Got a few questions about some AK mag pouches I have.

Most AK74 mag pouches have an extra strap and loop inside the pouch.  Anyone know what these are for?  The strap goes over one mag.  What's the purpose of the strap? Just to hold one mag in reserve?  And what the little loop for?  










What about the country of origin for these three?  A blue and two and two that are purple.  Seems like odd colors for a military pouch.





What's the country of origin for this little one?  Five cell for 20 rounds mags.  I'm thinking Chinese.  Never seen one like it before.








Lastly, this shorter East German pouch (right).  It's shorter than the standard pouch shown for comparison.  Not even close to closing with AK47 mags in it and AK74 mags will not quite close either.  Did East Germany make 20 rd magazines?

The little loop thing holds the stripper clip guide. I always thought the strap was to keep the stripper clips with ammo on it from falling out of the pouch? Just a guess.

I would say that 5 cell 20 rounder is definitely Chinese, they are the only ones that use that wooden toggle thing.

Makes sense, you can keep a lot more ammo in that compartment on stripper clips than what another 30 round mag holds.



Did some more research.  I think the 5 cell 20 round magazine pouch is actually North Korean. I found pictures of North Korean 30 rd mag pouches and they have the same shaped wood clasp things, canvas and stamps under the flap. The wood clasps are shaped differently than the Chinese wood clasps.  The Chinese are pointed on the end instead of flat.  

When I bought it a few years ago it had five 20 rd North Korean mags in it. I thought they were Hungarian mags until I got home and noticed they didn't have a spine and had a lot of odd stamps. But I always assumed the pouch was Chinese.

If I really stretch the flap I can get four 30 rd 5.45 mags in the short East German pouch, so it may have just shrunk a bit and made it tight.

Haven't found anything on the purple or blue pouches yet.

I think they maybe Romanian.

North Korean would be even better!

I have 3-4 of those E.G. AK74 mag pouches and the fit my 7.62 and 5.45 mags, not sure what's different about yours, but admittedly I'm no expert on such things.

the blue/purple usually denotes navy issue.
dennis

My father just gave me his Tantal, magazines, pouches, and ammo a few days ago.  One of the pouches is E. German and it has that single strap/loop.  I didnt know what it was for either.  After I saw this thread and it was mentioned that it was for stripper clips, I went and looked at it and saw that it also has 4 little slots to hold clips, and there were wrapped clips in them.  I found a clip guide in the cleaning kit pouch too.  

I probably never would have realized all that was even in there haha.  Bonus clips!