On December 31, 1999, TIME magazine named Albert Einstein its "Person of the Century," a reasonable choice, considering Einstein's impact on our understanding of the universe (and the impact of his problem child on global politics and warfare).
The case might also be made for a former tank commander in the Soviet Red Army who passed away yesterday at the ripe old age of 94.
Mikhail Timofeyevich Kalashnikov was a slight child, the son of peasants in the remote Siberian district of Tomsk. While he dreamed of making his mark as a poet, his family's chief means of subsistence, farming and hunting, gave him intimate familiarity with firearms and machines.
His skill with them would change the world.
Drafted into the Red Army in 1938 as a mechanic, he later commanded a tank crew and was wounded in battle. While recovering, he met many soldiers who complained of the quality of Soviet infantry arms and set out to design a better gun. He made several advances in firearms technology, but his most famous was an automatic/semiautomatic rifle perfected in 1947, logically dubbed the Avtomat Kalashnikova 1947, known around the world by its initials.
By "around the world," I mean everywhere. The AK47's ruggedness, light weight and large capacity make it the ideal weapon for dirty, dusty, cold, hot, dry, wet and every other sort of environment. It's simplicity of construction make it the most copied and ubiquitous gun ever, despite its low firepower and accuracy relative to other options. It is estimated that one-fifth of the world's half-billion small arms are versions of the AK47.
That simplicity and reliability have also allowed the AK to democratize warfare, putting effective firepower within the reach of peasants and tipping the balance of power in conflicts around the globe. The gun's reliability in the jungle environment was a major factor in the United States' loss in Vietnam (see C.J. Chivers' "The Gun"-- excerpts here and here-- for more on why the AK is the ideal Third World weapon and its superiority over the early US M16 in Vietnam).
Kalashnikov himself had mixed feelings about his most famous invention. While proud to have supplied the Red Army with one its most effective tools to defend his beloved rodina, he was unhappy with its popularity with terrorists and said in later years that, looking back, he would rather have given the world a better lawnmower.
Kalashnikov continued to invent, hunt and write poetry to the end of his life. He died yesterday in Udmurt. Cause of death will be announced after autopsy, but is presumed to be related to the heart and intestinal troubles he's suffered in recent years, according to RT.