The Eastern Front, Part Three: The Battle to Survive

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It was a hard battle, but Nikolayevka had fallen.  The men rested up over the night in the village, and the remaining days marches went uncontested.  By February 1^st the brave men of the Alpini Divisions had reached friendly lines.

The pain and suffering was not over yet for many of the survivors of either the Alpini Divisions or the 35th Corps.  Long hospital stays for battle wounds, frostbite, and malnutrition filled the immediate future for most.  Amputation from frostbite would unfortunately be a permanent reminder of what was endured by far too many.

The campaign on the Eastern Front had been brutal on the troops.  Since Italian boots first touched ground in the Ukraine in 1941, over 30,000 Italians were killed in battle, 21,000 of those coming during Operation Little Saturn.  Another 54,000 would die in the hellholes of Russian POW camps.  Only 45,000 of the 130,000 Italian troops who had been encircled during Operation Little Saturn were able to make good their escape.  By February of 1943 the Eighth Italian Army was only a shell of what it had previously been.  Benito Mussolini would quietly have the survivors withdrawn back to Italy by the end of that month. 

Back home, Fascist leaders tried to keep the full horror of what had transpired on the Eastern Front from the Italian populace.  This would prove to be an impossible task.  The anger that grew in the civilian population over what many considered the incompetence of the regime in their management of the Eastern Front was perhaps greater than any other event or time during the war.  Many Italians wondered how their leaders could send these men to fight without the proper equipment or materials to have a legitimate chance at victory.

It could be said that the destruction of the Eighth Italian Army in conjunction with the imminent collapse of the Italian troops fighting in North Africa all but broke the spirit of the Regio Esercito.  With the Regia Marina and Regia Aeronautica worn down from years of conflict on and above the Mediterranean and North Africa, Italy was now more than ever a prime target for the Allied juggernaut that would soon strike it.

Back on the Eastern Front, the Germans once again proved themselves on the field of battle.  While Operation Saturn was highly effective, it did not achieve all of its set goals due in large part to the actions of the German military.  Although the destruction of the German 6^th Army was monumental, Hitler and his generals still felt they could prove victories in Russia.  That summer of 1943 the two sides would face off in the titanic Battle of Kursk, the largest tank battle of all time.  The German Panzers proved their superiority against the best tanks the Soviets had when measured against each other one on one, but the Soviets had just too many men and machines to throw at the German forces.

The Soviets halted the German advance that initiated their offensive the battle, and then delivered a devastating counter-offensive of their own.   It would be Hitler this time, as the German assault failed to achieve the necessary early gains, who called off his troops against the wishes of many of his generals.  In addition, the Allied landings in Sicily that took place shortly after the Battle of Kursk began compelled him to send forces south to help stop the Allied drive.  The Soviets would renew their advance, and over the next two years would continue to drive westward until their flag flew over the Reichstag in Berlin the spring of 1945.  

The campaign on the Eastern Front emphasized a common theme that ran through the entire war for Italy; incredible acts of bravery demonstrated by the fighting troops on the battlefield who were eventually let down by their leaders’ lack of planning and material support.  It is unfortunate so many had to pay such a high price for the failure of so few, but the memory of their sacrifice will stand as an eternal  testament to the fighting spirit of Italy.

End Part 3 of 3

TJ Nicoletti

Few Returned:  28 days on the Russian front:   Eugenio Corti, Peter Edward Levy
Italian Army, 1940-1945:   Philip Jowett
War without Garlands: Barbarossa 1941/42:  Robert Kershaw
Stalingrad:  Anthony Beevor
World War II Magazine article with Albano Castelletto
Wikipedia Articles
Tucker, Spencer Encyclopedia of World War II
The Sergeant in the Snow by Rigoni Stern

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Strong interest in WW2. My Father served in the Pacific with 710 Tank BTL at Anguar, Peleliu, and Philippines. Grandfather was in Italian Army shortly after WW1.

Peleliu81

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