Degtyarev's anti-tank rifle was the most massive Soviet anti-tank rifle of World War II. In total, 281 thousand copies were released. For comparison, the Simonov's gun was produced in the amount of 190 thousand copies. Many have heard that both types of weapons were adopted in 1941. However, the irony and mystery of the situation lies in the fact that in reality the PTRD-41 was never in service with the Soviet Union. How did it happen?
Armament issues during the Great Patriotic War were dealt with by the State Defense Committee formed on June 30, 1941. The responsibilities of this instance included, among other things, the responsibility for adopting new types of weapons and equipment. The situation with German tanks in the summer of 1941 was disastrous, and therefore the GKO raised the question of forcing the release of anti-tank rifles. A competition for a new gun was also announced, in which designers Simonov and Degtyarev took part with their projects. The development lasted only a few weeks after which the GKO considered both proposals.
It is believed that both guns were officially adopted in 1941. However, in reality this is not the case. This point of view entered the public consciousness from the memoirs of Dmitry Fedorovich Ustinov, which were written many years after the war. If we turn to the documents of the State Defense Committee, then there is not a single mention of the adoption of the Degtyarev rifle in service. There is only a document confirming the adoption of the Simonov rifle. All documents are numbered consecutively, and therefore suspicions about the loss of the resolution are not consistent, since they are not confirmed by the analysis of this very numbering.
In fact, the case with the PTRD-41 is not the only one of its kind. The most plausible explanation for the fact that the State Defense Committee of the USSR did not accept the gun for service is that the sanction for the release of this type of weapon was announced in an emergency order by some other Soviet army department, which could delegate to itself some of the powers of a higher authority in connection with a special situation … Incidents of this kind took place mainly in 1941 and were associated with the beginning of the war. It is for this reason that we do not have a single suitable GKO document.
If you want to know even more interesting things, then you should read about 5 disadvantages of the legendary PPSh, about which it is not customary to remember.