A huge number of myths about the so-called mercury knives are circulating on the Internet. Some particularly enthusiastic citizens ascribe to them almost miraculous properties, call them a secret development of Soviet designers, made especially for the KGB. Some comrades even claim that such knives do not fail (I wonder how this is?). What exactly is a mercury knife?
Before the First World War, all participants began to massively abandon edged weapons. However, the harsh trench warfare made its own adjustments to reality, as a result of which there was a real surge of "interest" in a wide variety of melee weapons (up to axes and clubs!). Before World War II, the situation was similar. The dynamic development of firearms assigned the cold one not even a secondary role. The knife became an exclusively household item in a soldier's duffel bag. And yet, already in the course of the Finnish war, the leadership of the Red Army once again remembered that special army knives are still needed - primarily for sappers and reconnaissance.
Mercury knives really existed and were created for reconnaissance. However, contrary to popular misconception, the first mercury knife appeared in the USSR not at all during the Second World War, but after it. They were released in a limited edition of 1,500 copies in 1947. The development was indeed classified, but one should not speculate on this once again. A similar fate meets literally every development of a military or police purpose.
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The peculiarity of the mercury knife is that it has a small recess for installing a capsule with overflowing (inside the capsule itself) liquid metal. At one time, the designers suggested that the installation of such an element would allow the knife to always fly when throwing so that, upon reaching the goal, it is guaranteed to stick into it. However, in practice, the mercury "stabilizer" turned out to be of little use. Therefore, things did not go beyond the production of the first series. Subsequently, the knives were transferred to the KGB and the army, where they were used as ordinary combat ones. The only domestic mercury knife that has survived to this day is kept in the museum of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
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The development of the USSR was not unique. Around the same time, American designers tried to do the same thing. To date, there are also several mercury knives left in US museums and collections for the American special forces. They also did not receive wide distribution overseas. However, thanks to the formidable name, mercury knives immediately began to grow overgrown with numerous myths and horror stories.
If you want to know even more interesting things, then you should read about knife "Cherry": what is the phenomenon of weapons of Soviet intelligencethat collectors want it.
A source: https://novate.ru/blogs/220820/55752/