A Silly Pistol!
The Makarov Pistol (9×18) has been in active service with the Russian military since 1951, and mostly still is.
However, since 2016, the Russian Federation has been issuing their new service pistol, the PYa/MP443 Grach/MP443C Viking. All models are manufactured in Russia
As is the Russian style, the “Y” is for “Yagarin,” the pistol’s designer. The “Viking” model is the genera intended for export.
Heavily-influenced by Western trends, the Viking is chambered for 9×19, features a 1911-style two-position manual safety lever (ambidextrous), Picatinny Rail, a Cirillo-style, fixed rear sight (three-dot), 1911-style disassembly, forward slide serrations, squared-off trigger-guard (those last two “features,” they should not have bothered copying)
The Viking is a polymer-framed, tilt-barrel (Browning) design, featuring a double-column/double-feed magazine (so the grip is “wide”)
It’s reminiscent of a Glock, except the Viking is hammer-fired and has no trigger-tab safety, a non-captive recoil spring, no optics set-up. It also has no safety-plunger on the underside of the slide. That feature is pretty standard on modern carry-pistols, as it renders the gun drop-safe when present. Russians need to re-consider this omission, if they plan on selling these guns in the USA!
Most Russian gun-designers (like many in the West) don’t personally “go-armed” and never have. And, while their design-engineering skills are undisputed, their practical knowledge of the way pistols are carried and used for serious purposes, by Operators, is obviously deficient!
The Viking suffers from the same fatal design-flaw as does the CZ75. It’s an ostensibly trigger-cocking pistol, but with no decocking lever. That is: there is no way to lower the hammer on a live round, without touching the hammer, and the trigger.
For those who want to routinely carry this pistol with the hammer down on a live round, the hammer must be decocked by holding it back manually as the trigger is pulled, then slowly lowering the hammer all the way forward. This dubious procedure cannot be done rapidly, and even when done “carefully,” it is a veritable invitation to the UD. Not allowed on my ranges!
So, the Viking (like the CZ75) must be carried “cocked and locked” (1911-style), if it is to be ready for immediate deployment in a personal-security emergency (and why else would you carry a pistol?) The Viking’s suppositional “trigger-cocking feature,” as a practical matter, is unavailable!
The addition of a manual decocking lever would legitimately address this issue, but in the West manual decocking levers, along with hammer-fired pistols, have already come and gone.
So at least by Western standards, the Viking was obsolete the day it was designed!
The Russians may sell a few to non-serious consumers, like esoteric target-shooters, but Operators will have no interest, for reasons cited above.
When they want to seriously enter the Western pistol market, Russian marketers need to talk with some people who actually carry guns for serious purposes.
For that matter, I know a few Western gun manufacturers who would do well to consider that same advice!
“An ounce of practice is worth a ton of theory.”
EF Schumacher
/John
