StuG III

The Sturmgeschutz III, commonly abbreviated StuG III, is a German assault gun of the Second World War built on a modified Panzer III chassis, replacing the tank's rotating turret with a fixed casemate superstructure carrying a forward-facing gun, and manufactured chiefly by Alkett and MIAG from 1940 onward. Cheaper and faster to build than a turreted tank of comparable firepower because it dispensed with a turret ring and traverse mechanism, the StuG III was originally intended purely to support advancing infantry with direct fire against fortifications and strongpoints, but as Allied tanks improved it was progressively rearmed with longer, more powerful guns and increasingly used as an improvised tank destroyer. More than ten thousand StuG III vehicles were built, making it the most numerous German armored fighting vehicle of the war, and it remained in limited foreign service, including with Syria, for decades after 1945.