The Day of the Lion: An Italian WW2 TL
- Thread starter The Red
- Start date
Anno XX
The year of 1942, the twentieth year of the Fascist calendar, had been intended to be the year in which Italy became “The Olympiad of Civilisation.”
The Esposizione Universale Roma had been planned to be more than a World’s Fair, it was to be the climactic triumph of the Fascist revolution. It had been designed to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the March on Rome, where Benito Mussolini had been granted power after a largely orchestrated coup, to highlight the success of his regime.
Since this initial assumption of power Mussolini had reigned virtually unchecked first as Prime Minister and then as Duce. He had transformed Italy from an unstable liberal Kingdom into a totalitarian dictatorship in which communists, socialists and trade unionists had been crushed, liberals exiled or marginalised and the old aristocracy absorbed into his own National Fascist Party. In the late thirties it was planned that the world would see these achievements on display.
Visitors were to enter the exhibition through a vast arch whose structure would tower above Rome. The Arch of Empire would be the tallest structure in Europe besides the Eiffel Tower and it was to be the symbol of Fascist Italy. It would illuminate at night so that Italians might never forget Fascism’s stamp on the capital.
Passing through the arch you would enter into the Imperial Square and be surrounded by gleaming white structures reminiscent of the Roman Empire. Here you would cross to the pavilion which would feature a celebration of the unique combination of art, technology and science that enshrined Italian supremacy. Italy’s greatest physicist, Enrico Fermi, would flee Italy in 1938 following the introduction of the antisemitic Leggi Razziali but Guglielmo Marconi would be hailed as a great Italian of this mould whose fascist credentials were solid. Da Vinci and Galileo would also be enshrined as fascist heroes, dead too long to protest.
The exhibition was designed to be the centrepiece of the blossoming new Roman Empire. It would overshadow the Colosseum and the Pantheon in much the same way as Mussolini’s triumphs had eclipsed those of the Caesars. Italy had been transformed into a corporate body in which class distinctions had vanished and all had their place in building an Empire which would retake control of the Mediterranean and expand Italian influence as far as Aden and Argentina. Many leading figures in the United Kingdom and the United States looked on in awe at the dynamic change in what had previously been regarded as a second rate power.
Much of this was rhetoric, Mussolini had consolidated political control over Italy by the thirties but this had required compromise with the old aristocratic and capitalist classes which inhibited the true transformation of society he had promised. The ‘revolution’ often took the shape of existing local officials changing their titles and staying in post. Health and natalism campaigns flopped and Italy’s small industrial base floundered. Emigration remained the most attractive prospect for many young Italians in spite of official and unofficial attempts to curb it. Attempts to standardise the Italian language across varying dialects stalled as the Italian military struggled to cope with the demands for adventures in Ethiopia and Spain.
As the inadequacies of fascist autarky began to take their toll the plans for the exhibition were scaled down; the arch became smaller and narrower and made of aluminium instead of steel or concrete. Technical problems continued regardless and work had not begun before Italy found itself in yet another world war.
By 1942 the war raged on and work on the exhibition had ceased. The same economic difficulties which plagued the World’s Fair had also forbidden Italy from joining initially and by the Spring of 1940 she remained badly unprepared. Nonetheless with the collapse of France Mussolini argued he needed a mere few thousand dead to victoriously reshape the map of Europe alongside his ally Hitler. Italian troops were sent into the Alps and across the Egyptian frontier with this intent. Two years later victory was no clearer on the archless horizon and Italy had suffered several humiliating defeats.
October 27, 1942, the day of the twentieth anniversary of the March on Rome was a subdued affair when it came. Mussolini marked it with the opening of the new headquarters of the Fasci Femminili, the Fascist women’s organisation. He made no speech. It is likely he was suffering from peptic ulcers, aggravated by stress.
The formal remembrance came in the form of an exhibition more reminiscent of the tenth anniversary in 1932 than the planned Olympiad. Various rooms celebrated Mussolini’s rise to power and his triumphs whilst featuring exhibits dedicated to smearing Italy’s Jewish and Communist enemies. Trophies from the North African front were displayed along with the promise that there would soon be a new addition to the exhibition showcasing Italian victory. The exhibition was greeted with little fanfare and was poorly attended.
Italian Fascism was proudly omnipotent in its worldview. The Fascist state embodied the Italian nation, individuals served the state and would always be underneath it. All aspects of life were politicised into the struggle for the vitality of the state. In 1942 young Italians were prompted to write essays with the prompt “Should we die for the glory of Mussolini and the immortal destiny of Italy?” Mussolini boasted of an amnesty in which tens of thousands of prisoners had been released, including political opponents, such was the confidence the state had in its own strength. All the same, the war had seen its hold over the Italian people falter.
In the twenty-first winter of the fascist calendar, rations would diminish to starvation levels and coal would become a luxury. The black market became so important for the sustenance of the average Italian that it was factored into Fascist economic planning. Tens of thousands of Italians would be taken prisoner at Stalingrad. Hundreds of thousands more were away from home fighting resistance movements across Europe, deep within the Soviet Union and in Africa against the Anglo-American alliance in whose countries many Italians had family members. Tens of thousands of Italian engineers and other specialists had been sent to labour in German war industries as ‘guest workers’ only to find themselves often being treated as harshly as the slaves imported from the east.
The American invasion of French North Africa and the subsequent dissolution of the Vichy regime in the French metropole allowed Italy to realise old irredentist claims and occupy Corsica and Tunisia. Mussolini boasted of the great success Italy had achieved with the final dissolution of France but the direct American entry into the war filled many with foreboding as did the decisive British victory at El Alamein. Italian cities were bombed frequently for the first time in the Autumn of 1942, it is possible that one of the reasons for the poor attendance of the anniversary exhibition was Italian civilians heeding Mussolini’s warning to evacuate industrial cities whenever possible.
The Italian people, never fully behind the war, were now increasingly against it and against Fascism in turn but Mussolini still believed a victory could be attained which would set everything right. He yearned for an opportunity to rejuvenate his regime even as it began to disintegrate from within.
The year of 1942, the twentieth year of the Fascist calendar, had been intended to be the year in which Italy became “The Olympiad of Civilisation.”
The Esposizione Universale Roma had been planned to be more than a World’s Fair, it was to be the climactic triumph of the Fascist revolution. It had been designed to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the March on Rome, where Benito Mussolini had been granted power after a largely orchestrated coup, to highlight the success of his regime.
Since this initial assumption of power Mussolini had reigned virtually unchecked first as Prime Minister and then as Duce. He had transformed Italy from an unstable liberal Kingdom into a totalitarian dictatorship in which communists, socialists and trade unionists had been crushed, liberals exiled or marginalised and the old aristocracy absorbed into his own National Fascist Party. In the late thirties it was planned that the world would see these achievements on display.
Visitors were to enter the exhibition through a vast arch whose structure would tower above Rome. The Arch of Empire would be the tallest structure in Europe besides the Eiffel Tower and it was to be the symbol of Fascist Italy. It would illuminate at night so that Italians might never forget Fascism’s stamp on the capital.
Passing through the arch you would enter into the Imperial Square and be surrounded by gleaming white structures reminiscent of the Roman Empire. Here you would cross to the pavilion which would feature a celebration of the unique combination of art, technology and science that enshrined Italian supremacy. Italy’s greatest physicist, Enrico Fermi, would flee Italy in 1938 following the introduction of the antisemitic Leggi Razziali but Guglielmo Marconi would be hailed as a great Italian of this mould whose fascist credentials were solid. Da Vinci and Galileo would also be enshrined as fascist heroes, dead too long to protest.
The exhibition was designed to be the centrepiece of the blossoming new Roman Empire. It would overshadow the Colosseum and the Pantheon in much the same way as Mussolini’s triumphs had eclipsed those of the Caesars. Italy had been transformed into a corporate body in which class distinctions had vanished and all had their place in building an Empire which would retake control of the Mediterranean and expand Italian influence as far as Aden and Argentina. Many leading figures in the United Kingdom and the United States looked on in awe at the dynamic change in what had previously been regarded as a second rate power.
Much of this was rhetoric, Mussolini had consolidated political control over Italy by the thirties but this had required compromise with the old aristocratic and capitalist classes which inhibited the true transformation of society he had promised. The ‘revolution’ often took the shape of existing local officials changing their titles and staying in post. Health and natalism campaigns flopped and Italy’s small industrial base floundered. Emigration remained the most attractive prospect for many young Italians in spite of official and unofficial attempts to curb it. Attempts to standardise the Italian language across varying dialects stalled as the Italian military struggled to cope with the demands for adventures in Ethiopia and Spain.
As the inadequacies of fascist autarky began to take their toll the plans for the exhibition were scaled down; the arch became smaller and narrower and made of aluminium instead of steel or concrete. Technical problems continued regardless and work had not begun before Italy found itself in yet another world war.
By 1942 the war raged on and work on the exhibition had ceased. The same economic difficulties which plagued the World’s Fair had also forbidden Italy from joining initially and by the Spring of 1940 she remained badly unprepared. Nonetheless with the collapse of France Mussolini argued he needed a mere few thousand dead to victoriously reshape the map of Europe alongside his ally Hitler. Italian troops were sent into the Alps and across the Egyptian frontier with this intent. Two years later victory was no clearer on the archless horizon and Italy had suffered several humiliating defeats.
October 27, 1942, the day of the twentieth anniversary of the March on Rome was a subdued affair when it came. Mussolini marked it with the opening of the new headquarters of the Fasci Femminili, the Fascist women’s organisation. He made no speech. It is likely he was suffering from peptic ulcers, aggravated by stress.
The formal remembrance came in the form of an exhibition more reminiscent of the tenth anniversary in 1932 than the planned Olympiad. Various rooms celebrated Mussolini’s rise to power and his triumphs whilst featuring exhibits dedicated to smearing Italy’s Jewish and Communist enemies. Trophies from the North African front were displayed along with the promise that there would soon be a new addition to the exhibition showcasing Italian victory. The exhibition was greeted with little fanfare and was poorly attended.
Italian Fascism was proudly omnipotent in its worldview. The Fascist state embodied the Italian nation, individuals served the state and would always be underneath it. All aspects of life were politicised into the struggle for the vitality of the state. In 1942 young Italians were prompted to write essays with the prompt “Should we die for the glory of Mussolini and the immortal destiny of Italy?” Mussolini boasted of an amnesty in which tens of thousands of prisoners had been released, including political opponents, such was the confidence the state had in its own strength. All the same, the war had seen its hold over the Italian people falter.
In the twenty-first winter of the fascist calendar, rations would diminish to starvation levels and coal would become a luxury. The black market became so important for the sustenance of the average Italian that it was factored into Fascist economic planning. Tens of thousands of Italians would be taken prisoner at Stalingrad. Hundreds of thousands more were away from home fighting resistance movements across Europe, deep within the Soviet Union and in Africa against the Anglo-American alliance in whose countries many Italians had family members. Tens of thousands of Italian engineers and other specialists had been sent to labour in German war industries as ‘guest workers’ only to find themselves often being treated as harshly as the slaves imported from the east.
The American invasion of French North Africa and the subsequent dissolution of the Vichy regime in the French metropole allowed Italy to realise old irredentist claims and occupy Corsica and Tunisia. Mussolini boasted of the great success Italy had achieved with the final dissolution of France but the direct American entry into the war filled many with foreboding as did the decisive British victory at El Alamein. Italian cities were bombed frequently for the first time in the Autumn of 1942, it is possible that one of the reasons for the poor attendance of the anniversary exhibition was Italian civilians heeding Mussolini’s warning to evacuate industrial cities whenever possible.
The Italian people, never fully behind the war, were now increasingly against it and against Fascism in turn but Mussolini still believed a victory could be attained which would set everything right. He yearned for an opportunity to rejuvenate his regime even as it began to disintegrate from within.
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Anno XXI
At the beginning of January 1943 Mussolini told his new National Directorate that the twenty-first year of the fascist era would be a decisive one for the destiny of Italy.
There had been setbacks, yes but he remained confident in the resilience of the Italian people and emphasised this above all else. Wars were not determined by arms or access to raw materials he argued but by political consciousness. He spoke favourably of the ideological fanaticism of the Red Army and attributed this to their imminent victory at Stalingrad. While he fantasised about a Spanish entry into the war turning the tide in North Africa and emphasised that Italy must still seek to conquer Egypt he predicted that soon Italy itself would be put to the test.
The conflation of political ideology and patriotic fervour which had defeated Fascism in Russia could also be used to save it at home when Allied troops arrived. The Mediterranean front was the decisive one of the war he argued and if the Italian people held firm, victory remained possible.
There were two problems with this calculation which Mussolini acknowledged privately. The first was that Italy had become overly dependent on her German ally, whose priorities lay in the east. Mussolini had once hoped to wage a parallel war in the Mediterranean alongside Germany on the continent but by the end of 1942 it had become entirely reliant on German resources for the maintenance of its own war effort. Adolf Hitler had come to view the Mediterranean front as important only in delaying an Anglo-American landing on the European mainland until the Soviet Union could be defeated.
Hitler remained an admirer of Mussolini but the Italian dictator had grown weary of playing second fiddle to his condescending German counterpart. He nonetheless was aware of his influence over Hitler and hoped to exploit this to convince his ally to make peace with the Soviet Union or at least maintain a defensive posture, so as to focus their combined strength on the Mediterranean front. Mussolini proposed a conference of the dictators to determine future Axis strategy but Hitler refused, stressing the crisis on the Caucasus front required his full attention. Instead Mussolini sent his Foreign Minister and son-in-law Galeazzo Ciano to Hitler’s headquarters alongside his Chief of Staff, Marshall Ugo Cavallero to convey his ideas. Hitler rejected the idea of peace with the Soviets, lecturing his Italian guests on how the Volga was the natural border of Europe which would need to be retaken and that the Soviets would be bled to death beforehand.
Cavallero and Ciano came home empty handed and Mussolini had them removed shortly thereafter. Cavallero was replaced by the anti-German Vittorio Ambrosio who immediately sought to reorganise Commando Supremo and in so doing restore Italian strategic independence from Germany. Mussolini took on the Foreign Affairs brief alongside his many other titles, believing this would give him greater control over dealings with Hitler and thus greater focus on the Mediterranean theatre.
The second problem was that Italian morale was crumbling on the homefront and within the army. If the war had indeed become one of political conviction this could prove fatal. Mussolini saw the National Fascist Party as paramount in dealing with this. Alongside the removal of Cavallero and the reshuffling of Ciano, Mussolini replaced or reshuffled almost his entire cabinet bringing in new men who he personally trusted. Carlo Scorza, a former street thug and veteran was promoted to the role of Party Secretary in the hopes that he would restore the Blackshirt presence on Italy’s streets. At the same time as Ambrosio replaced Cavallero, the loyal fascist Admiral Giuseppe Sirianni was made Chief of Supermarina in order to prepare the Italian Navy for its role in the coming year of decision.
By the second month of 1943 Mussolini believed Italy was well placed to face the great challenges ahead. He had secured his regime in a way that would revitalise the home front whilst taking steps to ensure the Axis would focus on the strategy needed to secure victory. If the Soviets could be made to accept a peace similar to Brest-Litovsk then the Axis would have the resources and manpower required to maintain a hold on Africa and return to the offensive there once more. If the Italian people could have their dynamism restored, they would shatter the plutocratic Americans and the perfidious British.
For Mussolini’s opponents, both underground and recently marginalised, it became clearer that he was leading Italy off of a cliff.
--
At the beginning of January 1943 Mussolini told his new National Directorate that the twenty-first year of the fascist era would be a decisive one for the destiny of Italy.
There had been setbacks, yes but he remained confident in the resilience of the Italian people and emphasised this above all else. Wars were not determined by arms or access to raw materials he argued but by political consciousness. He spoke favourably of the ideological fanaticism of the Red Army and attributed this to their imminent victory at Stalingrad. While he fantasised about a Spanish entry into the war turning the tide in North Africa and emphasised that Italy must still seek to conquer Egypt he predicted that soon Italy itself would be put to the test.
The conflation of political ideology and patriotic fervour which had defeated Fascism in Russia could also be used to save it at home when Allied troops arrived. The Mediterranean front was the decisive one of the war he argued and if the Italian people held firm, victory remained possible.
There were two problems with this calculation which Mussolini acknowledged privately. The first was that Italy had become overly dependent on her German ally, whose priorities lay in the east. Mussolini had once hoped to wage a parallel war in the Mediterranean alongside Germany on the continent but by the end of 1942 it had become entirely reliant on German resources for the maintenance of its own war effort. Adolf Hitler had come to view the Mediterranean front as important only in delaying an Anglo-American landing on the European mainland until the Soviet Union could be defeated.
Hitler remained an admirer of Mussolini but the Italian dictator had grown weary of playing second fiddle to his condescending German counterpart. He nonetheless was aware of his influence over Hitler and hoped to exploit this to convince his ally to make peace with the Soviet Union or at least maintain a defensive posture, so as to focus their combined strength on the Mediterranean front. Mussolini proposed a conference of the dictators to determine future Axis strategy but Hitler refused, stressing the crisis on the Caucasus front required his full attention. Instead Mussolini sent his Foreign Minister and son-in-law Galeazzo Ciano to Hitler’s headquarters alongside his Chief of Staff, Marshall Ugo Cavallero to convey his ideas. Hitler rejected the idea of peace with the Soviets, lecturing his Italian guests on how the Volga was the natural border of Europe which would need to be retaken and that the Soviets would be bled to death beforehand.
Cavallero and Ciano came home empty handed and Mussolini had them removed shortly thereafter. Cavallero was replaced by the anti-German Vittorio Ambrosio who immediately sought to reorganise Commando Supremo and in so doing restore Italian strategic independence from Germany. Mussolini took on the Foreign Affairs brief alongside his many other titles, believing this would give him greater control over dealings with Hitler and thus greater focus on the Mediterranean theatre.
The second problem was that Italian morale was crumbling on the homefront and within the army. If the war had indeed become one of political conviction this could prove fatal. Mussolini saw the National Fascist Party as paramount in dealing with this. Alongside the removal of Cavallero and the reshuffling of Ciano, Mussolini replaced or reshuffled almost his entire cabinet bringing in new men who he personally trusted. Carlo Scorza, a former street thug and veteran was promoted to the role of Party Secretary in the hopes that he would restore the Blackshirt presence on Italy’s streets. At the same time as Ambrosio replaced Cavallero, the loyal fascist Admiral Giuseppe Sirianni was made Chief of Supermarina in order to prepare the Italian Navy for its role in the coming year of decision.
By the second month of 1943 Mussolini believed Italy was well placed to face the great challenges ahead. He had secured his regime in a way that would revitalise the home front whilst taking steps to ensure the Axis would focus on the strategy needed to secure victory. If the Soviets could be made to accept a peace similar to Brest-Litovsk then the Axis would have the resources and manpower required to maintain a hold on Africa and return to the offensive there once more. If the Italian people could have their dynamism restored, they would shatter the plutocratic Americans and the perfidious British.
For Mussolini’s opponents, both underground and recently marginalised, it became clearer that he was leading Italy off of a cliff.
--
Antifascismo
The Partito Comunista d'Italia (PCI) had found itself on the losing side of the struggle against Fascism following the March on Rome. The Italian section of the Communist International had been caught by surprise with the fascist stunt and the speed with which Mussolini was given control of the Italian state whose power was now entirely directed against them.
The party was officially outlawed, many members including its entire leadership were imprisoned or exiled. Thousands more were tortured by the Blackshirts who now controlled the streets. The trade unions which had provided a fertile ground for communist organisation and recruitment were banned. As debates raged in the Communist International as to what extent local Communist parties should submit themselves to ‘Bolshevisation’, organising themselves to match the structure and strategy of Lenin’s Bolsheviks, Italy began more and more to resemble the reactionary brutality of Tsarist Russia with any left-wing activity being driven underground.
Pursuing a clandestine approach allowed the PCI to survive as an organised body even though difficulties remained with communication between cells and the party leadership. As in the Soviet Union and elsewhere a powerful left opposition faction remained within the party which exacerbated organisation further. By 1942 the party had only a few thousand members within Italy but the movement retained its presence in the industrial towns and cities of northern Italy, even when it was more of a mantra than any concrete organisation.
For all its faults the PCI remained the most prominent organisation in active opposition to Mussolini’s regime. In lieu of open working class organisation, a communist leaflet or newspaper in a dock or factory would find itself being circulated through dozens or hundreds of different hands. Fascist bodies were infiltrated, surveyed and sabotaged. Mussolini proudly boasted of how the Communists were no longer a threat to Italy after twenty years of Fascism whilst also laying the blame for Italy’s increasing difficulties at their doorstep.
The final victory of the Red Army at Stalingrad in February 1943 was the greatest difficulty the Fascism had yet faced and was a rallying point for Communists within Italy. The war had focused the PCI, allowing their propaganda to tie together Italy’s strategic woes with the weakening of the Fascist regime. The long work days with no overtime pay and insufficient rations alongside Italian defeats and Allied air raids made it easy to highlight the many failures of the Fascist regime and its incompetent and increasingly delusional leadership. After Stalingrad demoralisation amongst Italian workers had reached its peak, it was clear that Italy would lose the war and many looked to the Red Army for deliverance. The PCI decided it was time to go on the offensive.
The Fiat automotive plant at Mirafiori was one of the largest industrial complexes in Italy, host to twenty thousands and the symbolic heart of a flourishing Italian industry in Fascist propaganda. Mussolini had made an awkward speech attempting to impress these notions on the workforce at the plant’s opening in 1939, only to receive a cold reception. The war had meant that even though the factory hadn’t yet produced any of the cars it was designed for, it was a vital component in war production. For strategic and propaganda purposes it was a perfect target for strike agitation.
Strikes had officially been abolished by the Fascists in 1926 but the Communists had already successfully encouraged some smaller strikes at the start of 1943. The PCI presence within the plant was minimal but the stated motivation for the strike was popular and the plan circulated widely. The Fascist state had announced a one time bonus would be paid to those workers whose homes had been affected by bomb damage. It was designed to display the state’s compassion though many saw it as a reluctant admission of culpability in failing to prevent enemy air raids. The strike demanded that the bonus be paid to all Italian workers.
The failure of rationing had left the Lira effectively worthless; however it was a popular proposal which allowed as many workers as possible to display their discontent. When the strike began on the 5th of March not all workers downed tools but three days later it had spread to the entire factory and beyond through the railways and into the northern industrial cities. By the 11th of March more than a hundred thousand workers were on strike in northern Italy with many more observing a work-to-rule, refusing to work overtime. The strike then spread south and demonstrations began to go beyond the central demand of the bonus to calling for the end to the war or even the end of Fascism.
The Fascists reacted first with dismay then with horror as the work stoppages and demonstrations continued week after week. After twenty years their control over the Italian worker was unravelling in front of their eyes and it seemed they would soon be faced not only by Allied armies in the field but also an armed revolution at home. The Communists had even appeared to set a date.
The PCI were jubilant with the success of the strike which had exceeded all expectations but its popularity had also left them overwhelmed. A great deal of organisation and planning had gone into the strike and the same would be needed to properly exploit its success. Plans were made for mass demonstrations for peace in Rome, Turin and Milan to take place. It was intended to be the beginning of the end of Fascism with subsequent demonstrations planned across the country for May Day. However it was not an armed revolt, the Communists lacked the numbers or the arms with which to carry one out. The arms factories remained on strike rather than producing weapons for a revolution.
Nonetheless Mussolini had begun to see the planned demonstrations as a Communist plot to seize control of the three cities, egged on by Hitler who urged him to crush the strikes and by his new party secretary who promised an army of Blackshirts could be summoned to save his regime. On Easter Sunday the demonstrations went ahead but were poorly attended, many workers who were happy to express their discontent via the demand for the bonus were left uncomfortable calling outright for the end of a regime that had taken great pleasure in disposing of its past opponents. The Communists had expected the streets of the three cities to be swamped but only a few thousand came out in Milan and Turin, and only a few hundred in Rome. Nonetheless the Fascists were ready for an armed revolution and responded accordingly.
The Easter Sunday massacre of April 25th took the form of a state sponsored riot as armed blackshirts gunned down peace demonstrators whilst the police looked on, ready to intervene on behalf of the blackshirts should the demonstrators fire back. Unarmed as most actually were, they fled. The violence ended swiftly with dozens dead and hundreds injured. Mussolini announced from the Palazzo Venezia to a crowd of triumphant Blackshirts that the Communist coup had been crushed whilst blood was still being washed off the Piazza del Popollo. He also agreed to extend the bonus payment to all workers and the strikes slowly petered out. It looked like the Fascist regime had successfully dealt with the strike using a balance of carrot and stick but many within it had been left deeply shaken.
The PCI were quick to martyr those who had fallen on Bloody Sunday but also realised their strategy had hit an impasse. Fascist violence against demonstrators angered many but also made them reluctant to put themselves in the line of fire. Nonetheless the strike had been a success, they had revealed the weakness of Mussolini’s regime and how they could be expected to respond to further insurrection. Newspapers and leaflets continued to circulate at Mirafiori and elsewhere while weapons began to go missing from the factory. Secreted part by part from worker to worker like leaflets and newspapers.
Mussolini saw the end of the strikes as a validation of his rejuvenation efforts. Loyal Fascists had seen off the great challenge domestically just as they could still do to their foreign enemies even as they drew closer and closer to Italy.
Still many within his regime began to look for a way out before they arrived.
---
The Partito Comunista d'Italia (PCI) had found itself on the losing side of the struggle against Fascism following the March on Rome. The Italian section of the Communist International had been caught by surprise with the fascist stunt and the speed with which Mussolini was given control of the Italian state whose power was now entirely directed against them.
The party was officially outlawed, many members including its entire leadership were imprisoned or exiled. Thousands more were tortured by the Blackshirts who now controlled the streets. The trade unions which had provided a fertile ground for communist organisation and recruitment were banned. As debates raged in the Communist International as to what extent local Communist parties should submit themselves to ‘Bolshevisation’, organising themselves to match the structure and strategy of Lenin’s Bolsheviks, Italy began more and more to resemble the reactionary brutality of Tsarist Russia with any left-wing activity being driven underground.
Pursuing a clandestine approach allowed the PCI to survive as an organised body even though difficulties remained with communication between cells and the party leadership. As in the Soviet Union and elsewhere a powerful left opposition faction remained within the party which exacerbated organisation further. By 1942 the party had only a few thousand members within Italy but the movement retained its presence in the industrial towns and cities of northern Italy, even when it was more of a mantra than any concrete organisation.
For all its faults the PCI remained the most prominent organisation in active opposition to Mussolini’s regime. In lieu of open working class organisation, a communist leaflet or newspaper in a dock or factory would find itself being circulated through dozens or hundreds of different hands. Fascist bodies were infiltrated, surveyed and sabotaged. Mussolini proudly boasted of how the Communists were no longer a threat to Italy after twenty years of Fascism whilst also laying the blame for Italy’s increasing difficulties at their doorstep.
The final victory of the Red Army at Stalingrad in February 1943 was the greatest difficulty the Fascism had yet faced and was a rallying point for Communists within Italy. The war had focused the PCI, allowing their propaganda to tie together Italy’s strategic woes with the weakening of the Fascist regime. The long work days with no overtime pay and insufficient rations alongside Italian defeats and Allied air raids made it easy to highlight the many failures of the Fascist regime and its incompetent and increasingly delusional leadership. After Stalingrad demoralisation amongst Italian workers had reached its peak, it was clear that Italy would lose the war and many looked to the Red Army for deliverance. The PCI decided it was time to go on the offensive.
The Fiat automotive plant at Mirafiori was one of the largest industrial complexes in Italy, host to twenty thousands and the symbolic heart of a flourishing Italian industry in Fascist propaganda. Mussolini had made an awkward speech attempting to impress these notions on the workforce at the plant’s opening in 1939, only to receive a cold reception. The war had meant that even though the factory hadn’t yet produced any of the cars it was designed for, it was a vital component in war production. For strategic and propaganda purposes it was a perfect target for strike agitation.
Strikes had officially been abolished by the Fascists in 1926 but the Communists had already successfully encouraged some smaller strikes at the start of 1943. The PCI presence within the plant was minimal but the stated motivation for the strike was popular and the plan circulated widely. The Fascist state had announced a one time bonus would be paid to those workers whose homes had been affected by bomb damage. It was designed to display the state’s compassion though many saw it as a reluctant admission of culpability in failing to prevent enemy air raids. The strike demanded that the bonus be paid to all Italian workers.
The failure of rationing had left the Lira effectively worthless; however it was a popular proposal which allowed as many workers as possible to display their discontent. When the strike began on the 5th of March not all workers downed tools but three days later it had spread to the entire factory and beyond through the railways and into the northern industrial cities. By the 11th of March more than a hundred thousand workers were on strike in northern Italy with many more observing a work-to-rule, refusing to work overtime. The strike then spread south and demonstrations began to go beyond the central demand of the bonus to calling for the end to the war or even the end of Fascism.
The Fascists reacted first with dismay then with horror as the work stoppages and demonstrations continued week after week. After twenty years their control over the Italian worker was unravelling in front of their eyes and it seemed they would soon be faced not only by Allied armies in the field but also an armed revolution at home. The Communists had even appeared to set a date.
The PCI were jubilant with the success of the strike which had exceeded all expectations but its popularity had also left them overwhelmed. A great deal of organisation and planning had gone into the strike and the same would be needed to properly exploit its success. Plans were made for mass demonstrations for peace in Rome, Turin and Milan to take place. It was intended to be the beginning of the end of Fascism with subsequent demonstrations planned across the country for May Day. However it was not an armed revolt, the Communists lacked the numbers or the arms with which to carry one out. The arms factories remained on strike rather than producing weapons for a revolution.
Nonetheless Mussolini had begun to see the planned demonstrations as a Communist plot to seize control of the three cities, egged on by Hitler who urged him to crush the strikes and by his new party secretary who promised an army of Blackshirts could be summoned to save his regime. On Easter Sunday the demonstrations went ahead but were poorly attended, many workers who were happy to express their discontent via the demand for the bonus were left uncomfortable calling outright for the end of a regime that had taken great pleasure in disposing of its past opponents. The Communists had expected the streets of the three cities to be swamped but only a few thousand came out in Milan and Turin, and only a few hundred in Rome. Nonetheless the Fascists were ready for an armed revolution and responded accordingly.
The Easter Sunday massacre of April 25th took the form of a state sponsored riot as armed blackshirts gunned down peace demonstrators whilst the police looked on, ready to intervene on behalf of the blackshirts should the demonstrators fire back. Unarmed as most actually were, they fled. The violence ended swiftly with dozens dead and hundreds injured. Mussolini announced from the Palazzo Venezia to a crowd of triumphant Blackshirts that the Communist coup had been crushed whilst blood was still being washed off the Piazza del Popollo. He also agreed to extend the bonus payment to all workers and the strikes slowly petered out. It looked like the Fascist regime had successfully dealt with the strike using a balance of carrot and stick but many within it had been left deeply shaken.
The PCI were quick to martyr those who had fallen on Bloody Sunday but also realised their strategy had hit an impasse. Fascist violence against demonstrators angered many but also made them reluctant to put themselves in the line of fire. Nonetheless the strike had been a success, they had revealed the weakness of Mussolini’s regime and how they could be expected to respond to further insurrection. Newspapers and leaflets continued to circulate at Mirafiori and elsewhere while weapons began to go missing from the factory. Secreted part by part from worker to worker like leaflets and newspapers.
Mussolini saw the end of the strikes as a validation of his rejuvenation efforts. Loyal Fascists had seen off the great challenge domestically just as they could still do to their foreign enemies even as they drew closer and closer to Italy.
Still many within his regime began to look for a way out before they arrived.
---
Dissenso
Although the PCI was the most prominent organisation in opposition to Fascism it was not necessarily best placed to remove it. In the Spring of 1943 three conspiracies would emerge and occasionally coalesce to remove Mussolini from power from within his own regime. The lynchpin to all three conspiracies was the Italian Head of State, King Victor Emmanuel III. The King had put Mussolini in power and could also legally remove him, the Army and Navy swore its loyalty to him rather than Mussolini and the increasing unpopularity of the Fascist regime hadn’t yet affected the House of Savoy to the same extent. Italy had never been a country which was comfortably monarchist but even many republicans now looked to the institution for deliverance.
Despite Fascist repression there had remained an underground of Conservatives, Liberals and Socialists opposed to Mussolini’s regime. Though not as well organised as the Communists, Italy’s deteriorating war situation had also emboldened them into action. They were organised together by Ivanoe Bonomi, an elderly Liberal statesman who had been Prime Minister prior to the Fascist era. Bonomi retained strong links with the House of Savoy and figures within the military such as Marshal Pietro Badoglio who had become convinced of the need to remove Mussolini and Fascism in order to save Italy from destruction.
Bonomi hoped to include all anti-fascist elements within his organisation, including the Communists however the PCI were wary of the establishment figure who had been notoriously lenient towards the Blackshirts during his time in power. The success of the Mirafiori strike made them argue that they should play the leading role in any anti-fascist coalition, one not necessarily contingent on support from the King. Bonomi enjoyed more success with more moderate Socialist Republicans such as those of the Action Party however the violent put down of the Easter Sunday demonstrations split his coalition with some seeing the King as having dipped his hands in the blood. Bonomi continued trying to square the circle, arguing that only the King could concretely remove Mussolini and that if the dissenters to Fascism were disunited then the Fascist regime might survive the removal of Mussolini.
The conspiracy within the National Fascist Party was initially centred around Dino Grandi. Grandi had been a Fascist his entire political life but had long become the primary opposition figure within the regime, arguing in his own words that his loyalty to the Duce did not correspond to blind obedience. Grandi had opposed the alliance with Germany, criticised the Fascist regime’s increasing antisemitism and argued against Italian entry into the war. By the end of 1942 even his loyalty to Mussolini quietly faded after the Duce blocked an attempt by Grandi to make peace feelers via the British embassy in Spain and then removed him from the cabinet.
Mussolini had sought to rejuvenate his regime via this reshuffle but he invigorated the conspiracy against him in turn. Prominent Fascists who had been sidelined alongside Grandi now joined, including former Education Minister Giuseppe Bottai and former Foreign Secretary Galeazzo Ciano. Ciano was another lifelong Fascist, married to Mussolini’s daughter and considered by many to be his natural successor. An aristocrat who had become a Count following his father’s death, Ciano personified the compromises with the old Italian elites that Mussolini’s regime had made and by 1943 he had fallen out of favour. After his failure to successfully express Mussolini’s wishes to Hitler he had been replaced as Foreign Secretary by the Duce himself and made Ambassador to the Holy See.
Ciano, who had already been convinced of the need to find a way out of the war, now also determined that to do so would require the removal of his father-in-law. His demotion had given him access to a neutral nation full of Allied diplomats with which he could arrange a future without Mussolini alongside his aristocratic connections to the Italian Royal Family and contacts within the Italian Army.
The Army conspiracy was centred around Brigadier General Guiseppe Castellano, Head of Planning with the Army General Staff and friend of the newly appointed Commando Supremo Chief of Staff Vittorio Ambrosio. The Army conspiracy was less developed than those of Bonomi or the Fascists, with the crisis in North Africa occupying most of their time.
The Axis had been largely successful in securing Tunisia following the American landings in French North Africa but a subsequent Anglo-American offensive had linked their two fronts in the north east of the country. By April the Axis position was in a state of collapse. Supplying forces in North Africa, initially made easier with access to Tunisian ports, now became a suicidal endeavour for what remained of the Italian merchant fleet. Anglo-American air power had become dominant not only over the skies of North Africa but also southern Italy and, one after another, bombed out ports were rendered useless. Large scale evacuation of Italian forces was now impossible, and by the final surrender of the Axis armies in May only a handful had managed to escape at night in small boats.
The fall of Tunisia represented the end of the Italian Army as an operational force. Compounded by losses on the Eastern Front, Ambrosio was limited to only a handful of divisions to defend the vast Italian coastline with few remaining planes and tanks. On paper there remained 23 divisions with which to defend Italy but these were paper units with little more strength than a brigade.
16 and 17 year olds and First World War veterans were drafted to make up the shortfall but these children and old men lacked much experience of modern war and the bonus strike had left little to arm them with. The Italians were desperately scavenging anything they could from French stockpiles under their control to make up the shortfall. Even the more hardened veterans returning from the Eastern Front at Ambrosio’s direction were dismayed by being sent directly to build coastal fortifications in Sicily rather than be allowed any time to rest after their ordeal.
The continuing Allied air offensive against Italy and the build-up of resources in Tunisia indicated that an attack on Sardinia or Sicily was imminent and Ambrosio knew that Italy could no longer defend itself. The only options were to seek peace or to fall on Germany’s mercy. The Germans had the elements of three divisions already in Italy after supply issues prevented their transport to Tunisia and Hitler offered five more. The German dictator continued to prioritise the Eastern Front but accepted that only propping up his Italian ally would allow him to continue to do so.
Ambrosio instructed Mussolini to deny the German offer and demanded the German units already in Italy be placed directly under his command. He intended to keep them at arms length, split between Sardinia, Sicily and the mainland. Objectively Italy couldn’t hope to defend itself without German help but Ambrosio knew accepting it would undo the strategic autonomy he had hoped to foster and leave his country little more than a German puppet. Ambrosio sent a series of memorandums to the King laying out the perilousness of the strategic situation and recommending a way out of the war to ensure the survival of Italy and its monarchy.
The King, however, had not yet lost faith in Mussolini. Although shaken by Ambrosio’s candour and accepting audiences with all three shades of conspirators, Victor Emmanuel dithered and concluded that Italy had to find a way out of the war but that Mussolini was best placed to deliver it.
For Mussolini this was an impossible task, the Allies had made it clear that any peace would come at the expense of his regime but continuing the war would mean complete subordination to Germany. He was resigned to the fact that he had tied himself to Hitler’s fate though continued to search for a victory that would restore Italian prestige and cement the rejuvenation of his regime.
It could no longer come from the Army so instead he pinned his hopes on Italy’s most powerful weapon; her battle fleet.
---
Although the PCI was the most prominent organisation in opposition to Fascism it was not necessarily best placed to remove it. In the Spring of 1943 three conspiracies would emerge and occasionally coalesce to remove Mussolini from power from within his own regime. The lynchpin to all three conspiracies was the Italian Head of State, King Victor Emmanuel III. The King had put Mussolini in power and could also legally remove him, the Army and Navy swore its loyalty to him rather than Mussolini and the increasing unpopularity of the Fascist regime hadn’t yet affected the House of Savoy to the same extent. Italy had never been a country which was comfortably monarchist but even many republicans now looked to the institution for deliverance.
Despite Fascist repression there had remained an underground of Conservatives, Liberals and Socialists opposed to Mussolini’s regime. Though not as well organised as the Communists, Italy’s deteriorating war situation had also emboldened them into action. They were organised together by Ivanoe Bonomi, an elderly Liberal statesman who had been Prime Minister prior to the Fascist era. Bonomi retained strong links with the House of Savoy and figures within the military such as Marshal Pietro Badoglio who had become convinced of the need to remove Mussolini and Fascism in order to save Italy from destruction.
Bonomi hoped to include all anti-fascist elements within his organisation, including the Communists however the PCI were wary of the establishment figure who had been notoriously lenient towards the Blackshirts during his time in power. The success of the Mirafiori strike made them argue that they should play the leading role in any anti-fascist coalition, one not necessarily contingent on support from the King. Bonomi enjoyed more success with more moderate Socialist Republicans such as those of the Action Party however the violent put down of the Easter Sunday demonstrations split his coalition with some seeing the King as having dipped his hands in the blood. Bonomi continued trying to square the circle, arguing that only the King could concretely remove Mussolini and that if the dissenters to Fascism were disunited then the Fascist regime might survive the removal of Mussolini.
The conspiracy within the National Fascist Party was initially centred around Dino Grandi. Grandi had been a Fascist his entire political life but had long become the primary opposition figure within the regime, arguing in his own words that his loyalty to the Duce did not correspond to blind obedience. Grandi had opposed the alliance with Germany, criticised the Fascist regime’s increasing antisemitism and argued against Italian entry into the war. By the end of 1942 even his loyalty to Mussolini quietly faded after the Duce blocked an attempt by Grandi to make peace feelers via the British embassy in Spain and then removed him from the cabinet.
Mussolini had sought to rejuvenate his regime via this reshuffle but he invigorated the conspiracy against him in turn. Prominent Fascists who had been sidelined alongside Grandi now joined, including former Education Minister Giuseppe Bottai and former Foreign Secretary Galeazzo Ciano. Ciano was another lifelong Fascist, married to Mussolini’s daughter and considered by many to be his natural successor. An aristocrat who had become a Count following his father’s death, Ciano personified the compromises with the old Italian elites that Mussolini’s regime had made and by 1943 he had fallen out of favour. After his failure to successfully express Mussolini’s wishes to Hitler he had been replaced as Foreign Secretary by the Duce himself and made Ambassador to the Holy See.
Ciano, who had already been convinced of the need to find a way out of the war, now also determined that to do so would require the removal of his father-in-law. His demotion had given him access to a neutral nation full of Allied diplomats with which he could arrange a future without Mussolini alongside his aristocratic connections to the Italian Royal Family and contacts within the Italian Army.
The Army conspiracy was centred around Brigadier General Guiseppe Castellano, Head of Planning with the Army General Staff and friend of the newly appointed Commando Supremo Chief of Staff Vittorio Ambrosio. The Army conspiracy was less developed than those of Bonomi or the Fascists, with the crisis in North Africa occupying most of their time.
The Axis had been largely successful in securing Tunisia following the American landings in French North Africa but a subsequent Anglo-American offensive had linked their two fronts in the north east of the country. By April the Axis position was in a state of collapse. Supplying forces in North Africa, initially made easier with access to Tunisian ports, now became a suicidal endeavour for what remained of the Italian merchant fleet. Anglo-American air power had become dominant not only over the skies of North Africa but also southern Italy and, one after another, bombed out ports were rendered useless. Large scale evacuation of Italian forces was now impossible, and by the final surrender of the Axis armies in May only a handful had managed to escape at night in small boats.
The fall of Tunisia represented the end of the Italian Army as an operational force. Compounded by losses on the Eastern Front, Ambrosio was limited to only a handful of divisions to defend the vast Italian coastline with few remaining planes and tanks. On paper there remained 23 divisions with which to defend Italy but these were paper units with little more strength than a brigade.
16 and 17 year olds and First World War veterans were drafted to make up the shortfall but these children and old men lacked much experience of modern war and the bonus strike had left little to arm them with. The Italians were desperately scavenging anything they could from French stockpiles under their control to make up the shortfall. Even the more hardened veterans returning from the Eastern Front at Ambrosio’s direction were dismayed by being sent directly to build coastal fortifications in Sicily rather than be allowed any time to rest after their ordeal.
The continuing Allied air offensive against Italy and the build-up of resources in Tunisia indicated that an attack on Sardinia or Sicily was imminent and Ambrosio knew that Italy could no longer defend itself. The only options were to seek peace or to fall on Germany’s mercy. The Germans had the elements of three divisions already in Italy after supply issues prevented their transport to Tunisia and Hitler offered five more. The German dictator continued to prioritise the Eastern Front but accepted that only propping up his Italian ally would allow him to continue to do so.
Ambrosio instructed Mussolini to deny the German offer and demanded the German units already in Italy be placed directly under his command. He intended to keep them at arms length, split between Sardinia, Sicily and the mainland. Objectively Italy couldn’t hope to defend itself without German help but Ambrosio knew accepting it would undo the strategic autonomy he had hoped to foster and leave his country little more than a German puppet. Ambrosio sent a series of memorandums to the King laying out the perilousness of the strategic situation and recommending a way out of the war to ensure the survival of Italy and its monarchy.
The King, however, had not yet lost faith in Mussolini. Although shaken by Ambrosio’s candour and accepting audiences with all three shades of conspirators, Victor Emmanuel dithered and concluded that Italy had to find a way out of the war but that Mussolini was best placed to deliver it.
For Mussolini this was an impossible task, the Allies had made it clear that any peace would come at the expense of his regime but continuing the war would mean complete subordination to Germany. He was resigned to the fact that he had tied himself to Hitler’s fate though continued to search for a victory that would restore Italian prestige and cement the rejuvenation of his regime.
It could no longer come from the Army so instead he pinned his hopes on Italy’s most powerful weapon; her battle fleet.
---
Lictor
The Regia Marina had long been the pride of Italy and a strong navalist movement predated Fascism. Italy had few resources and despite being a continental power was dependent on the Adriatic and Mediterranean sea lanes for most of her trade. As such a powerful navy had become vital to maintaining Italian independence. Although the Regia Marina had suffered from a lack of cohesion following Italian unification by the turn of the century it had developed a reputation as a modern innovative force, defeating first the Ottoman and then the Habsburg navies prior to the outbreak of global conflict.
By the end of the First World War, and the collapse of both empires, Italian control of the Adriatic sea seemed secure. Italian naval doctrine in the early interwar period focused on maintaining control of the Adriatic whilst promoting good relations with the United Kingdom. The Washington Naval Treaty ensured, at least on paper, that Italy would have parity with its main Mediterranean rival, France. This seemed to ensure Italy’s security to the liberal government but to the incoming Fascist regime it appeared to be an acceptance of Italy as a second rate power.
Development of the Regia Marina under Mussolini and his naval minister Giuseppe Sirianni was in line with the Fascist worldview of Italy as an emerging global power. The focus became on control over the Mediterranean rather than security within it . The Suez Canal was seen as the new nexus of power in the modern world, one which required partial or full Italian control in order for Italy to achieve its destiny of expansion in Northern and Eastern Africa. The same went for the Dardanelles, Gibraltar and Malta.
As early as 1926 it was envisaged that war with France and the United Kingdom might be required to realise these aims. Only five years earlier the Italian naval minister Giovanni Sechi had warned “Britain can bring us to our knees in one month, without employing a single infantryman.” Now Mussolini set Italy on a collision course on the basis of British overreach and decline. France was viewed as a modern Carthage in contrast to Mussolini’s New Rome.
Italy first circumvented the parameters of the Washington Naval Treaty before ignoring them outright to build a cutting edge battle fleet capable of realising the Fascist ‘Mare Nostrum’ worldview. Navalism was promoted aggressively by Mussolini’s regime. Ship launches became major events in coastal cities with the Fascist controlled Naval League organising banquets and ceremonies across Italy. Italian submarines circumnavigated Africa and cruisers visited Australia and Japan. These visits along with foreign delegations being encouraged to attend annual fleet reviews were designed to impress potential allies and enemies alike.
The centre-piece of Fascist naval expansion were the massive Littorio-class battleships, named after the first of its kind and in turn based on the Lictor guards who would ceremonially carry the Fasces in the days of Rome. In much the same way the Regia Marina was used to promote Fascist prestige but was not an extension of the regime itself. Although loyalty to Fascism was pursued aggressively in the naval academy, there remained uncertainty over Mussolini’s policy.
As it became clear that the likelihood of a conflict with the United Kingdom was increasing some officers sometimes expressed their concerns, only to be punished. Sailors and non-commissioned officers were occasionally found with communist propaganda leaflets they had received from dock workers, being in possession of such materials was punished severely.
Nonetheless morale in the Regia Marina was generally good and the officer class remained highly nationalistic and if not devoutly Fascist they enjoyed the esteem and prestige the regime showered upon them. Mussolini had built a powerful fleet to ensure future Italian glory but contemporary Italy had only been able to afford it at the expense of its army and industry. Neither had been ready when the war with France and the United Kingdom did come.
The Regia Marina had been in a much stronger position when the war arrived although it was immediately beset by setbacks. The surprising collapse of France had led Mussolini to declare war hastily. This opportunism meant that when Italy went to war a quarter of its merchant fleet was outside of the Mediterranean, stranded due to British control of Gibraltar and Suez. This hobbled Axis supply to the North African front before it had even begun.
Less than a fortnight after Italian entry France asked for an armistice and the French fleet was neutralised however in the Autumn the Italian battle fleet was severely damaged by bombs and torpedoes from British carrier aircraft. Italian naval doctrine had remained focused on battleships in the interwar era and now seaborne airpower came into its primacy the Regia Maria lacked any aircraft carriers. They had also been slow to develop effective marine radar. This left the fleet vulnerable at night or whenever it strayed too far from land based air fields.
Due to these vulnerabilities the Regia Maria had been unable to achieve the aim which the Fascist regime had set out for it. Rather than securing Italian dominance of the Mediterranean the primary focus of the Italian fleet instead became maintaining the supply routes to the North African front, something it was unable to ever fully accomplish due to their inability to neutralise the British-held island of Malta.
The Italians had never been able to bomb Malta heavily enough to force its surrender nor had its blockade been able to entirely starve the island of supplies despite the damage inflicted on Allied convoys. In the meantime the British blockade of Italy had left the Regia Marina entirely dependent on their German ally for fuel oil.
The Germans were not forthcoming as their own supplies diminished and soon the Regia Marina found most of its battle fleet effectively immobilised. The increasing dominance of Allied air supremacy had dealt a crippling blow against Italian escort vessels and inflicted heavy damage on the battle fleet at port. By June 1943 around half of the fleet's pre-war strength was sunk and half of the remainder were undergoing repairs.
The Regia Marina could still count on powerful units, particularly its Littorio battleships but these faced issues with a lack of destroyers available for escort as well as a lack of air cover. Allied air power had become so dominant that the battle fleet had been forced to relocate from Naples to its northern base at La Spezia which itself was the target of heavy Allied bombing.
Nonetheless the battle fleet remained the most powerful weapon at Italy’s disposal. It gave Allied planners pause for even a one-way sortie by the Regia Marina could prove devastating to any operation if they were to be underestimated. In this way the battle fleet continued to contribute to the Italian effort in a hypothetical sense, even though it had not made battle since the Summer of 1942.
The notion of being a glorified guard dog was not particularly heartening to those at Supermarina who previously had been told they were the new conquerors of the Mediterranean. Even before being replaced the Chief of the Naval Staff, Admiral Angelo Iachino, had resolved that the battle fleet would need to act against any Allied invasion of Italy. If not for any strategic purpose then to maintain its honour.
This sentiment was welcomed by his replacement, once again Admiral Guiseppe Sirianni who had been mandated by Mussolini to reevaluate the purpose of Regia Marina as he had done in the twenties. The prestige of the navy had helped empower the Fascist regime in its infancy, now it would bring about its rejuvenation by finding glory at the bottom of the sea.
---
The Regia Marina had long been the pride of Italy and a strong navalist movement predated Fascism. Italy had few resources and despite being a continental power was dependent on the Adriatic and Mediterranean sea lanes for most of her trade. As such a powerful navy had become vital to maintaining Italian independence. Although the Regia Marina had suffered from a lack of cohesion following Italian unification by the turn of the century it had developed a reputation as a modern innovative force, defeating first the Ottoman and then the Habsburg navies prior to the outbreak of global conflict.
By the end of the First World War, and the collapse of both empires, Italian control of the Adriatic sea seemed secure. Italian naval doctrine in the early interwar period focused on maintaining control of the Adriatic whilst promoting good relations with the United Kingdom. The Washington Naval Treaty ensured, at least on paper, that Italy would have parity with its main Mediterranean rival, France. This seemed to ensure Italy’s security to the liberal government but to the incoming Fascist regime it appeared to be an acceptance of Italy as a second rate power.
Development of the Regia Marina under Mussolini and his naval minister Giuseppe Sirianni was in line with the Fascist worldview of Italy as an emerging global power. The focus became on control over the Mediterranean rather than security within it . The Suez Canal was seen as the new nexus of power in the modern world, one which required partial or full Italian control in order for Italy to achieve its destiny of expansion in Northern and Eastern Africa. The same went for the Dardanelles, Gibraltar and Malta.
As early as 1926 it was envisaged that war with France and the United Kingdom might be required to realise these aims. Only five years earlier the Italian naval minister Giovanni Sechi had warned “Britain can bring us to our knees in one month, without employing a single infantryman.” Now Mussolini set Italy on a collision course on the basis of British overreach and decline. France was viewed as a modern Carthage in contrast to Mussolini’s New Rome.
Italy first circumvented the parameters of the Washington Naval Treaty before ignoring them outright to build a cutting edge battle fleet capable of realising the Fascist ‘Mare Nostrum’ worldview. Navalism was promoted aggressively by Mussolini’s regime. Ship launches became major events in coastal cities with the Fascist controlled Naval League organising banquets and ceremonies across Italy. Italian submarines circumnavigated Africa and cruisers visited Australia and Japan. These visits along with foreign delegations being encouraged to attend annual fleet reviews were designed to impress potential allies and enemies alike.
The centre-piece of Fascist naval expansion were the massive Littorio-class battleships, named after the first of its kind and in turn based on the Lictor guards who would ceremonially carry the Fasces in the days of Rome. In much the same way the Regia Marina was used to promote Fascist prestige but was not an extension of the regime itself. Although loyalty to Fascism was pursued aggressively in the naval academy, there remained uncertainty over Mussolini’s policy.
As it became clear that the likelihood of a conflict with the United Kingdom was increasing some officers sometimes expressed their concerns, only to be punished. Sailors and non-commissioned officers were occasionally found with communist propaganda leaflets they had received from dock workers, being in possession of such materials was punished severely.
Nonetheless morale in the Regia Marina was generally good and the officer class remained highly nationalistic and if not devoutly Fascist they enjoyed the esteem and prestige the regime showered upon them. Mussolini had built a powerful fleet to ensure future Italian glory but contemporary Italy had only been able to afford it at the expense of its army and industry. Neither had been ready when the war with France and the United Kingdom did come.
The Regia Marina had been in a much stronger position when the war arrived although it was immediately beset by setbacks. The surprising collapse of France had led Mussolini to declare war hastily. This opportunism meant that when Italy went to war a quarter of its merchant fleet was outside of the Mediterranean, stranded due to British control of Gibraltar and Suez. This hobbled Axis supply to the North African front before it had even begun.
Less than a fortnight after Italian entry France asked for an armistice and the French fleet was neutralised however in the Autumn the Italian battle fleet was severely damaged by bombs and torpedoes from British carrier aircraft. Italian naval doctrine had remained focused on battleships in the interwar era and now seaborne airpower came into its primacy the Regia Maria lacked any aircraft carriers. They had also been slow to develop effective marine radar. This left the fleet vulnerable at night or whenever it strayed too far from land based air fields.
Due to these vulnerabilities the Regia Maria had been unable to achieve the aim which the Fascist regime had set out for it. Rather than securing Italian dominance of the Mediterranean the primary focus of the Italian fleet instead became maintaining the supply routes to the North African front, something it was unable to ever fully accomplish due to their inability to neutralise the British-held island of Malta.
The Italians had never been able to bomb Malta heavily enough to force its surrender nor had its blockade been able to entirely starve the island of supplies despite the damage inflicted on Allied convoys. In the meantime the British blockade of Italy had left the Regia Marina entirely dependent on their German ally for fuel oil.
The Germans were not forthcoming as their own supplies diminished and soon the Regia Marina found most of its battle fleet effectively immobilised. The increasing dominance of Allied air supremacy had dealt a crippling blow against Italian escort vessels and inflicted heavy damage on the battle fleet at port. By June 1943 around half of the fleet's pre-war strength was sunk and half of the remainder were undergoing repairs.
The Regia Marina could still count on powerful units, particularly its Littorio battleships but these faced issues with a lack of destroyers available for escort as well as a lack of air cover. Allied air power had become so dominant that the battle fleet had been forced to relocate from Naples to its northern base at La Spezia which itself was the target of heavy Allied bombing.
Nonetheless the battle fleet remained the most powerful weapon at Italy’s disposal. It gave Allied planners pause for even a one-way sortie by the Regia Marina could prove devastating to any operation if they were to be underestimated. In this way the battle fleet continued to contribute to the Italian effort in a hypothetical sense, even though it had not made battle since the Summer of 1942.
The notion of being a glorified guard dog was not particularly heartening to those at Supermarina who previously had been told they were the new conquerors of the Mediterranean. Even before being replaced the Chief of the Naval Staff, Admiral Angelo Iachino, had resolved that the battle fleet would need to act against any Allied invasion of Italy. If not for any strategic purpose then to maintain its honour.
This sentiment was welcomed by his replacement, once again Admiral Guiseppe Sirianni who had been mandated by Mussolini to reevaluate the purpose of Regia Marina as he had done in the twenties. The prestige of the navy had helped empower the Fascist regime in its infancy, now it would bring about its rejuvenation by finding glory at the bottom of the sea.
---
The Supreme Sacrifice
The return of Admiral Giuseppe Sirianni as Chief of Staff caused some disquiet amongst the officers of Supermarina who saw him not only as a political appointment but also a political imposition designed to bolster the influence of Fascism in the Regia Marina.
At 78 years old Sirianni may have not been the most obvious candidate to lead the ‘rejuvenation’ efforts within the Italian navy but Mussolini admired his drive. The Admiral, who had once struck fear into the French, would raise the political consciousness of Italy’s strongest remaining asset in preparation for the year of decision.
Sirianni railed against what he saw as a continued soft spot for the British which had never been truly eradicated even after three years of war and more than a decade of prior preparation. Shortly after his arrival he brought forward the anticipated promotion of Admiral Carlo Bergamini to commander of the Italian fleet. This was seen by many as a snub against his predecessor, Angelo Iachino, and raised questions as to who else Sirianni might consider to be an ‘Anglophile’ in need of replacement.
In reality Sirianni had been more impressed by Bergamini’s focus on the need for the Regia Marina to prepare to make greater sacrifices as Italy entered a new phase of the war. The issue of the lack of fuel oil which had plagued the fleet since 1940 had been improved somewhat after the dissolution of the Vichy French State allowed the reserves of the French fleet to be scavenged and the access to Tunisian ports improved the prospects of supplying Axis forces in North Africa.
Bergamini argued that this provided an opportunity for the Regia Marina to take control of the Strait of Sicily and in doing so maintain control of occupied Tunisia whilst also fending off the anticipated Allied landing in the Balkans. Instead, only weeks after Sirianni and Bergamini had embarked on this strategy, the situation in North Africa had rapidly deteriorated and with it Allied air dominance of Axis supply routes made Bergamini’s emphasis on sacrifice a necessity. Dozens of escorts were sunk before Italian losses became unsustainable and the remainder of the Axis forces on the African continent were left to wither.
With the head of the naval staff and the fleet of one mind a plan had been put in place to devote the fleet’s remaining strength towards a daring Tunisian Dunkirk which would have seen the remaining Italian armies rescued and returned home to fight another day. The risks involved gave many Italian naval officers pause and after Luftwaffe attempts to evacuate German forces in Tunisia from the air ended in a massacre and the Allied bombing of ports in southern Italy became an all-out offensive the project was sidelined.
Bergamini and Sirianni were instead forced to accept the need to evacuate the battle fleet to La Spezia with a smaller force of older battleships being relocated to Taranto. Bergamini had argued that ships at port were no safer from Allied planes than they were at sea but by the Spring of 1943 the damage from Allied bombing was so extensive that the battle fleet could no longer be stationed at Naples in spite of the commander’s protests that La Spezia was little safer. Allied bombings of La Spezia in April and June would prove this theory correct.
Supermarina now faced the prospect of an Allied invasion of Italy, one which its intelligence indicated would come against Sicily April with defeat in Tunisia imminent internal assessments were made of the Regia Marina’s ability to defend Italy against different potential Allied assaults. The conclusion was made that in the event of an Allied invasion of Corsica or Sardinia the battle fleet would be able to intervene but a landing against Sicily should not be contested in a major way unless an opportunity to inflict a devastating blow against Allied forces presented itself.
This conclusion offended Bergamini who protested to Sirianni who in turn dismissed the report. He argued the report reflected the way in which the battle fleet had become used to inactivity. Army General Mario Roatta who assumed command of all Italian units on Sicily, including those of the Navy, painted a grim picture of Sicilian defence with only naval units operating on a wartime footing. Roatta stated a large German contingent would be necessary for the defence of the island. Bergamini argued that if Sicily were to be lost then the fleet would be entirely exposed to Allied air attack whilst the Allied fleets would be able to sortie from Sicily and attack the Italian coast at a moment’s notice. Moreover, entrusting the battle fleet with being Italy’s first line of defence would fit in better with the need to retain Italian strategic independence which Comando Supremo had been tasked with.
Sirianni concurred. Beyond that the old Fascist took exception to the notion of abandoning Sicily to its fate, unfavourably comparing detractors to the Italian premier Victor Orlando who had resolved to retreat to Sicily if necessary to continue the struggle against the Central Powers. “Are we officers of the Regia Maria less patriotic than Orlando the Mafiosi?” Sirriani asked at a meeting of the Comando Supremo. This resolve pleased Mussolini. An alternative plan submitted by Admiral Raffaele de Courten that the battle fleet might maintain its safety by retreating to Toulon in the event of Sicily falling led to him being sacked.
A visit by Admiral Karl Doenitz, the new Chief of the German Kriegsmarine, to Rome in May received a warm reception from Sirianni. Doenitz appreciated his counterpart’s ideological dedication and returned to report to Hitler that he was confident the Italians would fight to the end. He was impressed by their commitment to Sicily but expressed his own belief that the next Allied move would be made against Greece or Sardinia in line with information that German military intelligence had gleaned from documents carried by an apparent British marine officer whose plane had crashed off of the coast of Spain.
Whilst the Supermarina were also making preparations for a potential Allied invasion of Sardinia, their own intelligence continued to indicate that Sicily was the target. Even as Doenitz departed from Rome the island was under continuous attack from the air. A landing appeared imminent.
With Mussolini having given his blessing to Sirianni’s arguments, Italian naval planners now made their preparations to bring as much strength as possible to meet an Allied invasion fleet several times larger than anything they could bring to bear. Many resolved themselves to a one-way trip for the honour of the Regia Marina.
In the meantime Allied air power continued to deplete the battle fleet’s remaining strength at port, and the morale of the Italian sailor along with it.
---
The return of Admiral Giuseppe Sirianni as Chief of Staff caused some disquiet amongst the officers of Supermarina who saw him not only as a political appointment but also a political imposition designed to bolster the influence of Fascism in the Regia Marina.
At 78 years old Sirianni may have not been the most obvious candidate to lead the ‘rejuvenation’ efforts within the Italian navy but Mussolini admired his drive. The Admiral, who had once struck fear into the French, would raise the political consciousness of Italy’s strongest remaining asset in preparation for the year of decision.
Sirianni railed against what he saw as a continued soft spot for the British which had never been truly eradicated even after three years of war and more than a decade of prior preparation. Shortly after his arrival he brought forward the anticipated promotion of Admiral Carlo Bergamini to commander of the Italian fleet. This was seen by many as a snub against his predecessor, Angelo Iachino, and raised questions as to who else Sirianni might consider to be an ‘Anglophile’ in need of replacement.
In reality Sirianni had been more impressed by Bergamini’s focus on the need for the Regia Marina to prepare to make greater sacrifices as Italy entered a new phase of the war. The issue of the lack of fuel oil which had plagued the fleet since 1940 had been improved somewhat after the dissolution of the Vichy French State allowed the reserves of the French fleet to be scavenged and the access to Tunisian ports improved the prospects of supplying Axis forces in North Africa.
Bergamini argued that this provided an opportunity for the Regia Marina to take control of the Strait of Sicily and in doing so maintain control of occupied Tunisia whilst also fending off the anticipated Allied landing in the Balkans. Instead, only weeks after Sirianni and Bergamini had embarked on this strategy, the situation in North Africa had rapidly deteriorated and with it Allied air dominance of Axis supply routes made Bergamini’s emphasis on sacrifice a necessity. Dozens of escorts were sunk before Italian losses became unsustainable and the remainder of the Axis forces on the African continent were left to wither.
With the head of the naval staff and the fleet of one mind a plan had been put in place to devote the fleet’s remaining strength towards a daring Tunisian Dunkirk which would have seen the remaining Italian armies rescued and returned home to fight another day. The risks involved gave many Italian naval officers pause and after Luftwaffe attempts to evacuate German forces in Tunisia from the air ended in a massacre and the Allied bombing of ports in southern Italy became an all-out offensive the project was sidelined.
Bergamini and Sirianni were instead forced to accept the need to evacuate the battle fleet to La Spezia with a smaller force of older battleships being relocated to Taranto. Bergamini had argued that ships at port were no safer from Allied planes than they were at sea but by the Spring of 1943 the damage from Allied bombing was so extensive that the battle fleet could no longer be stationed at Naples in spite of the commander’s protests that La Spezia was little safer. Allied bombings of La Spezia in April and June would prove this theory correct.
Supermarina now faced the prospect of an Allied invasion of Italy, one which its intelligence indicated would come against Sicily April with defeat in Tunisia imminent internal assessments were made of the Regia Marina’s ability to defend Italy against different potential Allied assaults. The conclusion was made that in the event of an Allied invasion of Corsica or Sardinia the battle fleet would be able to intervene but a landing against Sicily should not be contested in a major way unless an opportunity to inflict a devastating blow against Allied forces presented itself.
This conclusion offended Bergamini who protested to Sirianni who in turn dismissed the report. He argued the report reflected the way in which the battle fleet had become used to inactivity. Army General Mario Roatta who assumed command of all Italian units on Sicily, including those of the Navy, painted a grim picture of Sicilian defence with only naval units operating on a wartime footing. Roatta stated a large German contingent would be necessary for the defence of the island. Bergamini argued that if Sicily were to be lost then the fleet would be entirely exposed to Allied air attack whilst the Allied fleets would be able to sortie from Sicily and attack the Italian coast at a moment’s notice. Moreover, entrusting the battle fleet with being Italy’s first line of defence would fit in better with the need to retain Italian strategic independence which Comando Supremo had been tasked with.
Sirianni concurred. Beyond that the old Fascist took exception to the notion of abandoning Sicily to its fate, unfavourably comparing detractors to the Italian premier Victor Orlando who had resolved to retreat to Sicily if necessary to continue the struggle against the Central Powers. “Are we officers of the Regia Maria less patriotic than Orlando the Mafiosi?” Sirriani asked at a meeting of the Comando Supremo. This resolve pleased Mussolini. An alternative plan submitted by Admiral Raffaele de Courten that the battle fleet might maintain its safety by retreating to Toulon in the event of Sicily falling led to him being sacked.
A visit by Admiral Karl Doenitz, the new Chief of the German Kriegsmarine, to Rome in May received a warm reception from Sirianni. Doenitz appreciated his counterpart’s ideological dedication and returned to report to Hitler that he was confident the Italians would fight to the end. He was impressed by their commitment to Sicily but expressed his own belief that the next Allied move would be made against Greece or Sardinia in line with information that German military intelligence had gleaned from documents carried by an apparent British marine officer whose plane had crashed off of the coast of Spain.
Whilst the Supermarina were also making preparations for a potential Allied invasion of Sardinia, their own intelligence continued to indicate that Sicily was the target. Even as Doenitz departed from Rome the island was under continuous attack from the air. A landing appeared imminent.
With Mussolini having given his blessing to Sirianni’s arguments, Italian naval planners now made their preparations to bring as much strength as possible to meet an Allied invasion fleet several times larger than anything they could bring to bear. Many resolved themselves to a one-way trip for the honour of the Regia Marina.
In the meantime Allied air power continued to deplete the battle fleet’s remaining strength at port, and the morale of the Italian sailor along with it.
---
Corkscrew
In early June two waves of more than a hundred American B-17 bombers struck La Spezia Naval Base during the day. The high explosive bombs seriously damaged two of the Littorio class battleships, Roma and Vittorio Veneto alongside the base’s shore installations.
The attack left Supermarina shaken both by the ease with which the American raiders had been able to attack and the damage inflicted. Insufficient radar coverage had allowed the Americans to achieve complete surprise, anti-aircraft fire from land and sea had been ineffective, the handful of aircraft the Regia Aeronautica sent up to face the enemy had met similarly poor results.
The damage to Roma and Vittorio Veneto left the remainder of the battle fleet without two of its most powerful units with only one operational Littorio remaining. Bergamini was validated in his warnings about the fleet being little safer in port than on the open sea but now his plan of using the battle fleet as the first line of defence against Allied invasion had been seriously undermined. Nonetheless Sirianni did not waver from viewing the battle fleet as essential to defending against any Allied invasion and remained adamant that whatever units available at the time would be employed if it came.
The Fascist Admiral made this assurance to curb any potential lapse into inaction that might have been brought about by the American raid but also to emphasise the need to recover from it. Supermarina estimated that the damage to Vittorio Veneto could be fixed at the end of the month and Roma by the end of July. The crews of both ships found themselves being broken up, some would stay in La Spezia while the damaged battleships travelled to Genoa further up the coast and still considered safe from Allied bombs. Others were sent to act as crews for Italy’s dreadnought battleships in Taranto.
The First World War-era ships lacked the mobility of their modern counterparts but they remained dangerous and at the very least would force the Allies to divide their own forces in dealing with them, distracting them from the real danger. Workers at the Genoa dry dock had their working days extended to hasten the repair of the more modern units with the entire workforce of the dry dock running night and day shifts. To assist in this Allied prisoners were marched into Genoa from Fossoli POW camp to “help repair the damage they had done.”
The workers and sailors at La Spezia were under similar orders to repair the damage to the shoreline for the return of the two Littorios. The entire base became shrouded in smoke during the day, in an attempt to prevent any more daylight raids from achieving the same accuracy. It was made clear that an invasion may be imminent and that Italy would need every ship it could get.
The need for urgency was not unfounded, a few days after American bombs had struck La Spezia, the Italian island of Pantelleria along with the rest of the Pelagie Islands surrendered. Pantelleria lay in the Strait of Sicily less than 50 miles from the island and had been under constant blockade and bombardment since the fall of Tunisia. The mountainous island’s caves provided an effective defence against the bombs and shells but the island lacked reliable access to fresh water and there was insufficient food for the island’s civilian population and naval garrison.
What Italy had failed to bring about in Malta was now being inflicted on Italians. Pantelleria’s small Carthiginian harbour was cut off by Allied air patrols during the day, leaving only a handful of supplies to get through by braving the naval blockade at night. Constant air attacks on the island’s communications, power plant and road network made distribution of these scant resources almost impossible. May became June and the daily air raids became hourly, civilians and soldiers alike were subjected to a subterranean existence of darkness, hunger and thirst, unable to sleep or rest from the constant barrage above.
Under these conditions demoralisation came easily. Much of the Italian garrison were natives of the island and had little interest in their home being turned into a battlefield with their families trapped in the middle. Supermarina had refused to evacuate civilians from the island and along with much of the garrison they now felt abandoned to face an Allied invasion they weren’t equipped for.
Fascist propaganda had boasted throughout the war that Pantelleria was a powerful fortress bristling with aircraft and guns. On the 8th of June the Italian people heard that the Allied bombardment had failed to break the defenders and that the island would be held to the last. Three days later Admiral Gino Pavesi, Pantelleria’s military commander, concluded the situation was untenable. Due to the smoke from the constant bombing Pavesi had been unaware of the Allied invasion fleet approaching the shore when he informed Supermarina of the need to avoid a bloodbath. A response was still being considered in Rome when the smoke cleared and British troops landed to the sight of numerous white flags.
The fall of Pantelleria served to further worsen the morale of the Italian public. Three days after having been assured it would hold on until the end the seemingly impregnable fortress had surrendered without the defenders firing a shot. Fascist propaganda excused the surrender as having been due to a lack of water on the island but many Italians began to wonder whether it was a harbinger of the sort of military collapse an Allied invasion of the mainland would bring. For most Italians who were already war weary it became a question of when the war did end whether it would mean chaos or salvation for Italy.
The loss of the island had a profound effect on the morale of the Regia Marina. Supermarina had hoped for a protracted defence of the island in order to buy time for the battle fleet to lick its wounds. Instead an Italian Admiral had gone rogue and surrendered the island without a fight. To his fellow officers this was a source of great embarrassment and Bergamini made a fiery speech to the assembled crews at La Spezia where he denounced Pavesi as a stain on the Regia Marina which they would wipe clean with their heroism.
To add insult to injury, 50 British Lancaster bombers struck Genoa at dusk less than a fortnight after Pavesi’s surrender, further damaging Roma and Vittorio Veneto. It was now estimated neither ship would be seaworthy in August. It was time the Regia Marina did not have although the extent of the damage was suppressed. Devoted as Supermarina was to making battle with the Allied fleets, reality gave way to honour.
To many sailors at La Spezia, shrouded in smoke much like their comrades in Pantelleria had been, it was easy to empathise with Pavesi. Here was a ‘traitor’ who had opted to spare the lives of his men and civilians rather than fight an unwinnable battle. Although conditions were nowhere near as bad on the base compared with the island, long hours of hard labour on shore installations and a lack of real daylight proved demoralising enough on their own.
Many wondered what their reaction might be when called upon to make their own pointless sacrifice.
---
In early June two waves of more than a hundred American B-17 bombers struck La Spezia Naval Base during the day. The high explosive bombs seriously damaged two of the Littorio class battleships, Roma and Vittorio Veneto alongside the base’s shore installations.
The attack left Supermarina shaken both by the ease with which the American raiders had been able to attack and the damage inflicted. Insufficient radar coverage had allowed the Americans to achieve complete surprise, anti-aircraft fire from land and sea had been ineffective, the handful of aircraft the Regia Aeronautica sent up to face the enemy had met similarly poor results.
The damage to Roma and Vittorio Veneto left the remainder of the battle fleet without two of its most powerful units with only one operational Littorio remaining. Bergamini was validated in his warnings about the fleet being little safer in port than on the open sea but now his plan of using the battle fleet as the first line of defence against Allied invasion had been seriously undermined. Nonetheless Sirianni did not waver from viewing the battle fleet as essential to defending against any Allied invasion and remained adamant that whatever units available at the time would be employed if it came.
The Fascist Admiral made this assurance to curb any potential lapse into inaction that might have been brought about by the American raid but also to emphasise the need to recover from it. Supermarina estimated that the damage to Vittorio Veneto could be fixed at the end of the month and Roma by the end of July. The crews of both ships found themselves being broken up, some would stay in La Spezia while the damaged battleships travelled to Genoa further up the coast and still considered safe from Allied bombs. Others were sent to act as crews for Italy’s dreadnought battleships in Taranto.
The First World War-era ships lacked the mobility of their modern counterparts but they remained dangerous and at the very least would force the Allies to divide their own forces in dealing with them, distracting them from the real danger. Workers at the Genoa dry dock had their working days extended to hasten the repair of the more modern units with the entire workforce of the dry dock running night and day shifts. To assist in this Allied prisoners were marched into Genoa from Fossoli POW camp to “help repair the damage they had done.”
The workers and sailors at La Spezia were under similar orders to repair the damage to the shoreline for the return of the two Littorios. The entire base became shrouded in smoke during the day, in an attempt to prevent any more daylight raids from achieving the same accuracy. It was made clear that an invasion may be imminent and that Italy would need every ship it could get.
The need for urgency was not unfounded, a few days after American bombs had struck La Spezia, the Italian island of Pantelleria along with the rest of the Pelagie Islands surrendered. Pantelleria lay in the Strait of Sicily less than 50 miles from the island and had been under constant blockade and bombardment since the fall of Tunisia. The mountainous island’s caves provided an effective defence against the bombs and shells but the island lacked reliable access to fresh water and there was insufficient food for the island’s civilian population and naval garrison.
What Italy had failed to bring about in Malta was now being inflicted on Italians. Pantelleria’s small Carthiginian harbour was cut off by Allied air patrols during the day, leaving only a handful of supplies to get through by braving the naval blockade at night. Constant air attacks on the island’s communications, power plant and road network made distribution of these scant resources almost impossible. May became June and the daily air raids became hourly, civilians and soldiers alike were subjected to a subterranean existence of darkness, hunger and thirst, unable to sleep or rest from the constant barrage above.
Under these conditions demoralisation came easily. Much of the Italian garrison were natives of the island and had little interest in their home being turned into a battlefield with their families trapped in the middle. Supermarina had refused to evacuate civilians from the island and along with much of the garrison they now felt abandoned to face an Allied invasion they weren’t equipped for.
Fascist propaganda had boasted throughout the war that Pantelleria was a powerful fortress bristling with aircraft and guns. On the 8th of June the Italian people heard that the Allied bombardment had failed to break the defenders and that the island would be held to the last. Three days later Admiral Gino Pavesi, Pantelleria’s military commander, concluded the situation was untenable. Due to the smoke from the constant bombing Pavesi had been unaware of the Allied invasion fleet approaching the shore when he informed Supermarina of the need to avoid a bloodbath. A response was still being considered in Rome when the smoke cleared and British troops landed to the sight of numerous white flags.
The fall of Pantelleria served to further worsen the morale of the Italian public. Three days after having been assured it would hold on until the end the seemingly impregnable fortress had surrendered without the defenders firing a shot. Fascist propaganda excused the surrender as having been due to a lack of water on the island but many Italians began to wonder whether it was a harbinger of the sort of military collapse an Allied invasion of the mainland would bring. For most Italians who were already war weary it became a question of when the war did end whether it would mean chaos or salvation for Italy.
The loss of the island had a profound effect on the morale of the Regia Marina. Supermarina had hoped for a protracted defence of the island in order to buy time for the battle fleet to lick its wounds. Instead an Italian Admiral had gone rogue and surrendered the island without a fight. To his fellow officers this was a source of great embarrassment and Bergamini made a fiery speech to the assembled crews at La Spezia where he denounced Pavesi as a stain on the Regia Marina which they would wipe clean with their heroism.
To add insult to injury, 50 British Lancaster bombers struck Genoa at dusk less than a fortnight after Pavesi’s surrender, further damaging Roma and Vittorio Veneto. It was now estimated neither ship would be seaworthy in August. It was time the Regia Marina did not have although the extent of the damage was suppressed. Devoted as Supermarina was to making battle with the Allied fleets, reality gave way to honour.
To many sailors at La Spezia, shrouded in smoke much like their comrades in Pantelleria had been, it was easy to empathise with Pavesi. Here was a ‘traitor’ who had opted to spare the lives of his men and civilians rather than fight an unwinnable battle. Although conditions were nowhere near as bad on the base compared with the island, long hours of hard labour on shore installations and a lack of real daylight proved demoralising enough on their own.
Many wondered what their reaction might be when called upon to make their own pointless sacrifice.
---
Autarchia
On the 25th of June, with fires still burning in Genoa, Ambrosio and Mussolini received a visiting Japanese delegation. Mussolini had long held up the alliance with Japan with great optimism, their string of conquests and tenacity in defence of them being a great source of confidence for him even though their entry into the war had also forced Italy into war against the United States. However his guests provided little comfort on this occasion, stating candidly that Japanese raids into the Indian ocean would not be an option in 1943 nor would they be able to provide any of the strategic raw materials the Italians requested.
Moreover the Japanese were blunt about the Italian strategic situation, arguing that Italy must move to a total war economy and contribute more to the overall Axis war effort. Mussolini reassured the delegation that steps were already being taken to fully mobilise Italian strength to deal a decisive blow against the enemy.
The Anglo-Americans may have been successful in Africa but they had now trapped themselves strategically, being forced into attempting a landing in Europe. Surely, this would be a debacle as bloody as the American offensives in the Pacific? If the invasion came against Italian territory the Allied troops might land but the Regia Marina battle fleet would destroy their convoys before Italian troops emerged from the mountains to drive them back into the sea.
The United Kingdom showed signs of exhaustion and the people of the United States were losing faith in the war having been unprepared for the privations of rationing. A failed invasion of Europe would leave them at a strategic impasse and worsen morale even further, perhaps to the breaking point.
It’s hard to determine to what extent Mussolini believed this fantasy. To a certain extent he had to, as a victory against the Anglo-Americans was the only way he could hope to find a way out of the war which didn’t mean the end of his regime. The Japanese ambassador, Shinrokuro Hidaka, would state later that Mussolini at this time would often appear agitated and confused, slipping in and out of reality.
There was also perhaps a degree of projection in Mussolini’s claims about Allied morale, for the Italian people were long past exhaustion. In June meat was taken off of the ration with the remaining allotment providing less than a 1000 calories. Rations for industrial workers were slightly higher however they compensated little for the increased hours demanded by the attempts to replace the loss of armaments from the disasters of Stalingrad and Tunisia or Blackshirt efforts to root out Communists on the factory floor.
Street fights between factory workers and Blackshirts became a common sight in the streets of northern Italian cities and towns for the first time since the twenties. The pervasiveness of the black market and the criminal enterprises it emboldened added to a sense of looming chaos. Much of Italy’s urban population who had family in the countryside returned there for better food security and an escape from Allied bombing although the collapse of fertiliser production left farmers dreading a failed harvest. Famine beckoned.
For those workers still within northern cities the Allied attacks on the Italian rail network and its subsequent takeover for military traffic proved to be as effective as strikes in grinding production to a halt. Extended shifts were often spent sitting idle and hungry waiting for this or that to arrive and contemplating getting home without being jumped by Fascist paramilitaries.
Morale was also being raised as an issue within the National Fascist Party. The Party Secretary Carlo Scorza reported that roughly one in ten Italians were party members but warned that those numbers held “no absolute value if they do not represent spirit and will.” His predecessor in the role, Roberto Farinacci, lamented that the party was “absent and impotent.” Scorza attacked much of the party membership and leadership for being opportunists who had joined for personal gain with no belief in Fascism.
Scorza recommended revitalising the party by gutting its membership of these opportunists, leaving only the Old Fighters such as himself who had been present at the party’s inception and the young Blackshirts attempting to reassert the party’s authority in the streets. Mussolini gave tacit approval to these calls for a purge which in turn helped galvanise support for Grandi’s anti-Mussolini conspirators within the party.
The Communists were not so apprehensive about their membership. Since the initial success of the March strikes had ended in a bloody suppression the PCI had grown in strength and influence, particularly within the plants and dockyards which had participated in the March action. The demand then had been focused on a bonus for workers, next time it would be for the end of the war, the end of Fascism, and the end of hunger; Peace, Freedom and Bread.
By June the PCI had accumulated a stockpile of ammunition, small arms and explosives with a few hundred fighters who had some form of experience or training; however their real strength was invested in urban workers as a whole. The Easter Sunday action had failed because too many sympathetic to their causes had been fearful of Fascist retaliation and they had been vindicated by the subsequent massacres. If the Communists could cut off the Fascist head however the workers of northern Italy would come out in support. Preparations continued in anticipation for the instigating event, expected to be the coming collapse of food distribution.
Ambrosio at the same time continued to look for a way out of the war which kept something of the existing Italian Kingdom intact, with or without Mussolini. The fall of Pantelleria had left him shaken and although Mussolini had declared that if the Allied invaders wanted to occupy Italian soil they would have to do so in a vertical position, his Chief of Staff knew that conditions on Sicily were little better for the Italian defenders than they had been for Pavesi’s men.
Like Pantelleria, Sicily had been under constant aerial attack and blockade since May. The Axis air forces on the island had lost more than half of their strength attempting to maintain control of its skies and most of the remainder were forced to evacuate. Only a quarter for the necessary supplies the island required were getting through causing civilians to wander the countryside for miles in search of food despite fears of being strafed by roaming Spitfires. As the weeks went by much of civilian life carried on underground in crowded shelters; after the fall of Pantelleria the air raid sirens rang day and night.
General Alfredo Guzzoni arrived in Sicily at the start of June to take over command of armed forces on the island. Though he had never visited the island before he was quick to ascertain the dreadful state of morale, including amongst his own troops. Although Guzzoni insisted he was not above shooting soldiers who refused to fight, he complained of chronic shortages of ammunition, fuel and modern weaponry.
The patchwork organisation of Army, Navy, Fascist militia and Germans which made up the defenders of the island had been organised into a central Sicilian Armed Forces Command however most of the 200,000 Italian defenders consisted of coastal units; poorly trained older men and young boys drafted to defend their homes. Guzzoni’s plan of defence relied upon these units sacrificing themselves to hold off the Allied invasion long enough for his two motorised divisions to arrive and drive them back into the sea. The armour they were to do this with consisted entirely of obsolete French tanks.
Guzzoni estimated he could repel one Allied landing but would not be able to stop a second. Ambrosio attempted to bolster the defence of Sicily by concentrating the German forces already within Italy there. He went as far as to consider requesting as many German divisions as possible for the defence of the Italian mainland, undermining his bid for strategic independence, but was persuaded against this by the determination of the Regia Marina to make battle against any Allied landing and by the warnings of Giuseppe Castellano who pointed out that if Italy were to detach itself from the war it would be best that there were as few Germans as possible to kick out.
The Army conspiracy continued to lay the groundwork for removing Mussolini, with the reliably anti-German General Giacomo Carboni being placed in control of Italian forces around Rome. If the order came Carboni could take control of the capital and deter any Fascist or German response. Ambrosio dithered, wary of going against the King he had sworn to obey, who in turn remained confident that Mussolini was still the best man to clean up his own mess.
Ambrosio muddled on, working to manifest Mussolini’s fantasies whilst preparing for them to collide with reality. Like all of his opponents, systemic or otherwise, he prepared not only for the end of Mussolini but how Berlin would react.
Unlike the Japanese, Germany was an ally who was all too happy to lend a hand.
On the 25th of June, with fires still burning in Genoa, Ambrosio and Mussolini received a visiting Japanese delegation. Mussolini had long held up the alliance with Japan with great optimism, their string of conquests and tenacity in defence of them being a great source of confidence for him even though their entry into the war had also forced Italy into war against the United States. However his guests provided little comfort on this occasion, stating candidly that Japanese raids into the Indian ocean would not be an option in 1943 nor would they be able to provide any of the strategic raw materials the Italians requested.
Moreover the Japanese were blunt about the Italian strategic situation, arguing that Italy must move to a total war economy and contribute more to the overall Axis war effort. Mussolini reassured the delegation that steps were already being taken to fully mobilise Italian strength to deal a decisive blow against the enemy.
The Anglo-Americans may have been successful in Africa but they had now trapped themselves strategically, being forced into attempting a landing in Europe. Surely, this would be a debacle as bloody as the American offensives in the Pacific? If the invasion came against Italian territory the Allied troops might land but the Regia Marina battle fleet would destroy their convoys before Italian troops emerged from the mountains to drive them back into the sea.
The United Kingdom showed signs of exhaustion and the people of the United States were losing faith in the war having been unprepared for the privations of rationing. A failed invasion of Europe would leave them at a strategic impasse and worsen morale even further, perhaps to the breaking point.
It’s hard to determine to what extent Mussolini believed this fantasy. To a certain extent he had to, as a victory against the Anglo-Americans was the only way he could hope to find a way out of the war which didn’t mean the end of his regime. The Japanese ambassador, Shinrokuro Hidaka, would state later that Mussolini at this time would often appear agitated and confused, slipping in and out of reality.
There was also perhaps a degree of projection in Mussolini’s claims about Allied morale, for the Italian people were long past exhaustion. In June meat was taken off of the ration with the remaining allotment providing less than a 1000 calories. Rations for industrial workers were slightly higher however they compensated little for the increased hours demanded by the attempts to replace the loss of armaments from the disasters of Stalingrad and Tunisia or Blackshirt efforts to root out Communists on the factory floor.
Street fights between factory workers and Blackshirts became a common sight in the streets of northern Italian cities and towns for the first time since the twenties. The pervasiveness of the black market and the criminal enterprises it emboldened added to a sense of looming chaos. Much of Italy’s urban population who had family in the countryside returned there for better food security and an escape from Allied bombing although the collapse of fertiliser production left farmers dreading a failed harvest. Famine beckoned.
For those workers still within northern cities the Allied attacks on the Italian rail network and its subsequent takeover for military traffic proved to be as effective as strikes in grinding production to a halt. Extended shifts were often spent sitting idle and hungry waiting for this or that to arrive and contemplating getting home without being jumped by Fascist paramilitaries.
Morale was also being raised as an issue within the National Fascist Party. The Party Secretary Carlo Scorza reported that roughly one in ten Italians were party members but warned that those numbers held “no absolute value if they do not represent spirit and will.” His predecessor in the role, Roberto Farinacci, lamented that the party was “absent and impotent.” Scorza attacked much of the party membership and leadership for being opportunists who had joined for personal gain with no belief in Fascism.
Scorza recommended revitalising the party by gutting its membership of these opportunists, leaving only the Old Fighters such as himself who had been present at the party’s inception and the young Blackshirts attempting to reassert the party’s authority in the streets. Mussolini gave tacit approval to these calls for a purge which in turn helped galvanise support for Grandi’s anti-Mussolini conspirators within the party.
The Communists were not so apprehensive about their membership. Since the initial success of the March strikes had ended in a bloody suppression the PCI had grown in strength and influence, particularly within the plants and dockyards which had participated in the March action. The demand then had been focused on a bonus for workers, next time it would be for the end of the war, the end of Fascism, and the end of hunger; Peace, Freedom and Bread.
By June the PCI had accumulated a stockpile of ammunition, small arms and explosives with a few hundred fighters who had some form of experience or training; however their real strength was invested in urban workers as a whole. The Easter Sunday action had failed because too many sympathetic to their causes had been fearful of Fascist retaliation and they had been vindicated by the subsequent massacres. If the Communists could cut off the Fascist head however the workers of northern Italy would come out in support. Preparations continued in anticipation for the instigating event, expected to be the coming collapse of food distribution.
Ambrosio at the same time continued to look for a way out of the war which kept something of the existing Italian Kingdom intact, with or without Mussolini. The fall of Pantelleria had left him shaken and although Mussolini had declared that if the Allied invaders wanted to occupy Italian soil they would have to do so in a vertical position, his Chief of Staff knew that conditions on Sicily were little better for the Italian defenders than they had been for Pavesi’s men.
Like Pantelleria, Sicily had been under constant aerial attack and blockade since May. The Axis air forces on the island had lost more than half of their strength attempting to maintain control of its skies and most of the remainder were forced to evacuate. Only a quarter for the necessary supplies the island required were getting through causing civilians to wander the countryside for miles in search of food despite fears of being strafed by roaming Spitfires. As the weeks went by much of civilian life carried on underground in crowded shelters; after the fall of Pantelleria the air raid sirens rang day and night.
General Alfredo Guzzoni arrived in Sicily at the start of June to take over command of armed forces on the island. Though he had never visited the island before he was quick to ascertain the dreadful state of morale, including amongst his own troops. Although Guzzoni insisted he was not above shooting soldiers who refused to fight, he complained of chronic shortages of ammunition, fuel and modern weaponry.
The patchwork organisation of Army, Navy, Fascist militia and Germans which made up the defenders of the island had been organised into a central Sicilian Armed Forces Command however most of the 200,000 Italian defenders consisted of coastal units; poorly trained older men and young boys drafted to defend their homes. Guzzoni’s plan of defence relied upon these units sacrificing themselves to hold off the Allied invasion long enough for his two motorised divisions to arrive and drive them back into the sea. The armour they were to do this with consisted entirely of obsolete French tanks.
Guzzoni estimated he could repel one Allied landing but would not be able to stop a second. Ambrosio attempted to bolster the defence of Sicily by concentrating the German forces already within Italy there. He went as far as to consider requesting as many German divisions as possible for the defence of the Italian mainland, undermining his bid for strategic independence, but was persuaded against this by the determination of the Regia Marina to make battle against any Allied landing and by the warnings of Giuseppe Castellano who pointed out that if Italy were to detach itself from the war it would be best that there were as few Germans as possible to kick out.
The Army conspiracy continued to lay the groundwork for removing Mussolini, with the reliably anti-German General Giacomo Carboni being placed in control of Italian forces around Rome. If the order came Carboni could take control of the capital and deter any Fascist or German response. Ambrosio dithered, wary of going against the King he had sworn to obey, who in turn remained confident that Mussolini was still the best man to clean up his own mess.
Ambrosio muddled on, working to manifest Mussolini’s fantasies whilst preparing for them to collide with reality. Like all of his opponents, systemic or otherwise, he prepared not only for the end of Mussolini but how Berlin would react.
Unlike the Japanese, Germany was an ally who was all too happy to lend a hand.
---
Alaric
German doubts about the stability of their Italian ally had been festering even as the Fascist regime celebrated its twentieth year.
In November 1942, Reichsmarshall Hermann Goering who was second only to Hitler in the Nazi regime had made a visit to Rome. It was there where he had made a positive response to Mussolini’s proposals to end the war in the Soviet Union, encouraging the Italian dictator in turn to send his Foreign Secretary and the Chief of Staff to plead with Hitler. At the end of the visit Goering expressed grave doubts to Berlin about what might happen should Mussolini be incapacitated by illness.
Hitler had been distracted by the disaster unfolding at Stalingrad over the winter of 1942/43 but shortly after dismissing his Italian visitors he began to make plans for pursuing the war in the Mediterranean if Mussolini were to fall. The German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring had coordinated Wehrmacht activities in Italy since the end of 1941. At the beginning of 1943 Hitler had all German forces in the Mediterranean placed under Kesselring’s control. Just as Ambrosio and Mussolini sought to distance Italy from German influence, Hitler was detaching his troops from Comando Supremo. Kesselring would continue to defer to Italian command but Berlin now had a direct line to the theatre which bypassed Rome.
Kesselring had a high regard for Mussolini and, unlike Hitler, for the Italian people as a whole but he was aware of the sorry state of the Italian military and how vulnerable Italy was to potential Allied invasion. He had successfully lobbied Hitler to offer five divisions to assist in Italy’s defence only for Mussolini to reject the offer on Ambrosio’s advice. The Chief of Staff of Comando Supremo and his supposed German subordinate would continue to butt heads over the number and positioning of German forces in Italy throughout the Spring; Ambrosio only wanted weapons, Kesselring insisted on troops coming along with them. In Berlin paranoia grew about an impending Fascist collapse.
Ambrosio’s insistence on strategic independence, the wave of strikes, and the rumours of conspiracies against Mussolini convinced many within Hitler’s inner circle that the Italians; whether it be Ambrosio, the King or Mussolini himself, could not be trusted. Field Marshal Erwin Rommel argued that Germany should occupy the north of the country in order to protect German forces in the south against Italian duplicity. The industry and strategic location of the Po Valley were also seen as essential for the continuation of the German war effort.
Hitler remained unconvinced, he had been critical of Mussolini’s initial inaction against the March strike wave but was heartened when it culminated in brutal suppression by the Blackshirts. The report made by Admiral Doenitz of the high morale of the Regia Marina and how their untapped strength would be brought to bear against any enemy invasion gave him additional cause for optimism.
Furthermore Hitler remained fixated on the Eastern Front and the new weapons to be deployed there. After the situation in the Soviet Union stabilised in March Hitler had continued to ignore Mussolini’s requests to negotiate with Moscow, or at the very least remain on the defensive. On the contrary he had authorised a new offensive that would turn the odds back in Germany’s favour, one which he would remain committed to despite delays and occasional doubts as the new German heavy tanks waited to be unleashed.
With his mind occupied, Hitler found it gratifying to believe the assurances that the Italian situation was not as bad as some of his subordinates made it out to be. Hitler sent Rommel to Greece with an armoured division to prepare for an Allied invasion there and instructed Kesselring that more German troops were still available to the Italians but they would have to come from France rather than the Soviet Union.
The sudden Italian surrender on Pantelleria raised further German concerns about the reliability of their ally. The hope that Italian resistance would stiffen in defending their homeland now changed to a fear morale might collapse completely instead. The earlier proposals for an invasion of northern Italy in the event of an Italian collapse were now further developed, with an emphasis put on placing as many German troops within Italy as possible prior to the execution of the occupation. In the best case, from the German perspective, these units could be used to bolster Italian defences and stability within Italy and in the worst case it would minimise any Italian resistance to the occupation of their country.
Kesselring once again offered this ‘help’ to Ambrosio, sarcastically alerting the Italian Chief of Staff to the fact that time was running out for him to realise he needed German troops. An insulted Ambrosio replied that he had not come to such a conclusion, although later relented to Kesselring’s earlier requests that German forces already within Italy be concentrated in Sicily and the heel of the Italian boot. Ambrosio subsequently requested more German troops but only for Sardinia and under his command.
Kesselring, with Hitler’s blessing, responded by sending the reinforcements bound for Sardinia through the northern Italian railways to sail from Genoa. In transit German ‘liaisons’ were left behind at rail hubs in anticipation for further reinforcement of German troops, to better coordinate the arrival of Ambrosio’s requested weapons and, covertly, to take control of the railway lines should Mussolini’s regime collapse.
In Sicily the two reconstituted German armoured divisions arrived. They were ordered under Italian command although Kesselring’s headquarters had made sure that they would have a direct line of communication if Italian resistance were to falter. Although powerful on paper the German forces represented a shell of those units which had been destroyed in Tunisia, with less than a hundred tanks between them.
On the 5th of July, the same day as Hitler’s Summer offensive in the east finally began, Luftwaffe reconnaissance of Tunisian ports indicated a large number of hospital ships being amassed. Four days later, with German forces still struggling to achieve a breakthrough against powerful Soviet forces, further reports indicated five Allied invasion convoys headed towards Sicily. Kesselring never received the report, having died that same day in an Allied air raid.
That night whilst survivors raked through the wreckage of the San Domenico Hotel where Kesselring had made his headquarters, German forces on Sicily reported their first sightings of Allied paratroopers.
Operation Husky had begun.
---
German doubts about the stability of their Italian ally had been festering even as the Fascist regime celebrated its twentieth year.
In November 1942, Reichsmarshall Hermann Goering who was second only to Hitler in the Nazi regime had made a visit to Rome. It was there where he had made a positive response to Mussolini’s proposals to end the war in the Soviet Union, encouraging the Italian dictator in turn to send his Foreign Secretary and the Chief of Staff to plead with Hitler. At the end of the visit Goering expressed grave doubts to Berlin about what might happen should Mussolini be incapacitated by illness.
Hitler had been distracted by the disaster unfolding at Stalingrad over the winter of 1942/43 but shortly after dismissing his Italian visitors he began to make plans for pursuing the war in the Mediterranean if Mussolini were to fall. The German Field Marshal Albert Kesselring had coordinated Wehrmacht activities in Italy since the end of 1941. At the beginning of 1943 Hitler had all German forces in the Mediterranean placed under Kesselring’s control. Just as Ambrosio and Mussolini sought to distance Italy from German influence, Hitler was detaching his troops from Comando Supremo. Kesselring would continue to defer to Italian command but Berlin now had a direct line to the theatre which bypassed Rome.
Kesselring had a high regard for Mussolini and, unlike Hitler, for the Italian people as a whole but he was aware of the sorry state of the Italian military and how vulnerable Italy was to potential Allied invasion. He had successfully lobbied Hitler to offer five divisions to assist in Italy’s defence only for Mussolini to reject the offer on Ambrosio’s advice. The Chief of Staff of Comando Supremo and his supposed German subordinate would continue to butt heads over the number and positioning of German forces in Italy throughout the Spring; Ambrosio only wanted weapons, Kesselring insisted on troops coming along with them. In Berlin paranoia grew about an impending Fascist collapse.
Ambrosio’s insistence on strategic independence, the wave of strikes, and the rumours of conspiracies against Mussolini convinced many within Hitler’s inner circle that the Italians; whether it be Ambrosio, the King or Mussolini himself, could not be trusted. Field Marshal Erwin Rommel argued that Germany should occupy the north of the country in order to protect German forces in the south against Italian duplicity. The industry and strategic location of the Po Valley were also seen as essential for the continuation of the German war effort.
Hitler remained unconvinced, he had been critical of Mussolini’s initial inaction against the March strike wave but was heartened when it culminated in brutal suppression by the Blackshirts. The report made by Admiral Doenitz of the high morale of the Regia Marina and how their untapped strength would be brought to bear against any enemy invasion gave him additional cause for optimism.
Furthermore Hitler remained fixated on the Eastern Front and the new weapons to be deployed there. After the situation in the Soviet Union stabilised in March Hitler had continued to ignore Mussolini’s requests to negotiate with Moscow, or at the very least remain on the defensive. On the contrary he had authorised a new offensive that would turn the odds back in Germany’s favour, one which he would remain committed to despite delays and occasional doubts as the new German heavy tanks waited to be unleashed.
With his mind occupied, Hitler found it gratifying to believe the assurances that the Italian situation was not as bad as some of his subordinates made it out to be. Hitler sent Rommel to Greece with an armoured division to prepare for an Allied invasion there and instructed Kesselring that more German troops were still available to the Italians but they would have to come from France rather than the Soviet Union.
The sudden Italian surrender on Pantelleria raised further German concerns about the reliability of their ally. The hope that Italian resistance would stiffen in defending their homeland now changed to a fear morale might collapse completely instead. The earlier proposals for an invasion of northern Italy in the event of an Italian collapse were now further developed, with an emphasis put on placing as many German troops within Italy as possible prior to the execution of the occupation. In the best case, from the German perspective, these units could be used to bolster Italian defences and stability within Italy and in the worst case it would minimise any Italian resistance to the occupation of their country.
Kesselring once again offered this ‘help’ to Ambrosio, sarcastically alerting the Italian Chief of Staff to the fact that time was running out for him to realise he needed German troops. An insulted Ambrosio replied that he had not come to such a conclusion, although later relented to Kesselring’s earlier requests that German forces already within Italy be concentrated in Sicily and the heel of the Italian boot. Ambrosio subsequently requested more German troops but only for Sardinia and under his command.
Kesselring, with Hitler’s blessing, responded by sending the reinforcements bound for Sardinia through the northern Italian railways to sail from Genoa. In transit German ‘liaisons’ were left behind at rail hubs in anticipation for further reinforcement of German troops, to better coordinate the arrival of Ambrosio’s requested weapons and, covertly, to take control of the railway lines should Mussolini’s regime collapse.
In Sicily the two reconstituted German armoured divisions arrived. They were ordered under Italian command although Kesselring’s headquarters had made sure that they would have a direct line of communication if Italian resistance were to falter. Although powerful on paper the German forces represented a shell of those units which had been destroyed in Tunisia, with less than a hundred tanks between them.
On the 5th of July, the same day as Hitler’s Summer offensive in the east finally began, Luftwaffe reconnaissance of Tunisian ports indicated a large number of hospital ships being amassed. Four days later, with German forces still struggling to achieve a breakthrough against powerful Soviet forces, further reports indicated five Allied invasion convoys headed towards Sicily. Kesselring never received the report, having died that same day in an Allied air raid.
That night whilst survivors raked through the wreckage of the San Domenico Hotel where Kesselring had made his headquarters, German forces on Sicily reported their first sightings of Allied paratroopers.
Operation Husky had begun.
---
Husky
Operation Husky was for its time the largest amphibious invasion in history. More than 3200 ships were involved in the first Anglo-American landing on the European continent. It was hoped it would mark the end of Italy’s war and the beginning of the end for Nazi Germany.
The Allied invasion of Sicily began with a disastrously bungled airborne operation. A mix of high winds, inexperience and miscommunication led to more Allied paratroopers dying from drowning than from enemy fire. Scattered all over the southern coast of Sicily the airborne forces caused confusion but struggled to achieve a handful of their objectives.
The main Allied forces landed a few hours later in the early morning of the 10th of July. The American landings around Gela came ashore to minimal resistance whilst the British landing in the south-eastern corner of the island was virtually unopposed. Despite some isolated pockets of determined resistance, the Italian coastal divisions had evaporated.
By the morning the Americans had secured Gela and the British had advanced rapidly, seizing Noto inland and the port of Syracuse. Further north the port of Augusta had been abandoned in anticipation of the British arrival. Sicilian civilians found Italian soldiers appearing in their shelters asking for spare clothing. Blackshirts discarded their uniforms following rumours about Allied reprisals.
Upon hearing the reports of Allied paratroopers Guzzoni had alerted coastal commands to an imminent Allied landing and sent out a call for Axis troops and Sicilians to defend the island to the last. A breakdown in communications prevented him from learning of the extent of the Allied advance until the morning of the 11th. Both Mussolini and the King had returned to Rome the day before, where at night Admiral Sirianni phoned La Spezia.
Supermarina awaited confirmation of the airborne landings before informing Admiral Bergamini, instructing the commander of the Regia Marina battlefleet to stoke the boilers and sail for Sicily. Having failed to recover Roma and Vittorio Veneto from the damage of the air raids, the force amounted to one modern battleship, three cruisers and a dozen destroyers.
The Allied landings were covered by four battleships and two aircraft carriers, alongside dozens of cruisers and destroyers and thousands of aircraft flying from Africa, Malta, and Pantelleria. At Algiers, two more battleships, HMS Howe and King George V lay waiting to respond to any sightings of the Italian battle fleet.
The journey from La Spezia to the southern coast of Sicily would take roughly a day’s sailing. A few dozen aircraft were available to cover the battle fleet from Allied raids, while the older dreadnoughts would try to draw off Allied naval screening forces. The battle fleet would intercept the Allied invasion convoys whilst they disembarked and inflict as much damage as possible or they would die on their way to them. In either case, the battle fleet would go down defending the Fatherland.
Bergamini seemed to acknowledge that the latter option was more likely, according to an aide who overheard the conversation with Sirianni. “The plan is delusional but I will not falter,” he apparently told his superior. “I fear that we will never see one another again.” Allegedly these were his parting words before he left to address the sailors he would lead into battle.
Mussolini returned to Rome in high spirits. The Italian dictator had been saddened by the news of Kesselring’s death but everything was in place for the victory he needed to save his regime. Now the Italian homeland was under threat, the Italian people would rally behind his leadership.
Guzzoni initially had ordered Italian forces in the area of the British landing to drive them back into the sea. However, after hearing of the fall of Syracuse he ordered them north to check the British advance before it reached Messina, potentially cutting off all Axis forces on the island. In the early hours of the 11th of July he had been informed that the Regia Marina was not coming and that throwing back the invasion rested solely on Sicilian Armed Forces Command.
The German armour near Gela had been independently preparing to launch a counter-attack against the American beachhead but were now ordered east to push the British back leaving Italian forces in the area to deal with the Americans. The obsolete French tanks briefly caused havoc charging at the surprised American infantry before being wiped out by anti-tank fire. Italian infantry approaching Gela were massacred by their own coastal batteries which the Americans had captured intact.
The Germans retook Noto from the British only to then be routed by naval gunfire whilst attempting to advance on the beachhead. This had allowed the Italians time to successfully reoccupy Augusta but the opportunity to dislodge the Allies from Sicily had now gone. With the Allied beachheads having repelled the counterattacks and with the Axis forces involved now depleted, all that was left for Guzzoni to do was switch to the defensive until he could be reinforced.
General Hans Hube was ordered by Ambrosio to move his forces based around the Italian heel in Calabria to Messina where they could be made available to Guzzoni. Hube complied, having now also been made temporary commander of all German forces in southern Italy he was told by Berlin to defer to Ambrosio but to secure the straits of Messina in case of the need to quickly evacuate German forces from Sicily.
Both Hube and Guzzoni privately admitted by the 12th of July that the chances of holding Sicily were slim. Hundreds of Allied supply and transport ships remained congregated around the beacheads and with Axis counterattacks having burned out they unloaded greater numbers of men and material than anything Berlin or Rome could provide to defenders.
Had the Regia Marina battle fleet been able to get in amongst these convoys the Allied invasion might have been defeated by the Axis counterattacks. However the fleet was nowhere to be seen. German and Italian troops had been promised the Italian navy was only minutes away when preparing to counter-attack, now in retreat they felt abandoned.
In the fog of war, the soldiers on the ground remained unaware of the mutiny which had broken out at La Spezia the previous day.
---
Operation Husky was for its time the largest amphibious invasion in history. More than 3200 ships were involved in the first Anglo-American landing on the European continent. It was hoped it would mark the end of Italy’s war and the beginning of the end for Nazi Germany.
The Allied invasion of Sicily began with a disastrously bungled airborne operation. A mix of high winds, inexperience and miscommunication led to more Allied paratroopers dying from drowning than from enemy fire. Scattered all over the southern coast of Sicily the airborne forces caused confusion but struggled to achieve a handful of their objectives.
The main Allied forces landed a few hours later in the early morning of the 10th of July. The American landings around Gela came ashore to minimal resistance whilst the British landing in the south-eastern corner of the island was virtually unopposed. Despite some isolated pockets of determined resistance, the Italian coastal divisions had evaporated.
By the morning the Americans had secured Gela and the British had advanced rapidly, seizing Noto inland and the port of Syracuse. Further north the port of Augusta had been abandoned in anticipation of the British arrival. Sicilian civilians found Italian soldiers appearing in their shelters asking for spare clothing. Blackshirts discarded their uniforms following rumours about Allied reprisals.
Upon hearing the reports of Allied paratroopers Guzzoni had alerted coastal commands to an imminent Allied landing and sent out a call for Axis troops and Sicilians to defend the island to the last. A breakdown in communications prevented him from learning of the extent of the Allied advance until the morning of the 11th. Both Mussolini and the King had returned to Rome the day before, where at night Admiral Sirianni phoned La Spezia.
Supermarina awaited confirmation of the airborne landings before informing Admiral Bergamini, instructing the commander of the Regia Marina battlefleet to stoke the boilers and sail for Sicily. Having failed to recover Roma and Vittorio Veneto from the damage of the air raids, the force amounted to one modern battleship, three cruisers and a dozen destroyers.
The Allied landings were covered by four battleships and two aircraft carriers, alongside dozens of cruisers and destroyers and thousands of aircraft flying from Africa, Malta, and Pantelleria. At Algiers, two more battleships, HMS Howe and King George V lay waiting to respond to any sightings of the Italian battle fleet.
The journey from La Spezia to the southern coast of Sicily would take roughly a day’s sailing. A few dozen aircraft were available to cover the battle fleet from Allied raids, while the older dreadnoughts would try to draw off Allied naval screening forces. The battle fleet would intercept the Allied invasion convoys whilst they disembarked and inflict as much damage as possible or they would die on their way to them. In either case, the battle fleet would go down defending the Fatherland.
Bergamini seemed to acknowledge that the latter option was more likely, according to an aide who overheard the conversation with Sirianni. “The plan is delusional but I will not falter,” he apparently told his superior. “I fear that we will never see one another again.” Allegedly these were his parting words before he left to address the sailors he would lead into battle.
Mussolini returned to Rome in high spirits. The Italian dictator had been saddened by the news of Kesselring’s death but everything was in place for the victory he needed to save his regime. Now the Italian homeland was under threat, the Italian people would rally behind his leadership.
Guzzoni initially had ordered Italian forces in the area of the British landing to drive them back into the sea. However, after hearing of the fall of Syracuse he ordered them north to check the British advance before it reached Messina, potentially cutting off all Axis forces on the island. In the early hours of the 11th of July he had been informed that the Regia Marina was not coming and that throwing back the invasion rested solely on Sicilian Armed Forces Command.
The German armour near Gela had been independently preparing to launch a counter-attack against the American beachhead but were now ordered east to push the British back leaving Italian forces in the area to deal with the Americans. The obsolete French tanks briefly caused havoc charging at the surprised American infantry before being wiped out by anti-tank fire. Italian infantry approaching Gela were massacred by their own coastal batteries which the Americans had captured intact.
The Germans retook Noto from the British only to then be routed by naval gunfire whilst attempting to advance on the beachhead. This had allowed the Italians time to successfully reoccupy Augusta but the opportunity to dislodge the Allies from Sicily had now gone. With the Allied beachheads having repelled the counterattacks and with the Axis forces involved now depleted, all that was left for Guzzoni to do was switch to the defensive until he could be reinforced.
General Hans Hube was ordered by Ambrosio to move his forces based around the Italian heel in Calabria to Messina where they could be made available to Guzzoni. Hube complied, having now also been made temporary commander of all German forces in southern Italy he was told by Berlin to defer to Ambrosio but to secure the straits of Messina in case of the need to quickly evacuate German forces from Sicily.
Both Hube and Guzzoni privately admitted by the 12th of July that the chances of holding Sicily were slim. Hundreds of Allied supply and transport ships remained congregated around the beacheads and with Axis counterattacks having burned out they unloaded greater numbers of men and material than anything Berlin or Rome could provide to defenders.
Had the Regia Marina battle fleet been able to get in amongst these convoys the Allied invasion might have been defeated by the Axis counterattacks. However the fleet was nowhere to be seen. German and Italian troops had been promised the Italian navy was only minutes away when preparing to counter-attack, now in retreat they felt abandoned.
In the fog of war, the soldiers on the ground remained unaware of the mutiny which had broken out at La Spezia the previous day.
---
La Rivolta
The Regia Marina had always taken it as a point of pride that even in the early days of disorganisation following Italian unification they never had problems with fleet morale. Unlike the Germans at Kiel, the Russians at Odessa, or the British at Invergordon they had never faced a mutiny. As such the protests on the early morning of the 11th of July were a cause of great surprise to fleet officers whose main concerns with intervening in Sicily had been fuel and distance. Admiral Bergamini had been certain that he had instilled in his sailors the conviction to fight to the bitter end even if when the order finally came he seemed uncertain of it himself.
There are many factors to consider when mapping out the conditions which caused the mutiny; the two years of setbacks followed by a year of inaction, the late-stage imposition of an ardent Fascist in Admiral Sirianni as Naval Secretary being seen as an imposition by an increasingly unpopular regime, the mounting rumours that the battle fleet would be sacrificed to save said regime and the preparation to do so causing an inevitable intermingling between industrial workers and sailors at a time of increased Communist activity.
It was expected that the sailors would remain aloof from the Communist threat in much the same way as Naval officers had taken no part in the more systemic intrigues against Mussolini. The last weeks sailors spent at La Spezia prior to the mutiny had been full of alarm and disorganisation if the aftermath of Allied bombing; working long hours at night and shrouded in smoke during the day, decreased rations, Blackshirt intimidation and news from Pantelleria of an Admiral who when confronted with this own order to sacrifice his men and civilians had refused.
Bergamini meanwhile was often on shore. He had been forced to make the Littorio his temporary flagship but the remaining modern battleship was unable to accommodate his full staff. When the sailors of the battle fleet were ordered to assemble before him in the middle of the night they were faced by a man who had led them for only a few months and had spent little time amongst them. Now he was commanding them to die alongside him.
The Admiral’s own uncertainty on the night seemed to be reflected in his words which no longer instilled confidence. When he addressed the assembled sailors that the time had come to ready themselves for the final battle he was heckled. His decision to paraphrase Mussolini in saying that the fleet had lived as sheep for too long and that now was their day to live as lions was not the triumphant call to arms he had hoped it would be. Instead the name of Mussolini was booed which escalated into some sailors shouting that they did not want to die for Fascism.
The negative reaction caused shock, not only among the officers but amongst many sailors who were unhappy with their fate but resigned to it. Had the incident ended there it might have been dismissed as grumblings, the dissenting element could have been isolated and the battle fleet may still have met its intended fate; ploughing through the Allied invasion convoys in one last blaze of glory.
Instead, the Blackshirts who had assembled to observe what they expected to be a historic moment turned on the hecklers. As in other Italian cities and ports the Blackshirts had been a constant source of aggravation following the March strikes and at this moment their intimidation tactics reached an impasse. The sailors fought back.
The ensuing riot went on for hours, spreading out of the naval base and into the port where dock workers and Allied prisoners used as forced labour joined the sailors in suppressing first Blackshirts and other Fascist loyalists and then the troops brought in to take control of the situation. The men of the army and marines based within the port were not immune to being disaffected with their equipment in a state of disrepair. Upon discovering the extent of the insurrection many of their number deserted with some joining the mutineers.
Gunfire broke out across the port throughout the morning, leaving dozens dead and hundreds wounded. A hasty ceasefire arranged by Archbishop Giovanni Costantini restored an uneasy calm. In the aftermath of the chaos the mutineers and workers found themselves as the only force left standing within the port, their officers of the battle fleet held captive with Bergamini amongst them. Remaining Fascist loyalists and Army troops retreated into the mountains.
A port authority was quickly formed tasked with replacing the now-vacant Fascist structures whilst the sailors and workers formed their own councils around ships and factories. Radio transmissions from the base declared to the rest of Italy the mutineers' version of what had happened; they had been ordered to die for the glory of Mussolini and when they refused they had been threatened with violence so they had defended themselves. Subsequent broadcasts called for an end to the war and for the removal of Mussolini.
With full clarity given to the situation, officials in Rome reacted with horror. Confused rumours first came of an Allied air raid, then a potential Allied landing, then of a Communist insurrection had filtered through, gradually gaining equal importance to events playing out in Sicily. Mussolini, who had greeted news of the Allied invasion in high spirits with anticipation of his sought after victory was now thrown into another agitated turmoil. “The Royal Navy, constructed entirely during the twenty years of Fascism, has given itself up to the enemy.” He declared upon hearing the news.
The failure of the Army to contain the mutiny was another source of frustration, the remains of the outnumbered loyalist forces within the port having concluded during the ceasefire to retreat and secure the mountain passes outside of it until they could be reinforced. Mussolini denounced them as cowards and made it clear to Ambrosio that the Army would be considered responsible for the fiasco if it could not be resolved at once.
The Chief of Staff concurred, though he privately blamed the Navy for the mutiny and Mussolini for the Army's shattered state he was also aware that if the Army could not overcome a rebellion on Italian soil it had little hope of holding Italy together with or without Mussolini. Those tasked with the defence of Northwest Italy were the three divisions of the 16th Corps under the Italian 5th Army. The Corps headquarters had been based in La Spezia and though some staff had escaped the mutiny there was little organisation left to coordinate a response at the Corps level, leaving the divisions to communicate independently with Rome.
The 201st Coastal division was a largely static force composed of second rate units comparable to those who had failed to dig in against the Allied landings at Sicily. The 6th Alpine division was composed of elite troops but were also spread out across the Alps and unable to quickly respond. The task of suppressing the mutiny thus fell to the 5000 men of the partially motorised Rovigo division who were split between the west Ligurian coast and around Turin. Their commander, General Erminio Rovida, was phoned by Ambrosio directly on the 10th ordering him to move on La Spezia only for Rovida to reply that his troops were already engaged with the Communists in Turin and were marching to face those in Genoa.
It was the first confirmation to Comando Supremo that the La Spezia revolt had spread.
For the PCI, the instigating event had arrived.
---
The Regia Marina had always taken it as a point of pride that even in the early days of disorganisation following Italian unification they never had problems with fleet morale. Unlike the Germans at Kiel, the Russians at Odessa, or the British at Invergordon they had never faced a mutiny. As such the protests on the early morning of the 11th of July were a cause of great surprise to fleet officers whose main concerns with intervening in Sicily had been fuel and distance. Admiral Bergamini had been certain that he had instilled in his sailors the conviction to fight to the bitter end even if when the order finally came he seemed uncertain of it himself.
There are many factors to consider when mapping out the conditions which caused the mutiny; the two years of setbacks followed by a year of inaction, the late-stage imposition of an ardent Fascist in Admiral Sirianni as Naval Secretary being seen as an imposition by an increasingly unpopular regime, the mounting rumours that the battle fleet would be sacrificed to save said regime and the preparation to do so causing an inevitable intermingling between industrial workers and sailors at a time of increased Communist activity.
It was expected that the sailors would remain aloof from the Communist threat in much the same way as Naval officers had taken no part in the more systemic intrigues against Mussolini. The last weeks sailors spent at La Spezia prior to the mutiny had been full of alarm and disorganisation if the aftermath of Allied bombing; working long hours at night and shrouded in smoke during the day, decreased rations, Blackshirt intimidation and news from Pantelleria of an Admiral who when confronted with this own order to sacrifice his men and civilians had refused.
Bergamini meanwhile was often on shore. He had been forced to make the Littorio his temporary flagship but the remaining modern battleship was unable to accommodate his full staff. When the sailors of the battle fleet were ordered to assemble before him in the middle of the night they were faced by a man who had led them for only a few months and had spent little time amongst them. Now he was commanding them to die alongside him.
The Admiral’s own uncertainty on the night seemed to be reflected in his words which no longer instilled confidence. When he addressed the assembled sailors that the time had come to ready themselves for the final battle he was heckled. His decision to paraphrase Mussolini in saying that the fleet had lived as sheep for too long and that now was their day to live as lions was not the triumphant call to arms he had hoped it would be. Instead the name of Mussolini was booed which escalated into some sailors shouting that they did not want to die for Fascism.
The negative reaction caused shock, not only among the officers but amongst many sailors who were unhappy with their fate but resigned to it. Had the incident ended there it might have been dismissed as grumblings, the dissenting element could have been isolated and the battle fleet may still have met its intended fate; ploughing through the Allied invasion convoys in one last blaze of glory.
Instead, the Blackshirts who had assembled to observe what they expected to be a historic moment turned on the hecklers. As in other Italian cities and ports the Blackshirts had been a constant source of aggravation following the March strikes and at this moment their intimidation tactics reached an impasse. The sailors fought back.
The ensuing riot went on for hours, spreading out of the naval base and into the port where dock workers and Allied prisoners used as forced labour joined the sailors in suppressing first Blackshirts and other Fascist loyalists and then the troops brought in to take control of the situation. The men of the army and marines based within the port were not immune to being disaffected with their equipment in a state of disrepair. Upon discovering the extent of the insurrection many of their number deserted with some joining the mutineers.
Gunfire broke out across the port throughout the morning, leaving dozens dead and hundreds wounded. A hasty ceasefire arranged by Archbishop Giovanni Costantini restored an uneasy calm. In the aftermath of the chaos the mutineers and workers found themselves as the only force left standing within the port, their officers of the battle fleet held captive with Bergamini amongst them. Remaining Fascist loyalists and Army troops retreated into the mountains.
A port authority was quickly formed tasked with replacing the now-vacant Fascist structures whilst the sailors and workers formed their own councils around ships and factories. Radio transmissions from the base declared to the rest of Italy the mutineers' version of what had happened; they had been ordered to die for the glory of Mussolini and when they refused they had been threatened with violence so they had defended themselves. Subsequent broadcasts called for an end to the war and for the removal of Mussolini.
With full clarity given to the situation, officials in Rome reacted with horror. Confused rumours first came of an Allied air raid, then a potential Allied landing, then of a Communist insurrection had filtered through, gradually gaining equal importance to events playing out in Sicily. Mussolini, who had greeted news of the Allied invasion in high spirits with anticipation of his sought after victory was now thrown into another agitated turmoil. “The Royal Navy, constructed entirely during the twenty years of Fascism, has given itself up to the enemy.” He declared upon hearing the news.
The failure of the Army to contain the mutiny was another source of frustration, the remains of the outnumbered loyalist forces within the port having concluded during the ceasefire to retreat and secure the mountain passes outside of it until they could be reinforced. Mussolini denounced them as cowards and made it clear to Ambrosio that the Army would be considered responsible for the fiasco if it could not be resolved at once.
The Chief of Staff concurred, though he privately blamed the Navy for the mutiny and Mussolini for the Army's shattered state he was also aware that if the Army could not overcome a rebellion on Italian soil it had little hope of holding Italy together with or without Mussolini. Those tasked with the defence of Northwest Italy were the three divisions of the 16th Corps under the Italian 5th Army. The Corps headquarters had been based in La Spezia and though some staff had escaped the mutiny there was little organisation left to coordinate a response at the Corps level, leaving the divisions to communicate independently with Rome.
The 201st Coastal division was a largely static force composed of second rate units comparable to those who had failed to dig in against the Allied landings at Sicily. The 6th Alpine division was composed of elite troops but were also spread out across the Alps and unable to quickly respond. The task of suppressing the mutiny thus fell to the 5000 men of the partially motorised Rovigo division who were split between the west Ligurian coast and around Turin. Their commander, General Erminio Rovida, was phoned by Ambrosio directly on the 10th ordering him to move on La Spezia only for Rovida to reply that his troops were already engaged with the Communists in Turin and were marching to face those in Genoa.
It was the first confirmation to Comando Supremo that the La Spezia revolt had spread.
For the PCI, the instigating event had arrived.
---
Avanti!
The mutiny at La Spezia came as much of a surprise to the Central Committee of the PCI in Milan as it did to the Fascists in Rome. PCI agents within the port had sent messages via courier throughout the night though it was not until news of the ceasefire that it became clear a decision had to be made.
The Committee had already been in session due to the news coming through of an Allied landing in Sicily, though the general consensus had been to wait until the success of the invasion could be confirmed before committing to any action. If the invasion were to fail then Mussolini would have a great propaganda victory and their strategy would need to be reconsidered.
They were now faced with a wonderful surprise but also one which came with a challenge. The PCI leadership had anticipated that Mussolini’s regime could not survive a successful Allied invasion but were working on the assumption that the collapse wouldn’t begin immediately. They had hoped for more time to prepare.
Furthermore the mutiny wasn’t their doing and was out of their control. Although Communist agitation and propaganda had played a role it was impossible to know the minds of those leading the sailors, would they rally to support a Communist-led revolution or would such an event push them back into the Fascist fold? Perhaps they had simply refused a suicidal order but would remain loyal to the King even if not Mussolini?
The debate in the Central Committee was rushed somewhat by the rapid onset of events. It was clear that the Fascists would be reactive to the mutiny and making their own plans, if the option to strike was preferable then time was of the essence. Even if Fascism was to collapse without their help then it was likely the Germans would invade which would mean the opportunity for an uprising would be lost entirely. By late morning a decision had been reached to begin the overthrow of Fascism. The final voting tally has remained a matter of some dispute in Marxist circles. There was no time to inform their more moderate allies in the Italian Socialist Party and the Party of Action whose respective leaderships would largely remain bystanders in the following days.
The Communist strategy revolved around the so-called “industrial triangle” formed by the cities of Genoa, Milan, and Turin where Italian manufacturing was heavily concentrated and a large urban proletariat had developed. The industrial triangle was key to the Italian economy and represented the strongest base of existing or potential Communist support. If the PCI could bring about an uprising around the three cities it would force an end to what was left of the Fascist war effort. With a solid base of support and industry, success in the triangle would act as a springboard for spreading the revolution throughout Italy.
Decapitation strikes against Fascist, military and police targets would mark the first stage of the revolution, followed by the seizure of arms depots, communications and transport infrastructure. This would enable the urban workers to be alerted to what was going on and allow them to join it in full force. The breakdown in communications as to what was actually unfolding in La Spezia worked to the benefit of the PCI whose small teams of armed revolutionaries sped around on motorcycles eliminating their assigned targets.
The workers of the three cities who, since Easter, had become increasingly used to violence borne of intimidation or desperation this most recent escalation of bombs being thrown into police stations and Blackshirts being gunned down in broad daylight wasn’t the great shock it might have appeared to outside observers. Nonetheless it did garner attention when the incoming bulletins of the Allied landing in Sicily coming from Rome were replaced by the voice of Umberto Massola declaring that the Italian proletariat had seized control of Milan in the name of peace.
In Milan the military garrison was composed of the shattered Cosseria division, which was being reconstituted following its destruction on the Eastern Front, and the recently drafted Territorial Militia of old men and young boys. The Communist attack on the barracks achieved rapid success against the less than 200 veterans in no mood for further bloodshed after their exhaustive thousand mile retreat. Most of the militia simply stayed home, unwilling or unable to be mobilised due to the Communist attack on Milanese Territorial Defence Command.
With the barracks secure, the PCI distributed rifles and ammunition to supporters who went on to seize the Milanese train and transport depots along with several key buildings in the city centre. By the evening of the 10th the printing presses of the Fascist newspaper, Il Popolo d'Italia, had been turned to printing leaflets dispatched by buses across the city encouraging workers to join the uprising and to bring tyrants and expropriators to justice. As in La Spezia workers councils were formed in the factories and black marketeers and fascists were seized and placed in front of rudimentary People’s Courts.
The mood throughout Milan was fraught but often joyous. People celebrated the end of the war and whilst not all welcomed the vision of the future the PCI promised to usher in, few were sorry to see the end of Fascism. Hoarded stocks of food and wine reclaimed from the large estates and criminal gangs were supposed to go to central depots but instead often ended up being distributed to street revellers during the night. The end of bombing and privation deserved a party after all.
Elsewhere there was little to celebrate. In Genoa the decapitation strikes achieved a similar level of surprise and the small Port Defence Command was overwhelmed having not anticipated defending against inland attacks. Many within the second-rate regiment were local dockworkers who were happy to join the PCI. Though poorly armed their training would come in useful very quickly as troops of the Rovigo division entered the port whilst the Communists were still trying to secure it. Bloody urban fighting broke out with many sympathetic to the revolutionaries running to find cover.
In Turin the attempts to overwhelm the Rovigo units within the city failed and the Communists found themselves pinned down in a handful of buildings. The military commander of Turin, General Enrico Rossi, had been called out of retirement and hadn’t been in the role for a week but was a virulent anticommunist and ordered the Rovigo division’s artillery into the city centre to demolish the Communist holdouts before unleashing a brutal crackdown on the workers of the city.
Having ordered a city wide curfew, Communists and others suspected of dissent were dragged from their homes when found by Blackshirts and Carabinieri to be placed in front of Extraordinary Military Tribunals organised by Rossi where capital punishment was quickly sentenced and delivered.
By the night of the 10th whilst parties were underway in the streets and squares of Milan the mood within the PCI Central Committee was tense. The uprising had only been a partial success with comrades in Genoa reporting that they were running out of ammunition and Turin having gone quiet since the afternoon. Their new task was to form and arm a workers militia to hold Milan. It was unlikely this could be used as an offensive force for some time but it could be used to consolidate their gains and wait for further cracks in the Fascist regime to emerge.
Communication had been established with La Spezia via radio but the sailors refused to place themselves under Communist leadership and were unprepared to relieve Genoa even though many of their comrades there had joined the uprising. The Communists had promised peace, there was little appetite for a civil war.
In many ways the Communist strategy had failed but due to breakdowns in communication and transport this was not readily apparent to those in Rome. All that was clear was that Italy’s fleet had fallen to an uprising and that the majority of her armaments industry might soon follow. Whilst Mussolini awaited the outcome of Axis counterattacks in Sicily, those dissenting elements within his regime faced their own moment of decision.
---
The mutiny at La Spezia came as much of a surprise to the Central Committee of the PCI in Milan as it did to the Fascists in Rome. PCI agents within the port had sent messages via courier throughout the night though it was not until news of the ceasefire that it became clear a decision had to be made.
The Committee had already been in session due to the news coming through of an Allied landing in Sicily, though the general consensus had been to wait until the success of the invasion could be confirmed before committing to any action. If the invasion were to fail then Mussolini would have a great propaganda victory and their strategy would need to be reconsidered.
They were now faced with a wonderful surprise but also one which came with a challenge. The PCI leadership had anticipated that Mussolini’s regime could not survive a successful Allied invasion but were working on the assumption that the collapse wouldn’t begin immediately. They had hoped for more time to prepare.
Furthermore the mutiny wasn’t their doing and was out of their control. Although Communist agitation and propaganda had played a role it was impossible to know the minds of those leading the sailors, would they rally to support a Communist-led revolution or would such an event push them back into the Fascist fold? Perhaps they had simply refused a suicidal order but would remain loyal to the King even if not Mussolini?
The debate in the Central Committee was rushed somewhat by the rapid onset of events. It was clear that the Fascists would be reactive to the mutiny and making their own plans, if the option to strike was preferable then time was of the essence. Even if Fascism was to collapse without their help then it was likely the Germans would invade which would mean the opportunity for an uprising would be lost entirely. By late morning a decision had been reached to begin the overthrow of Fascism. The final voting tally has remained a matter of some dispute in Marxist circles. There was no time to inform their more moderate allies in the Italian Socialist Party and the Party of Action whose respective leaderships would largely remain bystanders in the following days.
The Communist strategy revolved around the so-called “industrial triangle” formed by the cities of Genoa, Milan, and Turin where Italian manufacturing was heavily concentrated and a large urban proletariat had developed. The industrial triangle was key to the Italian economy and represented the strongest base of existing or potential Communist support. If the PCI could bring about an uprising around the three cities it would force an end to what was left of the Fascist war effort. With a solid base of support and industry, success in the triangle would act as a springboard for spreading the revolution throughout Italy.
Decapitation strikes against Fascist, military and police targets would mark the first stage of the revolution, followed by the seizure of arms depots, communications and transport infrastructure. This would enable the urban workers to be alerted to what was going on and allow them to join it in full force. The breakdown in communications as to what was actually unfolding in La Spezia worked to the benefit of the PCI whose small teams of armed revolutionaries sped around on motorcycles eliminating their assigned targets.
The workers of the three cities who, since Easter, had become increasingly used to violence borne of intimidation or desperation this most recent escalation of bombs being thrown into police stations and Blackshirts being gunned down in broad daylight wasn’t the great shock it might have appeared to outside observers. Nonetheless it did garner attention when the incoming bulletins of the Allied landing in Sicily coming from Rome were replaced by the voice of Umberto Massola declaring that the Italian proletariat had seized control of Milan in the name of peace.
In Milan the military garrison was composed of the shattered Cosseria division, which was being reconstituted following its destruction on the Eastern Front, and the recently drafted Territorial Militia of old men and young boys. The Communist attack on the barracks achieved rapid success against the less than 200 veterans in no mood for further bloodshed after their exhaustive thousand mile retreat. Most of the militia simply stayed home, unwilling or unable to be mobilised due to the Communist attack on Milanese Territorial Defence Command.
With the barracks secure, the PCI distributed rifles and ammunition to supporters who went on to seize the Milanese train and transport depots along with several key buildings in the city centre. By the evening of the 10th the printing presses of the Fascist newspaper, Il Popolo d'Italia, had been turned to printing leaflets dispatched by buses across the city encouraging workers to join the uprising and to bring tyrants and expropriators to justice. As in La Spezia workers councils were formed in the factories and black marketeers and fascists were seized and placed in front of rudimentary People’s Courts.
The mood throughout Milan was fraught but often joyous. People celebrated the end of the war and whilst not all welcomed the vision of the future the PCI promised to usher in, few were sorry to see the end of Fascism. Hoarded stocks of food and wine reclaimed from the large estates and criminal gangs were supposed to go to central depots but instead often ended up being distributed to street revellers during the night. The end of bombing and privation deserved a party after all.
Elsewhere there was little to celebrate. In Genoa the decapitation strikes achieved a similar level of surprise and the small Port Defence Command was overwhelmed having not anticipated defending against inland attacks. Many within the second-rate regiment were local dockworkers who were happy to join the PCI. Though poorly armed their training would come in useful very quickly as troops of the Rovigo division entered the port whilst the Communists were still trying to secure it. Bloody urban fighting broke out with many sympathetic to the revolutionaries running to find cover.
In Turin the attempts to overwhelm the Rovigo units within the city failed and the Communists found themselves pinned down in a handful of buildings. The military commander of Turin, General Enrico Rossi, had been called out of retirement and hadn’t been in the role for a week but was a virulent anticommunist and ordered the Rovigo division’s artillery into the city centre to demolish the Communist holdouts before unleashing a brutal crackdown on the workers of the city.
Having ordered a city wide curfew, Communists and others suspected of dissent were dragged from their homes when found by Blackshirts and Carabinieri to be placed in front of Extraordinary Military Tribunals organised by Rossi where capital punishment was quickly sentenced and delivered.
By the night of the 10th whilst parties were underway in the streets and squares of Milan the mood within the PCI Central Committee was tense. The uprising had only been a partial success with comrades in Genoa reporting that they were running out of ammunition and Turin having gone quiet since the afternoon. Their new task was to form and arm a workers militia to hold Milan. It was unlikely this could be used as an offensive force for some time but it could be used to consolidate their gains and wait for further cracks in the Fascist regime to emerge.
Communication had been established with La Spezia via radio but the sailors refused to place themselves under Communist leadership and were unprepared to relieve Genoa even though many of their comrades there had joined the uprising. The Communists had promised peace, there was little appetite for a civil war.
In many ways the Communist strategy had failed but due to breakdowns in communication and transport this was not readily apparent to those in Rome. All that was clear was that Italy’s fleet had fallen to an uprising and that the majority of her armaments industry might soon follow. Whilst Mussolini awaited the outcome of Axis counterattacks in Sicily, those dissenting elements within his regime faced their own moment of decision.
---
July Days
While chaos reigned in Northwest Italy confusion and mistrust began to mount in Rome.
To the Italian people on the street going to work or to queue for rations on Saturday the 10th of July, loudspeakers announced that the enemy had landed in Southern Sicily and Italian forces were engaged in heavy fighting on the coast. No mention was given to events in the north although later that day it was stated that criminal bandits were attempting to disrupt the Italian war effort on orders from Moscow and that was why Milan radio was spouting Bolshevik propaganda.
Rumours circulated like wildfire as most realised they were being left in the dark of what was truly going on. Those who listened to the broadcasts coming from La Spezia and Milan got contradictory pieces of the puzzle, whilst Allied broadcasts appeared to have as little information as their listeners.
That section of the Italian population who maintained some faith in the Fascist regime looked to the balcony of the Palazzo Venezia where historically Mussolini would have emerged with some pronouncement, truthful or otherwise. So far there was only silence, other than the barked orders to stand back from the Duce’s residence by the increasingly nervous Blackshirts and Carabinieri who had been tasked with securing the building.
From inside Mussolini had been holding emergency meetings with his Chief of Staff and other senior officers of Comando Supremo, trying to make sense of the ongoing invasion of Sicily and the uprising in the Northwest. Though the Italian people were being kept in the dark by the Fascist regime, its leaders were not much more enlightened due to the breakdown of communications.
Mussolini’s phone call with General Rovida confirmed that the mutiny had spread to Genoa leaving the panicked Fascist and Military leadership attempting to discern the extent of the revolt they were facing. Contact was made with General Rossi in Turin who boasted he was back in control of the city but confirmed reports that Milan had fallen to Communist insurgents. The news that the PCI had been contained was not much relief when coupled with the fact that Italy’s second largest city was under their control.
The lack of clarity also left Comando Supremo to assume that the sailors at La Spezia were connected to the Communists in Milan, creating the spectre of a revolutionary conspiracy within the Regia Marina. The news that evening from Sicily that the Navy had abandoned Augusta without a fight in anticipation of British arrival worsened the suspicion. Sailors at Taranto who had been ordered to prepare to launch a diversionary sortie against the Allied invasion fleet were successfully confined to their ships quarters.
Mussolini’s despair at the mutiny turned to increasing paranoia as the news from Sicily made clear the extent of the British advance, he dismissed the Regia Marina officers present. He now turned to the Army for relief from the unfolding disasters, heartened that counter attacks had already taken place in Genoa and were underway in Sicily. Whilst awaiting the outcome of the fight in Sicily he tasked Marshal Ambrosio with finding more forces to be sent to suppress the Communists in the north.
Ambrosio responded that the Italian Army had exhausted its resources, the units left in the north who weren’t already committed were either too inexperienced or undergoing rebuilding. The only forces of any value nearby where the Alpine units dispersed along the border, it would take some time to organise them into an offensive force.The only motorised force available to Italy were those guarding Rome and moving them would leave the capital helplessly exposed to an enemy landing.
What the Army needed to do, Ambrosio insisted, was defeat the foreign enemy. The extent of the Allied advance was still unclear but if they could drive the invaders back into the sea then Italy might still gain an honourable peace. The challenge in the north was political rather than a military one and it required a political solution. The Communists would be overcome by the stronger political consciousness of the National Fascist Party.
Rather than send the Army north, he argued that Mussolini was best placed to assemble the Blackshirt militia across Italy to march on Milan and crush the Communists as they had twenty years beforehand. The nexus of this could be the Blackshirts training with German tanks whom Mussolini had been inspecting prior to the news of the Allied invasion. To best coordinate this Ambrosio suggested holding a meeting of the Fascist Grand Council, the state organ best placed to reorganise the Fascist state for a renewed political struggle.
The Grand Council of Fascism held wide ranging powers over Italian society but had not convened since Italian entry into the war. Mussolini’s efforts towards rejuvenation at the beginning of the year had promoted calls for the Italian dictator to reconvene it in order to address Italy’s economic and strategic woes.
It was the Grand Council that Carlo Scorza had hoped to utilise in order to bring about the purge of the party ranks he had called for, whilst his predecessor as Party Secretary, Roberto Farinacci wanted to go further and use it sideline the King whom it was rumoured anti-Fascist plots were coalescing around. It was also called for by the group around Dino Grandi and Galeazzo Ciano, who intended to use it to sideline Mussolini instead.
It was this latter group which motivated Ambrosio to recommend convening the Grand Council to Mussolini. It was clear to the Marshal that the disintegration of Italian society he had feared was now becoming reality and via the head of the Army conspiracy, Giuseppe Castellano, he communicated to Ciano that he was prepared to seize control of Rome and depose Mussolini. It was for this same reason he had sought to keep his best remaining troops near the capital whilst being willing to send the Blackshirts north. He considered it vital the Alpine units to be kept where they were in anticipation of a German response.
What was needed were grounds with which to give a legal bearing to the coup, which Ciano had recommended the Grand Council could provide. Ambrosio agreed, whilst warning the Fascist conspirators that they would be held responsible if the Grand Council failed to deliver.
An informal meeting between Mussolini and other Fascist leaders confirmed the need for the Grand Council to be convened, though divided there was a universal agreement amongst the Consuls that clarification and decision were needed. Thus the Grand Council was called to meet for the night of the 12th,
Mussolini had made it a rule that the lights of the Palazzo Venezia should always be on at night in order to give the Italian people the impression their leader worked tirelessly. On the night of the 12th the people of Rome, exhausted, weary and hungry, looked to their dictator’s residence with more anticipation than ever before.
---
While chaos reigned in Northwest Italy confusion and mistrust began to mount in Rome.
To the Italian people on the street going to work or to queue for rations on Saturday the 10th of July, loudspeakers announced that the enemy had landed in Southern Sicily and Italian forces were engaged in heavy fighting on the coast. No mention was given to events in the north although later that day it was stated that criminal bandits were attempting to disrupt the Italian war effort on orders from Moscow and that was why Milan radio was spouting Bolshevik propaganda.
Rumours circulated like wildfire as most realised they were being left in the dark of what was truly going on. Those who listened to the broadcasts coming from La Spezia and Milan got contradictory pieces of the puzzle, whilst Allied broadcasts appeared to have as little information as their listeners.
That section of the Italian population who maintained some faith in the Fascist regime looked to the balcony of the Palazzo Venezia where historically Mussolini would have emerged with some pronouncement, truthful or otherwise. So far there was only silence, other than the barked orders to stand back from the Duce’s residence by the increasingly nervous Blackshirts and Carabinieri who had been tasked with securing the building.
From inside Mussolini had been holding emergency meetings with his Chief of Staff and other senior officers of Comando Supremo, trying to make sense of the ongoing invasion of Sicily and the uprising in the Northwest. Though the Italian people were being kept in the dark by the Fascist regime, its leaders were not much more enlightened due to the breakdown of communications.
Mussolini’s phone call with General Rovida confirmed that the mutiny had spread to Genoa leaving the panicked Fascist and Military leadership attempting to discern the extent of the revolt they were facing. Contact was made with General Rossi in Turin who boasted he was back in control of the city but confirmed reports that Milan had fallen to Communist insurgents. The news that the PCI had been contained was not much relief when coupled with the fact that Italy’s second largest city was under their control.
The lack of clarity also left Comando Supremo to assume that the sailors at La Spezia were connected to the Communists in Milan, creating the spectre of a revolutionary conspiracy within the Regia Marina. The news that evening from Sicily that the Navy had abandoned Augusta without a fight in anticipation of British arrival worsened the suspicion. Sailors at Taranto who had been ordered to prepare to launch a diversionary sortie against the Allied invasion fleet were successfully confined to their ships quarters.
Mussolini’s despair at the mutiny turned to increasing paranoia as the news from Sicily made clear the extent of the British advance, he dismissed the Regia Marina officers present. He now turned to the Army for relief from the unfolding disasters, heartened that counter attacks had already taken place in Genoa and were underway in Sicily. Whilst awaiting the outcome of the fight in Sicily he tasked Marshal Ambrosio with finding more forces to be sent to suppress the Communists in the north.
Ambrosio responded that the Italian Army had exhausted its resources, the units left in the north who weren’t already committed were either too inexperienced or undergoing rebuilding. The only forces of any value nearby where the Alpine units dispersed along the border, it would take some time to organise them into an offensive force.The only motorised force available to Italy were those guarding Rome and moving them would leave the capital helplessly exposed to an enemy landing.
What the Army needed to do, Ambrosio insisted, was defeat the foreign enemy. The extent of the Allied advance was still unclear but if they could drive the invaders back into the sea then Italy might still gain an honourable peace. The challenge in the north was political rather than a military one and it required a political solution. The Communists would be overcome by the stronger political consciousness of the National Fascist Party.
Rather than send the Army north, he argued that Mussolini was best placed to assemble the Blackshirt militia across Italy to march on Milan and crush the Communists as they had twenty years beforehand. The nexus of this could be the Blackshirts training with German tanks whom Mussolini had been inspecting prior to the news of the Allied invasion. To best coordinate this Ambrosio suggested holding a meeting of the Fascist Grand Council, the state organ best placed to reorganise the Fascist state for a renewed political struggle.
The Grand Council of Fascism held wide ranging powers over Italian society but had not convened since Italian entry into the war. Mussolini’s efforts towards rejuvenation at the beginning of the year had promoted calls for the Italian dictator to reconvene it in order to address Italy’s economic and strategic woes.
It was the Grand Council that Carlo Scorza had hoped to utilise in order to bring about the purge of the party ranks he had called for, whilst his predecessor as Party Secretary, Roberto Farinacci wanted to go further and use it sideline the King whom it was rumoured anti-Fascist plots were coalescing around. It was also called for by the group around Dino Grandi and Galeazzo Ciano, who intended to use it to sideline Mussolini instead.
It was this latter group which motivated Ambrosio to recommend convening the Grand Council to Mussolini. It was clear to the Marshal that the disintegration of Italian society he had feared was now becoming reality and via the head of the Army conspiracy, Giuseppe Castellano, he communicated to Ciano that he was prepared to seize control of Rome and depose Mussolini. It was for this same reason he had sought to keep his best remaining troops near the capital whilst being willing to send the Blackshirts north. He considered it vital the Alpine units to be kept where they were in anticipation of a German response.
What was needed were grounds with which to give a legal bearing to the coup, which Ciano had recommended the Grand Council could provide. Ambrosio agreed, whilst warning the Fascist conspirators that they would be held responsible if the Grand Council failed to deliver.
An informal meeting between Mussolini and other Fascist leaders confirmed the need for the Grand Council to be convened, though divided there was a universal agreement amongst the Consuls that clarification and decision were needed. Thus the Grand Council was called to meet for the night of the 12th,
Mussolini had made it a rule that the lights of the Palazzo Venezia should always be on at night in order to give the Italian people the impression their leader worked tirelessly. On the night of the 12th the people of Rome, exhausted, weary and hungry, looked to their dictator’s residence with more anticipation than ever before.
---
Women don’t love us anymore
The meeting of the Grand Council had been agreed to by Mussolini on the basis of coordinating the Fascist response to the revolutionary threat. The question of peace of war loomed large but was not considered to be the subject of the meeting. The question of the continuity of the Fascist regime had not entered the Duce’s mind.
It’s possible that this case of tunnel vision allowed his regime to sign its own death sentence with Dino Grandi as the executioner and Carlo Scorza as the unwitting accomplice. Grandi proposed a resolution which would call for the National Fascist Party to focus first on crushing the Communist threat by bringing about a restoration of the Italian nation. He recommended this be brought about by Mussolini relinquishing some of his many responsibilities, most notably as head of the armed forces, in order to promote a new national restoration guided by the Catholic Church, Fascism and the Monarchy.
Scorza was thrown by this, as it appeared to be an endorsement of the sort of syncretic Fascist state he had argued for since he became Party Secretary. Mussolini stated he had no intention of relinquishing any of his responsibilities and threatened that he would continue to reform the National Fascist Party from within until it was ready to face the emerging challenges of the foreign invaders and the chaotic elements at home.
Had Mussolini maintained his resolve he may have shot down the momentum around Grandi’s proposals but after a break in the meeting to receive the latest communique from Sicily, the Duce returned deflated. General Guzzoni had reported that the counter-attacks against the Allied beachheads had failed; Italian forces on the island were now focused on containing the invaders rather than repelling them.
For months Mussolini had pinned his hopes on successfully fending off an Allied invasion which he believed would open the way to a negotiated peace which would leave his power intact. This opportunity had now vanished and Italy would become a battlefield instead. Reality seemed to take a toll, Mussolini remained passive for the remainder of the meeting and whilst the consuls debated the implication of Grandi’s proposals their leader deferred from giving further opinion of his own. The consuls voted heavily in favour of diminishing the power of the visibly shaken dictator, who shuffled off to his quarters amidst a coughing fit.
In the early hours of the 13th of July Grandi updated Ambrosio on the results of the Grand Council who in turn informed the King that the Duce’s own party had abandoned him. He went on to state bluntly that after three years of war in Africa, the Balkans and the Soviet Union, the Italian Army was exhausted. It could not stop an Allied invasion and had no hope of putting down an internal revolt whilst said invasion was ongoing. The war had to end and Mussolini stood in the way of that.
Ambrosio had been working to make the Italian monarch understand this reality since the fall of Tunisia in May but now was the first time he had made himself clear. The King who for so many years had looked up to Mussolini beyond his stature now had a new man of action to guide him. The emergence of the chaos Ambrosio had feared had shaken him out of his own dithering and gave inspiration for Victor Emmanuel to do the same.
The King summoned Mussolini for an audience that afternoon. The Duce had regained some of his composure from the night’s events and had seemed to formulate a course of action. Walking through the garden of the King’s private residence, Mussolini informed Victor Emmanuel of the events of the night’s meeting but told him he viewed this as an internal party affair which wouldn’t impact his government. The Grand Council was, constitutionally, a mere consultative body after all and he had brought the relevant legislation to prove it.
The King was blunt. He reportedly explained to Mussolini that he considered him to be at fault for the failures of the war and the chaos it had now caused. The Allies had made it clear he was a barrier to peace and moreover, his own party had lost faith in him. He would have to be replaced as Prime Minister. However there was still an opportunity to make things right, the King informed him there was an Army car waiting to take him to the Blackshirt armoured division training outside of the capital. He ordered Mussolini to lead them north to deal with the Communists.
Mussolini obeyed, thrown by the King’s dismissal but seemingly heartened by the opportunity to make amends. It was only after he entered the vehicle that he was informed he was under arrest, after twenty years in power his reign was at an end. Those who had plotted against him now moved to pick up the pieces.
With the plan for Mussolini’s arrest agreed, Ambrosio ordered General Carboni to secure Rome and access to it. The soldiers of the Granatieri di Sardegna division spread through the capital and occupied Fascist offices and Carabinieri headquarters. Renzo Chierici, the Fascist Chief of Police whom Mussolini had installed at the beginning of the year was made to relay orders for the Carabinieri to cooperate with the Army. The Ariete armoured division took up positions to the south of the city whilst the motorised infantry of the Piave division did the same to the north.
The Blackshirts training on German tanks were confined to barracks whilst their German trainers received orders from Ambrosio to report to German headquarters. Given the disruption of the Allied bombing and the transfer of authority to General Hube en route to the Sicilian front, they had essentially been sent on a wild goose chase. The only major force which might have threatened a counter-coup was subdued.
The entire affair had been relatively bloodless with the casualties consisting of some scuffles resisting arrest and a handful of Fascists who had committed suicide upon hearing the news of Mussolini’s removal. Even more were soon trying to ingratiate themselves with the new regime. Others fled to Spain, Switzerland, or Germany.
The Fascist calendar had reached its end date, an event which is often associated with great change or revelation. The force which had sought to consume the Italian people had reached its apocalypse and yet the new world still struggled to emerge. There were monsters yet to come.
---
The meeting of the Grand Council had been agreed to by Mussolini on the basis of coordinating the Fascist response to the revolutionary threat. The question of peace of war loomed large but was not considered to be the subject of the meeting. The question of the continuity of the Fascist regime had not entered the Duce’s mind.
It’s possible that this case of tunnel vision allowed his regime to sign its own death sentence with Dino Grandi as the executioner and Carlo Scorza as the unwitting accomplice. Grandi proposed a resolution which would call for the National Fascist Party to focus first on crushing the Communist threat by bringing about a restoration of the Italian nation. He recommended this be brought about by Mussolini relinquishing some of his many responsibilities, most notably as head of the armed forces, in order to promote a new national restoration guided by the Catholic Church, Fascism and the Monarchy.
Scorza was thrown by this, as it appeared to be an endorsement of the sort of syncretic Fascist state he had argued for since he became Party Secretary. Mussolini stated he had no intention of relinquishing any of his responsibilities and threatened that he would continue to reform the National Fascist Party from within until it was ready to face the emerging challenges of the foreign invaders and the chaotic elements at home.
Had Mussolini maintained his resolve he may have shot down the momentum around Grandi’s proposals but after a break in the meeting to receive the latest communique from Sicily, the Duce returned deflated. General Guzzoni had reported that the counter-attacks against the Allied beachheads had failed; Italian forces on the island were now focused on containing the invaders rather than repelling them.
For months Mussolini had pinned his hopes on successfully fending off an Allied invasion which he believed would open the way to a negotiated peace which would leave his power intact. This opportunity had now vanished and Italy would become a battlefield instead. Reality seemed to take a toll, Mussolini remained passive for the remainder of the meeting and whilst the consuls debated the implication of Grandi’s proposals their leader deferred from giving further opinion of his own. The consuls voted heavily in favour of diminishing the power of the visibly shaken dictator, who shuffled off to his quarters amidst a coughing fit.
In the early hours of the 13th of July Grandi updated Ambrosio on the results of the Grand Council who in turn informed the King that the Duce’s own party had abandoned him. He went on to state bluntly that after three years of war in Africa, the Balkans and the Soviet Union, the Italian Army was exhausted. It could not stop an Allied invasion and had no hope of putting down an internal revolt whilst said invasion was ongoing. The war had to end and Mussolini stood in the way of that.
Ambrosio had been working to make the Italian monarch understand this reality since the fall of Tunisia in May but now was the first time he had made himself clear. The King who for so many years had looked up to Mussolini beyond his stature now had a new man of action to guide him. The emergence of the chaos Ambrosio had feared had shaken him out of his own dithering and gave inspiration for Victor Emmanuel to do the same.
The King summoned Mussolini for an audience that afternoon. The Duce had regained some of his composure from the night’s events and had seemed to formulate a course of action. Walking through the garden of the King’s private residence, Mussolini informed Victor Emmanuel of the events of the night’s meeting but told him he viewed this as an internal party affair which wouldn’t impact his government. The Grand Council was, constitutionally, a mere consultative body after all and he had brought the relevant legislation to prove it.
The King was blunt. He reportedly explained to Mussolini that he considered him to be at fault for the failures of the war and the chaos it had now caused. The Allies had made it clear he was a barrier to peace and moreover, his own party had lost faith in him. He would have to be replaced as Prime Minister. However there was still an opportunity to make things right, the King informed him there was an Army car waiting to take him to the Blackshirt armoured division training outside of the capital. He ordered Mussolini to lead them north to deal with the Communists.
Mussolini obeyed, thrown by the King’s dismissal but seemingly heartened by the opportunity to make amends. It was only after he entered the vehicle that he was informed he was under arrest, after twenty years in power his reign was at an end. Those who had plotted against him now moved to pick up the pieces.
With the plan for Mussolini’s arrest agreed, Ambrosio ordered General Carboni to secure Rome and access to it. The soldiers of the Granatieri di Sardegna division spread through the capital and occupied Fascist offices and Carabinieri headquarters. Renzo Chierici, the Fascist Chief of Police whom Mussolini had installed at the beginning of the year was made to relay orders for the Carabinieri to cooperate with the Army. The Ariete armoured division took up positions to the south of the city whilst the motorised infantry of the Piave division did the same to the north.
The Blackshirts training on German tanks were confined to barracks whilst their German trainers received orders from Ambrosio to report to German headquarters. Given the disruption of the Allied bombing and the transfer of authority to General Hube en route to the Sicilian front, they had essentially been sent on a wild goose chase. The only major force which might have threatened a counter-coup was subdued.
The entire affair had been relatively bloodless with the casualties consisting of some scuffles resisting arrest and a handful of Fascists who had committed suicide upon hearing the news of Mussolini’s removal. Even more were soon trying to ingratiate themselves with the new regime. Others fled to Spain, Switzerland, or Germany.
The Fascist calendar had reached its end date, an event which is often associated with great change or revelation. The force which had sought to consume the Italian people had reached its apocalypse and yet the new world still struggled to emerge. There were monsters yet to come.
---
Il Futurismo
The removal of Mussolini was mostly well received within Rome and throughout Italy. In the afternoon the King had broadcast that after three years the war was coming to an end and he had tasked a new government headed by Marshal Enrico Caviglia with negotiating an honourable peace. Some despaired of what might become of Italy throwing herself at the mercy of her enemies or worried about how her erstwhile allies might react. Most however celebrated the end of bombing and hunger, with great anticipation for the return of loved ones. Several testimonies indicated an overwhelming albeit temporary sense of relief spreading throughout much of the country.
Caviglia was a popular Marshal from the First World War and was very much a figurehead, having been out of touch with Italian politics for more than a decade and uninvolved with military affairs during the war. This detachment worked in his favour as a post-Fascist leader and his wartime record lent itself to the task of the new regime.
Victor Emmanuel had asked Ambrosio to head the new government but the Chief of Staff replied that the military situation was too sensitive for him to be otherwise occupied. The King was wary of Caviglia’s Masonic ties but was reassured that he would be a largely ceremonial figure, one respected by the Allies and the Italian people. He was unpolitical and untainted by Fascism as opposed to other candidates such as Badoglio, Bonomi or Ciano.
The King had been convinced of the need to end Fascism but had no appetite for a return to liberal democracy either. The Italian people were warned that stability would be needed to guide the country out of the current predicament, curfews were announced and demonstrations were prohibited. An amnesty was offered for those who, in reaction to the recent failures of the outgoing regime, had committed rebellion; however this was coupled with warnings of severe punishment for those who would persist with such behaviour.
It was hoped that this carrot and stick approach would give the sailors of La Spezia an honourable exit from their mutiny and starve the PCI of oxygen. Admiral Raffaele de Courten was appointed Naval Minister in place of Mussolini and dispatched to La Spezia to bring the battlefleet back under Comando Supremo’s control. There was no longer the danger of the supreme sacrifice for the sailors to be threatened with but it was hoped by Ambrosio that the fleet might yet be able to play a role in ending the war if used as a bargaining chip with the Allies.
The 81 year old Caviglia made his own speech following on from the King, it had been written for him and outlined in greater detail the remit of his government. Caviglia reminded his countrymen that the war was not yet over but that a truce had been asked for in the hope of beginning armistice negotiations. Ambrosio was attempting contact with the Allied Supreme Commander, General Eisenhower, asking for a general ceasefire and had ordered Guzzoni to make similar arrangements on the ground in Sicily.
Grandi was dispatched to Spain where he intended to make contact with the British ambassador in Madrid, Samuel Hoare. Grandi had established a friendship with Hoare whilst they were respectively Italian ambassador to the UK and British Foreign Secretary. Hoare had attempted to mediate with Mussolini during the Italian invasion of Ethiopia and had attempted to distance Italy from Germany. These efforts had failed due to Mussolini’s imperial obsession but Grandi hoped with him out of the picture that Hoare would be in the mood to rekindle their friendship.
Ciano made the shorter trip to the Holy See where he worked on contacts already established with Allied diplomats with an eye on having the Vatican mediate a peace deal. Both Ciano and Grandi both hoped to ingratiate themselves with the new regime but acted largely independently of one another. With its task complete, those who had allied themselves together against Mussolini within the National Fascist Party became focused on their own priorities.
One of their co-conspirators was the Italian ambassador to Germany, Dino Alfieri, who was now tasked with informing the Germans of the new government’s intentions. Alfieri had arrived in Rome for the Grand Council and was hesitant to return to Berlin, wary of the German reaction to the new regime and its intentions. Instead he delivered a note from the King to the German embassy explaining that after three years of war Italy had exhausted itself and could no longer fulfil its obligations outlined in the Pact of Steel. Italy needed peace and so the Italo-German alliance had to come to an end.
There were no objections within the new Italian regime about seeking peace with the Allies but what form this peace should take was a matter of some dispute. There were those, such as Ambrosio, who were confident that a negotiated peace could be attained where Italy could leave the Axis alliance and sit out the remainder of the conflict as a sovereign, neutral power.
Then there was the view of General Castellano, who had organised the Army conspiracy against Mussolini with the belief that the institution would have to redeem its honour by joining the Allied cause. It is doubtful this opinion would have been a popular one amongst the Italian population. Their German ally had never been loved by the Italian people but they had been feared and the exhausted nation had little interest in provoking a new war.
It is quite likely that Ambrosio’s hope for a seamless Italian exit from the war would always have been wishful thinking but he had been astute enough to turn his aims for Italian strategic independence into keeping the Germans at arms length in preparation for Mussolini’s downfall. He was keen to make sure that Hitler be dissuaded from granting Castellano his wish.
The sailors at La Spezia marked the night of the 14th by using their signal flares as fireworks in celebration. They had been ordered into mass suicide in the hope that their sacrifice might save Mussolini’s regime only for their rebellion to topple the Duce instead and free the Italian people from the war he had dragged them into.
In Rome a few hours later flashes of a different kind illuminated the sky as Italian anti-aircraft guns reacted to the Fallschirmjäger dropping overhead.
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Achse
The German invasion of Italy was the culmination of an alliance which had been troubled from its very beginning, one which had descended into distrust and denial since the end of 1942 and had now erupted into outright conflict in the course of a few days.
Such was the enmity between the signatories of the ironically named Pact of Steel that both had spent the last few months making preparations for war to break out between each other even whilst fighting together. Much of the Italian leadership had grown so wary of their ally that they would sooner deal with their enemies, given how they were regarded by their German counterparts this shouldn’t have been a surprise. Nonetheless it came as one to Adolf Hitler.
By the Summer of 1943 the Italo-German alliance was held together largely by the personal relationship between Hitler and Mussolini. Hitler viewed the Italian people as racially inferior and their leadership duplicitous but to him Mussolini was one of the few truly great men his country had produced.
Though Hitler had admired Mussolini for twenty years there was little loyalty in their friendship, he had been double-crossing the Duce ever since Italy had entered the war and had despaired as Fascist imperial ambitions turned into one fiasco after another. Nonetheless Hitler’s confidence in the Italian dictator remained, buoyed in the Spring by the harsh measures taken against striking workers and Mussolini’s resolve to bring the full might of Italy’s remaining strength to bear against any Allied invasion. Even if Italy could no longer conquer the Mediterranean it could still divert Allied resources and delay a second front until Germany had settled scores with the Soviet Union.
Hitler’s latest offensive in the east had made little progress when the news came through during the daily situation report at Fuhrer Headquarters that Field Marshal Kesselring had been killed in an Allied air raid. The following day it was confirmed that an Allied landing had been made on Sicily though Hitler dismissed the operation as potentially being a feint, he remained fixated on events in the east and did not pay much attention to the alleged riot which had broken out at La Spezia.
On the 11th of July the situation in Italy had become clearer. The Allied invasion of Sicily could no longer be dismissed as a ruse and just as in Pantelleria Italian resistance appeared to be collapsing. To make things even worse, sailors of the Regia Marina battle fleet were mutinying at La Spezia and the revolt had spread to neighbouring cities. It was a situation which was all too familiar to Hitler; a key element of the Nazi worldview was the notion that the sailors' mutiny which had broken out at Kiel in 1918 had lost Germany the First World War.
This was a deeply entrenched belief, one which had prompted Hitler’s regime to go to great lengths to try and limit the deprivations experienced by the German homefront alongside heavy surveillance and repression of any dissent in order to stave off any danger of another revolution sweeping through Germany. It posed a danger which went beyond the Axis alliance, one which could not be entrusted to Mussolini to solve.
Preparations for the German occupation of northern Italy began almost immediately that day, delayed more by a lack of rail stock rather than faith in Mussolini’s regime finding a solution themselves. German forces in France were in a sorry state, their best units having been sent east and replaced with ones undergoing training or rebuilding. Now they were suddenly tasked with securing Germany’s southern flank
The 83rd Corps under General Hans-Gustav Felber were mobilised alongside the largely horse drawn 26th Panzer Division, it was a powerful force but one subject to train timetables and the cooperation of their allies in Italian-occupied France to get anywhere quickly. The date for the hastily rewritten Operation Alaric was set for the 14th of July.
The aims of the operation had to be reconsidered further as events in Italy developed. Transcripts from Hitler’s military situation reports held at the Berghof reveal his frustration with Mussolini’s decision to assemble the Fascist Grand Council which he considered a waste of time in such a moment of crisis, only for him to be further outraged when learning of the outcome of the meeting and Mussolini’s subsequent dismissal by the King.
Much as Mussolini’s own resolve appeared to have been shattered by the failure at Sicily, his removal from power led to Hitler losing whatever faith he had in the former Duce. He now fully embraced the low opinion held by German high command for their Italian ally and formed in his own mind an elaborate anti-German conspiracy. The failure to supply Tunisia, the surrender of Pantelleria, the death of Kesselring, the mutiny at La Spezia, the feebly contested Allied landings in Sicily and now the seamless use of state institutions to remove Mussolini from power and Italy from the war were all tied together as evidence of an insidious conspiracy by the “Jewish rabble” now in charge of Rome to deliver a quick victory to the Allies with as many German casualties as possible.
What had been Germany’s closest ally was now their worst enemy in Hitler’s eyes. It was not only Communist pockets in the north which would have to be dealt with but Italy as a whole. In the east Hitler was forced to abandon his Summer offensive, it had failed to achieve a breakthrough and now the Red Army was counterattacking. Although events in Italy had little direct bearing on the failure of Operation Citadel it was another disaster Hitler was happy to blame on Italian treachery. They would have to be punished.
In the previous days General Hans Hube who had been nominated Kesselring’s temporary successor had moved his remaining forces into Sicily under Italian direction whilst following orders from Berlin to make sure the Messina straits were under German control. Hitler wanted to prepare for the evacuation of German forces should Italy collapse, now he was going to use Hube’s forces to bring about that outcome.
Whilst German forces in the north carried out Alaric, Hube would take Rome. Sicily would have to be abandoned but Hitler was confident the Italian mainland could be occupied before the Allies could react. The attacks from north and south were expected to have achieved their goals within a week. The Italians by their own admission were exhausted after all, the new government was expected to flee rather than fight.
German paratroopers of the 2nd Fallschirmjager Division were to be dropped south of Rome to secure the roads around the city for Hube’s arrival and to prevent the escape of the King or his new government in the meantime. These troops had been preparing to move into Italy by land to assist in the defence of Sicily and were without adequate transports. As such only 2000 paratroopers would drop in the first wave with the rest of the division arriving subsequently. They were ordered to secure the entrances to the city without violence if possible. Resistance was expected to be minimal.
It was decided that the operation would be presented as Italians and their German allies coming together to save Fascism, with the 83rd Corps being rechristened as the ‘Fascist Freedom Corps’. Trustworthy Italian Fascists, most notably special forces commander Junio Valerio Borghese who had been in France preparing Italian submariners to attack New York, were brought along to act as observers. Goebbels’ propaganda would present them as jointly leading the operation.
The recruits of the 10th SS Panzer Division, most of whom were recently conscripted teenagers undergoing training, were ordered to be incorporated into the Corps by Hitler to ensure that the operation would be conducted “under a political flag” by Germans most ideologically aligned with Fascism. The Fuhrer’s personal misgivings about his former allies would remain private for now.
Hitler wanted Mussolini secured, whether he had been an unwitting pawn of this conspiracy or had actively strung the Germans along would need to be investigated before it could be decided whether or not Italian Fascism had a future.
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Prima che si apra il paracadute
From the Alps to Sicily the largest pincer movement in history took shape although Rome’s attention was immediately drawn to the sky falling in around them.
The initial two thousand men of the 2nd Fallschirmjager Division arrived over the skies of Rome in the early hours of the 15th of July. They had taken off from Avignon in southern France under great secrecy and though it was clear that this would be a combat drop, their destination was revealed to them only moments before they were in the air.
The plan was to secure the Ciampino airport on the southern outskirts of the city and land the rest of the division from there and the neighbouring Centocelle airfield. At Ciampino there was already a German presence in the form of the Luftwaffe command within Italy who were expected to assist in the operation. Once established they would take control of the roads leading out of the capital.
It was expected that the new Italian regime would be alarmed by airborne forces dropping outside of their city; however resistance was expected to be minimal. The German ambassador in Rome had been sent encrypted instructions to reassure the Italians that these forces were arriving in such a way due to a lack of available transport and were being sent to remedy the issue in preparation for the evacuation of German forces.
The thought that the Italians might question why more German troops were arriving in order to leave was considered but dismissed, it was expected the Italians might be uncomfortable by the arrival of the Fallschirmjager but would be happy to have an excuse not to fight. If it came to a confrontation, Hitler was confident that these elite troops would be enough to dispatch any Italian resistance.
Had the hastily arranged fleet of German transports followed the plan to avoid flying directly over the Italian capital such a confrontation might have been avoided but poor navigation due to the haste of the operation and the maintenance of the Roman blackout left them flying overhead regardless. Panic broke out below with inexperienced Italian soldiers manning anti-aircraft batteries they had only just taken control of believing they were facing an enemy air raid.
Cooler, more experienced heads recognised the sounds of German engines but became carried away by confused communications on open channels that the Germans were bombing Rome. Roman civilians who had been celebrating their city having escaped bombing during the war were now awoken by the dreaded sounds of air raid sirens and artillery fire.
The shock in the skies above was even worse for the Fallschirmjager who in many cases had already been lined up to jump and were now rocked back and forth by explosions and their transports taking evasive manoeuvres. Around 1 in 10 transports were shot down or crashed in the confusion with some others returning to France without their paratroopers having jumped. The remainder were scattered in the fields south of Rome, convinced they had been attacked on purpose and ready to respond.
The Italian soldiers of the Ariete division had been on high alert since the previous day. After securing the roads to the south of Rome they had been ordered to be on the lookout for any signs of interference with Mussolini’s removal, whether it be Allied, German or Mussolini loyalists. The arrival of German paratroopers was not quite as unexpected as it may have been given these orders and with control of the roads and ample transport, the division was able to use their armoured cars and tanks to full effect. They were guided by the terrified reports from civilians of the Roman countryside who had been made victims of German reprisals.
The Fallschirmjäger had struggled to compose themselves having been attacked in the skies above Rome and now being pursued by Italian forces. Despite Hitler’s bluster, small arms were not much use against tanks out in the open and the Germans supplies were limited to what they had landed with or what could be gained from the local population. This took the form of seizing food and water, often violently as the paratroopers vented their frustrations over the Italian ‘treachery’.
This culminated in the massacre of the hamlet of Falcognana where the Germans attempted to congregate away from the Italian armour until they were strong enough to assault the airport at Ciampino or at least hold out before they could be relieved. The protests of villagers being thrown out of their houses and businesses led to dozens being gunned down in the streets with the rest of the small population being confined to the local chapel. Few German stragglers arrived throughout the day and it became clear to the Germans they would not have sufficient strength to launch an assault. The German presence within the airport had already been detained in the morning.
Barricades were being constructed when Italian forces arrived, a brief firefight broke out before the paratroopers were called upon to surrender. The Germans refused and informed the Italians that local villagers were hostages whose lives would be put at risk by continued attacks. A stand-off emerged for several hours until orders, apparently directly from Ambrosio, came to clear the hamlet of Germans and secure full use of the road through it.
The attack was carried out swiftly with use of the Ariete division’s self-propelled artillery ploughing through the Germans, whose own ammunition soon ran out. Many more villagers were killed either accidentally or deliberately in the crossfire before the remaining paratroopers fled in small groups, waiting to reemerge once Hube’s panzers arrived.
Controversy remains over whether a better resolution could have been negotiated with the Germans and to what extent the villagers were murdered by the Fallschirmjager during the battle or may even have been killed by Italian fire.
Regardless, they would not be the last civilians to suffer in German occupied portions of Italy.
---
From the Alps to Sicily the largest pincer movement in history took shape although Rome’s attention was immediately drawn to the sky falling in around them.
The initial two thousand men of the 2nd Fallschirmjager Division arrived over the skies of Rome in the early hours of the 15th of July. They had taken off from Avignon in southern France under great secrecy and though it was clear that this would be a combat drop, their destination was revealed to them only moments before they were in the air.
The plan was to secure the Ciampino airport on the southern outskirts of the city and land the rest of the division from there and the neighbouring Centocelle airfield. At Ciampino there was already a German presence in the form of the Luftwaffe command within Italy who were expected to assist in the operation. Once established they would take control of the roads leading out of the capital.
It was expected that the new Italian regime would be alarmed by airborne forces dropping outside of their city; however resistance was expected to be minimal. The German ambassador in Rome had been sent encrypted instructions to reassure the Italians that these forces were arriving in such a way due to a lack of available transport and were being sent to remedy the issue in preparation for the evacuation of German forces.
The thought that the Italians might question why more German troops were arriving in order to leave was considered but dismissed, it was expected the Italians might be uncomfortable by the arrival of the Fallschirmjager but would be happy to have an excuse not to fight. If it came to a confrontation, Hitler was confident that these elite troops would be enough to dispatch any Italian resistance.
Had the hastily arranged fleet of German transports followed the plan to avoid flying directly over the Italian capital such a confrontation might have been avoided but poor navigation due to the haste of the operation and the maintenance of the Roman blackout left them flying overhead regardless. Panic broke out below with inexperienced Italian soldiers manning anti-aircraft batteries they had only just taken control of believing they were facing an enemy air raid.
Cooler, more experienced heads recognised the sounds of German engines but became carried away by confused communications on open channels that the Germans were bombing Rome. Roman civilians who had been celebrating their city having escaped bombing during the war were now awoken by the dreaded sounds of air raid sirens and artillery fire.
The shock in the skies above was even worse for the Fallschirmjager who in many cases had already been lined up to jump and were now rocked back and forth by explosions and their transports taking evasive manoeuvres. Around 1 in 10 transports were shot down or crashed in the confusion with some others returning to France without their paratroopers having jumped. The remainder were scattered in the fields south of Rome, convinced they had been attacked on purpose and ready to respond.
The Italian soldiers of the Ariete division had been on high alert since the previous day. After securing the roads to the south of Rome they had been ordered to be on the lookout for any signs of interference with Mussolini’s removal, whether it be Allied, German or Mussolini loyalists. The arrival of German paratroopers was not quite as unexpected as it may have been given these orders and with control of the roads and ample transport, the division was able to use their armoured cars and tanks to full effect. They were guided by the terrified reports from civilians of the Roman countryside who had been made victims of German reprisals.
The Fallschirmjäger had struggled to compose themselves having been attacked in the skies above Rome and now being pursued by Italian forces. Despite Hitler’s bluster, small arms were not much use against tanks out in the open and the Germans supplies were limited to what they had landed with or what could be gained from the local population. This took the form of seizing food and water, often violently as the paratroopers vented their frustrations over the Italian ‘treachery’.
This culminated in the massacre of the hamlet of Falcognana where the Germans attempted to congregate away from the Italian armour until they were strong enough to assault the airport at Ciampino or at least hold out before they could be relieved. The protests of villagers being thrown out of their houses and businesses led to dozens being gunned down in the streets with the rest of the small population being confined to the local chapel. Few German stragglers arrived throughout the day and it became clear to the Germans they would not have sufficient strength to launch an assault. The German presence within the airport had already been detained in the morning.
Barricades were being constructed when Italian forces arrived, a brief firefight broke out before the paratroopers were called upon to surrender. The Germans refused and informed the Italians that local villagers were hostages whose lives would be put at risk by continued attacks. A stand-off emerged for several hours until orders, apparently directly from Ambrosio, came to clear the hamlet of Germans and secure full use of the road through it.
The attack was carried out swiftly with use of the Ariete division’s self-propelled artillery ploughing through the Germans, whose own ammunition soon ran out. Many more villagers were killed either accidentally or deliberately in the crossfire before the remaining paratroopers fled in small groups, waiting to reemerge once Hube’s panzers arrived.
Controversy remains over whether a better resolution could have been negotiated with the Germans and to what extent the villagers were murdered by the Fallschirmjager during the battle or may even have been killed by Italian fire.
Regardless, they would not be the last civilians to suffer in German occupied portions of Italy.
---
Scylla and Charybdis
The lack of concern Ambrosio had in ignoring the plight of Italian civilians would later become a source of great controversy but for the moment Comando Supremo, and their new regime, were swept up in the ongoing crisis and such ruthless behaviour wasn’t dwelt upon.
The German landing outside of Rome was a tangible threat to be dealt with but there were already more alarming reports and rumours of Italian forces being attacked by their former allies across southern France and the Balkans. Whilst Fallschirmjager holdouts were being bombarded alongside their Italian hostages, General Guzzoni reported from Sicily that a truce had been agreed with the Anglo-Americans but German forces on the island had broken off all contact and appeared to be racing for Messina. The Germans were returning to mainland Italy and Rome stood between them and their Fatherland
The German commander, General Hans Hube had moved with his remaining men to Messina in the previous days. When he had been ordered to do so by Ambrosio the Italian political crisis was apparent but the outcome was not yet clear and he had been ordered to continue to pay lip service to his Italian superiors by Berlin whilst preparing to act independently should they become a hindrance.
The 14th Panzer Corps under his command already had most of their forces on the island where they took heavy casualties failing to dislodge the British beachhead before falling back along with Italian forces to prevent further Allied advances. Hube had been directed to bring the remaining German troops in southern Italy to help defend the island and secretly to ensure German forces would have priority should evacuation become necessary.
Hube had been ordered to secure the straits of Messina because of this concern. The scenes he witnessed when arriving in the city with his troops seemed to imply a collapse on the island had already begun. Loudspeakers announcing that Axis counterattacks were driving the enemy into the sea were drowned out by the clamour of starving refugees from the countryside attempting to escape to the mainland.
With all the diplomacy of an eastern front veteran, Hube took control of the city and its ferry crossings, ordering the streets and roads cleared at gunpoint. General Frido von Senger und Etterlin, German liaison with Guzzoni, explained to the Italian commander such actions were necessary to allow reinforcements to arrive as quickly as possible. The following day he and his staff were driving to Messina themselves under Hube’s orders.
German forces on the island had been in poor shape prior to the Allied invasion and the days of intense fighting under air and naval bombardment had not helped matters. Hube had realised the island could not be held but had hoped to use its barren, mountainous terrain to make the Allies bleed. The announcement of Italian exit from the war and Guzzoni’s orders from Comando Supremo to organise a truce now made it clear that he was now facing an immediate evacuation, a reverse Dunkirk.
He now ignored Ambrosio and Guzzoni and addressed German forces on the island directly, ordering them to come to Messina immediately by any means necessary. This was carried out, as had often been the case in German retreats in Africa and Russia, with German forces stealing whatever motor vehicles and supplies they could from their Italian allies, leaving them in the dust with the feeble excuse that their war was over and they didn’t need the equipment anymore.
The Germans had silenced the loudspeakers in Messina after taking control of the city but personal radios and gossip allowed news of the Italian exit from the war to spread anyway. The Germans had crammed the population of Messina and the large number of refugees into hot buildings with little food or water to clear the roads and now the war was over many felt they had little reason to fear the Germans anymore. Those attempting to go out into the streets to celebrate, to get something to drink or just some fresh air found themselves being barked at by increasingly nervous German occupiers. When they argued back the shooting started, just as it would in Falcognana the following day.
In Messina a riot broke out and even greater violence ensued than had been witnessed at the small Roman hamlet, the population were massacred with the same gusto as similar atrocities carried out in the Soviet Union. Survivors would later detail German tanks ploughing over dead bodies in the street to clear the way for the armada of captured vehicles heading for the ferries.
In an attempt to restore order Hube used the loudspeakers to declare that the Germans would be gone soon but until then the populace would have to either remain indoors or leave the city via the hills. Many chose the latter option to escape further atrocities, only to die in the elements.
By the 14th of July Messina, and Sicily were largely free of Germans. The Luftwaffe crews still present on the island were ordered to fly remaining aircraft to Ciampino before hastily being redirected to airfields in Austria. From Reggio Calabria, back on the mainland, Hube now had his own sense of direction. Having already been preparing to fight his way back to Germany if the Italians were not obliging he was now ordered to seize Rome.
It was a daunting task with only 50,000 men and less than 50 tanks, short of fuel and ammunition with a convoy of stolen French and Italian vehicles. Fittingly, the force had the look and feel of a barbarian army, ready to sack the ancient capital.
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The lack of concern Ambrosio had in ignoring the plight of Italian civilians would later become a source of great controversy but for the moment Comando Supremo, and their new regime, were swept up in the ongoing crisis and such ruthless behaviour wasn’t dwelt upon.
The German landing outside of Rome was a tangible threat to be dealt with but there were already more alarming reports and rumours of Italian forces being attacked by their former allies across southern France and the Balkans. Whilst Fallschirmjager holdouts were being bombarded alongside their Italian hostages, General Guzzoni reported from Sicily that a truce had been agreed with the Anglo-Americans but German forces on the island had broken off all contact and appeared to be racing for Messina. The Germans were returning to mainland Italy and Rome stood between them and their Fatherland
The German commander, General Hans Hube had moved with his remaining men to Messina in the previous days. When he had been ordered to do so by Ambrosio the Italian political crisis was apparent but the outcome was not yet clear and he had been ordered to continue to pay lip service to his Italian superiors by Berlin whilst preparing to act independently should they become a hindrance.
The 14th Panzer Corps under his command already had most of their forces on the island where they took heavy casualties failing to dislodge the British beachhead before falling back along with Italian forces to prevent further Allied advances. Hube had been directed to bring the remaining German troops in southern Italy to help defend the island and secretly to ensure German forces would have priority should evacuation become necessary.
Hube had been ordered to secure the straits of Messina because of this concern. The scenes he witnessed when arriving in the city with his troops seemed to imply a collapse on the island had already begun. Loudspeakers announcing that Axis counterattacks were driving the enemy into the sea were drowned out by the clamour of starving refugees from the countryside attempting to escape to the mainland.
With all the diplomacy of an eastern front veteran, Hube took control of the city and its ferry crossings, ordering the streets and roads cleared at gunpoint. General Frido von Senger und Etterlin, German liaison with Guzzoni, explained to the Italian commander such actions were necessary to allow reinforcements to arrive as quickly as possible. The following day he and his staff were driving to Messina themselves under Hube’s orders.
German forces on the island had been in poor shape prior to the Allied invasion and the days of intense fighting under air and naval bombardment had not helped matters. Hube had realised the island could not be held but had hoped to use its barren, mountainous terrain to make the Allies bleed. The announcement of Italian exit from the war and Guzzoni’s orders from Comando Supremo to organise a truce now made it clear that he was now facing an immediate evacuation, a reverse Dunkirk.
He now ignored Ambrosio and Guzzoni and addressed German forces on the island directly, ordering them to come to Messina immediately by any means necessary. This was carried out, as had often been the case in German retreats in Africa and Russia, with German forces stealing whatever motor vehicles and supplies they could from their Italian allies, leaving them in the dust with the feeble excuse that their war was over and they didn’t need the equipment anymore.
The Germans had silenced the loudspeakers in Messina after taking control of the city but personal radios and gossip allowed news of the Italian exit from the war to spread anyway. The Germans had crammed the population of Messina and the large number of refugees into hot buildings with little food or water to clear the roads and now the war was over many felt they had little reason to fear the Germans anymore. Those attempting to go out into the streets to celebrate, to get something to drink or just some fresh air found themselves being barked at by increasingly nervous German occupiers. When they argued back the shooting started, just as it would in Falcognana the following day.
In Messina a riot broke out and even greater violence ensued than had been witnessed at the small Roman hamlet, the population were massacred with the same gusto as similar atrocities carried out in the Soviet Union. Survivors would later detail German tanks ploughing over dead bodies in the street to clear the way for the armada of captured vehicles heading for the ferries.
In an attempt to restore order Hube used the loudspeakers to declare that the Germans would be gone soon but until then the populace would have to either remain indoors or leave the city via the hills. Many chose the latter option to escape further atrocities, only to die in the elements.
By the 14th of July Messina, and Sicily were largely free of Germans. The Luftwaffe crews still present on the island were ordered to fly remaining aircraft to Ciampino before hastily being redirected to airfields in Austria. From Reggio Calabria, back on the mainland, Hube now had his own sense of direction. Having already been preparing to fight his way back to Germany if the Italians were not obliging he was now ordered to seize Rome.
It was a daunting task with only 50,000 men and less than 50 tanks, short of fuel and ammunition with a convoy of stolen French and Italian vehicles. Fittingly, the force had the look and feel of a barbarian army, ready to sack the ancient capital.
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The Drive on Rome
Hube had made use of coastal roads to transport his forces from southern Italy to Messina but in driving northwards it became clear why Calabria was often referred to as Italy’s third island. Unlike Sardinia and Sicily, Calabria was detached from the rest of Italy not by sea but by terrible infrastructure.
It was terrain of the sort Hube had experienced before in the Soviet Union and as his convoy ground over dirt roads and tracks, throwing up dust as they went, the experience did not feel dissimilar from advancing in the Soviet interior during the Summers of 1941 and 1942. Their organisation was threadbare and time was against them, troops already shaken by days of combat against the Allied beachhead were urged to move on faster and faster if they wanted to see home again.
In the sweltering heat and poor roads the convoy gradually ground forward up the western coast of Calabria. Whilst plagued by the heat and infrastructure the Germans were assisted by surprise and the meagre Italian defences along the coast. As in Sicily, the Calabrian coastal divisions were composed of old men and young boys with little weapons or training who largely presumed the Germans were going home rather than launching a coup. Many had gone home themselves having misunderstood the broadcasts from the new government to mean the war was ending immediately. The handful of regular Italian forces in the area were based in the interior with little transport to intercept the German advance.
The first significant harassment the Germans received came from the skies with Italian fighter-bombers taking off from Crotone on the other side of Calabria and raiding Hube’s convoy on the morning of the 15th. By now it was becoming clear what the German intentions were, interrogation of Fallschirmjager prisoners had revealed Hitler’s plan of capturing Rome from the south.
Ambrosio used the direct communication Guzzoni had achieved with Allied command to request an overwhelming aerial bombardment of Hube’s convoy; their response was noncommittal. After months of Allied airpower having crippled the Italian war effort they appeared unwilling to step in and defend against German invasion. Grandi radioed from Madrid that he had met provisionally with the British Ambassador and been told, unofficially, that any negotiating position Rome might have would be subject to the new regime offering effective resistance to the German invasion.
The Italians were left to resort to their own means, coastal commands were ordered to concentrate their forces at choke points where they could hold the Germans for as long as possible, bridges were ordered blown and roads blocked whilst regular units not already bypassed were ordered towards the likely routes of advance. Enrico Caviglia used his second radio address as Prime Minister to denounce the German treachery and alert Italians to the danger whilst falsely reassuring that the full force of the Allied powers were now behind them.
In a surprise to the new regime, the PCI in Milan made their own radio address shortly after calling for Italian workers to unite in defence of Italy and to lend assistance to any anti-German efforts. In Naples the organised crime gangs of the Camorra made preparations for citizen militias and encouraged Neopolitans to join. Mussolini claimed to have truly united Italy but disparate aspects of Italian society were coming together as never before to oppose a Fascist restoration.
On the 16th Hube’s force reached Cosenza having advanced tirelessly since arriving in Reggio Calabria. It was where the tomb of Alaric, the German barbarian who had sacked Rome, was allegedly sited and it appeared the operation which bore his name had reached a similar point. Breakdowns had ravaged the improvised convoy and those vehicles left in working condition had almost exhausted their remaining fuel supplies. The capture of a landing ground outside of Cosenza allowed the Luftwaffe to bring in a trickle of supplies using what remained of their transport fleet, already depleted by Stalingrad, Tunisia, and now the debacle outside of Rome.
Hube was a Stalingrad veteran and radioed to Berlin his fears that the convoy was facing a similar fate. He recommended that they maintain a hold on Calabria until the operation in the north brought about Italian collapse or, if that failed, use their remaining force to seize a lightly defended port in order to evacuate as many men as possible via submarine and air. Instead he found himself being flown back to Germany to be told he was being relieved by his subordinate, Fallschirmjager General Paul Conrath who was a dedicated Nazi with a reputation for daring. Hermann Goering, keen to bolster his own standing and reputation, assured Hitler that Conrath was the man to finish the job.
The decision was made to prioritise the German armour and to continue the advance largely on foot, significantly reducing momentum and causing further exhaustion for the already beleaguered troops. Conrath was popular amongst the German rank and file and encouraged them onwards to victory, the advance resuming after Cosenza had been pillaged of all available supplies. The Regia Aeronautica struck again, this time leaving the town’s airfield badly damaged and the convoy entirely cut off once more. One of the last deliveries had been dedicated not to fuel for vehicles but amphetamines to maintain the soldiers' stamina on the long march.
Italian resistance stiffened with coastal divisions concentrating their limited firepower on harassing the German advance as much as possible. Dispatching these forces succeeded in causing delays but took a terrible toll on the defenders who were rarely taken prisoner by the Germans and often shot out of hand when not made to act as local guides. Their role, as it had been in defending the coast from Allied attack, was largely to act as cannon fodder before reinforcements could arrive.
Around Naples were the surviving veterans of the Pasubio division who had been placed around the region to assist the coastal divisions were brought together to halt the German advance. Meanwhile the inexperienced troops of the Piceno division based in the east of the Italian heel were ordered across the mountains via the Gravina canyon towards Potenza and then the coast in a march as arduous as the one faced by the Germans they were to intercept.
These two divisions barely constituted 5000 men, badly outnumbered with no armour and limited artillery; they were nonetheless well drilled and determined with the knowledge that they were defending their country against an invader who had treated them with contempt long before breaking their alliance. They had better knowledge of the terrain and the invaders were even more exhausted than they were. Amidst the patriotic fervour it was announced via Rome that the German barbarians would be broken before Naples.
This prophecy would come true although the Germans wouldn’t arrive for a climactic battle. Whilst approaching the Bay of Sapri Conrath’s force came under sustained attack from Allied air power for the first time. Whilst deliberations continued in London and Washington, the Allied commander in the theatre, General Dwight Eisenhower, had taken the decision to harass the Germans after conferring with Ambrosio and Guzzoni.
Unlike the limited raids flown out of Crotone the Allied air forces were able to mount almost continuous attacks on the German column to devastating effect. German troops dazed from days of relentless march in the heat, powered only by amphetamines and what food could be seized from local villages, were slow to dive for cover against marauding Allied fighters who mowed them down in droves. Whilst Conrath’s panzers took only a few casualties thanks to their armour his remaining vehicles were transformed into a pile of burning wrecks.
The shattered force limped to the town of Sapri on the night of the 20th of July where Conrath radioed Berlin to report the condition of his remaining troops. Thousands were dead and more injured, those uninjured had their boots falling apart from marching hundreds of kilometres and exhaustion was overwhelming them. The convoy had lost the majority of their vehicles and with them much of their remaining supplies, neither of which could be replaced. If they moved again they would be exposed to more attacks from the air. Conrath was left making the same recommendations his predecessor had a few days before, either to evacuate or sit tight.
What had appeared a daring but feasible dash at Rome from Fuhrer Headquarters had now ground to a halt. With the Italian fleet no longer available to the Germans, large-scale evacuation was all but impossible but Hitler remained confident that Italian collapse was not far away and that Conrath’s force would soon be relieved. Hence the Germans were ordered to hold out, waiting with increasing desperation to be rescued. In the meantime they wreaked havoc on the coast of Campania in an attempt to sustain themselves.
A new column made up of Italian refugees forced from their homes without their belongings and often with family missing would soon take up the advance north in their stead.
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