Designed by a young engineer Mikhail Kalashnikov, who was the Great Patriotic tanker, AK-47 became a cult symbol of the arms and military operations around the world.
Soldiers of the Soviet Union, armed with automatic weapons, during the Prague Spring – military action in socialist Czechoslovakia, during which Soviet troops suppressed Czechoslovakian reform attempts. (Josef Koudelka / Magnum)
Zagros Mountains, northern Iraq, 1979
Brook Wounded Knee, South Dakota, USA, 1973
A member of the American-Indian tribe waving an AK-47 during the massacre at Wounded Knee creek, which was the last major armed clash between the Dakota Sioux Indians and the U.S. Army, and one of the last battles of the Indian wars. (Bettmann / Corbis)
Abadan, Iran, 1980
Western Cambodia, 1981
Bucharest, Romania, 1989
Ironically, this member of the anti-communist movement also uses the AK-47 to catch members of the secret police during the overthrow of Nicolae Ceausescu – Romania’s communist dictator. (Christophe Simon / AFP / Getty)
Solentiname, Nicaragua, 1984
Woman and child during a training exercise conducted by local socialist defense forces for counter-revolutionary combats, acting with the support of the U.S., which tried to overthrow the leftist government. (Larry Towell / Magnum)
Kabul, 1992
Izhevsk, Russia, 2002
Sales of pirated copies, some of which are cheaper for a quarter of the original price, jeopardizes the work of Russian arms manufacturers. At a factory in Izhevsk (pictured) in 1991, worked 12 000 people, and today - there are only 7,000. Analysts estimate that revenue from global sales of these machines range from 70 to 105 million dollars. (Oleg Nikishin / Getty)
Hamer village, Ethiopia, 2009
Basra, Iraq, 2004
An armed member of the Army Muqtada al-Sadr, Mahdi protects the central Sunni mosque during the Friday prayer. (Abbas / Magnum)
Bar Qambar Khel, Pakistan, 2008
Pakistani Taliban jumping from a truck near the border with Afghanistan. The leader of Taliban Mullah Mohammed Omar once called U.S. President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair to a duel with the AK-47. U.S. again began to ship the counterfeit machines for the Afghan war, this time for the fight against al-Qaida and the Taliban. (Lynsey Addario / VII Network)
Dhushamareb, Somalia, 2009
Sufi Muslim in religious studies. Usually peaceful and tolerant Sufis in Somalia had only recently taken up arms to defend themselves from attacks by the Islamist group al-Shabab, who want to seize power in the southern areas of the country. (Michael Kamber / Polaris)
