- Kalashnikov, the famed weapons maker behind the AK-47, has reported a spike in small-arms sales.
- The Russian company says there’s been a boom in exports and sales to civilians overseas.
- The increase comes as Moscow calls up troops — who will likely be armed with Kalashnikovs — to fight in Ukraine.
As many Russians suffer in the pursuit of Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine, one beneficiary seems to be emerging.
Kalashnikov, maker of the legendary AK-47, is reporting a huge increase in small arms sales. Though the company is attributing the boom to increased overseas exports and sales to civilians, the fact that it is happening alongside the war in Ukraine seems more than coincidental.
Russia has already suffered an estimated 65,000 dead and is drafting 200,000 or more men who are being sent to the front with little training. Many of those troops are already complaining about being issued old and rusty AK-47s dating to the Cold War.
Many of the new rifles these reluctant conscripts will inevitably need will come from Kalashnikov, which manufactures most Russian small arms.
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“The Kalashnikov Concern increased the production of small arms by 40 percent,” the company said. “A significant increase in the production of small arms in 2022 was achieved through export contracts for the supply of military products and an increase in the export of civilian weapons. Already in September, actual exports of civilian weapons were equal to the total figure for 2021.”
Kalashnikov says its production goals are at a 20-year high. “This year, we see an increase in demand on the market for civilian small arms compared to last year,” said company president Alan Lushnikov. “That is why our production capacities are quite intensively loaded this year.”
Kalashnikov, which comprises a group of manufacturing firms, provides 95% of Russian small arms. The firm is partly owned by Russia’s state-owned Rostec arms conglomerate.
Lushnikov — a former Russian deputy transport minister who acquired a 75% stake in the company in 2020 — has previously said that 79% of revenue comes from military orders and the remainder from civilian purchases.
Small arms, big sales
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In addition to the AK-12, a 5.45 mm weapon that is the Russian military’s standard assault rifle, Kalashnikov makes sniper rifles, shotguns, anti-aircraft missiles, drones, laser-guided artillery shells, assault boats, and armored vehicles.
The US government banned imports of Russian-made Kalashnikovs after Russia seized and annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014. In August 2021, the US State Department banned importation of Russian-made ammunition after opposition politician Aleksey Navalny was poisoned by Russian security services.
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But the weapons are still available through Kalashnikov USA, a separate company that manufactures the weapons in America.
“Originally an importer of Russian-made firearms, the company began manufacturing its own guns — based on the Russian specifications — after the US government banned their importation,” says Kalashnikov USA’s website. “Today, the company produces a wide variety of semi-auto AK pattern rifles, shotguns and pistols for the US civilian marketplace.”
Firearms sales have soared both in the US and globally in recent years, with most weapons owned by civilians rather than the military or law enforcement.
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US-based research firm Small Arms Analytics estimated that at least 12.7 million guns were sold in the US between January and September 2022 — down from the same periods in 2021 and 2020 but well above the 9.7 million sold in 2019.
The Small Arms Survey, a Swiss-based nongovernmental organization, estimated in 2020 that “the global stockpile has increased over the past decade, largely due to civilian holdings, which grew from 650 million in 2006 to 857 million in 2017.”
Like the US, European nations have banned imports of Russian arms. Nonetheless, in addition to domestic sales in Russia, there are plenty of other nations — some with AK-47s on their national flags — that might still order Kalashnikovs because of price, familiarity, or nostalgia.
Ironically, what’s good for Kalashnikov may not be good for Russian soldiers.
The deadliest weapons in Ukraine have been artillery, tanks, and missiles, and Russia is running out of them. Sending ill-trained conscripts onto a modern battlefield without the support of those heavy weapons will get many of them killed no matter how new their rifles are.
Michael Peck is a defense writer whose work has appeared in Forbes, Defense News, Foreign Policy magazine, and other publications. He holds a master’s in political science. Follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn.
