WW2: Italy Stays Neutral speculation/RAR

[Coyote]

This is something I've wondered about for a long time.

In the lead-up to World War Two, Italy was still on relatively decent terms with the rest of the world powers, and Mussolini was frequently called upon to try to moderate Hitler as the German Chancellor became more bold and power-hungry. Right up until the shooting started, Mussolini was still regarded as a hopeful moderate, or so it seems.

I'm sure that somewhere in his egocentric mind, Il Duce knew that Italy was not prepared for war, at least not a real war. Italy had invaded Ethiopia with something resembling combined arms tactics and WMDs (gas) and was still being stalled against Ethiopian light infantry. But when World War 2 kicked off, he wanted his share of glory (and realized that if he didn't secure something, Hitler would take everything).

But I was wondering-- suppose Mussolini knew he wasn't ready and reconciled himself with that, and took another course in the war? I'm wondering what would have happened in Italy had stayed neutral, and not gotten bogged down on the Balkans and North Africa.

There were a number of companies willing to trade with the Fascist powers, and America, for one, was eager to avoid war at first. A neutral Italy would have allowed American business to trade to their hearts content with Germany by using neutral Italy as a conduit. Obviously this would have benefitted Germany and America (and other Western hemisphere businesses such as in Latin America). It also would have benefitted Italy, obviously, as the trade middleman.

Italy already had extensive holdings in North Africa-- all of Libya, for example, and a prescence in the Horn of Africa. Italy could have passed on intelligence to Germany, and cranked oil out of Libya for the Reich without much impediment. If Britain threatened the oil shipments, Italy could threaten to go to war with England and open a front in Africa.

Why would that matter? I'm thinking that if Italy had stayed neutral, then a lot of British forces in Africa may have been re-located to Europe or Australia... or they would not have gotten much by way of supplies, since Africa would be seen as 'quiet'. A threat by Italy, even a weak Italy, would give the British a sense that their already stretched-thin forces would have been stretched to the breaking point by having to contend with a suddenly-belligerent Italy. Sure, they managed to do it in real history, but in a history where Italy stayed neutral, they'd probably thank their lucky stars they didn't have a third combat theatre to deal with.

While on one hand, that means that Hitler doesn't have to get bogged down in the Balkans; he doesn't have to get distracted by sideshows in Crete, and he doesn't have to divert forces to Tunisia to form the Afrika Korps and shore up Italy. He can devote all his time and attention to smashing Russia, or trying to.

On the other hand, it also means there's no German prescence in those places. The allies can land in North Africa and have free reign. Germany and Italy might land forces in Libya and prevent the US forces from linking with British forces in Egypt, but at that point Italy may have to decide if it's going to let US forces, hostile to Germany, free crossing of its borders. Perhaps, by that time, Italy would have built up a more capable army with better weapons based off lessons their German allies learned in the Blitzkrieg, but then it seemed to me that Mussolini kept things cheap by keeping the defense budget at just slightly above 'maintain'.

How likely is it that Hitler would have willingly involved himself in the Balkans and Mediterreanean theatres if Italy had stayed out of it? Would Germany have been better served by a neutral Italy that was still open to world trade? Would Hitler have been compelled to move into North Africa and the Balkans to strategically pre-position himself from Anglo-American or Russian counterattacks, or would he have poured everything into Russia and counted on the Blitzkrieg to keep the allies too disoriented to mount a counter-offensive?

I know that Mussolini's ego pretty much forced him to attempt to fight in the ring with the heavyweights, but in this version of events let's say he had better sense and swallowed his pride and sought other, more clever, ways to be involved. What would have happened differently?

[Cecelia5578]

Well, a neutral Italy would remove a lot of the reasons for the allies getting involved in the Med in the first place, so wouldn't it make sense for them to try invading northern France in 1943? I know Shep and Skimmer have tons of useful knowledge about that idea.

[Sidewinder]

A neutral Italy would probably act like Francisco Franco's Spain. Mussolini might send a "volunteer" force to aid the Germans on the Eastern Front (see the Blue Division), but if he's smart enough to realize WWII is not a war Italy can emerge from unharmed, he'd probably turn down any requests to aid Germany on the Western Front, i.e., against the UK. If Hitler's stupid enough to continue pissing off the US, e.g., declaring unrestricted submarine warfare and letting American flagged ships become targets, or sending agents to sabotage US industries (see Operation Pastorius), the US will enter the war. US diplomats will apply pressure to Mussolini and tell him, "Knock it off!" (withdraw Italian troops from the Eastern Front, and give Allied troops free passage through Italian territory) while Soviet diplomats might add, "You're either with us, or you're against us, and if you're against us, we will rain death and destruction to you and your country- we will bring about the End of Your World." Mussolini will probably comply with the first request, but the second will be vetoed by Roosevelt/Truman and Churchill, simply because they will not want to have soldiers who can fight Germans, waste their time fighting a third-rate power whose defeat- even victory- will have marginal effect on the Germans' ability to wage war.

[lord Martiya]

I second Sidewinder, but non Cecelia5578 on the Med: Hitler still had the capabilty to use Southern France as U-Boote base and without the Italian Navy (still pretty useful for a carrierless force against a fleet using carriers), so at least a part of the naval involvement of the Royal Navy, mostly destroyers and light ships plus maybe a battleship (just in case Mussolini change his mind) would still be there to protect the convoys.

[Cecelia5578]

The Italian Navy is hardly relevant to the Allies pulling a cross channel invasion in 1943-its the landings in Sicily and mainland Italy that will bog down large numbers of Allied troops till the end of the war.

U-Boats in Southern France? Just how useful would those be?

[Sea Skimmer]

Once a U-boat entered the Mediterranean, it was essentially trapped. The currents in the Straights of Gibraltar were too strong for a submerged sub to push back into the Atlantic, and running on the surface was utterly suicidal even by 1942. Snorkeling wasn’t much better, and a dived sub snorting couldn’t make full speed anyway because, the U-boat hull forms before Type XXI weren’t optimized for performance when dived. Doenitz was strongly opposed to send any U-boats into the Mediterranean because of this, but Hitler overruled him because north Africa was basically his pet sideshow and he needed to prop up Italy.

If Italy is not in the war, then it is unlikely that more then a few dozen boats will ever operate in the Mediterranean, if any. They will not be a very significant threat. Nothing like the historic threat of U-boats, plus the whole Italian navy plus 1000 land based aircraft camped out on Sicily and Sardina.

Now meanwhile in real life between early 1941 and the invasion of Sicily allied convoys to India and the Mid East could not use the Mediterranean, instead ships had to sail independently around Africa, something which wasted a colossal amount of shipping tonnage given the extra ~10,000 miles of travel involved. With Italy not involved, then Greece isn’t occupied either, and allied shipping might well be able to make the run from Gibraltar to Suez without convoys at all. Or at least most shipping wouldn’t be. Now take that advantage, and compound it with the vastly reduced supply requirements of the British in the Mid East (though its likely far more troops will be deployed in the India-Burma theater) and the allies have effectively several million tons of extra shipping to work with.

That means they don’t have to build so many new cargo ships because they don't need as many while they are also taking fewer losses, and can thus build more escorts and landing craft. The former reducing losses even more, the latter making even more invasions possible. That means a major operation against Burma could go ahead, as was desired historically, probably kicking out the Japanese in 1943 or early 1944 at the worst, instead of early 1945.

In the European theater an invasion of France in 1943 is almost certain. The allies could have done in it in real life already, now they had even more resources to work with. Hitler has more resources to defend France with too, but no matter what he did the Atlantic wall could not have been that strong in 1943. What’s more, as I’m sure people have noticed the Russian front was going very badly by 1943, so most additional German forces would be sucked into that bottomless pit of a theater to be ground up by millions of Russians riding the T-34 swarm. Speaking of which, the swarm will be even bigger, since the allies can devote even more resources to running convoys into Russia. The PQ-17 disaster won’t happen because the much more heavily escorted convoy won’t scatter. That means no mid 1942 halt to convoys. Historically that halt was required not just because of the disaster, but because of the utterly vital need to get a convoy into Malta, which came off in Operation Pedestal.

In general while the Italian theater was a major drain on German resources, it was in most ways an even bigger drain on allied resources because of the stupid decision to invade the Italian boot. The allies had great strength, but the ability to use it depended on naval power and landing craft production, both major bottlenecks. Lots of both were pissed away into the Med while dozens of allied divisions did nothing sitting in the UK for two years.

[lord Martiya]

The Italian Navy is hardly relevant to the Allies pulling a cross channel invasion in 1943-its the landings in Sicily and mainland Italy that will bog down large numbers of Allied troops till the end of the war.

U-Boats in Southern France? Just how useful would those be?

I don't know for the U-Boats in Southern France, but the Regia Marina was a major pain in the asses of the Mediterranean Fleet and the Force H with five battleships (in theory they had six, but the Cavour was crippled early in the war and never repaired), seven heavy cruisers, seventeen light cruisers (plagued by extremely thin armour and operative doctrines made to fight and sink French destroyers who ran from light cruisers, not British destroyers who fought back until relieved by their own cruisers) and various destroyers, all packed in the best position from where intercept ships sailing from Suez to Gibraltar. After the disaster at Cape Matapan (one battleship heavily damaged by torpedo planes and one destroyer heavily damaged after escaping an hellish situation and three heavy cruisers and two destroyers sunk when Cunningham found the crippled Pola with two heavy cruisers and four destroyers in the middle of his fleet during night and recovered from the surprise) the Regia Marina was no more the treath it used to be, but until then it was still dangerous. In 1943 the Regia Marina has almost no more fuel and no air cover to protect it from carrier-based planes, that's why the supreme command didn't dared to send it to be sunk.

[Cecelia5578]

Are you British? And, if so, is there some sort of hereditary pre-occupation with southern Europe in WW2 that I am not getting?

[Samuel]

Are you British? And, if so, is there some sort of hereditary pre-occupation with southern Europe in WW2 that I am not getting?

I believe they wanted to keep it out of the hands of the Soviets when the war was over and hence needed to get the boots on the ground there. I'm pretty sure that is why Churchill was obsessed with Greece.

[Coyote]

Are you British? And, if so, is there some sort of hereditary pre-occupation with southern Europe in WW2 that I am not getting?

IIRC, Lord Martiya is Italian. So the interest is understandable.

[Coyote]

I think part of the scenario would hinge on whether or not Mussolini intends to remain neutral as long as possible, or if he is using neutrality as a way to buy time and enhance the Italian Army using the income from trade and by observing the lessons learned by the Germans.

If he stays neutral all the way through, it probably cuts the war short by a few months to a year; but opens southern Europe to postwar domination by Russia.

But if he buys time to enhance the military-- maybe by liscence-building Panzer-IVs and hiring German veterans to come in and train his men, especially the Italian submarine crews and maybe buy or build copies of the U-Boats-- then that might eventually create a nasty shock for the Allies later.

If the Allies land in North Africa and threaten to cross the borders of Libya to link with the British Army in Egypt, then Mussolini will have to pick sides. Same if the British decide that they have to occupy Greece. Or, the Allies could just force the issue about Libyan oil being used to fuel the German war machine-- Hitler, without the Ploesti oil fields to fall back on, will demand Italian control of that oil.

Also, if the Allies figure that 'neutral Italy' will allow convoys to pass through the Med, wouldn't that bottleneck at Gibraltar give the U-Boats the perfect spot to park and lay in wait? The whole route to Gibraltar would be a hunting ground.

Also, if by 1943, a neutral Italy is pushed into war (after actually preparing both men and equipment), then a professional, well-led and equipped Italian military would actually be more than just a speed bump to the Allies but a serious troublemaker.

[Sidewinder]

If he stays neutral all the way through, it probably cuts the war short by a few months to a year; but opens southern Europe to postwar domination by Russia.

That's possible, but considering Turkey's last-minute participation in WWII (see the Second Cairo Conference), I think it's possible the US and UK will back Mussolini so the future NATO members can- through Italy- convince Stalin attempting to bring Southern Europe into the Soviet sphere of influence will be more trouble than it's worth.

But if he buys time to enhance the military-- maybe by liscence-building Panzer-IVs and hiring German veterans to come in and train his men, especially the Italian submarine crews and maybe buy or build copies of the U-Boats-- then that might eventually create a nasty shock for the Allies later.

The longer the war drags on, the more obvious the Nazis will not crush the Soviets. I stand by my belief that Mussolini will continue claiming neutrality- eventually upgrading his position to strict neutrality, and cutting off all Italian aid to Germany- until the last minute (again, see Spain in WWII). Then he'll join the Allies to make himself look good, even win some aid from the US.

I doubt Italy could contribute much to aid the Nazis- or the Allies- thanks to the Alps, which are a perfect bottleneck with which to cutoff supplies and reinforcements between Italy and Germany.

[Cecelia5578]

If he stays neutral all the way through, it probably cuts the war short by a few months to a year; but opens southern Europe to postwar domination by Russia.

Does Germany still invade Yugoslavia in this instance? If not, then I fail to see how the communists will gain control of Yugoslavia post-war. Likewise, Italy holding onto Albania will make it extremely difficult for the Communists to gain power.

If the Allies do decide to land in France in 1943, then I think Italy becomes irrelevant overnight.

[lord Martiya]

IF, obviously, Italy remains what it was: a nation with a first-rate navy and a control-obsessed naval command, an air force with some very good planes and a command who insists in using biplanes (I don't care if the Fiat CR.42 was the best fighter biplane in history, against an Hurricane or a Spitfire with a pilot smart enough to not try a manouvered fight it served only to make Churchill laugh at the though of the Italian contingent in the Battle of Britain while it would be better used to protect the Italian Navy at Taranto from the Swordfishes) and a laughable army whose 'heavy' tanks were lighter than British medium tanks. If Mussolini actually used his brain and reinforced the army with real heavy tanks and better equipment and training, equipped the air force with the better Macchi C.200 and C.202 (this one with his German engine was deemed superior to the P-40 by the P-40 pilots) and Reggiane Re.2000 (RAF put an order for 300 of these, before Italy entered in war, so at least we know it was worth something in spite of its unreliable engine) and Re.2001 (basically an Re.2000 with a more reliable and more powerful engine) and gave the navy its two carriers (the never used Aquila, completed and about to be commissioned in 1942, and the never completed Sparviero), Italy could create problems. And I'm Italian, actually happy Mussolini used his balls instead of his brain and estimator of the WWII Regia Marina.

[CmdrWilkens]

If he stays neutral all the way through, it probably cuts the war short by a few months to a year; but opens southern Europe to postwar domination by Russia.

Does Germany still invade Yugoslavia in this instance? If not, then I fail to see how the communists will gain control of Yugoslavia post-war. Likewise, Italy holding onto Albania will make it extremely difficult for the Communists to gain power.

While Hitler's adventure into the Balkans probably cost him almost nothign and gained quite a bit for a short time its probably not going to happen without Italy becoming adventurous in Greece. Without that as a spark for action Hitler would likely continue to focus on Barbarossa and ignore the Balkans alltogether which means the existing Yugosalv government would not fall after having been pushed into concessions by the Germans and may have had enough staying power to get through the war unscathed. Certainly there would be no military reason for Stlain to move his troops in to the region in an attempt to force a decision and that being said an allied invasion in 1943 would be pushing against his logistical ability to reach the region before the other allies can get in to Germany so the Balkans woudl be relegated to tertiary status and forces diverted away from them. This would likely allow Bulgaria and Romania to retain their local influence and keep the Yugoslav and Greek situation under wraps as there would be no threatening Soviet troops to destabalize the situation.