Upcoming Conference…

On the 18th and 19th of July King’s College London will be holding the following conference:

Allied Fighting Effectiveness in North Africa and Italy, 1942 – 1945

As the call for papers says this conference will seek to evaluate the role the Mediterranean theatre played in the the Second World War.

Issues of Allied strategy aside, academic attention to the Mediterranean Theatre of Operations during the Second World War has not been commensurate with the scale and significance of the military operations conducted therein. Compared with other major campaigns of the conflict, most notably that of France and Northwest Europe during 1944-5, there has been a lesser focus in recent years on the issue of Allied fighting effectiveness at the operational and tactical levels of war in the North African, Sicilian and Italian campaigns. Yet the breadth of operational and tactical experiences encountered in these campaigns was perhaps uniquely broad; each campaign full of contrasts. For example, battles in Italy could be characterised by a degree of attrition more common to 1916 than the Second World War; they could be static and bloody affairs which involved protracted efforts to break strongly-held defensive positions. Over the course of the campaign in Italy alone the British Army sustained more casualties than in any other theatre during the war. On the other hand, these campaigns witnessed bold amphibious strokes, accompanied by the innovative application of force in complex joint and combined operations. New approaches were evolved and refined at the operational and tactical levels of warfare; it was in these campaigns that the Allies learnt much of their trade before the invasion of Northwest Europe in mid-1944. Encompassing the major campaigns of North Africa, Sicily and Italy from operation ‘Torch’ to the end of the war in Europe, this conference seeks to explore the intriguing dichotomy of the nature of battle in the Mediterranean theatre, whilst helping to emphasise its significance to the study of Second Word War military history.

The conference will explore the following key themes:

• Tactical effectiveness: doctrine, training and experience; combined arms tactics; urban and mountain warfare; technology; morale and combat psychology.
• Operational art; command, control and communications; logistics.
• The war in the air: the counter-air battle, the employment of tactical airpower; the effectiveness of air-to-ground operations.
• Naval operations, specifically the development and evolution of amphibious technique.
• Intelligence, propaganda, partisans and irregular warfare.
• Inter-Allied cooperation and aspects of coalition warfare.

This should be an interesting conference and if you have an interest in the war you should come an listen to some of the papers.

 

Ross

Review of James Holland’s “ITALY’S SORROWS”

In many ways James Holland’s new book, Italy’s Sorrow: A Year of War, 1944-45 is a very excellent book.

The absolute horror that civilians experienced as the front line moved throughout the Italy in 1944 is described in detail. The military analysis is balanced with Italian, Allied and Axis perspectives. The combination of solid military analysis and the inclusion of a multiplicity of perspectives make this book excellent.

It comes really as no surprise that for each moment that the front line was in movement, and thru each village it passed, the citizens of those in the general are were subject to abject horrors. The surprise is that Holland transcends the normal boundaries of military history to include the perspective of the non-combatants. Refreshingly, the fears and attitudes of Italian non-combatants, partisans and soldiers alike are featured equally. Their recollections are forceful and don’t always fit neatly with the historical narrative we think we know. Italy was having a near all out civil war after the collapse of the government in Rome. Italy was under the aegis of three different governments: the mafia infested allied occupational government in the south, Axis occupational government in the north and of course, the rump puppet government of Mussolini, the Salo Republic.

But, if you were a civilian living astride the front line you had more pressing problems than who was in charge where. You would be very lucky if the war would move through your town or village in a day or maybe two days. There would be shelling, there would be death – but it would be over quick.

If you were unlucky, like those that lived in Casino or in other places up and down the Italian peninsula, the war would stall in your town or village for not one or two days but months or weeks. When this stall occurred the destruction was usually complete, 90% – 100% of structures destroyed in a given area, not to mention the loss of life and the horrendous conditions of living in a war zone. Your home would be destroyed; your livelihood gone and many, many friends and family would be killed.

Holland brilliantly follows several Italian families who experienced this passing of the front. The recollections about those killed by ordinance that has not yet exploded or the feeling of utter confusion of wandering through a battlefield in the absence of information attempting to reach safety, but knowing full well, that any second could be the last for you and your family, all make for harrowing reading.

Civilians faced danger from the air, from both allied and axis aircraft, danger from ground troops, incessant shellfire, land minds and extreme German anti-partisan laws that legalized killing anyone for any reason.

Soldiers, at least generally, have access to food, water, medical attention and information. Civilians on the battlefield, generally, have none of these things in quantity. These elements of the civilian experience of war are often under explored in history and military history books, yet they are at the forefront of Holland’s history. For this, he deserves much credit for these eye opening accounts of Italy’s Sorrow.

Sir Max Hastings Speaks at Pritzker Library

Recently, Sir Max Hastings appeared at the Pritzker Military Library in Chicago. Hastings was present to discuss his new book RETRIBUTION: THE BATTLE FOR JAPAN, 1944-45.  RETRIBUTION was reviewed by Jonathan Beard for this blog only a month.  The interview at Pritzker, conducted by Ed Tracy, is excellent. Pritzker deserves high praise for their commitment to bringing high quality scholarship to the general public using traditional events and new media transmitted on the internet.