The Astra 300 was developed in 1922 by the Astra Unceta company and was first produced in Spain in 1922/1923. This weapon was originally used by the Spanish prison administration in the 1920s, in 1928 the pistol was then used for the first time by the
Spanish Navy. In the 1930s, the Astra 300 was primarily an army pistol. In 1937–1938, the
USSR purchased a small number of Astra 300 pistols from the
Spanish Republic. Richly trimmed, they were used as awards. In particular, the
People's Commissariat of Defense of the Soviet Union Kliment Voroshilov handed over the M300 of the luxury model to the Soviet pilots such as
Vasily Stalin,
Timur Frunze, and
Sergey Mikoyan. Larger weapons, with significant "representative" dimensions, such as the 7,63-mm Astra pistols of models 901-903, were handed over either to military leaders or to the highest commanding staff of the
NKVD. During the Spanish Civil War, it would be provided to the German
Condor Legion by the Nationalist faction, and would later be supplied to the German
Wehrmacht during World War II. Between October 1941 and July 1944, a total of about 85,000 copies of the Astra 300 were delivered from neutral Spain to
Berlin in
Nazi Germany. In 1946, the Astra 300 was largely replaced by its successor, the
Astra 3000. == Users ==