An Insightful, Revisionist Look at Italian Military History

Prof. LaMonica (Delaware County CC), author of American Tactical Advancement in World War I, The 1916 War Between "Pancho" Villa and the US Army, and other works, gives us an insightful, revisionist look at Italian military history from unification during the 1860s through the Second World War.

LaMonica demonstrates that, despite being seriously hampered by strategic over-reach, industrial limitations, institutional weakness, and politicized leadership, the Italian armed forces were more effective than is usually depicted in much English language literature, influenced by wartime propaganda and superficial research. He draws on a surprisingly large volume of hitherto overlooked or ignored sources – unit war diaries, official communications and reports, memoirs, letters, and more – by British, American, other Allied, and even German soldiers and other observers, from senior commanders to frontline troops. These offer more nuanced views of the performance of Italian soldiers, sailors, and airmen, often commenting favorably on combat performance.

The book comprises six chapters, one on the period from Italian unification to the eve of World War I, one on the Great War, one on the interwar period (when Italy engaged in wars in Libya, Ethiopia, and Spain), two on World War II through September 1943, and one on the immediate aftermath of the Italian armistice.

In each chapter LaMonica reviews the operations by Italian forces, noting the causes of success and failure, the latter most often due to poor performances at the top rather than by those on the front lines or the high seas.

LaMonica spends more time on World War II than prior conflicts. His treatment of the North African Campaign offers a good example of his theme. He opens with the spectacular British success from December 1940 through February 1941, made possible by failures in organization, strategy, planning, and leadership, exacerbated by inadequate equipment and tactics. But LaMonica notes favorable comments from some British observers about the actions of some Italian units. He then goes on to show how the subsequent impressive operations by Rommel would have been impossible without Italian troops, offering many examples of fine battlefield performances. Despite these, their role is usually glossed over, and German failures were often blamed on them. At sea, while the Italian Navy comes off in most English-language accounts as inept, the fleet did manage to contest command of the seas until the Axis surrender in Tunis, keeping the supply lines to Africa open, albeit at great cost, while inflicting considerable harm to the Royal Navy

At times LaMonica actually overlooks evidence that supports his premise. For example, while he gives a good account of the course of the Battle of Guadalajara, in Spain (March 1937), he doesn’t mention that the Republicans took fewer than a thousand prisoners, hardly suggesting a panicked rout, and he fails to mention Italian successes at Santander, Valencia, and Catalonia.

Oddly, LaMonica also doesn’t look at the operations of the Italian “Co-Belligerent” armed forces, some 250,000 troops plus naval forces, including a half dozen small divisions in the British Eighth Army, who almost never get mentioned in accounts of the campaign.

Despite a lack of maps, The Italian Way of War is an essential read for anyone interested in twentieth century European military history.

---///---

Note: The Italian Way of War is also available in e-editions.

StrategyPage reviews are published in cooperation with The New York Military Affairs Symposium

www.nymas.org