Before AK-47 there was “Lightning“ submachine gun

This post was published on our FB page, Killing Warsaw, on August 10th.

The “Błyskawica” (Lightning), was a submachine gun produced by the Home Army (underground partisan army) in occupied Poland. Together with a Polish version of the Sten submachine gun, with which it shares some design elements, it was the only weapon mass-produced covertly in occupied Europe during World War II.

The design was based on two of the most popular submachine guns of the era. The external construction with a retractable butt and magazine mounted under the gun was borrowed from the successful German MP 40. The internal design of the mechanism was modeled after the British Sten, Blowback, with an open bolt. It offered good performance and high reliability. The weapon was designed in such a fashion that resistance army members could use any captured stocks of German MP40 ammunition cartridges. That’s right ammo taken from the Germans.

It was not the only weapon produced by Polish partisans. More in the book "Killing Warsaw".