upleft, A Finnish soldier with a captured ROKS-3 flamethrower, June 1943 The ROKS-2 and ROKS-3 were man-portable

flamethrower A flamethrower is a ranged incendiary device designed to project a controllable jet of fire. First deployed by the Byzantine Empire in the 7th century AD, flamethrowers saw use in modern times during World War I, and more widely in World Wa ...

s used by the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. The ROKS-2 was designed not to draw attention, so the fuel and gas tanks were concealed under a sheet-metal outer casting resembling a knapsack; the flame projector was designed to resemble a standard

Mosin–Nagant The Mosin–Nagant is a five-shot, bolt-action, internal magazine–fed military rifle. Known officially as the 3-line rifle M1891 and informally in Russia and former Soviet Union as Mosin's rifle ( ru , винтовка Мосина, ISO 9: ...

rifle. The purpose of this was to prevent the operator from being specifically targeted by the enemy. The flame shots were ignited by firing specially modified

7.62×25mm Tokarev The 7.62×25mm Tokarev cartridge (designated as the 7.62 × 25 Tokarev by the C.I.P.) is a Russian rimless bottlenecked pistol cartridge widely used in former Soviet states and in China, among other countries. The cartridge has since been replac ...

cartridges. The ROKS-2 was used, amongst other engagements, during the close-range fighting during the first days of the

Battle of Kursk The Battle of Kursk was a major World War II Eastern Front engagement between the forces of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union near Kursk in the southwestern USSR during late summer 1943; it ultimately became the largest tank battle in history. ...

in 1943.''World War II'' - Willmott, H.P.,

Dorling Kindersley Dorling Kindersley Limited (branded as DK) is a British multinational publishing company specialising in illustrated reference books for adults and children in 63 languages. It is part of Penguin Random House, a subsidiary of German media con ...

, 2004, Page 189, The ROKS-3 was a simplified model designed to be easier to manufacture. It did away with the disguise for the backpack, though it retained the flame projector designed to resemble a rifle. Both models carried around of fuel. The fuel was propelled by nitrogen gas pressurized at and, under ideal circumstances, had a maximum range of around . The Finnish designation for captured ROKS-2 units was liekinheitin M/41-r. Captured Soviet flamethrowers saw some use by Finnish forces during the

Continuation War The Continuation War, also known as the Second Soviet-Finnish War, was a conflict fought by Finland and Nazi Germany against the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1944, as part of World War II.; sv, fortsättningskriget; german: Fortsetzungskrie ...

. They were operated by two-man teams of combat engineers. They were well regarded by the Finns, although flamethrowers of all kinds saw little use by Finnish forces. Some ROKS-3 units were supplied to

North Korea North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and ...

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Med ...

, and Syria.

References

External links

Information on the ROKS flamethrowers

Pictures of a ROKS-3
{{WWIIUSSRInfWeapons Flamethrowers of the Soviet Union World War II infantry weapons of the Soviet Union Military equipment introduced in the 1930s

See also

References

External links