano or modern sporting rifles like the Remington 700. Like the Mauser, the Mosin uses a blade ejector mounted in the receiver. The Mosin bolt is removed by simply pulling it fully to the rear of the receiver and squeezing the trigger, while the Mauser has a bolt stop lever separate from the trigger.Like the Mauser, the bolt lift arc on the Mosin–Nagant is 90 degrees, versus 60 degrees on the Lee–Enfield. The Mauser bolt handle is at the rear of the bolt body and locks behind the solid rear receiver ring. The Mosin bolt handle is similar to the Mannlicher: it is attached to a protrusion on the middle of the bolt body, which serves as a bolt guide, and it locks protruding out of the ejection/loading port in front of a split rear receiver ring, also serving a similar function to Mauser's "third" or "safety" lug.
The rifling of the Mosin barrel is right turning 4-groove with a twist of 1:9.5" or 1:10". The 5-round fixed metallic magazine can either be loaded by inserting the cartridges individually, or more often in military service, by the use of 5-round stripper clips.
Initial production
The 3-line rifle, Model 1891, its original official designation, was adopted by the Russian military in 1891. Production began in 1892 at the ordnance factories of Tula Arsenal, Izhevsk Arsenal and at Sestroryetsk Arsenal. An order for 500,000 rifles was placed with the French arms factory, italic=no.Refinement
There have been several refinements and variations of the original rifle, the most common being the M1891/30, which was a modernized design introduced in 1930. Some details were borrowed from Nagant's design.- One such detail is the attachment of the magazine spring to the magazine base plate. In Mosin's original design the spring was not attached to the base plate and, according to the Commission, could be lost during maintenance, rifle cleaning.
- Another detail is the form of the clip that could hold five cartridges to be loaded simultaneously into the magazine.
- One more detail is the form of the interrupter, a specially designed part within the receiver, which helps prevent double feeding. The initial rifle proposed by Mosin lacked an interrupter, leading to numerous failures to feed. This detail was introduced in the rifle borrowing from Nagant's rifle. Although the form of the interrupter was slightly changed, this alteration was subsequently borrowed back by the Commission for the Model 1891. During the modernization of 1930, the form of the interrupter was further changed, from a single piece to a two-piece design, as the part had turned out to be one of the least reliable parts of the action. Only the clip for loading cartridges and the attachment of the magazine spring to the magazine base plate in subsequent models were designed by Nagant. Considering the rifle could be easily loaded without using a clip, one cartridge after another, the magazine spring attached to the magazine base plate is the only contribution of Nagant to all rifles after 1930.
Nagant's legal dispute
A scandal was about to burst out, with Nagant threatening he would not participate in trials held in Russia ever again and some officials proposing to expel Nagant from any further trials, as he borrowed the design of the interrupter after it was covered by the secrecy status given in Russia of that time to military inventions and therefore violated Russian law. Taking into consideration that Nagant was one of the few producers not engaged by competitive governments and generally eager to cooperate and share experience and technology, the Commission paid him a sum of 200,000 Russian rubles, equal to the premium that Mosin received as the winner. The rifle did not receive the name of Mosin, because of the personal decision taken by Tsar Alexander III, which was made based on the opinion of the Defence Minister Pyotr Vannovskiy:
The Tsar himself dashed the word "Russian" from this document with his own hand. The decision to pay off Nagant proved wise, as he remained the major contractor for the Russian Government, and the Nagant M1895 revolver was subsequently adopted by the Russian army as its main sidearm.
However, in spite of the payment, Nagant attempted to use the situation for publicity, resulting in the name "Mosin–Nagant" appearing in the Western press.
From a technical point of view the rifle that came to be called "Mosin–Nagant" is the design proposed by Mosin as further amended by Mosin with some details borrowed from Nagant's design. Only since 1924 the rifle was officially named "Mosin's rifle" in the USSR, although some [|variants] were still known only by their year of origin.
Russo-Japanese War
In 1889 Tsar Alexander III ordered the Imperial Russian Army to meet or exceed European standards in rifle developments with "rifles of reduced caliber and cartridges with smokeless powder". The new weapons would entail "high velocities", exceeding and would result in land battles both commencing and being capable of being fought at longer ranges, nearly two kilometers. The new Mosin rifles would replace the Berdan rifles then in use by the Russian army.The Mosin rifle was first tested in combat in 1893, during clashes between Russian and Afghan troops in the Pamirs.
The Russo-Japanese War was the rifle's first major conflict. By the time the war broke out in 1904, approximately 3.8 million had been built, with over 1.5 million in the hands of the Russian cavalry and all of its reserves when hostilities commenced.
Between the adoption of the final design in 1891 and the year 1910, several variants and modifications to the existing rifles were made.
World War I
With the start of World War I, production was restricted to the M1891 dragoon and infantry models for the sake of simplicity. Due to the desperate shortage of arms and the shortcomings of a still-developing domestic industry, the Russian government ordered 1.5 million M1891 infantry rifles from Remington Arms and another 1.8 million from New England Westinghouse Company in the United States in 1915. Remington produced 750,000 rifles before production was halted by the 1917 October Revolution. Deliveries to Russia had amounted to 469,951 rifles when the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk ended hostilities between the Central Powers and now Soviet-Russia. Henceforth, the new Bolshevik government of Vladimir Lenin cancelled payments to the American companies manufacturing the Mosin–Nagant.File:111-SC-42421 - NARA - 55244047 .jpg|thumb|Arkhangelsk, Russia, November 20, 1918. The U.S. 339th Infantry Regiment, equipped with Mosin-Nagant rifles, is inspected by British General Edmund Ironside, commander of the North Russia intervention Force.
With Remington and Westinghouse on the precipice of bankruptcy from the Communists' decision, the remaining 280,000 rifles were purchased by the United States Army. American and British expeditionary forces of the North Russia Campaign were armed with these rifles and sent to Murmansk and Arkhangelsk in the late summer of 1918 to prevent the large quantities of munitions delivered for Tsarist forces from being captured by the Central Powers. Remaining rifles were used for the training of U.S. Army troops. Some were used to equip U.S. National Guard, SATC, and ROTC units. Designated "U.S. Rifle, 7.62mm, Model of 1916", these are among the rarest of American service arms. In 1917, 50,000 rifles were sent via Vladivostok to the Czechoslovak Legions in Siberia to aid in their attempt to secure passage to France.
Many of the New England Westinghouse and Remington Mosin–Nagants were sold to private citizens in the United States before World War II through the office of the Director of Civilian Marksmanship, the predecessor to the federal government's current Civilian Marksmanship Program.
Large numbers of Mosin–Nagants were captured by German and Austro-Hungarian forces and saw service with the rear-echelon forces of both armies, and also with the Imperial German Navy. Many of these weapons were sold to Finland in the 1920s.