His name has entered the languages of the planet and his most famous creation has sold 100 million copies but at 86 Mikhail Kalashnikov, father of the assault rifle that bears his name, is still a busy man.
He travels, he sells, and in the face of criticism he sings the praises of the weapon he created.
Blue eyes, grey hair, sprightly, he lives in the Urals town of Izhevsk and arrived Saturday in Moscow to hit back at criticism in the US press of the sale of 100,000 Kalashnikovs to Venezuela.
"It isn't the first time they have tried to sneer at Russian weapons," he said in response to an article on April 10 in the conservative Washington Times which claimed that Caracas had suspended the contract because Moscow was supplying old weapons.
In any case, he said, the rifle named after him "is extremely simply made for a poorly educated soldier."
"During the Vietnam war US soldiers used to abandon their M-16s and take the Kalashnikovs of the Vietnamese troops they had killed.
"Every day in Baghdad the Americans use my weapons because theirs don't work very well there."
Today he regrets that the gun that bears his name is so often used in inter-ethnic conflicts
"I created it to defend my country" he said.