Talk:Military history of Italy during World War II

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One of the most interesting counterfactuals emerging in World War II history is what would have happened if Italy had been engaged earlier. The tantalizing prospect glimmers that if Britain and France had been able to declare war on Italy as well as Germany in 1939, Mussolini's house of cards could have been torn apart before Germany could have intervened .

There is an even more compelling counterfactual: the British and French gave way to Italy in its Abyssinian adventure, partly, it seems, because they were genuinely impressed by the evident power of Fascist Italy. But it was a sham then, just as much as it was a sham later. One can argue that the history of the 20th Century would have been radically different had Fascist Italy been suppressed in the middle of the 1930s.

From this counterfactual comes a significant question: we know now how feeble Italy was, but why did the military advisors of the day not realize this? The answers to this question have the potential to illuminate not only past history, but also many of the perplexing military questions we face today.

Well, everybody miscalculated the international situation in the years before the war. The British were paralysed by fear of the Italian Navy throughout the '30s, but they discounted the small and apparently weak German fleet: a serious error

Mussolini and Stalin also underestimated German power: they were expecting Germany vs. France/Britain to be another slow war of attrition which would take years to decide. If they had foreseen the rapid German victories of 1940 they would have stayed away from Hitler and supported the Allies.

And of course, Hitler in turn seriously miscalculated Russian power...

The lesson of the whole sorry episode is "expect the unexpected"

Mmartins

The reason France and Britain didn't move against Italy during the 30s is part military and part political. Military, it couldn't be known in advance that the British Matilda tanks would be so important in the African war against Italy and neither could the triumph of air power over the battleships be known beforehand. So even though Britain/France had clear advantage over Italy they still saw that they would need to pay a heavy cost in ships and resources to defeat her (the whole point of the Italian navy versus British and the French). If they'd attacked Italy in 1939, they would not only be launching a war of aggression against a neutral nation, but they would also have to gather much bigger forces to defeat the Italians in Africa (which would drain manpower from Europe) than was the case in Operation Compass were a British force defeated the Italians in spite of severe numerical inferiority that wasn't of the British choosing. The political reasons which have been lost in the post-WWII propganda of the allies as the altruistic saviors of mankind is that the French and British governments (if not their populations) prefered a fascist government in Italy (and Spain and Germany) over the leftist government that surely would've taken it's place had Mussolini been brought down, say by military defeat at the hands of the British over Abyssinia. It was this preference that gave the fascist governments such leeway during the 30s although it is generally forgetten. Even Churchill wrote at the time that he would want a Hitler to save Britain should Britain ever face the same ruin as Germany. --Sus scrofa 20:45, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

Inaccuracies

"However, on June 10, 1940, as Rommel reached the English Channel, ..."

1. German forces reached the English Channel, surrounding the French and British armies in northeast France and the low countries on May 20, 1940, not June 10. Indeed, by June 4 the Dunkirk evacuation was over and pocket had surrendered.

2. Rommel was only a division commander in the 1940 campaign, and his panzer division was NOT the one that reached the English Channel on May 20. If you want to attribute the reaching of the channel to a German commander, the appropriate person is Kluge, commander of Panzer Group Kluge and in control of the panzer forces that did reach the channel.

Pre War Naval Demonstration for Germany

Before Italy decalared war, there was a massive and highly complex set of naval demonstations performed with Hitler in attendance. I remember reading about something like 70 Submarines firing deck guns in formation, then submersing and surfacing in perfect formation. There was also some record-breaking fleet sail-past at something like 37 Knots. Does anyone know the details of this, and if so, should it be included in the article? --Zegoma beach 20:56, 31 March 2006 (UTC)

Tone and Citation Tags

I've taken out the Tone tag because I don't see what is wrong with the tone of this article and because I don't think it appropriate this tag should be added by an unidentified IP address. I feel the same way about the citation tag but will leave it pending debate. This article is a summary article and each section has an underlying 'Main article' in Misplaced Pages cited. The contents therefore summarise the underlying articles and don't need citations. If there is a problem with citations this should be addressed in the underlying articles. Stephen Kirrage 11:34, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

In the absence of any response to the above, I've taken out the unreferenced tag as well Stephen Kirrage 08:41, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

"and thus they have remained theoretically at war with each other up to the present time."

I must say, the notion that two states formerly at war that although for a long time now at peace have failed to agree a peace treaty somehow makes them still "theoretically" at war seems to me rather preposterous. There is no realistic sense, even theoretical, in which one can claim that Italy is still at war with Japan. (This is not even comparable to the two Koreas, which still have a significant military buildup targeted against each other, and in the case of which a return to hostilities is still conceivable -- Italy and Japan do not target each other militarily, and the thought of a resumption of hostilities between them is simply unimaginable.) It seems far saner to say that a peace treaty is not necessary to end a state of war (even a "theoretical" state of war), than to claim that Italy and Japan are still in any sense (however theoretical) at war. --SJK (talk) 08:50, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Narrative must begin earlier

The history of Italy during the Second World War does not begin with the Nazi invasion of Poland nor with Mussolini's 10 June declaration. While I don't have the time to write this section now, I would hope someone would edit this piece to add Italy's invasions of Ethiopia (1935), Albania, and other territories, without which it is not really possible to understand Italy's position in 1939. Italy's irredentism and Mussolini's ideas about resurrecting a "Roman Empire" begin much earlier than Poland and should be reflected on this page. While Italy may not have been allied with Germany and fighting Britain and France right away, its actions in the Mediterranean and Red Sea were very much a part of the situation in Europe that led to war. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.254.241.30 (talk) 22:37, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Censoring by Nick Dowling

Who gives him the right to decide that the broadcasts by Radio Rome and Radio Berlin concerning the role of Axis forces are unreliable and of dubious nature. I'd hate to see him work for BBC. What has he got the mentality of a child?? Isn't it obvious that historians would've discovered by now that Radio Berlin and Radio Rome had got it all wrong, inventing units that didn't exist and placing them in wrong areas, and ofcourse, getting the dates, timing and weather all wrong when describing actions. Nick Dowling, get real, and have a read of the pages that deal with "Siege Of Tobruk", "Operation Brevity", "Operation Crusader", etcetera, to see that you got it all wrong mate. GENERALMESSE. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Generalmesse (talk • contribs) 03:25, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

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