Anglo-Portuguese Alliance

[keynes2.0]

The Italian military failures are rather easily explained by the conditions in which they fought. If you look at Operation Compass for example it's quite unnecessary to blame the quality of the Italian troops when the vast bulk of those troops didn't have the support to reach battle in a timely fashion. Italian troops fought perfectly well when they were properly equipped, although it suited German and British egos to give Rommel all the credit.

 

[21oliver]

Im sorry the Italian military from Mussolini on down was a farce...

 

[SFSLovenought]

Im sorry the Italian military from Mussolini on down was a farce...

Don't make sweeping statements like that. Obviously, in the millions strong Italian armed forces there were many good soldiers, just like their were many good soldiers in the Red Army in 1940.
I imagine some companies and battalions were competently led, but their incompetent higher command, combined with all their other problems, meant that even the good Italian soldiers ended up getting trashed.

 

[SirDraco]

The Italian military failures are rather easily explained by the conditions in which they fought. If you look at Operation Compass for example it's quite unnecessary to blame the quality of the Italian troops when the vast bulk of those troops didn't have the support to reach battle in a timely fashion. Italian troops fought perfectly well when they were properly equipped, although it suited German and British egos to give Rommel all the credit.

While it might not be the Italian troops that were fightings fault, You can blame the military leaders for poor planning etc, which still comes under the Italian Military. The Italians outnumbered the British in Africa, as Anthony Eden put it, "Never has so much been surrendered by so many, to so few."

Rommel most certainly deserves the credit for any success the Axis had in North Africa

I imagine some companies and battalions were competently led, but their incompetent higher command, combined with all their other problems, meant that even the good Italian soldiers ended up getting trashed.

This is what I was pretty much trying to say.

 

[21oliver]

I assume when we discuss things here were talking in general terms, not looking for the minority. I mean im sure the Germans had poor fighting units, but overall their military was of high quality, well led and trained, well equipped and conducted themselves well overall throughout the war. The Italians were just the opposite, and i am italian and can trace relatives back to the war and i still say they were horrible (apologizing for the few who distinguished themselves). The Entire Italian military structure had issues from production, to leadership to training, equipment, use and deployment etc...

This is a strategic game, we talk in strategic terms. Otherwise it changes the whole scope of things...

 

[keynes2.0]

While it might not be the Italian troops that were fightings fault, You can blame the military leaders for poor planning etc, which still comes under the Italian Military. The Italians outnumbered the British in Africa, as Anthony Eden put it, "Never has so much been surrendered by so many, to so few."

Rommel most certainly deserves the credit for any success the Axis had in North Africa

I would blame the higher commands. What I was arguing against was the statement that Italians were worthless and no amount was sufficient. Troops outside the high command can't be judged when they were put in a hopeless situation that no troops could fight under. Otherwise we would conclude that German troops were worthless because of '45, British troops were worthless because of France and Norway and so forth until we had exhausted the list (except for Brazilians, they never lost ).

And I would strongly contest the notion that Rommel, a single man, deserves most of the credit. While it's true that he saved the Italians from bad leadership, he wasn't the one who fixed the political meddling at the top. And the fact that the previous North African commanders were below Replacement level is to their detriment, not his credit.

 

[Darkath]

(except for Brazilians, they never lost )

Well they kinda did yesterday

 

[21oliver]

Col Trevor Dupuy wrote alot of books, some people swear by him and others dispute him. He had one where by he created a formula that when you plugged in many of the major battles from back in say the 1800's up past WW2 his formula came within i think 5% of the actual casualties. Was pretty cool, i used to use it for PBM games...

Anyway his analysis (i may be wrong on the numbers but i think im close) had the Germans each worth 1.3-1.5 to 1 western allies (UK, France, USA) and something like 3-4 to 1 vs the Soviets. This was taking in all relevant factors.

It seems your of the opinion that basically HOI3 is, you take the unit, you take the weapons and training and officers and all things are equal then. I myself disagree. I believe certain nations historically are simply better at warfare. And its not all in High Command and training, they simply have a bred tradition and an upbringing both physically and mentally that is better suited. I may not be clear here sorry i guess my point is this, if you take one division of German recruits and one division of Turkish recruits, train them the same, give them the same weapons and the same officers I still believe the German recruits will be a better fighting unit. How much? i cant say. there is simpy additional elements often hard to quantify. Just like some nations traditonally surrender and accept occupation and others fight unto death.

One of the biggest issues i have with HOI3 is thats how its setup. Start a game in 1936 and compare a German infantry brigade and a Turkish one, and youll see they are almost identical. Now over time the German units will gain an edge do to their LS they can invest. But the reality is with all the training in the world there is no way likely a Turkish Brigade would have been equal with a German one over the course of the entire war, much less at the start. The game is setup where as quantity wins not quality. In 1936 a German infantry division was likely worth at least as much as a Corps of Turkish troops. We dont see that in the game because there seldom is enough seperation in training between 2 nations where a single unit can beat more then another single unit. If we were going to base it historically, and were forced to use dates, then Turkey should start the game with something like 1900 Infantry and Germany 1940, that would be closer to reality. I mean if after the war Dupuy thought one German was worth 3 or 4 Soviets, how many Turks would he have been worth?

Getting back to the Italians, my point is simple, regardless of all the things they had to deal with, most of what ive read, heard and seen in my lifetime the Italians simply did not fight well. They simply did not conduct themselves with much quality. I think its a disservice to even mention them in the same sentence with the Germans, Brits and US. They simply werent very good at war.

 

[21oliver]

Well they kinda did yesterday

 

[Kagernaut]

The Italians performed poorly due to a few major factors, the two main ones being leadership and equipment---perhaps the most important right there.

The Italian General in North Africa (Graziani, I beleive?) wrote once that even the guns on the british armored cars could pierce their tank armor. He went on to make the point that militarily Italy was not prepared to fight, in terms of equipment. Italian tanks were typicaly sub par, and usually outdated by the time they took the field, and the Italians could hardly field great numbers of those or many other weapons anyway. The only equipment that was average quality was their planes, I IIRC they had a couple modern ships I believe.

As for leadership, many of the generals in the Italian army were appointed; instead of achieving their positions based on performance, they achieved based on status in the party, for example. This led to generals that literally had no idea what they were doing.

Whats worse for leadership, was Mussolini himself. He had been warned pre-war that Italy wasn't ready to go to war, and still they did. It wasn't exactly the best decision, and it was one of many failures.

On the soldier level, the Italians weren't magicaly incompetent or poorly trained necessarily, they just weren't given everything needed to succeed.

 

[21oliver]

I agree on the leadership i do, but i have to disagree on the soldiers. To the best of my knowledge the werent meant to be soldiers. We will have to agree to disagree i guess. Look at the Germans. Look at Stalingrad. No proper clothing, no ammo, no support, no food and so on and so on and so on And they probably did better there then any Italian success of the war. Leadership can only go so far, especially when your talking large groups of men. Hell the Italians were disapointing in WWI as well...

 

[keynes2.0]

I would be amazed if you could get that kind of accuracy in such a model of such complex events without overfitting to the curve. If a certain type of Panzer III was only present at battles that Germans won because it was phased out at later points then you simply construe your model to rate that vehicle very highly, perhaps even higher then a later model that was superior in all regards.

I'm not saying that equipment explains everything in all circumstances. I'm saying that the examples of the ignominious defeats of Italian forces in North Africa before the arrival of the Africa corps are easily explained by equipment. And unlike Dupuy, that is a prediction made before the events. The Italian generals were saying there was great danger disaster due to lack of equipment. The British generals were saw the potential great success for the exact same reasons. When those with the best knowledge and expertise about events make an accurate prediction about the future great attention should be given to their analysis.

 

[keynes2.0]

I agree on the leadership i do, but i have to disagree on the soldiers. To the best of my knowledge the werent meant to be soldiers. We will have to agree to disagree i guess. Look at the Germans. Look at Stalingrad. No proper clothing, no ammo, no support, no food and so on and so on and so on And they probably did better there then any Italian success of the war. Leadership can only go so far, especially when your talking large groups of men. Hell the Italians were disapointing in WWI as well...

Stalingrad was tough for both sides. I could say the exact same thing about the Soviets. Or the Italians for that matter. And the Soviets won that battle you might recall.

The Italians didn't have any great victories but the Germans had defeats far worse then the Italians ever had. Look at the 1944 Soviet offensives. Look at how the Germans let themselves be defeated in detail by Operation Dragoon. The Italians never suffered defeats of those magnitudes. We shouldn't conclude that German troops were bad from these, we should conclude that there is only opportunity for success and failure when a nation is in heavy fighting.

The Italians had plenty of successes in North Africa after their failures in the opening chapters. These successes were limited but that's just because there was a limit for what could be accomplished in the logistical reality of the North African theater. The size of their successes and defeats was limited because their interest in the war was limited.

 

[21oliver]

 

[SirDraco]

The Italians didn't have any great victories but the Germans had defeats far worse then the Italians ever had.

And that is why they are remembered as not being very good. It's your successes that people remember. Lets face it, Operation Compass was pretty embarrassing for the Italians, The British managed to capture more Italians than they had themselves.

 

[keynes2.0]

Something the Japanese accomplished against the British at Singapore and the Americans would have done to the Germans in Southern France if reinforcements hadn't pushed their total numbers up. The numerical disparities weren't as great in those instances but the operational situation wasn't as hopeless either.

 

[Dalwin]

I am inclined in the case of the Italians to blame it all on leadership, equipment and training. It is certainly not that the Italians were not meant to be soldiers.

Just look at the obvious exceptions like the Alpine Corps. Even the Germans praised the performance of the Italian Alpine troops during Fall Blau.

 

[SirDraco]

Something the Japanese accomplished against the British at Singapore and the Americans would have done to the Germans in Southern France if reinforcements hadn't pushed their total numbers up. The numerical disparities weren't as great in those instances but the operational situation wasn't as hopeless either.

I'm not saying that it didn't happen to others but the others had other successes to back up those poor defeats, the Italians didn't.

 

[Porkman]

Col Trevor Dupuy wrote alot of books, some people swear by him and others dispute him. He had one where by he created a formula that when you plugged in many of the major battles from back in say the 1800's up past WW2 his formula came within i think 5% of the actual casualties. Was pretty cool, i used to use it for PBM games...

Anyway his analysis (i may be wrong on the numbers but i think im close) had the Germans each worth 1.3-1.5 to 1 western allies (UK, France, USA) and something like 3-4 to 1 vs the Soviets. This was taking in all relevant factors.

It seems your of the opinion that basically HOI3 is, you take the unit, you take the weapons and training and officers and all things are equal then. I myself disagree. I believe certain nations historically are simply better at warfare. And its not all in High Command and training, they simply have a bred tradition and an upbringing both physically and mentally that is better suited. I may not be clear here sorry i guess my point is this, if you take one division of German recruits and one division of Turkish recruits, train them the same, give them the same weapons and the same officers I still believe the German recruits will be a better fighting unit. How much? i cant say. there is simpy additional elements often hard to quantify. Just like some nations traditonally surrender and accept occupation and others fight unto death.

One of the biggest issues i have with HOI3 is thats how its setup. Start a game in 1936 and compare a German infantry brigade and a Turkish one, and youll see they are almost identical. Now over time the German units will gain an edge do to their LS they can invest. But the reality is with all the training in the world there is no way likely a Turkish Brigade would have been equal with a German one over the course of the entire war, much less at the start. The game is setup where as quantity wins not quality. In 1936 a German infantry division was likely worth at least as much as a Corps of Turkish troops. We dont see that in the game because there seldom is enough seperation in training between 2 nations where a single unit can beat more then another single unit. If we were going to base it historically, and were forced to use dates, then Turkey should start the game with something like 1900 Infantry and Germany 1940, that would be closer to reality. I mean if after the war Dupuy thought one German was worth 3 or 4 Soviets, how many Turks would he have been worth?

Getting back to the Italians, my point is simple, regardless of all the things they had to deal with, most of what ive read, heard and seen in my lifetime the Italians simply did not fight well. They simply did not conduct themselves with much quality. I think its a disservice to even mention them in the same sentence with the Germans, Brits and US. They simply werent very good at war.

You should always re examine your beliefs if the end result is, "The Germans were just a superior group to everyone else in the late 30's and 40's."

 

[keynes2.0]

I'm not saying that it didn't happen to others but the others had other successes to back up those poor defeats, the Italians didn't.

Italian troops were a majority of the forces in the Axis victories during North Africa. Italian troops fought well on the eastern front until they were withdrawn. Their performance was pretty unremarkable but that's my point. We shouldn't judge them by the outliers of defeat in particularly notable circumstances, in most of their fighting they had the same sorts of gains and losses as other forces.