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Reassessment of Italian Combat Prowess


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Rickusty,

Your post is like reading the long abstract for a Military History Senior Seminar in the topic. Well done!

All,

While I claim no great expertise in the WW II Italian military, though I respect the bravery and devotion to duty of the Italian soldier, I most definitely have an informed opinion on the assertions that Spec Ops units are natural habitats for sociopaths and that sociopaths form the bulk of war heroes.

I believe the premise to be fundamentally false. I do believe, though, that sociopaths are easier to train to kill than ordinary civilians who require fundamental reprogramming (basic training,boot camp, etc.) in order to do the brutal work of war.

While sociopaths do indeed make great killers in wartime, they are lousy team players and care only for themselves. Such people don't last long in battle, once their comrades note this, and note it they do. Even Spetsnaz doesn't let in such people. Indeed, it rejects them out of hand. I know of no military force which screens for sociopaths/psychopaths, as in wanting them, though I have no doubt other entities do for certain tasks.

But if a live grenade lands in a group of soldiers, and someone must dive on it to save the rest, the sure bet is the sociopath absolutely won't do it, unless it's for some personal, self-aggrandizing reason. Generally speaking, sociopaths will put personal welfare above the welfare of the group, the antithesis of the team mentality every military instills from the get.

The super aggressive, devil may care Type A personalities, though, found in many Spec Ops units have often demonstrated difficulties restraining their more extreme behaviors.

That said, I think it may be fairly argued that the very personality types frequently attracted to Spec Ops tend to have some real control issues. The hard-charging stop at nothing mentality which is wonderful in combat doesn't do wonders on the domestic front at home, and combat seems to only exacerbate the problem. I've long heard of such things, but here's what the NY times had to say. It's worth reading.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/15/us/15vets.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

On a more disturbing note, we have the apparent"murder and mayhem" squad operating against the IRA in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2252237/The-murder-mayhem-squad-Shocking-new-revelations-undercover-soldier-carried-shoot-ask-questions-later-attacks-IRA-terrorists-British-Army.html

And on that seem, and most certainly worse, we have what appears to be very scary Delta Force lethal action against American citizens at Waco, Texas. For the record, I've seen the referenced FLIR imagery, and it's quite clear to me the shooting is going into the house and that people coming out of the house are being shot. This piece makes some telling insider points about the differences between Delta Special Operators and other ones. (Sidebar and not at link) BTW, the FLIR analyst who was to testify turned up dead and all his notes and video tapes were gone. The rest is even more bizarre.

http://www.apfn.org/apfn/secretmilitary.htm

There was also some CW S.A.S. unit disbanded over necklacing (tire, gas, match) in Africa. Can't find specifics.

As horrible as the above is, I'd venture to say that virtually every man in these units, upon entry, showed no sociopathic ideation in the psych screening. Could some game the system? Yes! I was assaulted by a sociopath who got through a very extensive psych battery over child custody.

Regards,

John Kettler

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From 1919 to 1935 the German army was limited to 100000 men with no conscription. There is a severe limit on the number of men who can have military experience with an army that size.

Except that the Reichswehr was accepting men, training them for two years, and then releasing them back into the civilian sector, thus creating an unofficial reserve of trained soldiers who were among the first to be called up once conscription was reintroduced. They formed the cadres of the new divisions. Privates became NCOs and sergeants became commissioned company grade officers.

Michael

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Yes, but the success of the French campaign is (partly) attributable to the execrable actual performance of the French high command, and who thought what before hand is not really relevant.

True enough, except for the slight problem that even the Germans were scared (respectful?) of the French military.

If the Germans had gone ahead with Schliefen 2.0 in 1940, as they had fully intended to, then this discussion thread would be full of comments about how wonderful the French mobile forces were, how far sighted and correct the French war plans were, and how inept the Germans were.

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Except that the Reichswehr was accepting men, training them for two years, and then releasing them back into the civilian sector, thus creating an unofficial reserve of trained soldiers who were among the first to be called up once conscription was reintroduced. They formed the cadres of the new divisions. Privates became NCOs and sergeants became commissioned company grade officers.

Michael

You need to do the maths to work out how significant that was(n't)...

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Figure an effective turnover of ~25,000 per year, for ten years, less some natural attrition, plus a residual at the end of the Versailles limited period, gives you about 250,000 trained pers by the mid/late 1930s. That's enough for 25 divisions fully manned, or enough to provide cadres for about 200 divisions.

Seems fairly significant to me.

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Yeah you.re dead wrong Malan, sorry.

The Germans purposefully got around the Versailles Treaty a number of ways. First of all was creating fictitious organizations within the TruppenAmt. They also had a 'black Reichswehr' that operated in Russia, and in Germany. This was fairly small but significant nonetheless. They nationalized the airlines, and ordered airline routes over exercise areas to get troops used to planes around. Obviously everyone knows about the glider schools, and former pilots from WW1 were obviously flying those airliners over the exercises.

Though they officially couldnt have tanks, they still conducted exercises with fake ones, the tank crews using bicycles with wood sides (painted to look like tanks) etc.

All of this was great and not even the crux of Von Seeckts workaround which was first cross training of two sorts - a lot of people learned some about other specialties, and in general everyone was supposed to be able to conduct their immediate superior's job if needed. This would be a huge boon when the nation mobilized obviously.

Second, as stated above many troops were allowed to retire somewhat early. IIRC the enlistment minimum was like 10 or 12 years and many were allowed to leave at 7 years and become 'reserves'. Of course reserves were officially verboten but they were added to secret lists.

The Germans were hugely concerned during the 1920s, it wasnt necessarily a nefarious plan to make the Wehrmacht you see in WW2 - the armor doctrine, Blitzkrieg stuff really comes in the 1930s. But you see the massive expansion in size of what becomes the Wehrmacht in the 1920s, with the clever ways around Versailles. The French incursion in 1923 had some demanded a 'Peoples War', much like the Francs Tireurs they complained so much about in 1914, but on a more massive scale. More prudent voices won the day. There was also a static warfare movement, but it is much to the secret general staff's credit (TruppenAmt) that they foresaw the next war to be a war of movement. So they planned the beginnings of the Blitzkrieg doctrine, and then built the weapons around it. Or planned them anyways.

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Yeah you.re dead wrong Malan, sorry.

The Germans purposefully got around the Versailles Treaty a number of ways. First of all was creating fictitious organizations within the TruppenAmt. They also had a 'black Reichswehr' that operated in Russia, and in Germany. This was fairly small but significant nonetheless. They nationalized the airlines, and ordered airline routes over exercise areas to get troops used to planes around. Obviously everyone knows about the glider schools, and former pilots from WW1 were obviously flying those airliners over the exercises.

This mostly relates to LW pilots not Army. The cooperation with Russia only lasted from the early 20's to 1933 (Hitler stopped it)

Though they officially couldnt have tanks, they still conducted exercises with fake ones, the tank crews using bicycles with wood sides (painted to look like tanks) etc.

Indeed they did - how does this affect the NUMBER of troops trained?

All of this was great and not even the crux of Von Seeckts workaround which was first cross training of two sorts - a lot of people learned some about other specialties, and in general everyone was supposed to be able to conduct their immediate superior's job if needed. This would be a huge boon when the nation mobilized obviously.

See above

Second, as stated above many troops were allowed to retire somewhat early. IIRC the enlistment minimum was like 10 or 12 years and many were allowed to leave at 7 years and become 'reserves'. Of course reserves were officially verboten but they were added to secret lists.

Do the maths. Even if the entire army did 1 year and was replaced, between 1919 and 1935 you can have 1.6million men trained. The oldest of which are nearly 40 by the start of the war (assuming age 18 in 1920). In reality you can't do anything like this number (who is doing the training?) A more reasonable figure would be less than half this. In fact the figure I have indicate the following reservists from each age group.

birth year reservists and active troops in 1939

1901-1905 <10000 per year group

1906-8 10-15000 each year group

1909-1914 50,000 in 1909 group, rising by approx 50000 per year group until the 1914 group has c320k reservists and troops still in the army in 1939 (the current army figure from this group is c 40k). The 1914 group is c 90% military experienced, as they were the first hit by conscription.

This gives the following breakdown of numbers in 1939

active duty units 1.3m (great bulk fully trained)

recent released reserves 647k (these count as recent experience/fully trained)

1.2m ex WW1 experience, but by definition born before 1900, i.e. 40+

808k classified as untrained

total army strength 4.1m men, 1.95m of which fully trained and <40 (or 48%)

I freely admit that by May 1940 most of the untrained 800k above will have completed personal training, however in the mean time Germany raised another 43 divisions, which will not have trained at the unit/command level.

I am not saying the German army was bad. Just not as monolithic and good as popular myth. Panzergruppe Kleist had no equals in effectiveness (literally), and the initial follow up units were also good, but after that you hit rather less good. If the French had not fallen for the sucker punch, the quality of the troops of the 2 armies that were engaged would have been a lot less different. The quality of the command systems however is a completely different point.

The Germans were hugely concerned during the 1920s, it wasnt necessarily a nefarious plan to make the Wehrmacht you see in WW2 - the armor doctrine, Blitzkrieg stuff really comes in the 1930s. But you see the massive expansion in size of what becomes the Wehrmacht in the 1920s, with the clever ways around Versailles. The French incursion in 1923 had some demanded a 'Peoples War', much like the Francs Tireurs they complained so much about in 1914, but on a more massive scale. More prudent voices won the day. There was also a static warfare movement, but it is much to the secret general staff's credit (TruppenAmt) that they foresaw the next war to be a war of movement. So they planned the beginnings of the Blitzkrieg doctrine, and then built the weapons around it. Or planned them anyways.

Yes, the Germans were very concerned in the 1920's. But this was not fixed by training the youngsters particularly. They viewed their 100,000 man army as the cadre round which they would recall the ww1 veterans, who would only have been 20-35 at the time.

And, lest we (I!) forget, the whole point of this is to compare 1940 German army to 1944. There was a view that 1940 was undoubtably better. I put it to you that this is not a forgone conclusion...

Is it too much to hope that people dont repeat popular wisdom on this thread and use sources? I have cited my main one.

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Actually the whole point was Italian combat prowess. I never engaged in the 1940 Wehrmacht vs 1944 - I find the debate dead silly.

And your wrong about the LW pilots in Russia. Yes LW pilots trained there, but also A LOT of army armor training went on Kazan. I suggest you read The Roots of Blitzkrieg by Corum. It covers this whole period. And what do you mean only 1920-1933? 13 years is a long time...

When I said the TruppenAmt was very concerned in the 1920s it was because they felt sure of a war was imminent with either France (1923), or Poland, or Czechloslovakia. The rest comes later, the 1920s sees Germans attempt to build a force to deal with these threats, and ways to rapidly expand their military if needed, and get modern training and doctrine in despite the Versailles Treaty.

This is why for example they purposefully retained officers like Ernst Volckheim, because he had perhaps the most armor experience of anyone in the German Army at that time, by virtue of his WW1 combat. Since Volckheim couldn't be a Panzer leader at the time, they retained him in other capacities, though he wrote many articles about armored warfare and secretly helped form the Panzer units and training.

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Do the maths. Even if the entire army did 1 year and was replaced, between 1919 and 1935 you can have 1.6million men trained. The oldest of which are nearly 40 by the start of the war (assuming age 18 in 1920). In reality you can't do anything like this number (who is doing the training?) A more reasonable figure would be less than half this. In fact the figure I have indicate the following reservists from each age group.

birth year reservists and active troops in 1939

1901-1905 <10000 per year group

1906-8 10-15000 each year group

1909-1914 50,000 in 1909 group, rising by approx 50000 per year group until the 1914 group has c320k reservists and troops still in the army in 1939 (the current army figure from this group is c 40k). The 1914 group is c 90% military experienced, as they were the first hit by conscription.

This gives the following breakdown of numbers in 1939

active duty units 1.3m (great bulk fully trained)

recent released reserves 647k (these count as recent experience/fully trained)

1.2m ex WW1 experience, but by definition born before 1900, i.e. 40+

808k classified as untrained

total army strength 4.1m men, 1.95m of which fully trained and <40 (or 48%)

I freely admit that by May 1940 most of the untrained 800k above will have completed personal training, however in the mean time Germany raised another 43 divisions, which will not have trained at the unit/command level.

You're asking people for cites when discussing general and well-known issues, and yet don't provide a cite when providing specific numbers, such as above??

In general this is a forum, not a research treatise, so personally I don't expect for every contention in every post to be backed by citations, but I do think it appropriate to provide citations when citing very specific information/figures, as you have done.

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I am sorry, I obviously didn't make myself clear. I am still using my original source cited earlier (Blitzkrieg Legend, Frieser. Naval Institute Press 2012, but avaloable in German in the mid 90's)

And I usually do not ask for (or even quote myself) sources. In this case, the debate had got to stalemate with people giving opposite opinions to JasonC. I thought that people would be interested in a few facts, and provided sources to substantiate my position. However, the myth of German universal military professionalism is so all pervading that I am obviously not achieving anything. I will duck out.

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Rickusty,

You're welcome! Italian logistics did have lots of problems, but Commando Supremo did a pretty good job of keeping Rommel supplied, even when he went swanning off without permission and to the consternation of those charged with keeping his forces going. Had Regia Marina had an adequate fuel supply, there is no doubt it would've hurt the British a lot worse than they were. Had the Germans seized Malta, in the planned, but cancelled, Operation Hercules, then the British would've probably been forced out of the Med altogether. I believe their next base had Alexandria fallen (a given if the Med became untenable because Rommel got most of his supplies), then they planned to retire to Aden. Recall, too, how overstretched the British were in the Med, and de la Penne's guys didn't help!

If you haven't read it, may I commend to your attention THE BLACK PRINCE, by Borghese? He ran Decima X during the war, and it was his unit which put the hurts on the Brits at both Alexandria and Gibraltar. A first rate book!

Regards,

John Kettler

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However, the myth of German universal military professionalism is so all pervading that I am obviously not achieving anything.

hmm, not sure how you've come to that conclusion (er, no citation). I've read the book that you've cited and found it very interesting and well-argued. That said, I long since gave up trying to understand who was trying to prove what in this thread, so it is difficult to say what the book demonstrates in the context of this thread.

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To dt and his usual willful missing of the point, strawmen etc - no the Italian armed forces of WW II did not blow chunks because they lost, though the separate entirely objective fact that the Italian armed forces of WW II blew chunks undoubtedly contributed to their losing their little bit of the war. The Italian armed forces of WW II blew chunks because they up and blew chunks, of their own free screwed up will and (lack of) ability.

Find me the other modern army that defends with a 6 to 1 advantage and loses its entire force inside of 2 months. We are talking world historical chunk blowing. Chunks flying off the ceiling hard enough to knock a man down. They sucked. The only reason it took them so long to lose completely is their ally didn't, so much at least. Clear enough?

Next on Sailor Malan and his "struggle", again we have straw men and dodges. The failings of the Italian military of WW II were multilayered and multifaceted, as well as epic. Everything blew chunks. The generalship, the plans, the equipment, the training, the motivation - above all the actual combat performance. Our Italian friend noted in passing on the subject of the motivation line item, that "The hearts of the soldiers was not much in the war, the population didn't believe in it..." And this is certainly true.

Now, here is the thing. If even they who blew chunks had that much sense, at the time, why should Italians today lack even that much sense? Why should a modern Italian run around looking for ways to mitigate the epic chunk-blowing failures of a military he had nothing to do with, generations ago, that even subjects of a brutal nationalist tyrant had the sense not to take seriously? Why are contemporary Italians taking it more seriously today, than men back then did at the time? What conceivable motive is there? The Italian armed men of WW II knew that the Italian army of WW II wasn't worth a hangnail - why are their grandsons stupider on the point?

Hint, it starts with N and ends with ism...

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A bigger example of misdirection or probably lack of comprehension is mind-boggling. I thought the comments on the Italian WW2 performance so far had been fairly unanimous in saying how poorly overall it had fought. Perhaps more usefully Rickusty has provided reasons and insights other than "blows chunks".

It has also been noted that parts of the Italian forces performed very well. How this equates to " Hint, it starts with N and ends with ism..." requires a huge and tortuous stretch.

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"How this equates to " Hint, it starts with N and ends with ism..." requires a huge and tortuous stretch."

It isn't anything about the WW II Italian military that prompts my hint, above. It is the contemporary longing to find something, anything, in the way of military prowess, in the worst military performance of any power's military in modern times, that prompts that hint. Not to put too fine a point on it, the reason people are bending over backwards looking for an imaginary prowess that is not there, is their entirely contemporary nationalist ideology thinks finding some would be important - to them, now. Hint, it isn't actually of any importance whatever, now. Also, it wasn't there, back then.

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JasonC,

Decades ago I learned a neologism from Robert Anton Wilson. Sombunall. Some, but not all, are/do/look like/behave XX, etc. Thus, sombunall Italian leaders and soldiers were military incompetents, disastrous leaders, logistically hopeless, cowardly, etc. To slag the ones who knew what they were doing, and did it despite the overwhelming tide against them, is unfair. Even the Germans admitted the Italians fought well under tough circumstances, at times outperforming the Germans. Nor does the Wiki on Regia Aeronautica paint a picture of gutless boobs. Quite the contrary.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regia_Aeronautica

On balance, I think sweeping generalizations do not present the full picture. What would've happened had equivalent U.S. aviation forces, with equivalent aircraft and training, been put into such a demanding combat environment and the awful supply jam that not only exacerbated all existing problems but ground down Regia Aeronautica almost certainly faster than combat did?

I'd also argue the Regia Marina's submarine force acquitted itself well, if the data here are correct.

http://italianmonarchist.blogspot.com/2012/05/sommergibili-of-regia-marina.html

I think Doenitz would've been well pleased with a U-Boat which produced sinkings like what the Da Vinci achieved--17 sinkings, of which 13 were well north of the highly desirable 5000t mark. This was the best-performing Italian submarine of the war.

http://www.regiamarina.net/sub_actions.asp?nid=194&lid=1

I knew zip squat about Italian submarine ops except the Decima Mas stuff and that decades ago I saw that official Italian histories of their sub ops existed. The Da Vinci sank 149,828 tons of shipping in one year!

Regards,

John Kettler

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Rickusty,

You're welcome! Italian logistics did have lots of problems, but Commando Supremo did a pretty good job of keeping Rommel supplied, even when he went swanning off without permission and to the consternation of those charged with keeping his forces going. Had Regia Marina had an adequate fuel supply, there is no doubt it would've hurt the British a lot worse than they were. Had the Germans seized Malta, in the planned, but cancelled, Operation Hercules, then the British would've probably been forced out of the Med altogether. I believe their next base had Alexandria fallen (a given if the Med became untenable because Rommel got most of his supplies), then they planned to retire to Aden. Recall, too, how overstretched the British were in the Med, and de la Penne's guys didn't help!

If you haven't read it, may I commend to your attention THE BLACK PRINCE, by Borghese? He ran Decima X during the war, and it was his unit which put the hurts on the Brits at both Alexandria and Gibraltar. A first rate book!

Regards,

John Kettler

Hello John,

yes that book is really interesting, and what a "character" Borghese was.

In fact, as I pointed out before, some posts ago, I think (my opinion and some other more knowledgable naval historians than myselr , take it as it is please!) is that the biggest feat of the Regia Marina, apart from its elite units as the X Mas, was the achievement of sending supplies, tanks, men and other valuable stuffs down there to Libya. The fight in the Central Mediterranean was hard, but both sides got a beating.

If we want to talk about "pure" surface, daylight and night naval battles between similiar vessels, we can say that the Royal Navy most of the time had the edge.

The underwater war instead was even, the British and Italian (and later German) subs all had sensible losses.

Both Axis and Allied Air forces fought well IMO, the Royal Air Force sinking a lot of cargos, the Luftwaffe and Regia Aeronautica trying to cover axis shipping while attacking when the large allied convoys passed through it.

The Regia Marina' strategy of sending to Libya (and later Tunisia) very small convoys but very often was a strategically sound decision, given the low numbers of cargos available, the powerful Royal Navy which and the forces involved.

And we should not forget that ULTRA played such an important role in the war.

After all, for 3 years, the Regia Marina was able to supply decently the italian and german forces in Africa.

This maybe was the biggest achievement of the Regia Marina.

The decision of not taking Malta was really inexplicable.

It must be said though that Kesselring and the Italian Comando Supremo were in favour of taking Malta in the summer of 1942, against the will of Rommel and ultimately Hitler and Mussolini, who decided to try to continue the advance on Alexandria.

And to see two good units as the "Folgore" Div. and the "Ramcke" Brig being used as normal infantry in the desert just showed what a gamble the decision was in that time.

JasonC, I agree with you generally. And I even think we can all agree on the fact that the italian armed forces didn't really shine or fight well in the last world war.

I don't know if your comment about the "italians of today" was directed at me.

But I can say that really, I have nothing to gain from this.

In fact, nobody pays me to say otherwise, I am not a nationalist at all,I lived and studied in Canada, worked in Russia and for my work I meet and see everyday people from all the world.

I really consider myself a citizen of the world.

It's just that I am really interested in the history of our armed forces. Maybe because many of my relatives fought there, told stories, or maybe since I was 10 and started to buils my first model kits or whatever. Another passion of mine is the history of the Greek armed forces in ww2 and the battles against these 2 armies in Albania-Greece in 1940-41. I am a close friend and collaborator to a Greek historian and publisher as well.

I think that in a discussion forum like this, it is quite interesting and useful to try to "asses" (after all, the title of this thread is named after this verb) and to "see" why it was like that, where the problems originated.

To try to see as well what units were not behaving badly and to see , apart from the failures (of which, there were so many...) where and how some units achieved a success (call it moderate, modest or other). Possibly with a critical and curious mind.

The Air-naval battles against the convoy "Harpoon" of Middle-June 1942 was a tactical success.

The 1st and 2nd naval battles of Sirte were not victories for the Allies. We can call it a draw. In some cases, convoys which were protected were able to fulfill their missions.

Capo spartivento battle as well.

Operation Vigorous was a tactical and strategical victory for the Regia Marina.

Or, as we said, the feats of the airborne troops, the torpedo bombers' pilots, the alpine troops.

The losses were more than the victories, for sure, in many battles the losses were heavy (and inexplicable sometimes...),and that's why the war was lost (and luckily so...), but why we could just overlook the reasons for this , the times actions and battles were actually won (or quite so..), if we want to talk about the italian armed forces in this thread?

The aerial-naval battles in the Mediterranean were bloody and difficults.

But it's also very interesting to note that between the British and the Italians there has been, generally speaking and in given cicrumstances, a sense of chivalry in fighting the last war.

The italian forces in Eastern Africa fought so well, that they were famously given the permission by the British to parade with still their weapons even as prisoners, Duke of Aosta ahead of his men.

The Regia Aeronautica and the Royal Air forces' HQs in Malta, shared between them informations about pilots who were missing in the first months of the war.

The Folgore Division had many praises , and even the man who sunk the Valiant in Alexandria, Luigi Durand De la Penne, had his "Golden medal" appointed to him by the commanding officer of the Valiant himself, Adm. Morgan after the war, in the Taranto naval base.

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Lurking around among the vastness of internet, I found out something which could be quite interesting to read for those interested.

From the website "Lone Sentry" I found out two interesting small articles from the US Army's "Tactical and Technical Trends" series published during the war.

1) The Italian soldier

The first paragraph reads:

"...One of the first things to remember about the Italian soldier is that he entered this war without any strong personal conviction that it was necessary. Italy had no Pearl Harbor to unite her people and fill them with a relentless determination to win. A private belief of this kind can go a long way toward helping men to withstand the heavy psychological strain of combat. The American soldier has it; the Italian does not. As a result, a question commonly asked by American troops--"Is the Italian a good or bad fighter?"--cannot be answered in a single word. The Italian knows how to fight well. What offsets this is the fact that his moods are anything but predictable..."

2) Italian small-scale counterattacks

The short article begins with:

"...The inferiority of the Italian to the German Army is apt to obscure certain Italian qualities which it would be unwise to ignore. Among these is the skill and promptitude of Italian small-scale counterattack from prepared positions. During the battle of Keren in Eritrea, for example, the Italians, through this tactic, succeeded more than once in dislodging the British from newly taken positions.

Since many junior Italian officers have not been sufficiently trained, these counterattacks do not always materialize. But, whenever the junior officer happens to be well trained and keen, he may prove to be a formidable opponent, and preparation to meet such action should be taken whenever fighting against the Italians...."

Both quite interesting as they somehow reconnect to a post I wrote some days ago, where I pointed out that ,generally speaking, the "will to fight" was really scarse on the whole, but also pointing out about the curiousness of the small-team mentality among the italian armed forces (small army elite units like the "Folgore", small trained torpedo flying squadrons like, small naval intruders' units like the "Xth Mas") and the imagination in creating small ad-hoc units, with a far higher standard of skill and training compared to the huge mass of unskilled and untrained (and demoralised) mass of infantry.

Also here, again from the same US Army's "Tacnical and Technical trends" series, there's an interesting article which discuss about the Italian Army Organization in North Africa and the peculiarity to create these kind of units.

At the end of the small article, it's written:

"... "Groups"

Another feature of Italian organization which is worthy of mention is the passion for forming "raggruppamenti," or groups. This is a method of providing, for instance, a headquarters and administrative detachment for various independent batteries of artillery which are meant to operate together. Another example is provided by such formations as the "Raggruppamento Celere Africa Settentrionale" or "RACAS" (North Africa Mobile Group) which is a force of armored cars, mechanised infantry, portee guns and light tanks. The use of "raggruppamenti" is evidence of the Italian bent for improvisation and the desire to break the back of a rigid system of tables of organization."

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