[2] Originally of French design, the Canon de 75 modèle 1897 was supplied to the United States in large numbers and became the standard field gun for the US Army during World War I.

The mle 1897 was a revolutionary breech-loading artillery piece that combined a Nordenfelt eccentric screw breech, fixed "quickfire" ammunition, and a hydro-pneumatic recoil mechanism.

The combination of fixed ammunition, recoil mechanism, and simple breech made the mle 1897 one of the fastest-firing and most accurate field guns of its era.

[2] It had a box trail carriage with a gun shield, and two wooden-spoked steel-rimmed wheels on an unsprung axle, designed for horse traction.

[4] Although World War I had shown that direct fire, light field guns like the mle 1897 lacked adequate firepower to destroy an entrenched enemy, the majority of combatants had large numbers of them and had little impetus to replace them.

[5] The new M2A1 carriage had a sprung axle with steel disc wheels and pneumatic tires, a new gun shield, and an integrated jack.

[6] To achieve this, existing box trail 75 mm gun carriages were given sprung axles, steel wheels, and pneumatic tires to allow them to be towed behind vehicles at higher speeds.

[6] Production of the M2A2 carriage, featuring newly made M2 recoil mechanisms assembled from tubes mounted in a cradle (instead of a solid steel forging bored through as on M1897),[11] began in 1936, but the conversion process was slow, and by the end of 1939 only 200 were converted.

[12] By 1940, the War Department had modernized 56 of its 81 75 mm gun battalions in the Regular Army and National Guard with these two conversions.

The towed version and the M3 GMC was used by American tank destroyer battalions during operations in the North African and Italian campaigns.