Yakov Taubin

[2][3] In the fall of 1931, he sent a draft of a design, which used regular 40.8 mm (1.61 in) MG Dyakonov rifle grenades, to the Red Army artillery leadership, and it was accepted for development at the Kovrovsky Tool Plant Number Two.

Later, a group of experts led by Taubin continued this work in Moscow, being organized in the spring of 1934 as an independent design office under OKB-16 of the People's Commissariat of Arms of the USSR.

In 1937–1938, the Taubina was rejected as a company-level support weapon in favour of a mobile, cheap, and well-tested 50 mm (2.0 in) mortar, based on a 1938 design by B. I. Shavyrina.

The Taubina was used in small numbers with success by the Red Army during the Winter War against Finland, but soon all work on the automatic grenade launcher was ended.

[5] The MP-6 used a short recoil system, weighed 70 kilograms (150 lb), had an initial muzzle velocity of 900 metres per second (3,000 ft/s), and a rate of fire of about 600 rounds per minute, with an 81-round clip provided.

In-flight, the ammunition clips sometimes became dislodged because of their large surface, which caused them to experience significant aerodynamic pressure, so the gun was converted to being belt-fed.

[1] Competitive trials were conducted between Taubin's design and the newly developed, gas-operated Volkov-Yartsev VYa-23, a 23mm gun with generally similar characteristics.

This place is now Yuri Gagarin Park within the city limits of Samara and contains the mass graves of several thousand victims of execution by Soviet authorities.