Italians Hold off the Russian resistance with the Germans

Geekhis

Fully agree. Both on the problems preventing the Italians being able to hold the Don line and the probable result if somehow they did. Think that even when Manstein was making his desperate bid to break through to Stalingrad and relieve the 6th Army the view from Berlin was to hold that line until the summer before a new offensive to drive the Soviets back further.:eek:

Steve
 
Absloutly not.
It's not question of belief and support, but rather a mattern of opportunism.

No, not opportunism. The italians accepted the fascist regime and welcomed all its positive decisions, forgetting trivial details like the loss of freedom. It was a conscious decision too, since the opposition to the regime before 1943 was very, very thin.
Italians should not allowed to wiggle out of the situation claiming that "nobody really supported Mussolini, we just went along for a bit". Dictators thrive on popular support, if you give it to them, you're also responsible for their acts.

it's just that italians have a well-rooted tendency to align with the winning side.

Really? When? Because of all the wars fought by Italy in the last two centuries only Mussolini decision to join WW2 could be defined as "jumping on the winner's chariot". If you are talking about internal policy, maybe you should rephrase that affermation as"italians have the stupid tendency to not care enough about policy".
 

kenmac

Banned
If Mussolini had got the licences for the 88mm anti-tank gun and Panzer mk4 in 1940 and began manufacturing them they may well have held the Soviets back.
 
If Mussolini had got the licences for the 88mm anti-tank gun and Panzer mk4 in 1940 and began manufacturing them they may well have held the Soviets back.

I'm afraid even if they somehow had those liscenses in 1930 it wouldn't have made enough difference. They'd still suffer long delays on production and distribution, quality control problems (metallurgy was notoriously bad due to shortcut measures), lack of ammo due to poor logistical support, and the other myriad issues with the army command/control/structure that I mentioned in my earlierpost.

Of course it wouldn't have hurt. ;)
 
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