South Yorkshire Times – Saturday 18 September 1943

The Battle of Italy

Italy’s surrender, a very considerable achievement for the United Nations, is not fundamentally minimised by the violent reaction of Germany to this defection. Some of the armistice conditions exacted from the Italians are stultified for the time being, but it was hardly to be expected that Hitler would stand complacently by and watch his enemies streaming into position on his southern flank. It is a score to the Allies, however, that he has been compelled to do now what he evidently was unwilling to do at the time of his last meeting with Mussolini. On that occasion it is presumed the Duce asked for more direct assistance, came empty handed away from the conference, and was discredited. Now the divisions the Fuehrer declined to send to help Italy he must furnish to hold the country. In fact it appears that Germany plans to wage a full scale campaign on Italian soil as a delaying expedient. Italy will be the chief sufferer by this decision.

Our own purpose is to come to grips with the Nazis as closely as we can, to weaken and ultimately destroy their power to make war, and in the end to bring them to bay on their own soil and utterly defeat them. Thus it is clear that in electing to come out in force and meet us in Italy the German army is merely postponing the day when its own homeland will become a battlefield. What strength it uses now will have to be deducted from the resources available for the last, the decisive clash.

The events of the past week will have a salutary effect on those who are ever ready at the first sign of improvement in Allied fortunes to outstrip actuality with optimistic assumption. The Germans have shown that they can still move quickly and act decisively. Their propaganda may be ahead of their performance, but there is no doubt that they have made very skilful adjustments to meet an awkward situation. The coup which, if their claims are correct (and there is no evidence to the contrary) gave them Mussolini as a pin on which to hang a resurrected Fascism was a smart one. Most, if not all the Italians’ British prisoners seem likely to be under their control, and they appear to be dealing with ruthless success with such opposition as the Italian armed forces and civilian population have offered. On the other hand the loss of the Italian fleet is a heavy blow to their prestige and their position in the Mediterranean. It considerably increases our freedom of action, and gives us an immensely valuable margin for the vast amphibious operations which lie ahead.

What emerges most clearly from developments since Italy came out of the war is that this unhappy country will provide the arena for the first full scale encounter between Nazi and Anglo-American forces. But this decision to make a fight for Italy does not absolve Germany from the need to keep a watch in the West. Allied pressure is piling up; for the Nazis the breaking point is appreciably nearer.