#Belarus

Before we talk about SMAR-100BPM in detail, we need to understand the circumstances that led to the creation of the modern Belarussian small arms industry.

According to TASS Russian News Agency, the Belarusian State-owned Foreign Trade Unitary Enterprise “BELSPETSVNESHTECHNIKA” (BSVT) has started assembling Vepr rifles and shotguns from Russian-made Molot parts. TASS was informed about this cooperation by a “Belarusian defense industry contact” during the MILEX 2019 arms exhibition recently held in Minsk, Belarus.

After a meeting with the President of Belarus, Roman Golovchenko, the chairman of the State Military Industrial Committee of the Republic of Belarus, gave an interview to a local news channel called Belarus 1 where he talked about the country’s plans concerning the upcoming developments in the military industry. Particularly, Golovchenko announced that they are planning to build a new small arms and ammunition plant.

About a year ago we published an article telling about a Belarusian PDW concept called Humble Bee. Victor Aster, the inventor and CAD designer of that weapon concept, has recently come up with a new project called Rocky Gun. The idea is to make sort of model kits that allow you to build cardboard replicas of firearms.

21st Century Asian Arms Race spotted an image shared on the website of the Office of the Azeri President that is showing a rifle of Belarusian origins in a unit armory locker of the Azeri Armed Forces. The rifle in question was previously reported on by TFB in February of this year. Appearing in a display put on by the state-owned Military-Industrial Committee of Belarus was an AR15 chambered in 7.62x39mm, configured to take AKM-patterned magazines (as opposed to STANAG configured ones, also popular for 7.62x39mm AR15 derivatives). Where the rifle is made or imported from is difficult to discern. Originally the design is actually a U.S. one, introduced at SHOT 2017 by a startup called Arsenal Firearms, with the nomenclature as the “Switch”, also offered in 5.45x45mm. The website appears to be down and it doesn’t look like it saw much success in the United States. However at the display of the rifle in Belarus, there was a BSVT flag and placard right next to it. BSVT is an abbreviation for BELSPETSVNESHTECHNIKA, a subsidiary of the aforementioned Military-Industrial Committee of Belarus. The company produces defense items from small arms to missiles.

At an exhibition in Minsk held by the Belarusian Military-Industrial Committee, the  Goskomvoenprom or GKVP, a new rifle was unveiled. The unnamed rifle appears to blend features from both the AR and AK platforms.

The Belarusian Historical and Cultural Complex “Stalin Line” has published a video telling about current small arms of Belarusian special forces. None of them is an unknown firearm, yet it is still interesting to see what combination of guns and accessories they use. You can watch the video (in Russian) and as always, we’ll take a brief look at each of the guns.

During MILEX-2017 military exhibition, a Belarusian company called BSVT has introduced a new compact semi-auto pistol. The pistol is called PSN-V which is an abbreviation meaning “Vasilyev Concealed Carry Pistol” (ПСН-В – Пистолет Скрытого Ношения Васильева). It is chambered in 9x19mm and dedicated for undercover concealed carry use by law enforcement officers.

Recent photographic evidence has shown that Assad’s Syrian Arab Army (SAA) is equipped with DNS-1 Day & Night Vision Sights from the Belarusian company “Belarusian Optical & Mechanical Association”. These optics have been seen mounted on both AK74Ms and PKMs using a Picatinny rail on a standard Kalashnikov optic mounting platform in use on many Soviet small arms designs. Although these optics haven’t been seen in large quantities, their presence in two photographs signifies at least a small order of such DNS-1 optics. The DNS-1 appears to have an infrared capability in addition to a standard daytime usage mode, very similar to the U.S. Army’s discontinued Day/Night AN/PVS-10 of the 1990s and early OIF/OEF eras. Although these sights were cutting edge technology when they were introduced, today they tend to be overweight compared to numerous other equivalent optics available. For the Syrian Army, these optics would be a tremendous advantage over the rebels they are fighting, especially during periods of low light.