[LINK] world.guns.ru
The AKS-74U [aka AKSU-74 or AK-74SU] short assault rifle (the "U" suffix means "Ukorochennyj" in Russian = "Shortened" in English) was developed in the late 1970s from the AKS-74 assault rifle.
The AKS-74U was intended as a personal defense weapon for tanks, guns, helicopters and other vehicles crews, and for the airborne and special operations forces, who required a compact but relatively powerful individual automatic weapon. It has the size and effective range of a typical submachine gun, but has the advantage of the general issue, assault rifle ammunition and magazines, as well as the parts interchangeability with the general issue assault rifle, the AK-74.
Why did Russia go to a 5.45x39mm (actual bullet diameter is 5.62mm) cartridge? To keep up with the Joneses (Americanskis) with their 5.56mm M-16, of course. See the continuation.
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Differences from an AK-74:
AKS-74U has a severely shortened barrel, with the gas chamber moved back and appropriately cut down gas piston rod. Since the portion of the barrel after the gas port is very short, a special muzzle device was designed, which is used as a flash hider and the gas expansion chamber (to achieve reliable gas operated action). The front sight base is lowered, and the standard adjustable rear sight is replaced by the flip-up rear (marked for 200 and 400 meters distance), mounted on the receiver cover. The receiver cover is hinged to the receiver at the front and flips up when opened (original AK-74 receiver cover is detachable).
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Arsenal in Bulgaria makes a reasonable facsimile.
Diminuitive military rounds
[LINK] world.gun.ru
The idea of the reduced caliber ammunition for military shoulder arms was played with for a very long time. Each time the technology leaped forward, the standard calibers were reduced - from the 0.45 - 0.50 inch (11.4 - 12.7mm) of the mid-1800 to the .30 of the mid-1900s. The idea of further reduction of the caliber down to 6.5 - 5.6 mm (.240 - .220 inch) was also considered in many countries since the beginning of the XX century, but it was not until the 1960s when the idea of the low impulse, small-caliber, high velocity round came up to something real. When US Army adopted the M16 rifle in the mid-1960s, everybody else eyed Americans with interest. And as soon as the idea of small caliber rifle was found worthwhile, the total rearming began.
Soviet army started the development of its own small-caliber ammunition in the late 1960s. After some years of development, a new round was created. This round featured a bottlenecked, tapered case, slim bullet with nominal caliber of 5.45mm (actual bullet diameter is 5.62 mm). The bullet featured a combined steel and lead core with the hollow nose, muzzle velocity from the 415mm barrel was about 900 m/s. As soon as the new ammunition was available and accepted by the Soviet Military, it was decided to develop a new family of small arms around this cartridge. The fastest way to do so was to simply adapt the existing 7.62mm AKM assault rifle and the RPK light machine gun for new ammunition. This "new" arms would serve as an intermediate, temporary solution until the new, more effective and modern arms would be developed. The task of adaptation of the AKM/RPK family for the new round was relatively simple, since the new round was designed with this conversion in mind (case length and the overall length of both 7.62mm and 5.45mm cartridges are almost the same).
Basically, the small-caliber Kalashnikov assault rifle, officially adopted by the Soviet Army in 1974 as the "5.45mm Avtomat Kalashnikova, obraztsa 1974 goda (AK-74)", was no more than the older AKM, re-chambered for a new round, with very minor modifications.
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See a photo of a Hezbollah terrorist holding an AKS-74 in this earlier A-C-E post.
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