“Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan” is my second favorite science fiction movie after “Aliens.” Had the M41A Pulse Rifle been in the hands of Peewee Herman, “Aliens” still would have been the coolest movie in human history. “The Wrath of Khan” earns its spot because of the amazing 1982 analog special effects combined with Ricardo Montalban’s epic pecs (which were real, by the way).
All real men are smitten with the concept of space combat. Nobody does that better than “The Expanse.” The folks who made that series put a great deal of effort into getting the physics right. If you haven’t seen it, “The Expanse” is nailing 95% on the Tomatometer and is available on Amazon Prime. Check it out. You’ll thank me later.
As cool as “Aliens,” “Star Trek,” and “The Expanse” are, none of that is actually real. However, on January 24, 1975, the Soviets test fired the first legit orbital space cannon. This modified 23mm antiaircraft gun loosed twenty rounds in three bursts pointed Lord-knows-where. Given that there is no air friction in space, the Russkies likely dropped those 20 high explosive shells into some benevolent alien’s afternoon picnic someplace. Tragically, humanity has gone to war over stupider things.
Details
In the 1970s, the U.S. and the USSR were locked in the Space Race. The Russians smoked us when they launched Yuri Gregarin into low Earth orbit in April of 1961. Then Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin told the Commies to suck it from the surface of the moon eight years later. By the mid-1970s the metric to beat was an inhabitable orbital space station.
Our own Skylab went up in May of 1973. However, the Russians beat us to it with their first Salyut (“Fireworks”) space station in 1971. Now faced with the prospect of Americans and Russians occupying the same vast reaches of infinite space, the Soviets naturally began scheming how to blow us to pieces over it.
Salyut wasn’t much of a space station. This thing was thrown together out of Soyuz components just to win the race. The Salyut was cramped and fairly miserable. However, in their defense, they did orbit seven of the things. Four of these were nominally there for respectable research purposes. The remaining three were Almaz (“Diamond”) military spy stations.
Origin Story
Aleksandr Nudelman of the KB Tochmash design bureau in Moscow got the tasker to build the world’s first orbital space cannon to defend the Almaz stations from imaginary American attacks. Nudelman and his team began with a 14.5mm automatic gun that weighed 37 pounds and could accurately engage terrestrial targets up to a mile away. This was adapted from the KPV antiaircraft gun that the Russians used as primary armament on their BTR and BRDM armored personnel carriers.
The KPV formed the basis for the family of towed ZPU antiaircraft guns as well. It cycled at 600 rounds per minute and was a proven and effective short-recoil design that should function just fine in outer space. However, Nudelman’s mob eventually decided on something with a bit more authority.
Proper Defensive Weaponry
The final operational version was a 23mm beast called the R-23M Kartech (“Buckshot”). This fast-firing weapon was adapted from the tail gun on the Tupolev Tu-22 Blinder supersonic strategic bomber. The R-23M Kartech was a curious gas-operated, single-barrel weapon that incorporated four individual chambers like a revolver. The gun fired 23x260mm telescoped ammunition at 2,500 rpm. Muzzle velocity hovered around 2,800 feet per second.
The R-23M was fitted in a fixed mount along the centerline of the station. There was an optical sight mounted in the spacecraft’s cockpit. To aim the thing, cosmonauts had to orient the entire space station. Actually touching it off was where the real fun started.
Physics is a Cruel Mistress
For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. That’s not just a good idea, that’s the law. This is the reason full-power 12-gauge buckshot rounds are adequate to peg your funmeter after a long day on the range. This gets even worse in zero gravity with no air.
Smokeless powder contains an oxidizer that provides its own oxygen. Modern cartridge-firing weapons will shoot just fine in a vacuum. The problem is what to do when the recoil from that 23mm gun sends your sparkly new spaceship hurtling toward Uranus.
They only fired the thing once and then only remotely. The station was de-crewed and about to plunge into the earth’s atmosphere to be incinerated at the time.
The Russians are so paranoid they still haven’t declassified the results of that firing test. However, back in 1975, our communist friends really did unlimber their R-23M Kartech space cannon for real, quite effectively lighting up the final frontier.
