Jan - Aug 1942
Regio Esercito.
In January, several projects came to a conclusion (among them a new training and doctrine publication for the Esercito’s Carabinieri or military police), releasing funds for one of the last two portions of the Infantry Improvement Project of 1942: for improving the support weapons in the infantry company and battalion. In February, the final project, infantry anti-tank weapons, received their approval for funding. These projects, farmed out to Beretta and Breda, specifically, returned an improved version of their current products in May. An improved light artillery system debuted in April (having been funded the year previous). The new weapons encouraged the
Commando Supremo to begin a doctrinal study and training regime for their infantry units in May. Another encouraged focus from the German attaches was for combat medicine and first aid, much like they had already done in their own forces. The Italians begrugingly accepted the “suggestion” and funded them in March and April, which finished in July.
A batch of Carabinieri officers in 1942. The Germans had
consistently pointed out the deficiencies of their nominal
Italian ally’s military police units, and while funding eventually
was approved, the dedication to forming new units remained
low.
The new doctrinal manual for the Carabinieri was unfortunately out of date at publication, and the German military advisors scornfully reminded their Italian counterparts. The Italians, refused to reapproach their issue until March when funding was finally available, and published their latest effort in July. Another special branches, that of the
Paracadutisti,
Alpini and Mountain schools issued new training and doctrinal guidance in February, and the
Paracadutisti received approval for their new equipment in February and new tactical guidance in March.
The M15/42. Experience with the PzKpfw.IILs informed some,
minor, choices in this tank, but the Italians insisted on riveted
armor, a standarized gun system (instead of the two versions
of 37mm in the L-IT ausf. L and 50mm in the L-IT ausf. H) that
was supposed to be a compromise between the two but didn’t
meet either of the benefits nor mitigated the problems of either.
In the Armor branch, building on the experience with the PzKpfw.IIL-ITs, new armor schemes and a new engine design received final authorization in February. Funding for organizational work was continued when the original funding ran out in May, and the German attaches had been encouraging this work for years, ever since the Italians had first chosen to purchase the German light armor sets. Further work on instilling an offensive mindset amongst the divisions of the Italian forces began in February, and finished in July. In June, work began on lowering the supply consumption of the numbers of headquarters in the Esercito; while more work on maximizing the numbers of forces that a divisional commander could call on started in July.
Regia Marina.
Radar training, long the bane of the figurehead Admiral Cavagnari, concluded funding in February after sufficient numbers of operators had completed their course work. This work then turned to completing the Fire Control System training in March. Doctrine work turned towards better positioning of the battleships for naval combat in March, which would end in August. The crews of the show pieces of the Marina completed another round of training in May, with the requisite funding turning towards training the destroyers of the fleet for their escort roles, and working on anti-submarine warfare techniques which were pummeling the Kriegsmarine, and which the Italians were themselves significantly deficient in. Another project, specifically that of the optimization of the Regia Marina’s naval bases, finally finished in July.
An Italian convoy under simulated attack from
Naval Aviation units in 1942.
Naval aviation training was completed in March for organization and planning naval air strikes at sea and against ports. In May, more funding was appropriated for naval strike techniques, which were thought to improve the efficiency of those strikes. This project was supplemented by another training cycle in June. In July, the Regia Marina sought new air-dropped torpedoes, as they had been using slightly modified surface vessel torpedoes which were having difficulty staying intact upon deployment, as well as showing faulty trigger mechanisms.
RM Scipione Africano, one of the latest versions
of destroyer in the Regia Marina.
More funding received approval for disbursal in July with a training cycle for increasing the capability of destroyers and light cruisers to detect other naval forces. Previous efforts essentially had spread the destroyer screens far and wide, but relaying that information back to the battleline was problematic. Radios could be detected, light semaphore and flags could only be used within line of sight. Thus, the training focused on using those new Radar sets to detect vessels at ranges beyond sight. This funding coincided with a push for a new armament system for destroyers. In August, when debates in the
Supramarino concerning the use of submarines in convoy raiding operations again arose. In a sop to their commanders, some research was conducted in convoy raiding doctrine, but it largely focused on the surface fleet.
Civil/Secret.
For Mussolini, little mattered more than creating an Italy that would be counted amongst the greatest nations in the world. To reach that lofty goal--few would go so far as to dare challenge it as a dream--he recognized that the industrial base was in desperate need of improvement. He directed the accountants in several concerned ministries--namely, National Economy, Corporations, Posts and Telegraphs, and Agriculture and Forests--to fund several projects to improve industrial production and efficiencies, as well as the production of military and military-related supply, logistics and organization, and Civil Defense. The industrial subsidies (production, efficiency and supply production) ran out in May, while Supply Organization and Logistics expired in June. Funding for agriculture improvements received approval in March; those subsidies expired in June. The Civil Defense project finalized their recommendations in July.
Mussolini chairing a cabinet meeting. Throughout
Il Duce’s tenure, he held almost every cabinet position,
at one time or another.
In February, Mussolini acting in his position as Minister of the Interior, received notification from the department that projects to improve extraction of coal and oil refineries had finished; a few weeks later, he was informed that improvements to the extraction of synthetic oil was finalized.
The latest iteration of the journey to improving Italy’s radio detection telemetry capability received funding in March. These developments, spearheaded by Nello Carrara and Lieutenant Ugo Tiberio at FIVRE developed a device broadly equivalent to the British cavity magnetron to further develop their radar systems. The radar systems entered production in July. Once that project had been completed, the funding was directed to begin developing a new encryption key system for the Regia Marina; the funding for these projects had been diverted from the Regia Aeronautica’s budget after significant consternation had developed with the staff of the
Superaereo for purchasing foreign aircraft rather than procuring local examples as well as suggesting that the Italians should develop a strategic bomber.
*****
Author's Note: I decided to strike whilst the iron was hot, given that there's a bit of a gap between when the top of the page billing might occur, and several posts since my last one.
Post to follow. This is some impressive work.
Thank you, and can't wait to read that response!
Eagerly waiting for the next update .
I am planning to download this whole AAR as pdf cause I wanna read it offline again and again and again and againnnnn
This brings up something I want to open up to the community at large. I can understand that these posts can get quite large (some posts are in excess of 3k words!) and thus might not lend themselves to single sitting readings. Would my readers appreciate having the ability to grab PDFs of the work? (I'm leaning to a "Book" and "Chapter" system, so each chapter will have its own, but then I'll also have a "Book" with all of the chapters in one file)