The DShK 1938 (Cyrillic: ДШК, for Russian: Дегтярёва-Шпагина Крупнокалиберный, romanized: Degtyaryova-Shpagina Krupnokaliberny, "Degtyaryov-Shpagin large-calibre") is a Soviet heavy machine gun.

[18] Requiring a heavy machine gun similar to the M2 Browning, development of the DShK began in the Soviet Union in 1929 and the first design was finalised by Vasily Degtyaryov in 1931.

[17][19] The initial design used the same gas operation from the Degtyaryov machine gun, and used a 30 round drum magazine, but had a poor rate of fire.

Georgy Shpagin revised the design by changing it to a belt-fed with a rotary-feed cylinder, and the new machine gun began production in 1938 as the DShK 1938.

[17][20] The DShK and the American M2 Browning are the only .50 caliber machine guns designed prior to World War II that remain in service to the present day.

[17] Similar to the PM M1910 Maxim, when deployed against infantry, the DShK was used with a two-wheeled trolley, with which the machine gun weighed a total of 346 pounds (157 kg).

[17] In June 1988, during The Troubles, a British Army Westland Lynx helicopter was hit 15 times by two Provisional IRA DShKs smuggled from Libya, and forced to crash-land near Cashel Lough Upper, south County Armagh.