Notes | After the first year of Operation Barbarossa, it became apparent to the Romanians that their anti-tank weapons were not effective enough against the Soviet T-34s and KV-1s, so the decision was made to up-grade to 75mm and work began in 1942 to design a new gun. The Resita model 1943 was a combination of two different weapons, the carriage and recoil was from the Soviet Zis-3 field gun and the barrel was from the Vickers model 31 anti-aircraft gun. It was chambered to fire same 75mm round that was used with German Pak 40 but had a slightly higher muzzle velocity. It was a powerful anti-tank gun which could easily defeat the T-34 and KV-1 plus it was also used as a light field piece. The first Romania units to receive these guns was the Romanian 1st armoured division, with others receiving theirs later. |