SKS rifle

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Russian Simonov Type 45 aka the Russian SKS rifle - 7.62x39mm. The Russian SKS has a milled receiver and a blade bayonet. The rifles were issued with hardwood or laminated stocks. This example has a hardwood stock.

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Chinese Type 56 Carbine aka the Chinese SKS rifle - 7.62x39mm. The Chinese SKS has a stamped receiver and a spike bayonet (aka a "pig sticker") much like one of their AK47 copies - the Type 56 assault rifle. This version, like many imported SKS rifles, have the infamous 'orange cratewood' stocks, probably the lowest quality wood in any mass produced rifle, save for the last ditch Arisaka Type 99 rifles at the end of WW2. Many SKS rifles during the Vietnam War were issued with reddish plastic stocks, because of the incidents of 'wood rot' in the humid SE Asian jungles.

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Yugoslavian SKS rifle with fold out bayonet, a SKS variant most seen during the Balkan Wars - 7.62x39mm.

Whereas the Russian SKS rifle can appear in any of the world's battlegrounds, the Chinese SKS can really only appear in places where there was a lot of military aid by Mainland China. Most of the SKS rifles seen in movies about the Vietnam war are Chinese Type 56 carbines, but to have original Russian Type 45 Carbines is not historically implausible. The Soviet Union supplied ComBloc weapons in every hemisphere where there was a Marxist/communist presence.

The SKS rifle appears in the following films and television series used by the following actors:

Film

• Seen in a weapons shop and carried by some villagers in Rambo III

• NVA Soldiers in Platoon (Chinese Type 56 Carbine)

• NVA soldiers in Uncommon Valor

• NVA soldiers in Rescue Dawn

• NVA soldiers in Flight of the Intruder (Chinese Type 56 Carbine)

• NVA soldiers in We Were Soldiers

• Guerilla fighter in RoboCop 3

• Viet Cong in The Odd Angry Shot

• Militia fighters and refugees in Tears of the Sun

• NVA soldiers in Hamburger Hill (Chinese Type 56 Carbine)

• Colombian Soldier in Toy Soldiers

• The Dogs of War

• The Katanganese Gendarmes and Simba rebels in Dark of the Sun (Chinese Type 56 Carbine)

• Tropic Thunder

• Red Corner

• Stealth

• Hanson (Ted Monte) in Curse of the Komodo (Norinco SKS Sporter)

• Mariana (Rosario Dawson) in The Rundown (Norinco SKS Sporter) or possibly a SKS-M

• Serb and Bosnian Soldiers in No Man's Land (Yugo SKS Rifle aka M59/66)

• American Beauty

• Sniper 3

Television

• The Unit

• VC and NVA units in Tour of Duty

• VC and NVA units in China Beach

• East German soldiers in The War Game (1965)

• Seen used by Serb Soldiers in the Episode "Downed Pilot" in Situation Critical (Yugo SKS Rifle aka M59/66)

Video Games

• Insurgency

• Syphon Filter: The Omega Strain

• Vietcong

• Jagged Alliance 2