Organization
Despite the performance advantages, it turned out that no branch of the US Army wanted the new gun. The Infantry considered it too large and heavy. The other possible user, the Tank Destroyer Center, preferred more mobile self-propelled weapons. Finally, a pressure from the head of Army Ground Forces, Gen. Lesley McNair, resulted in the gun being adopted by the TD Center. McNair's opinion was apparently influenced by the experience of the North African Campaign, where self-propelled guns were found to be hard to conceal.
On 31 March 1943 AGF ordered to convert fifteen self-propelled tank destroyer battalions to a towed form; eventually AGF decided that half of TD battalions should be towed. A towed TD battalion possessed 36 pieces, in three companies of 12. M3 Halftracks were issued as prime movers. The organization from 1 September 1944 authorized M39 Armored Utility Vehicle instead, but these only reached frontline in spring 1945.
Those towed tank destroyer battalions were attached to US Army division to improve their anti-tank capabilities. Most often, a complete battalion was attached to an infantry division. In some cases towed TD battalions were attached to armored or airborne divisions; sometimes companies of the same battalion were given to different divisions; and sometimes a single division had several TD battalions - including a mix between towed and self-propelled - at once.
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