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War In Italy, 1943-1945: A Brutal Story - Richard Lamb
Paperback Published: 1996-03-21 368 pages Amazon Sales Rank: 457496 List Price: $18.50 Lowest New Price: $10.35 (20 available) Lowest Used price: $1.90 (17 available)
Richard Lamb, one of the few Italian-speaking officers in the British Army during World War II, has relied in part on newly opened Italian archives to present a surprising and unprecedented history of the war in Italy from Mussolini's fall until the final victory. Chronicling an unbroken sequence of Nazi infamies, Lamb reveals how German troops massacred thousands of surrendering Italians in the Aegean islands, deported Italian Jews to Auschwitz, and slaughtered Italian hostages and POWs. Had it not been for Mussolini's frenzied attempts to protect his countrymen, Italy would have been treated even worse than Poland.Lamb answers important and controversial questions, such as why the Allies did not land unopposed in Italy before the Germans poured over the Brenner Pass, and why Pope Pius XII did not take a stronger stand on behalf of Jews and the victims of the Ardeatine massacre. He details Anthony Eden’s opposition to an aid for Italian partisans, and the disastrous order form the War Office that British POWs should stay in their camps. He unfolds the extraordinary stories of the Cossack settlement in the Fruili, the attempted annexation of northern Italy by de Gaulle and Tito, the contributions of the Royalist Army to the Allied cause, the Italian civilians who helped Allied POWs escape, and the German generals who failed to obey Hitler's order to "scorch" all of Northern Italy.War in Italy will long remain the most complete account ever published of one of the most terrible dramas of World War II. Similar Books
A waste of paper and time (1) - Most students of history, including those with degrees (which I doubt Mr. Lamb has) find the various topics related to World War II fascinating for a number of reasons. As a serious student of history, I was particularly drawn to this book because of the title. I expected a frank, objective historical account with a minimum of organization and coherence. Instead, I found a boring, repetitive, disorganized, personalized account full of nursery-style blasts and outbursts against individuals and groups of people. Mr. Lamb is supposedly a respected "historian" yet he violates the first golden rule of historical analysis by getting emotionally involved and showing his personal vendetta against the Germans and Fascist Italians. His diatribe of subjective remarks and unprofessional terms pop up here and there, amidts supposed facts so the reader is often fooled into believing the whole paragraph or chapter as part of an honest, objective account based on personal experience (Mr. Lamb served as a soldier in Italy fighting against the Axis) as well as research and documentation. Instead, one comes across terms such as "the hated Germans", the "Brutal Kesselring". In regards to Croats, he writes the "criminal Pavelic" or "Ante Pavelic, the terrorist" leader of Croatia. Mussolini's letter to Hitler is called "pathetic" and this goes on as I have only reached the first third of the book. I can say in all honesty I am bored with Mr. Lamb's antics and tactics to deceive the reader in his one-sided English propaganda. Apparently, all fascist Italians were "bad" and all those who sided with Badoglio or the communists were "good". One could expect a more intelligent debate from a 12 year old writing a dissertation. Mr. Lamb's black and white subjectivity comes to light when he conveniently brushes aside the murder of more than 60,000 Italian civilians by the carpet bombing tactics of the British and American air-forces, and calls the execution of "franc-tireurs" terrorists "criminal" and yet identifies communist saboteurs who shot helpless soldiers in the back while unarmed "patriots". Naturally, as a typical chauvinistic Englishman blinded by his own obedience to Queen and country (the same that subjected one fourth of the world to tyrannical rule for centuries) and by very typical English arrogance, Kesselring's decision to treat saboteurs and partisans as criminals was an inexcusable war crime, while Churchill's speech to the commons in regards to charring and flattening Italy from end to end should she stay in the Axis was an act of "liberation". Other than Mr. Lamb's amateurish writing style and obvious bias which stems no doubt from a deep-rooted inferiority complex towards his opponents in the war, I see a degree of emotional balance that should perhaps be treated before another such "historical account" is offered to the public. In short, this book, though discusses the crucial episode of WWII that dealt with the Italian campaign, is a complete waste of time and a total zero as far as objectivity and accuracy are concerned. Ironically, Mr Lamb doesn't seem to understand the difference between brigades, regiments and divisions though he served in the war. This should be an indication of his credibility and accuracy as a historian. One more from the same (1) - As we say in Brazil: Those have tongue can talk everything and Paper ( eletronic or not ) accept anything... About this subject I don't have any doubt that not just we Brazilians but nortamerican Afro descendents too cannot agree with that interpretation of history And I'll never get tired to say ...A very curious, adaptable and malleable thing is are History... Five-star, outstanding history of the politics of Italy in WWII (5) - War in Italy is well-written and excellent book - a good read! It deserves five stars, not biased reviews. This book succeeds in what it set out to do, admirably so. If you want a straight timeline, as one reviewer did, then look for a book written in that fashion. Mr. Lamb writes to inform and educate the reader about a complex situation, with many nuances and turns, and a simple chronological approach is not necessarily the best way to do it. The detailed knowledge exhibited is impressive, and Mr. Lamb fairly handles both the German and Italian aspects - if the former don't come out so well in this enterprise, it is because of the wretched nature of their actions, not Mr. Lamb. Also this is history written by someone who was actually THERE -on site at the time- and who was fluent in the language. Maybe he KNOWS a bit more than some of us looking at this so many years later? The low rating and the reasons given by some reviewers are among the most misleading I have seen on amazon - look at the reviews in the press and academia by the real experts! Good Overview of Neglected Front of WWII (1) - (actually I rate this book at 4 Stars but this webpage will not support that correction). Many Americans know that former Senator and Presidential candidate Robert Dole was badly wounded while fighting in Italy in World War 2 but know little else about the conflict there, its history having been overshadowed by the Normandy invasion and the War in the Pacific. For those with an interest in finding out more about this ignored, but important struggle of the Second War World, this book provides a good overview, particularly from the standpoint of the Italians themselves, the author having been a British military officer attached to Royal Italian Army units fighting alongside the Allies. In the wake of the defeat of Axis forces in North Africa, where Italy had played an important role, given that Libya had been its colony, the Allies as their next step launched an invasion of Sicily. After this succeeded and it became clear that the mainland of the country was imminently scheduled for invasion as well, leading military and political circles in Italy, recognizing that an Allied victory would occur in due course, decided that a change of national course was in order. Although Mussolini as the Commander or Duce of the Nation was dictator of the country, the King of Italy was still the nominal head of state and he and Field Marshal Badoglio organized a coup against Mussolini in July 1943 causing his removal from office by the Fascist supreme council. Thereafter followed 45 days of calm before the storm like limbo as Italy, still at war with the Allies, considered its next move opening up secret negotiations with the Americans while the Germans suspiciously looked on. As a result of this process, the Badoglio regime decided to surrender to the Allies and switch sides in the war in early September. The Germans, no fools, responded with alacrity to this maneuver which was badly bungled by the Italians and their Allied supporters as division after division of German troops and armor poured across the Brenner Pass from Austria into Italy as part of "Operation Axis" forcing the Badoglio's "royal government" to flee to Brindisi near the southeastern tip of the country. Simultaneously the Nazis "rescued" Mussolini from his captivity and sponsored him in the establishment of a puppet fascist "social republic" based at Salo in the far north. Real power, however, much to Mussolini's chagrin, lay with German officials throughout the country, most symbolically at Rome. Many Italian troops, although possessed of a healthy dose of national pride, were hapless in the wake of these events as they viewed obedience to the King as fit and proper, even if they had no strong political views. As a result, although many units went over to the Germans without a fight, many others put up resistance to them to one degree or another but were defeated after a short time except in Corsica and Sardinia where with the aid of the Free French the Germans were driven out. Given that Fascist Italy had been Germany's ally, however, the Germans led by their commander General Kesselring responded with the savagery that had come to be expected of them to captured Italian troops massacring thousands of unarmed POWS they viewed as traitors, both in Italy and in areas of Greece and the Balkans under Axis occupation, and shipping off 600,000 of them to concentration camps, notwithstanding the protests of Mussolini and many Italians who remained loyal to the Axis alliance. In addition, the Nazis launched a wholesale pogrom against the small Italian Jewish community relocating them in their entirety to death camps, something even Italian fascists had little stomach for. In this regard the author seeks to acquit Pope Pius XII, considering that he did the best he could to protect and shelter Jews and other potential victims of Nazi repression but that his public stance was muted under extreme duress as Hitler had made it clear that he was considering invading the Vatican with 10,000 SS troops and pillaging its riches. Calmer heads among the Germans prevailed, however, as they considered gratuitous cruelties of this type, after a certain point, to be a diversion and waste of resources from the real military struggle against the Allies and the partisans. Mussolini, in order to salvage his pride and to hopefully mitigate Germans abuses of Italians, organized a new fascist "republican" army led by General Graziani. These units, aside from the depredations of the fascist "Black Brigade" gangs in tandem with the SS against civilians considered to have partisan sympathies, had limited military success and did little to lessen German contempt for Italy which Hitler indicated should be treated "like Poland" although his personal fondness for Il Duce did result in the latter making two state visits to Germany to consult with Der Fuhrer ("The Leader") and to review and anoint new fascist divisions being organized there to which some interned Italian prisoners were allowed to join. Many of these new recruits, however, deserted at the first opportunity upon reaching their home soil. Of greater military significance than the rejuvenated fascist units, and of the Royal Italian Army that acquitted itself decently in action with the British beginning at Monte Cassino leading to the liberation of Bologna by them, was the guerrilla war launched by the partisans, largely under communist leadership. To this threat, the Germans responded, as usual, with characteristic brutality through the taking and execution of hostages and the burning down of whole villages, the most notorious being the massacre at the Ardeatine Cave in Rome in March 1944 where over 300 civilians were shot as part of the 10 to 1-later raised to 50 to 1-policy of retribution against civilians for the killing of German soldiers by "terrorists." Needless to say, such atrocities fueled widespread hatred of the Germans, who had been largely tolerated by the public before 1943, and the partisan movement took on a mass character liberating whole areas in the north and after the defeat of the collapse of the Wehrmacht's "Gothic Line" south of the Alpine region and its surrender in May 1945, captured and executed Mussolini himself. A colorful, if brutal, episode in this chronicle is the little known fact that Hitler sent several regiments of White Russian Cossacks into Northeastern Italy which he promised to them as a homeland in return for their aid in exterminating the Italian and Yugoslav partisans that were operating in this area. Although the Cossacks dealt the people they came into contact with a further dose of cruelty, they failed in their objective and they and their camp followers were forced to retreat from their ostensible promised land in an abject condition seeking at all costs to avoid coming into the custody of Soviet forces whose policy, to no surprise, was to deal summarily with such turncoats. The book is very absorbing and readable but often assumes a familiarity with Italian culture and history that most general readers don't have. Thus, for example, one is confronted with untranslated Italian vocabulary wanting of explanation. The overall style can also at times become somewhat terse and schematic, being written in the style of the staff reports and cables that the book quotes from frequently. Nonetheless, the book, both its text and the documents appended thereto, is an accessible and informative look at an important episode in the military and political history of the Second World War in Europe. I gave up at page 112 (2) - This book has a very confused time line. I read the book up to page 112 and the author only talks about Mussolini and Hitler's relationship, the Italian and German Generals and the politics. There is only implied mention of what is going on with the Allies and I don't remember Patton or Montgomery being mentioned in the first 112 pages. The book would probably appeal to someone who wanted to know the details of the politics going on inside Italy and between Italy and Germany. I was looking for a more comprehensive description of events with a single continuous timeline. |