Bardonecchia. Forte Bramafam (Italy)

[Massimo_Foti]

As far as I know, there are only 3 survivors of this model:


210 mm mod. 1935 by Massimo Foti, on Flickr

[Massimo_Foti]

The 149mm is much more common. It keep serving after WW II. There is one even in Sinsheim


149 mm mod. 1937 by Massimo Foti, on Flickr

[Massimo_Foti]

A wide-angle shot:


210 mm mod. 1935 by Massimo Foti, on Flickr

[Massimo_Foti]

A french design, it served in WW I. It was still the mainstay of italian divisional artillery in WW II. This piece is on loan from "Museo dell'Artiglieria" Torino:


105 mm mod. 1913 by Massimo Foti, on Flickr

[Massimo_Foti]

100 mm mod. 1914 by Massimo Foti, on Flickr

[Doug_Kibbey]

Pretty nice location for a museum. Former Alpini outpost?

[Massimo_Foti]

It's one among the forts along the french-italian border. This one covered the Frejus's tunnel. Since a few years a group of volunteers is turning it into a new life. Their website is in italian, but you can get the idea:
www.fortebramafam.it/

In the same area you can find another two, world-class, much bigger forts, that have a longer history behind them:
www.fortediexilles.it/
www.fortedifenestrelle.com/

All the places above are pretty easy to reach from Torino

Massimo

[Massimo_Foti]

I am taking this opportunity to talk a bit about italian artillery in WW II.

By the early thirties the Army realized the whole artillery was in need of an upgrade, it was entirely based on WW I and large amount of guns were former austro-hungarian (75 mm mountain howitzer, 100mm and 150mm howitzer all were Skoda). The heavy models were the worst of all.

So they start designing and testing new models, the process took a few years, but resulted in some world-class models. Above you can see 210mm:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/..._da_210/22

And 149mm howitzers:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...modello_37

The 149mm gun was equally impressive:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...modello_35

So was the anti-aircraft 90mm:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...e_da_90/53

All the four guns above compared well to anything available elsewhere during WW II. Their heavy Breda tractors were pretty good too.

There were also new 75mm design, but I’ll talk about them later on, once I’ll have some more pictures posted.

Main problem was that Italy had very limited industrial capabilities, and was suffering from a chronic lack of raw materials, especially metal alloys required for modern artillery. On top of that, at the very same time the Italian Navy was building battleships like never before, spreading the limited resources even more.

The Ethiopian War and Spanish Civil War made things worst, the Italian Army spend large amounts of its budget on them and consumed a lot of material from the storage, material that was very hard to replace giving the limited resources at hand. One side-effect was that in the late thirties all the new heavy artillery models got very little priority compared to the urgency of filling again the empty depots of existing equipment and ammunition.

If you look at the history of the artillery pieces I mentioned above, all their designs was finalized by 1937. Yet little if any gun was available by 1940 and only a very limited amount of them reached the front line up to 1943. A typical case of too little, too late.

On top of that, the few that were available were spread too thin, most went to Russia, were they couldn’t make any real difference, and the Italian Army in North Africa kept fighting with WW I artillery, including pieces that at the time already deserved a place in a museum like the old 149mm:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...a_149/35_A

[Massimo_Foti]

One of these can be seen in Saumur too. This piece is on loan from "Museo dell'Artiglieria" Torino:


75 mm mod. 1935 by Massimo Foti, on Flickr

[Massimo_Foti]

Another one on loan from "Museo dell'Artiglieria" Torino:


75 mm mod. 1934 by Massimo Foti, on Flickr

[Massimo_Foti]

The two guns above are variants of the same 75/18 design. It was also used on the Semovente da 75/18:
preservedtanks.com/Typ...oryId=5400

Massimo

[Massimo_Foti]

The whole set is now on Flickr:
www.flickr.com/photos/...306630228/

Massimo

[howitzer]

Hi,
Do not you know how was the mark of howitzer M14 labeled in your photo in Italy army?I think that the barrel is mark 14,but the shield and wheels are new.
Thank you,
Jan

[Massimo_Foti]

The wheels were changed by the Italians to be used with motorized tractors. I can't tell you about the shield.
As far as I remember some additional guns were manufactured by Italian factories, but I may be wrong

Massimo

[howitzer]

Thanks for your answer. I think that adaptation arised progress in 50.years. Leather I don't know if it leads officialy.The shield was probably used from mark number 16, but the wheels are new.
Jan