Vladimir Grigoryevich Fyodorov

Who was Vladimir Grigoryevich Fyodorov?

Vladimir Grigoryevich Fyodorov was a Russian and Soviet scientist, weapons designer, professor, lieutenant general of a corps of military engineers, founder of the Soviet school of automatic small arms, and a Hero of Labour.

In 1900 Vladimir Fyodorov graduated from Mikhailovskaya Artillery Academy and was transferred to the artillery committee of the Chief Artillery Directorate. He designed a number of automatic rifles: one chambered in 7.62 mm, another in 6.5 mm for a cartridge of his own design, and one of the first assault rifles in the world: the Fedorov Avtomat, which saw service firing a 6.5 mm Arisaka rifle cartridge. Automatic weapons designed by Fyodorov were used during World War I and the Russian Civil War.

After the October Revolution, Vladimir Fyodorov was appointed head and technical director of the first Soviet weapons plant, which produced submachine guns of his design. In 1921, he organized and headed a design bureau at the automatic small arms factory. In 1922, Fyodorov designed the Fedorov-Shpagina machine gun. In 1931-1933, Fyodorov worked as a standardization consultant at a weapons and machinegun trust. He then published a number of works on automatic weapons and was appointed a small arms consultant at Narkomat and with the Ministry of Arms. Between 1946 and 1953, Fyodorov was a member of the Academy of Artillery Sciences. He was a tutor of Vasily Degtyaryov, Georgi Shpagin, Sergei Simonov and others. Vladimir Fyodorov authored a number of scientific works on the history, design, production, and combat use of small firearms.