Photo Of The Day: Above you can see some left-handed shooting with the UKM 2020 machine gun. As Poland changed teams and joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in 1999, the challenge to adapt their firearms to common NATO ammunition arose. The PKM machine gun was already being produced in Poland under licence, but it needed a serious redesign to be able to accept the new ammunition (7.62x51mm NATO) as well as the links and belt that hold them.

UKM stands for Uniwersalny Karabin Maszynowy which translates into Universal Machine Gun.

For a 7.62x51mm machine gun, it looks light and versatile. East meets West.

Caption from 21 Brygada Strzelców Podhalańskich, machine-translated:

21 Brygada Strzelców Podhalańskich
Testing the new UKM 2020S in Polygonie in Nowej Debie.
Prototype – the UKM 2000P modernization tool is lightweight, with an ergonomic design

All pictures from 21 Brygada Strzelców Podhalańskich. You can find their website here: https://www.wojsko-polskie.pl/21bsp/

Check TFB’s previous article on the UKM here: Hands on with the Polish ZMT UKM 2000.