Fiat 3000

The Fiat 3000 was an Italian light tank of the interwar years and the first tank built in series in Italy. It was based on the French Renault FT and became the standard tank of the emerging Italian armoured units after the First World War. A large wartime order of 1,400 was cancelled when the war ended and only 100 were delivered. The first vehicles entered service in 1921 as the Model 21, armed with two 6.5 mm machine guns. A Model 30 with a 37 mm gun was adopted in 1930, with a more powerful engine, improved suspension and a turned-sideways engine that let designers shorten the hull. The tanks were later redesignated L5/21 and L5/30. They first fought in Libya in 1926, saw action against Ethiopia in the Second Italo-Abyssinian War, and a few were still in use with Italian units in 1943 when the Allies landed in Sicily. A few were sold to foreign armies, among them Albania, Latvia, Hungary and Ethiopia.