ULTRA or Italian treachery?

[Montemurro]

A discussion of a myth which I thought was long dead, sprung out from this thread in the HOI-forum. About whether it was either officers from the Italian Navy (RMI) who betrayed the Axis convoys or if it were actually the British who were reading the Axis codes. The "highlights" so far:

Originally Posted by LAH

You are not that far off, many times convoys heading for africa with desperately needed supplies were sold out to the Allies by Italian officiers.

Originally Posted by LAH

I have read many books on the subject, but the last one I just read was "Rommel's Desert War" by Samual W. Mitcham.

Originally Posted by spfisk

So have I, and the only mention of Italian officers "selling out" convoys, is James J. Sadkovich in "The Italian Navy in World War II", Jack Greene and Alessandro Massignani in "Rommel's North Africa Campaign" and Ian W. Walker in "Iron Hulls, Iron Hearts". They all point out that it was only something Rommel thought because he didn't know better, ULTRA was still a secret back then and would remain so many years after the war. The "betrayal" by Italian officers was only a cover made up by the British to keep ULTRA's role a secret.

Originally Posted by LAH

Good points.... Ultra had allot to do with the successful interception of Axis shipping..... But, one has to remember that many Italian officiers did not support the Axis cause, and at the first chance they got, they pulled Italy out of the war.

So, to elaborate on my previous post:
Quote from "Rommel's North Africa Campaign" by Jack Greene and Alessandro Massignani, page 179:

Among Rommel's remarks [In "The Rommel Papers"] there are also claims against the High Commands in Rome and Berlin, and open charges of treason against the Italian Navy officers who "sabotaged whatever they could." Such charges have often been accepted without any reconsideration by historians and are repeated in many historical works appearing on the campaign. The bitter accusation by Rommel against the "treasonable" officers of the Regia Marina has been discovered only in later years [The book is from 1994] as a cover operation mounted by the British in order to keep secret the role of ULTRA.

James J. Sadkovich in his "The Italian Navy in World War II" notes that the Italians suspected that the German codes had been broken, but since they couldn't prove it and didn't want to alienate their allies further, an investigation of the ranks in the Italian General Staff was mounted instead on German insistence. But of course the investigation didn't find anything. "Mussolini's Afrika Korps: The Italian Army in North Africa 1940-1943" by Rex Trye and "Iron Hulls, Iron Hearts" by Ian W. Walker also acknowledges ULTRA as what is by some called "the real traitor".
Since ULTRA's existence was only revealed in the 1970s and taking into account the tradition among some historians of believing whatever Wehrmacht Generals say, it shouldn't be a surprise to find Rommel's accusations against RMI officers presented as historical fact through the 1980s.

Beyond the above, here is various comments on the RMI and its officers, which implies how unlikely it was that "many times convoys heading for africa with desperately needed supplies were sold out to the Allies by Italian officiers.".

Oscar Di Giamberardino while critical in his "La marina nella tragedia nazionale" of the strategical decisions taken by the RMI's General Staff, also insisted that RMI officers conducted the war with an "apolitical professionalism".
Marc'Antonio Bragadin in "Il dramma della Marina italiana" wrote that the navy's "moral was magnificent" and Admiral Angelo Iachino in his memoirs also considered moral excellent.
Alfredo Viglieri, who had served on the RMI's General Staff, in his memoirs insisted that while "faults, antagonisms and rivalries" among RMI officers might sometimes cause errors and indecision, they were nonetheless "truly and sincerely attached to their ships and their crews."
Franco Maugeri, anti-Fascist who had headed the SIS (Italian Naval Intelligence) during the war, in his "From the Ashes of Disgrace" maintained that "In ships, in manpower, in seamanship and in ésprit de corps we had no reason to feel ashamed,".

Assuming that the British in addition to their technical superiority were not only reading the Axis codes via ULTRA, but at the same time also had RMI officers "selling out" the Axis convoys - that only makes the already less than impressive British record of interdicting Axis convoys (0.5% of dispatched matériel sunk on the Balkan routes, 14% on the Libyan routes and 28% on the Tunisian routes. Source: Again James J. Sadkovich, Rex Trye, Ian W. Walker and Jack Greene and Alessandro Massignani.) look even worse and the Italian performance so much more impressive.

[Winkelried]

I cannot comment on topic but I have to say I'm very surprised that the admin let the guy choose "Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler" -> LAH (sometimes also LSAH) as a nickname. I'm sure you're no longer surprised about his statements now that you know what his nick (probably) means...