China has created many artificial coral reefs, so it is not surprising to find anything on the bottom of the sea. But I think this should not be a real ztz99.
First of all, the gun mantlet is gone, which means that the gun on this tank may be fake, or at least it has been harmless, which means that it has been processed and sunk on the bottom of the sea intentionally.
But the machine gun is still installed on its bracket, and even half of the belt is connected. Unless it is an accidental loss and cannot be recovered, otherwise, with extremely strict firearm management policy, this is unimaginable in PLA (you must know that my uncle once lost a single bullet, and the whole squad lay on the ground of the shooting range for a whole day to search for it), This is obviously contradictory to the cannon that has been disarmed.
And the bump on the top of the turret seems too high and steep, on the real ztz99 it should be lower and smoother I think. So I prefer it's a model tank with a lot of detail, not a real one.
