Dead at 94, the man who created world's most lethal weapon: Mikhail Kalashnikov passes away in hospital bed
- Former Russian peasant designed the AK-47 after the Second World War
- Popular with militants, the gun is still made in his home city of Izhevsk
- Its low price and wide production made it synonymous with mass killing
- Inventor insisted he created it to 'defend the fatherland' of Soviet Union
- He never wanted to design guns and would rather have built a lawnmower
- There is one Kalashnikov for every 70 people in the world
- Mikhail Kalashnikov, the designer of the assault rifle that has killed more people than any other firearm in the world, has died in hospital at the age of 94.
The creator of the AK-47 more than 60 years ago died in hospital his home city of Izhevsk, near the Ural Mountains - where his gun is still made.
He had been ill for some time and had been in intensive care since November 17.
Deadly icon: Mikhail Kalashnikov with the weapon that made his fortune - and won him praise and condemnation. There is one AK-47 for every 70 people in the world, the deadliest weapon ever created
Soviet hero: Mikhail Kalashnikov in 1949, two years after the weapon he invented went into mass production
Honoured: He met President Vladimir Putin just three months ago. Mr Putin expressed his 'deep condolences'
Kalashnikov, a Russian peasant with little formal education, designed the eponymous rifle in 1947 - with the letters AK-47 referring to 'Kalashnikov's Automatic' (Avtomat Kalashnikova) and the year of its release.
But the rifle and its variants soon became the weapons of choice for dozens of armies and guerrilla groups around the world.
Specifically engineered to work in the harsh conditions in which Soviet troops operated, it became one of the most successful weapons ever produced and turned its inventor into one of the most lauded men in the Soviet Union.
Cheap, efficient and easily mass-produced, the gun soon became synonymous with killing on a sometimes indiscriminate scale.
It was taken up by militants as far afield as Iraq, Afghanistan, Colombia, Liberia, Sudan, Zaire and Gaza, to name a few. Osama Bin Laden was infamously pictured clutching the deadly weapon.
Militants: Osama Bin Laden was pictured with the weapon including in this photo in June 2001
Conflict: A Libyan rebel fighter as she heard Colonel Gaddafi's forces had been driven out of Benghazi in 2011
Invading U.S. troops reportedly found a gold-plated Kalashnikov in one of the palaces of Saddam Hussein, left. Right: A Palestinian militant brandishes his AK-47 during a rally near the West Bank city of Nablus
Weaponry: Iraqi schoolboys practice firing AK-47 assault rifles at a summer military camp, Baghdad, in 2002
Mass-produced: A Nato soldier surrounded by weapons collected from Albanian guerillas in 2001
Iraqi policemen hold AK-47s during a police parade in the capital Baghdad 2003. The weapon, named for its inventor and the year when it was created, was never patented in Russia so was widely copied100 MILLION AND COUNTING: HOW AK-47 BECAME WORLD'S DEADLIEST
The AK-47's story truly began in 1942, when Soviet soldiers siezed new-style automatic rifles from German troops.
Unlike traditional or semi-automatic rifles, they could fire a whole magazine of bullets simply by holding down the trigger, because the recoil from each shot ejected the previous cartridge.
Entrenched in the conflict of the Second World War, the Soviets set to work straight away on copying the Nazis' designs.
But their first versions were clunky, weighing more than 5kg without bullets, and the task of creating a new design fell to Mikhail Kalashnikov, who had created an unsuccessful gun prototype earlier in the war.
His design mashed together the best elements of previous weapons and won a competition in 1946, going into full production the next year.
Accuracy was not its strongest point but it endured for its simplicity and reliability in even the harshest of conditions - built, as it was, in the wilds of Siberia.
It was not patented - opening the door for millions of 'pirate' versions - because of the culture which existed in the Communist state.
All ideas were property of the government, not one individual person, and pride came from helping the great Soviet army.
Source: World Guns
There are an estimated 100 million Kalashnikovs, one for every 70 people in the world. The gun is in official service in 55 countries and adorns the flag of Mozambique.
Its vast popularity was partly down to the fact its design was never patented, so it was widely ripped off.
This was accelerated by the Soviet Union's policy of allowing friendly countries to imitate its designs of weaponry to strengthen its position during the Cold War.
The Kalashnikov was prized for its sturdy reliability in difficult conditions.
During the Vietnam war American soldiers reportedly threw away their M-16s in the harsh jungle and took every AK-47 they could find.
The 205-year-old Izmash factory, which makes the weapon and is seen by Russians as a national icon, always complained that its potential income was hit badly by the 'pirated' versions of the designs made abroad.
But Izmash has also suffered from dwindling demand and a failure to make up for this with foreign orders - a problem plaguing many specialised post-Soviet industries.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, who met Mr Kalashnikov just three months ago, expressed his 'deep condolences' over his death.
Born in a Siberian village as the 17th child of his family on November 10, 1919, Mr Kalashnikov had a tragic childhood during which his father was deported under Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin in 1930.
In October 1941 he was heavily wounded and shell-shocked in a Soviet defeat by the Germans. He reportedly first conceived of the weapon while recovering in hospital.
Despite the lethal legacy of his weapon, Russia lavished Mr Kalashnikov with honours including the prestigious Hero of Russia prize, the nation's highest honour, for designing the iconic rifle.
In 2007, president Vladimir Putin praised him, saying 'The Kalashnikov rifle is a symbol of the creative genius of our people.'
The inventor had said he had never intended for it to become the world's most popular weapon, and he fell into making it by accident.
Instead he had wanted to design farm equipment 'such as a lawnmower', he claimed.
Yet he carried on working as the chief designer at Izmash well into his 80s.
He profited little from his gun, and almost not at all before the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Because of the lack of patent laws he was, like the inventors of more harmless global successes like Tetris, merely a state employee.
'I created a weapon to defend the fatherland's borders,' he said during an award ceremony at the Kremlin to mark his 90th birthday.
Fame: Despite the advent of hundreds of other guns, the AK-47 by Mikhail Kalashnikov (pictured with his designs) led the pack for its hard-wearing simplicity and the ease with which it could be copied
The former Siberian peasant, pictured in 2002, continued working as a leading gun designer well into his 80s
Celebration: The ageing inventor had a complex legacy but was honoured as a Russian hero
Indirectly, Mikhail Kalashnikov leaves a bloody legacy. He claimed he would rather have invented a lawnmower
'It's not my fault that it was sometimes used where it shouldn't have been. This is the fault of politicians.'
On another occasion he said: 'After the collapse of the great and mighty Soviet Union so much c**p has been imposed on us, especially on the younger generation. I wrote six books to help them find their way in life.'
There is a bronze bust of him in his native village of Kurya in the Siberian region of Altai - and it is a local tradition for newlyweds to lay flowers there.
'They whisper "Uncle Misha, wish us happiness and healthy kids," he once said. "What other gun designer can boast of that?"'
INSTRUMENT OF MURDER: FIVE FACTS ABOUT THE WORLD'S DEADLIEST GUN
- Chile's Communist president Salvador Allende died holding an AK-47 in 1973
Dangerous: Kalashnikovs in Colombia - During the Iraq war, U.S. troops found a gold-plated Kalashnikov reportedly given to Saddam Hussein's son Uday at one of the Iraqi leader's palaces in Baghdad
- Osama bin Laden used to hold an AK-47 in his videotaped diatribes against the West...
- ... But America may have inadvertently given it to him. Guns captured in Lebanon in 1982 reportedly found their way, via the CIA and the Pakistani Inter-Service Intelligence Agency, to the Mujahadeen, who were resisting the then-Soviet occupation of Afghanistan
- Several American mass shooters, including some at high schools, have used the weapon including recently in Georgia and New Jersey.
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