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If the soldiers of Spain had known the real condition of the Italian Army, they probably would have had a different perception of the Italian participation. Seen from the outside however, the Italian Army gave the impression to be truly powerful organization, and Mussolini’s gambit was likewise able to convince several branches of foreign intelligence that Italy had implemented a huge plan of mechanization of its army. This of course was not so, and the ‘other side of the coin’ was soon plainly obvious to the military economists; in less than three years time, first in Ethiopia and then in Spain, the army “burned” through a great part of its potential in these almost fruitless demonstrations of force. In the meanwhile the situation in Europe, which was getting worse day after day, would require a quick and massive preparation of a modern army able to face an imminent conflict; an army that Italy no longer maintained.
At that point the hard reality was that Italy hadn’t enough money either to modernize the army or to provide the bulk of basic equipment for the influx of soldiers needed in case of a general mobilization. It was now forced upon the army’s mid and low commands to have to pay the price for years of extravagance and ill planning, for they would be ordered to manage the available resources to fit any need as best as they could; which, in other words meant that a large segment of Italian soldiers fighting in WWII never obtained the critical equipment they needed through the whole of the conflict. From an economic point of view the decade between 1930 an ’40 could be defined as the beginning of the downward spiral for the Italian Army; a force which had began the decade as being considered a modern outfit, but reached the dawn of WWII in an unhewn condition of backwardness. Alas, where in a total of 73 (binary type) divisions, approximately 40 of them did not possess a decent quantity of the most common equipment like shoes, uniforms, and rifles, let alone the necessary amount of armor and transport needed to win a modern war.
This was the condition of the Italian Army in 1940: from a strategic point of view it remained similar in being to it’s make up from the late twenties. Due to the incurred expenses from forays into Ethiopia and Spain during the thirties, in addition to some other factors, the government and its army squandered its chance to initiate an overall modernization. From a tactical point of view, the situation in 1940 was definitely far worse than in the early thirties due mainly to the fact that a great part of the weaponry was now outdated and on average was of poorer quality than the soldiers possessed during the previous decade.
A good portion of the soldiers training continued to focus on the type of warfare that many Italian military planners foresaw as the most likely scenario for its troops; a defensive battle in the mountainous regions of northern Italy, pitted against either French-Yugoslavian forces or Germany, with a counter-attack launched after the invaders had worn themselves down on the Italian positions. Although Italian leaders spoke of fighting a ‘rapid’ style of war, similar to the German Blitzkrieg tactics, they never put the amount of training needed to hone this difficult skill. The years of training for mountainous fighting was evident throughout the Second World War for the Italian soldier, as some of their finest performances came in a defensive role in either highland or static positions; Keren and El Alamein to name a few. But when the most modern of weapons were needed to fight wide open offensive engagements, Italian units often struggled due in large part to their lack of access to these instruments of war.
There were many in the Comando Supremo in the late 1930′s who were very aware that the Italian army would not be ready for some years time in regards to modernization of equipment and tactics to fight in a European war. In agreeing to an alliance with Germany in 1939 through the ‘Pact of Steel’, Mussolini was given assurance by Hitler that the Germans had no intention of waging war for several years to come, and the Italians would thus have this opportunity to develop the type of army necessary to win modern wars. If they would have properly utilized this chance we will never know, for Hitler’s promise was of course a bold face lie, and his Wehrmacht unleashed hell upon Poland less than 6 months after signing the ‘Pact’. When Mussolini failed to break the chain that bound Italy to Germany, the Italian military was now operating on Hitler’s schedule, and the crisis the limited amount of time Italy had to prepare for war was compounded by its financial and industrial limitations.
Even if all the faults of the Italian Army can and should not be attributed to the economic situation, surely it has its relevance, much like the characters in one of Aesop’s famed fables; the Italian army spent too much time acting like the grasshopper, just in the same way other nation’s armies, like diligent ants, prepared themselves for one of the coldest winters endured by humanity.
So this was the path that had been chosen for the Italian army to follow into the hell that was the Second World War; a path paved in institutionalized neglect, helmed by a national leader who had once stood at the pinnacle of international statesmanship, but now found himself hopelessly floundering in a sea of despair that was in no small part of his own making.
Mussolini had been the Duce of a ‘new Italy’ at the dawn of the War, but within four years he would become swallowed by the immensity of the events. While this War shone down the light of destiny onto some men, for example Winston Churchill, whom would heed the call of greatness in order to guide their country to victory, others faded away into the shadows; by the last months of the war, Mussolini had become nothing much more than a spectator to history.
Mussolini commanded an army of brave men; brave, but for the most part uninterested in his dreams of conquest. Men who were asked to fight alongside a partner that they shared no love for, against an enemy that most had no hatred of. He commanded men who were armed for the most part with only the barest of weapons and supplies, led by officers who had grown fat at the teat of corruption or incompetence during the inter-war years.
The Army of Italy would fight on battlefields across the globe, in places that many of its men had most likely never had heard of before arriving. There would be victories obtained, but far more often defeat would have to be absorbed. There were periods were the army disappointed, and there were those periods that they overachieved. In the end however lay ultimate defeat. It may also be said that for the most part these defeats did not necessarily originate with the opening of any given engagement, but that the seeds of these losses were sown years before, from behind the desks of the bureaucrats, and in the offices of power. The war for Italy was not lost in the sands of North Africa, the hills of Greece, or the snow of the Russian steppe; it occurred when its Duce lost his way, in the middle of Rome.
Special Thanks to TJ for the overall editing of the text and for his valuable additions. His contributions makes him a co-author in all respects.
References
Galeazzo Ciano; Diary 1937 – 1943
Giuseppe Bottai; Diary 1935 – 1944
Giuseppe Bottai; Vent’Anni e un Giorno
Dino Grandi; Il Mio Paese. Ricordi Autobiografici.
Renzo De Felice; Mussolini il Duce vol. 1 and 2
Enzo Biagi; La Seconda Guerra Mondiale – Parlano I Protagonisti
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This was a great article and well written. Im gonna share it with some of my friends.
Excellent article! Thoroughly researched and well written.