Large-caliber single-shot anti-tank guns were widely used during the Second World War, not only by the red army. Both the allies and the Axis countries had their own samples, including Germany, which paid great attention not only to the development of tanks, but also to the creation of the latest anti-tank weapons. And yet the most striking and famous "armored vehicle fighter" was the Degtyarev anti-tank rifle, made in the USSR.
The Soviet Union began to think seriously about creating its own anti-tank rifles in the early 1930s. On March 13, 1936, a competition was announced for the design of a PTR with a caliber of 20-25 mm. The most important requirement for a new weapon was the mass indicator. It was not supposed to exceed 35 kg. After a long and tense competition between the designers in 1938, the winner was nevertheless chosen. As a result, the Rukavishnikov PTR model was approved for testing. However, the rifle did not go into circulation, despite the rather successful tests in 1940.
The advancement of new weapons was hampered by the position of the domestic military. Among the officers' circles, it was believed that such rifles would be absolutely useless against tanks in the coming war. The People's Commissariat of Defense mistakenly believed that all tanks in a future conflict would have armor no thinner than 60-80 cm. A 14.5-mm cartridge could not have taken such a thickness. Everything changed after the outbreak of World War II.
Already on July 23, 1941, from the very top of the state leadership, it was decided to immediately resume work on the creation of an anti-tank rifle. The reason for this was that the bulk of German tanks had an armor thickness of 35-40 mm. An armor-piercing bullet fired from a gun at a target at a distance of 500-800 meters could quite cope with such indicators.
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The best Soviet gunsmiths at that time - N. IN. Rukavishnikov, V. AND. Degtyarev and S. G. Simonov. First of all, a new 14.5-mm armor-piercing incendiary cartridge was created, and an anti-tank rifle was already made for it. By August 29, 1941, the first successful model, the Degtyarev rifle, was tested and adopted. It was made on the basis of the Vladimirov's rifle, which was not accepted into service in the 1930s due to the imperfection of the design.
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The main advantage of the PTRD was its simplicity and manufacturability. Even an "average" craftsman could make a PTRD on an ordinary lathe. This made it possible to produce thousands of guns in the shortest possible time. Over the entire war in the USSR, more than 281 thousand units of this weapon were produced. Therefore, it is impossible to underestimate the contribution of the Degtyarev rifle to the victory, especially in the first months and years of the war.
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A source: https://novate.ru/blogs/230720/55420/