Chapter 17: Six months with Mussolini
The following is excerpted from Sir David James' best-selling memoir, "The Accidental Hero."
You might think that, after my victories defending the Edinburgh Project, I would have my choice of assignments in the Intelligence Corps. However, in truth, I had very little to do. My successes in Scotland aside, I was an untrained operative. [1] I needed proper training, or I would only endanger lives and the mission. That didn't mean that I didn't hunger for a proper assignment. Training exercises seemed almost absurd after the thrills of fending off the Germans in Great Britain. Finally, in early 1944, I got my first official post in the Intelligence Corps. I was off to Amsterdam, with the cover of being a South African businessman on vacation in the Netherlands. Of course, with my cursed luck, Amsterdam fell to the Germans a few days later. I found myself a prisoner of war, but as my Afrikaans was flawless (I take to Germanic languages like a duck to water, my tutors tell me), I was not found out. My status as a neutral observer forced the enemy to treat me with respect and dignity, and offered me my choice of destinations. I chose Rome. As you will no doubt recall, I am fluent in Italian, and Rome offered me an opportunity to continue to serve my country whilst under guard.
I had no idea how successful my self-appointed mission would be. As luck would have it, Benito Mussolini himself befriended me, believing that I could return to Johannesburg and convince my brethren that supporting the Axis would result in independence and a healthy piece of British colonial possessions in the southern portions of Africa. I, naturally, encouraged those beliefs, and gradually gained the dictator's confidence. In this way, over the course of 1944 and early 1945, I gained a unique perspective on enemy plans and intentions during our regular chats.
By 16 October 1944, I was dining with Mussolini twice a week. He even, incredibly enough, set me up with an office across the hall from his, where I could conduct my "business" in South Africa without interruption or scrutiny from his staff. I remember that day clearly from the angry shouts across the corridor. I was pleased to hear that British armor was in a position to flank the Italian lines, possibly even driving all the way to Rome. Throughout the rest of October, he grew more and more agitated as he frantically tried to draw troops out of the Middle East and shift them to Italy. He was on the phone to Hitler almost every day. I recall the morning of 26 October 1944 for his screaming at his supposed ally. "I thought you were a warrior. What have you done lately except conquer Poland? It is Italy who controls France, Signore Hitler, and not you. If you hope to have any gains from glorious Italy, you had best do something about these British attacks!"
To Mussolini's initial delight, Hitler reported that he had ordered a diversionary operation. He sent a division from German bases in the Baltic Sea to cut off British supply in Brittany. Believing that stealth would win him the day, only a single division of transports sailed west that autumn afternoon. Unfortunately for Hitler's master plan, it sailed directly into
HMS Nelson and the rest of the British fleet, on patrol off the coast of Brittany. The enemy was quickly sunk. I got my first coded transmission from London in early November, the first time in some months that I'd heard from them. The transmission informed that a general offensive was planned, with a line anchored on Anzio in the west. I was to learn everything I could about Italian deployments in the region and pass them along to the British high command. I had little access to Italian planning, so there was little I could do directly, but I did play some small part in ensuring that certain supply convoys did not reach their intended destinations.
By the middle of November, our lads had pressed quickly up the Italian peninsula. Mussolini was beside himself with rage. He wept to his mistress when he thought they were alone (Mussolini really did not understand how thin the walls were), cursing the name of Hitler. She pointed out, once, that without German panzers, Rome might have already fallen. I am sorry to say I never saw the girl again. As British and American forces approached their objectives by the end of November, I expected to see Mussolini completely lose his mind. He was strangely quiet, instead, even happy at times. Mussolini was never skilled at keeping his emotions to himself (although he thought was, and none of his subordinates chose to reveal that information to him). I gently probed for information. I offered to use my business contacts in the British Embassy to negotiate a truce for the upcoming Christmas holiday, if he was amenable. Mussolini simply smiled and said that "the war would be over by Christmas." What on earth could he have meant, I wondered? My thoughts immediately went to the Edinburgh Project. Had the Italians or Germans figured out what we were up to, and worse still, copied the results? Did they have a plan to invade the British Isles again? Was that blighter Stalin planning something in Moscow? I tried in vain to learn what was happening. I found out after the war that Mussolini did not actually know what was going to happen either; Hitler had convinced him to give him operational command elsewhere while Mussolini focused on Italy.
When the attack came, beginning 17 December 1944, I was stunned. France had been so quiet for so long that I had forgotten about it. A lot of time and money had gone into the defenses at Nantes and St. Nazaire. The Loire River was supposed to be an impenetrable barrier. Hitler's heavy panzers barely even paused as they rolled across the bridges over the Loire. Without an orderly retreat, the Germans could well have flanked the Allied forces in Brittany, driving us into the sea. What was worse, I knew that we had vanishingly small transport capacity. If they did turn our flank, we were doomed, and a lot of good men would have had to surrender. Beloe, Commander of the British Third Army, stood his ground. He ordered a retreat to more defensible lines, but did not for one moment think about panicking. Beloe is an unsung hero, in my book. I still send him a fruit basket every Christmas: he may very well have saved the British Empire as we know it today. Beloe even sent me a personal telegram the day after St. Nazaire fell. He cryptically said that "I should expect some company soon." I had no idea what he was talking about at the time, and most importantly, neither did Mussolini.
The British and American campaign of early 1945 was nothing short of brilliant. Considerable credit should go to the Commander of the Operation, General Hobart of the Royal Hussars. I know that Wally Graham gets most of the attention for his daring invasions, and rightfully so, but without Hobart, there is no Wally Graham. It was Hobart who developed the campaign, and a beauty it was. Secrecy was everything. Larry Quentin of the Royal Marines (another chap who is badly underrated in our history books) was among the most feared and hated British soldiers, so we took advantage of that. Quentin leaked to the press that he was going to lead another invasion of Denmark, designed to close the Baltic and "lock up the Krauts," as he put it. He was going to use a new corps of Royal Marines to take Copenhagen, then with American support, expand from there. While Hitler shifted forces to compensate, nobody noticed that three American Marine divisions, formerly stationed on the lines in Brittany, had gone missing. Throughout January, more and more bluster came out of Quentin. Finally, on 9 February 1945, the target was revealed: Anzio. Mussolini nearly soiled himself; he could hear Allied artillery fire from his house. I was given the order to slip across to Allied lines as soon as I could for a new assignment.
I will not pretend that the Italian campaign was without complications. We very nearly lost everything when the Italians took Frosinone and Littoria, isolating the attack force at Anzio. Back in France, we suffered another heavy blow at La Ferte. But Hobart and his lads persevered. British forces were on the doorstep to Rome. As soon as Anzio was taken, I got out of Rome as quickly as I could. I visited with General Hobart, who assured me that by the end of the year, Italy would surely surrender. While Italy had never been so weak, the damned Axis had one more nasty surprise in store for us.
I might have been dining with generals, but I was sick to my stomach when I heard of the treachery of the Sauds. Promises of Persia and a further expansion of their power in Arabia compelled them to join the Axis. Instantly, our most stable theater became a nightmare scenario. If not for the desert, the Saudi forces (with plenty of German and Italian help, of course, as well as aid from Bulgaria and Hungary) could have easily swept around our completely unsecured left flank and cut off the Suez Canal. Even if the defeat of Japan made India more secure than ever before, a situation in which we lost the ability to send troops and ships to the theater at need was hardly a palatable one. The Soviets could descend upon the subcontinent at any time. All the gains we had achieved in Palestine, in Syria, in the Middle East, had to be abandoned. If we abandoned them too quickly, we might lose our defense force, but if we stayed put, the Saudis could cut us off, eventually, by traveling through the desert.
Overall, while in the most important theater, we were better off in 1945 than in 1944, the sudden strikes of Germany in France and the treachery of the Arabs in the east made the Allies more vulnerable, not less. Japan's heroic resistance against the Soviets in Korea could not last forever; either the Bear would put all of his weight on Korea, or he would pull a nasty trick of some kind and catch us off guard. It was only a matter of time. German armor was unmatched by anything we could produce. The Edinburgh Project continued to advance, but not quickly enough: our scientists promised they could begin working on prototypes in February 1946, but as far as when a workable weapon would be ready, we had no idea. Even if Rome was in more danger than it ever had been before, there was no guarantee that Italy would surrender, even if Rome did fall. The Tiber was a formidable boundary indeed, and my reports of Roman defenses were bleak, to say the least. As I waited for a new assignment, I could not help but wonder if we were negotiating some kind of end to the war.
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[1] I very nearly typed "Skotland." I've been ignoring this AAR too long, I think.
I haven't played in quite some time, but I have to say that the Saudi DOW was extremely frustrating. I kind of expected the attack on France, because I cannot answer their Heavy Armor (which you will note they also have in the Middle East). I'm trying to rebuild my transport fleet, the Edinburgh Project is taking up a huge amount of IC... it's not great. I'm technologically doing well, probably better than any country not named the US (although I don't know, intelligence wise, what I'm up against in Germany or the Soviet Union). Nobody else is building nukes, to the best of my knowledge.
The nukes are both a blessing and a curse. I have no doubt that I could nuke Rome from an airpower perspective, but that means holding off until the nuke is ready, which will probably be the end of 1947/early 1948. I finish up Civilian Nuclear Research 4 in early February, at which point I can finally research the Nuclear Bomb. Then, I have to wait for one to finish. Unfortunately, I just don't think I'm very likely to have them by the end of the game. If I do, it won't matter.
Everything hinges on Italy. Germany is still the leader of the Axis, but if I can get Italy out of the war, several good things happen. I turn the Italian army against Germany. Germany has to occupy all the territory that Italy has, which will force them to spread out, where I can start trying to take away the peripheral locations (like Norway or Denmark). If Germany pulls a significant portion of its army out of the east, the Soviets will come in force. Fair warning: if the Soviets do get involved in a serious way, that will probably signal the end of the AAR, unless Germany is an Ally by that point. Even then, I might just call it a day.
Taking Italy will be no easy task. Their National Unity is stupidly high (76.1%), and even if I took Rome, they won't quit. They're at 47.30% surrender progress, as a point of reference. VP wise, that means continuing to press up the peninsula. If I thought I could get away with it (I can't), I would pull a big chunk of forces out of France and push everything against Italy. Maybe if America sends me more expeditionary forces, I can make that happen. Of course, I don't have a lot of transport capabilities, so...
Anyway, I'm eager to hear if you guys have strategies I haven't thought of yet. I won't play for a week or two yet, so you'll have time to share your brilliant ideas.
