What if: Stalin sends a Soviet Expeditionary Force to Italy in 1943

So what if Jozef Stalin after having been informed by the Allies that they are planning to invade Italy decides that he is going to send a Soviet Expeditionary Force to Italy to take part in the invasion as a show to the Soviet People that the Soviet Union will fight the Axis on all front no matter where they are.
 
Any OTL information on this being considered?

I would have thought the Soviets had their hands full on the Eastern Front, without worrying about a Mediterranean Theatre.
Not that i can find at this moment, but the Soviet Expeditionary Force to Italy does not need to be big, maybe around 50,000, just enough to be a factor in the fight for Italy.
 
Or sending ships true the Bosporus strait ore as you say, from Iran, Iraq and than board ships in Syria.
Bosporus was closed. Even if it was not. German subs in Black see as well as aircraft on Greek and Italian islands could make such enterprise pritty expensive. Through Iran it could be possible but Soviets would need to be completly equipped by LL equipment. Down to the rifles and pistols to make supplying them much easier.
 
Surely Red Army had enough doing already. Sending even small expeditionary group would be away from that strenght what Soviets need against Germans. And Stalin hardly wants that they return with odd ideas.
 
Surely Red Army had enough doing already. Sending even small expeditionary group would be away from that strenght what Soviets need against Germans. And Stalin hardly wants that they return with odd ideas.

Exactly. The USSR has no troops to spare, and Stalin does not want Soviet soldiers exposed to non-Soviet ideas. Even Italian Communists would be contaminating.
 
The logistics would be nearly impossible without either the Red Expeditionary Forces adopting a western Allied TOE, as the Chinese did in Burma, or the Soviets continually sending large quantities of supplies along one of the Lend-Lease routes. The former is difficult but doable, the latter clearly not worth the cost for a force of <5 divisions.
 

ben0628

Banned
I doubt Stalin would be interested in sending forces to Italy. Normandy maybe, but Italy?

Perhaps he does this as a way of spreading communism to Italy?

Also perhaps after an initial Italian invasion, he sends an expiditionary force to Yugoslavia before Tito can secure the country for himself.
 
There is a way to do this. The USSR beat the Germans so soundly in 1941 and 1942 that by 1943 the Eastern Front is where it was IOTL at the beginning of 1945. The Soviets then invade Italy from the northeast.
 
There is a way to do this. The USSR beat the Germans so soundly in 1941 and 1942 that by 1943 the Eastern Front is where it was IOTL at the beginning of 1945. The Soviets then invade Italy from the northeast.

Which is quite possible if Stalin kept the bulk of his forces along the old pre-1939 border (where the forts were and where the Soviets could supply their troops by rail) rather than trying to defend on the new border in the depths of occupied Poland.

It wouldn't save the Soviets from a massive pasting, but it would likely be far less of a disaster than OTL and allow the Soviets to push the Germans back much earlier.

fasquardon
 
An army corps of "front" equivalent was out of question due to sheer logistical problems. A Guard regiment or such could be an option; a token presence in a show of inter-Allied resolute friendship. Let's say Stalin decides for this (to later, obviously, shoot or send to Gulag most of the men involved in the late Forties...) while buoying on the great decisive victories of summer 1943. When the small expedition is still being organized in the Caucasus, Italy surrenders. After some consideration, the tyrant opts for sending the small force anyway, provided the kingdom of Italy declares war on Germany - as in the end Victor Emmanuel III and Badoglio agreed to do. So, after, a long trek by train, lorries and a ship detour from Bandar Abbas through the Red Sea, suez and the Med, a Guard mechanized regiment, partly reequipped with US vehicles and weapons (trucks, bulldozers, bazookas, grenades and mortars, AA guns, a handful of tank destroyers...), lands at Naples on November 30th, 1943.
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
Effectively impossible. The Red army had literally just suffered 1,000,000 casualties at Kursk (~400,000 KIA) and lost almost 8,000 armored vehicles. Soviet air craft losses were in the 4,500 range.

Stalin didn't have forces to spare.
 
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