FB PM-63

The FB PM-63 is a compact Polish submachine gun, also called the RAK (Reczny Automat Komandosow), that entered Polish Army service in 1965. Design work began in the 1950s and is credited to Piotr Wilniewczyc, and the Lucznik Arms Factory of Radom built it between 1964 and 1974, about 80,000 examples in all. It is a straight blowback, open bolt, select-fire weapon with a machine pistol layout, a collapsible wire stock, a folding foregrip and a 15 or 25 round box magazine. The sliding front end acts as a compensator and can also be used to cock the weapon. The base model fired the 9x18mm Makarov cartridge at about 650 rounds a minute, with an effective range near 150 meters. Variants in other chamberings, the PM-70 and PM-73, saw little use, and China built an unlicensed copy as the Type 82. Its recorded combat use runs from the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia through Vietnam, the Iran-Iraq War, Afghanistan, Iraq and the war in Ukraine.