Why are the Red Army Committee and the General Equipment Department not interested in deeply tapping the potential of Zis-3? This question is actually not complicated at all.

There are many reasons. First, zis-3 is originally a temporary substitute for zis-2 when it is temporarily unable to be mass-produced. It is a transitional weapon. If it weren't for the difficulty in producing zis-2 and the consumption of the Patriotic War exceeded imagination, it wouldn't have appeared at all.

Regarding a transitional product, the relevant departments of the Red Army are naturally unwilling to waste too much energy, as long as this weapon can be used temporarily. Anyway, the zis-2 will be mass-produced in the future.

In fact, historically, when the German tiger and leopard appeared on the battlefield, the zis-2 soon took over. This 57mm magic needle also produced more than 20,000 pieces, and since 1943, it has replaced the zis-3 as the main anti-tank weapon of the Red Army artillery. With the existence of the better and more professional zis-2, why waste too much energy on the zis-3, a weapon destined to be a transitionalist?

The second reason is that to tap the potential of zis-3, it is actually necessary to make major improvements to zis-3. From the aforementioned German improvement strategy, it can be seen that in order to improve the anti-tank capability of zis-3, a larger medicine room must be replaced to accommodate more launching drugs to launch armor-piercing bombs with faster initial velocity.

However, such improvements are very troublesome. At least for those zis-3s that have been produced and offline, it basically means returning to the factory for major surgery. This requires a lot of working hours, and it may not be supplied to front-line troops in large quantities for the time being.

In other words, this kind of improvement is not as fast as directly producing a brand new zis-2. Think about it, you have to change the gun and develop a new 76.2 mm caliber new high-power armor-piercing shell. Can this be faster? Instead of trying to make an old gun like this, it is better to directly produce a new gun.

The third question is that this is still a problem of high-power armor-piercing bombs. As mentioned earlier, there are two factors that restrict the effectiveness of Zis-2, one is production capacity and the other is the distributed armor-piercing bomb. From the actual situation of the Red Army, even the high-speed armor-piercing bomb of Zis-2 (APCR) cannot be produced, and it also launches another 76.2 mm high-speed armor-piercing bomb at the same time. Is this realistic?

To put it bluntly, the Red Army did not want to distribute better armor-piercing bombs to the front-line troops, but it was really impossible. Limited resources would definitely only guarantee projects with higher priority, such as armor-piercing bombs of d-1, d-5, d-25 and zis-2, which are the key points. And the old transitional goods zis-3 should take a break!

The fourth reason is, yes. Comrade, you read it right, there is a fourth reason. And this reason is even simpler, that is, thanks to the tank gun competition last time Tukhachevsky set up, there is another official selected team member who replaced Zis-3, that is, the D-5 tank gun.

Of course, it is definitely not the D-5t installed on the tank and the D-5s installed on the tank destroyer, but the towed anti-tank gun D-44 based on the D-5. The reason is very simple, it is simply that the Military Commission discovered that the D-5 has such great potential. It can also quickly obtain armor-piercing bombs with great power. Not to mention that the nzk-15 is even a B-cart Nzk-15a, which can meet the needs, and it is also cheap. So why do you still produce zis-2 and zis-3?

Well, with the order of the Military Commission, the production of zis-3 was immediately suspended, and the zis-2, which is about to be mass-produced, was also tragic. We could only continue to maintain small-scale production until the ACPR of the tungsten carbide core is completed before mass production can be re-production.

Therefore, zis-3 is destined to fade out of the front line soon, and its destiny in the future is likely to be withdrawing from the front line. It acts as teaching aids or aids to other brother countries, such as China.

Therefore, after receiving Rokosovsky's request for help, the Military Commission did not reinforce more T-54 and T-35a to the Second Front of Belarus. Because these two things were so scarce, there was a shortage of supply everywhere, and there was not that much. Of course, the Military Commission did not stop waiting for death, but urgently allocated a batch of Su-5 and Su-5a to Rokosovsky. Everyone is familiar with the u-5, which is nothing more than the t-34 chassis and D-5s tank guns. As the first tank killer of the Soviet Union, after the continuous improvement of the Black Panther and the emergence of the Tiger King, its performance was also lagging behind. By 1944, only Su-1 could meet the demand.

Of course, because of the emergence of a certain immortal, the nzk-15 series armor-breaking bomb was developed. The effectiveness of the su-5 may be able to meet the needs in the long run, unless the Germans let the e-5 and e-1 series appear in advance.

Of course, the reason for spending a little more on this Su-5 is very simple. In this time and space, due to the emergence of a certain immortal, there is one more platform suitable for carrying D-5s, that is, the mt-lb36 track conveyor.

In order to meet the needs of the Red Army, Northern Industry urgently studied the solution to install the D-5s and D-25s on the mt-lb36 chassis. After more than half a year of testing, the D-5s was successfully equipped with the mt-lb36, which is the so-called su-5a. The difference between u-5a and su-5 is actually the difference. The different chassis leads to the two types of tank destroyers having the turret front and the other being the turret rear (su-5a). From the appearance, the su-5a is closer to the later self-propelled howitzers. The only difference is that they still use fixed turrets.

Judging from the use of the Red Army, su-5 and su-5a have their own advantages. The former has a lower appearance and better concealment. While the latter is due to the rear position of the turret, the long gun barrel will not protrude forward and occupy a large amount of space, which also makes the maneuverability of the su-5a more ideal. Moreover, the chassis of the mt-lb36 has a larger crew compartment at the rear, making the space more abundant. For the Red Army anti-tank artillery, the su-5a has better man-machine efficiency and more shells loaded with stronger continuous combat capabilities.

Northern Industry also developed the first self-propelled artillery of the Red Army with a rotating turret based on the Su-5a, which was the 122mm self-propelled howitzer later named the Su-122a. As the standard supporting firepower of the mechanized army at the end of the war, the performance of the su-122a was quite outstanding in that era.

Back to the topic, when Rokosovsky received these batches of Su-5 and Su-5a, he was actually a little disappointed. He understood the performance of the D-5 and believed that this anti-tank gun would probably not be able to deal with the most advanced tanks of the German army. In fact, what Rokosovsky wanted most was the su-1.

In fact, the Germans also thought so. Through combat seizure, they obtained the main anti-tank guns and tank guns of the Red Army. After live ammunition tests, the Germans complained about the performance of the Red Army's anti-tank guns.

"Zis-3 and F34 are only a little stronger than the 5mm tank guns equipped by our army. The zis-2 has good performance, but the armor-piercing shells equipped with it really cannot exert the excellent performance of this gun. As for the D-5 tank gun, it is only equivalent to our army's kwk4 l4. As for the 1mm smoothbore gun equipped by the Russian army, the gun fires armor-piercing shells with great power. But the accuracy is too poor... Based on the above, we can believe that continuous improvement of the Black Panther and the development of a new generation of heavy tanks will help our army completely win the armor advantage on the battlefield..."

Not only the German technical experts believed that in fact, after fighting with the Red Army's Klinchi armored troops, the German heavy tank troops were full of confidence. The troops generally required to obtain more Tiger tanks.

Anyway, the German tank soldiers were full of confidence. They drove the Tiger tank and rushed towards the Red Army's anti-tank position, and then hit the ambush Su-5.

In fact, the Germans discovered the existence of the Su-5, but because they thought they knew the performance of the D-5 very well, they believed that this kind of artillery could really threaten the Tiger tanks, probably within 5 meters. The KWK36 tank gun equipped by the Tiger tank can destroy the Su-5 from 1 meter away. So the Germans were really not worried at all.

"At two o'clock, three enemy heavy tanks were found and ready for combat!"

Constantine discovered the existence of a tiger two thousand meters away. There was no way, who made the tiger tank extremely tall and powerful? I have to say that the German tank design was really bad. For example, the tiger seemed to be famous in World War II, but its essence was actually an unsuccessful work. The Germans brought their talent to the extreme of wasting weight.

The separation of the engine and the gearbox causes the Tiger tank to require a transmission shaft that penetrates the body, and this has to increase the height of the body with the existence of the transmission shaft. The relationship between the weight of the tank and the body is 1:3:7, of which the width is one, the length is three, and the height accounts for seven. The Germans increased the height of the tank, which naturally led to the tiger's weight rising straight.

Of course, it is not just the tiger who has this disadvantage, the Black Panther and the Tiger King have similar problems. The worse disadvantage of the tiger is that it has not made good use of inclined armor at all, and both the turret and the front of the vehicle body are vertical armor. Therefore, even if the thickness of the front armor reaches 1 mm, its overall defense is still not very good. It is even worse than the later improved model of the Black Panther.

Some comrades may be dissatisfied and may say that the data is wrong. What does it mean to say that the front thickness of the Tiger tank turret is at 2 mm, and that the part of the gun shield and the turret overlap, this part must be considered as the superimposed thickness.

I can only say that this is really nonsense. In fact, you can find a sectional view of the turret of a Tiger tank. Not to mention two hundred millimeters, there are very few parts that reach 15 millimeters. For example, the so-called cannon shield, the turret superposition part, is actually only 9 millimeters, which is the weakest part of the tiger turret. Let's put it this way, the average armor level of the tiger turret is between 1 and 135. Only a very small number of parts have reached the level of 14 to 15 millimeters.

It should be noted that the tiger is very tall, and a considerable part of the armored body is obviously exposed. Even if the Red Army gunners cannot penetrate the turret, they can just greet the tiger's body. What's more, the Su-5 and Su-5a equipped with the new generation of nzk-15 series armor-piercing bombs can penetrate about 12 mm to 13 mm armor-piercing bombs. In particular, it is noted that the armor-piercing ability of the armor-piercing bombs has nothing to do with the distance. It is this power at zero distance, and it is still this power at 3 meters away. Of course, the effective range of the d-5s is not as far as three thousand meters, and basically only has the ability to attack targets within 15 meters.

But it cannot be said that it is so absolute. On the battlefield, there are always some people who will burst out with character. For example, Constantine, as he said just now, he found a tiger appearing two thousand meters away. According to the instructions of the tactical manual, he immediately ordered the loader to load a nzk-15 armor-breaking bomb into the barrel.

Constantine is not particularly familiar with this armor-piercing bomb that had just been airlifted by plane and does not have much confidence in its power. Because the Su-5 he commanded had encountered a tiger one day before. That time he fired ten guns at the tiger, but only destroyed one from the side. Such a battle fruit really made him feel heartbroken. Especially this time, the tactical manual issued with the new armor-piercing bomb requires them to attack from a long distance as much as possible, preferably attacking the tiger 1 meter away. This explanation makes him even less confident.

Constantine laughed to herself, "It's better to fight from a distance, at least it will give us enough time to escape!"

"The distance is one thousand eight, one armor-breaking bomb, prepare and release it!"

With Constantine's order, the body of the su-5 shook slightly twice, and the shells shot towards the slowly moving tiger like Li Xuan's arrow.

As smoke flashed in front of the tiger turret, Constantine knew that he had hit it, but he was not too excited because he felt that hit it would be of no use. He didn't believe that the D-5s could destroy the terrible tiger.

The actual situation seemed to be similar to Constantine's expectations. The tiger that was shot on the forehead seemed to be unscathed, and it was still moving forward slowly. Constantine just shrugged and continued to order: "Distance 17 meters. Armored bombs are ready... let it go!" The u-5 shook again, and soon another Armored bomb hit the tiger's forehead accurately. Even Constantine was a little surprised because they fought very accurately today. Even a special shooter like him in the group would not be easy to hit the enemy 15 meters away. It is usually very good to be able to succeed one or two times in ten times, but today, it actually takes any action.

Of course, the only thing that made Constantine regret was that the su-5 was too weak, even if it hit the enemy, it could not cause any damage to the enemy. He could only launch attacks again and again in vain, and waited until he ordered a retreat at a distance of about 1 meter.

However, today's situation was a bit unexpected. Just when Constantine was preparing to perform the third shooting, the tiger was still in good condition. Smoke emerged from the gap between the turret and the chassis, and it started to be very small and gradually increased. Constantine knew very well that this was definitely a fire inside the enemy tank. Such smoke was either ignited by hydraulic oil or a cartridge ignited. Of course, no matter what the situation was, this was good news.

So Constantine temporarily curbed the idea of ​​continuing to attack and began to observe carefully. After all, the nzk-15 armor-piercing bombs issued by the superiors are limited. A special shooter like him only got 1 round, while a first-class shooter only got 1 round, and a first-class shooter only got 1 round. As for the first-class shooter again, then use the old-style armor-piercing bombs honestly!

Just as Constantine observed, flames emerged from the tiger's car. The hit tiger quickly stopped. Then the commander, gunner, loader, driver and radio pushed open the hatch door and escaped in a panic. The flames and smoke almost chased their butts and sprayed out from the open hatch. The scene was still spectacular!

To be honest, Constantine felt incredible. Could it be that the newly issued armor-breaking bomb is really so powerful?

The battle continued, and soon Constantine gave up thinking about this problem that seemed a bit absurd at the moment. Because the enemy's tanks were still slowly moving in.

"At 1 o'clock, 21 meters away, armor-breaking bombs are ready!"

The tiger was targeted by Constantine this time. It had just crossed a ridge and the front of the car was raised high towards the sky, revealing a small part of its stomach. Constantine, who had a lot of combat experience, knew it was the best time to shoot, so he chose to fire without hesitation.

I have to say that Constantine's luck is really booming today. He hit the target again. The metal jet formed by the armor-breaking bomb tore open the tiger's "soft" belly without any effort. After slashing the driver's head on the spot, he continued to rush forward. After drilling a hole as thick as a thumb in the gunner's thigh, he also ignited some cartridges.

With a loud bang, the tiger's body and head separated, and all members were either blown into pieces or burned to coke.

This time, Constantine had great confidence. He began to believe what his superiors said. The newly issued armor-piercing bomb was indeed able to hunt tigers at a distance of about 15 meters. In fact, on this day, another Red Army gunner set an amazing record with the nzk-15. After a "faulty" nzk-15 flew forward for four thousand meters, the blind cat hit a No. 4 F2 tank like a dead mouse. After the explosion, it easily tore open the turret armor of the No. 4 F2 tank, and smashed the unlucky commander who had not figured out the situation at all on the spot!

After the battle on this day, Rokosovsky received an unexpected telegram from the artillery troops, especially the tank destroyer equipped with Su-5, strongly demanded that more NZK-15 and NZK-15a be distributed immediately, and emphasized that the more the better! (To be continued.)
Chapter completed!