allegedly was intended as a defensive weapon against in-space attacks by the US space program.
??? If it was for in-space attacks, wouldn’t it be more logical to mount a gun outside of ship 😆?
It was intended as a survival aid for emergency landings. It’s not a shotgun, but a three barrel pistol (but it can shoot both normal rounds and shells). Another interesting detail - it’s buttstock is a folding machete.
TP-87 was invented by request of A. Leonov after emergency landing of ‘Voshod-2’ where cosmonauts Leonov and Belyaev had to survive 3 days in wild taiga forest for a rescue team to retrieve them.