Italian Army Seems Underpowered

[32karakter]

IMHO implementing Italy into the game - well, any grand strategic, sandbox-like game where you have the ability to change fundamental things - is more than problematic.

Either you have to fudge the numbers somehow, or Italy could - and will - emerge as a monster of the med, a powerful axis ally, far more powerful than in history. Especially if a human player plays her, with hindsight and knowledge.

i may not be too bold if i say, that post-ww1 Italy, especialy under the fascist regime made almost every single time the wrong decision - and i think, even with artificial limitations, these bad choices could be righted in the hands of the average player.

 

[Loke]

Praetonia - The thing is you wrote "Italy lost to Greece historically" and that my friend is not true.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Italian_War

 

[Sir Garnet]

The lives of Italian soldiers were thrown away by their indifferent generals in WW1 and Mussolini's effort to use fascism to inspire a generation of Italians that they were warriors like Romans and Italians of past centuries, and that he had a cause worth fighting and dying for, would have depended on his army enjoying at least modest competence in war industry, military bureaucracy, equipment design and procurement, training, staff work, logistics, and leadership. Instead, each of these was lackadaisical at best, riddled with corruption, political and bureaucratic rivalry and turf wars, and incompetence at worst, turning the enthusiastic into the hopeless. Despite all the sapping handicaps, Italians could fight well with good leadership.

Greece was a tragicomedy of incompetence. Both the officers called to service and the troops were poorly and sometimes untrained. Greek numbers and fighting capacity were somehow grossly underestimated, the effect of combat in mountainous terrain and winter appears to have been ignored, and the lackadaisical military logistics system failed to make and deliver troops with adequate boots, uniforms, weapons, ammo, and especially food. That Italian troops kept fighting such circumstances is impressive.

Personal accounts describe how idealism, patriotism, and enthusiasm were sapped away to be replaced with hopeless and bitter acceptance, and being taken prisoner and surviving the war as the best hope for the future. of the inevitable - hardly surprising. Maybe not in intention, but certainly in effect, Italy from Mussolini on down did not treat the war as a serious matter. It is hard not to give the most credit to Il Duce's arbitrary and inconstant governance, and second the military commanders who failed in the duties a commander owes to his troops.

It is also hard to see how these problems could have been avoided given the personal nature of the fascist dictatorship and the combination of political interest, corruption, and entrenched bureaucracy in the government and military. But for the challenge it is fun to try as Italy.

 

[Orlunu]

Either you have to fudge the numbers somehow, or Italy could - and will - emerge as a monster of the med, a powerful axis ally, far more powerful than in history. Especially if a human player plays her, with hindsight and knowledge.

Give her her historical numbers, which were partway between what we have now and her official organisation, and realistically reflect her tiny industry. Bias her AI build policies away from armour and aircraft pre-war. An AI will play her better, but not much better, than historically accurate. In human hands, she could be much better, but that's as it should be.

 

[Praetonia]

Praetonia - The thing is you wrote "Italy lost to Greece historically" and that my friend is not true.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Italian_War

I think you perhaps were misled by my original statement:

"Italy lost to Greece historically. If the Germans had not intervened, Greece was set to defeat Italy."

I did not mean to imply that Greece annexed Italy or something like that. What I have said is that Italy militarily lost to Greece before the Germans intervened and defeated Greece, which is true.

Is this clearer for you?

 

[32karakter]

Italy's goal was to conquer Greece; not only did they fail to do so but lost territory of their own while taking almost twice as many casualties. At the point at which the Germans intervened they were further from accomplishing their goals than before they had started the war. That's a loss by any reasonable definition.

The Germans, for sure, did not lose to Greece.

Yeah, by the raw facts, thats true, however, maybe a bit too simple view of the events. However, italian defeats often gave great opportunities for the other axis allies (khm, Japan, khm).

Of course, the greek offensive was pretty much a textbook example of the wrong decisions a player in a game would never made.
(Was it tom Clancy saying, that fiction has to be credible, history wont?)

 

[32karakter]

Give her her historical numbers, which were partway between what we have now and her official organisation, and realistically reflect her tiny industry. Bias her AI build policies away from armour and aircraft pre-war. An AI will play her better, but not much better, than historically accurate. In human hands, she could be much better, but that's as it should be.

We will see

(Honestly, now i think, the first nation i will try will be Italy, im curious, what could i do with her potential.)

 

[Orlunu]

Honestly, now i think, the first nation i will try will be Italy

It will be for a lot of people, she's the tutorial nation iirc.

 

[Beagá]

I always though of France or US for that. France has a one front war with focused armies on one front. US enters the war late and can simply remain neutral, while having tons of building and research options.

 

[tommylotto]

Greece....
The Italian leadership launched the war on a lark without adequate preparation. There was a pro-German coup in Romania and Italy wanted to mark its territory before Germany infringed upon its sphere of influence anymore than it already had. The war was started so hastily that the Italians were outnumbered in combat battalions. So, they were outnumbered attacking through mountains in bad weather nullifying their advantage in planes. The result was very predictable -- even German troops would have been repulsed. Once the initial offensive was stopped by the Greeks and the Italians forced to withdraw to more defensible lines, the Italian military moved heaven and earth to stabilize the situation. Huge resources were poured into Albania that dwarfed the Italian effort in North Africa. With all their incompetence, the Italians were wearing the Greek army out and would have soon been able to resume the offensive and muddle their way to Athens.

Meanwhile the Germans wanted to further humiliate their allies and further interfere in their sphere of influence. The prideful Greeks knowing they were at the breaking point wanted to preserve the illusion of victory over the Italians. So, they did not seriously resist the German attack but rather kept the bulk of their Army against the Italian front as the German swept in from behind. Then they quickly surrendered to the Germans. They would rather rapidly lose to the Germans than retreat an inch to the Italians -- as nonsensical as that seems.

Balance.....
In real life Italy performed craptastically. However, they had an impressive looking military. The game gives us plenty of ways to nerf a nation. You can give Italy an historic OOB and still have it perform poorly in the AI's hands by nerfing it in other ways. I would prefer if they got the history right by giving Italy its military and use more realistic reasons for poor performance -- equipment, leadership, etc. The Italy in my mod has a very accurate OOB and more often then not gets stomped in Albania and in North Africa. I play as Haiti with fog of what turned off and watch a stack of incompetent Italian divisions get routed by a few well equipped commonwealth divisions in North Africa all the time.

 

[Leoap]

Greece....
The Italian leadership launched the war on a lark without adequate preparation. There was a pro-German coup in Romania and Italy wanted to mark its territory before Germany infringed upon its sphere of influence anymore than it already had. The war was started so hastily that the Italians were outnumbered in combat battalions. So, they were outnumbered attacking through mountains in bad weather nullifying their advantage in planes. The result was very predictable -- even German troops would have been repulsed. Once the initial offensive was stopped by the Greeks and the Italians forced to withdraw to more defensible lines, the Italian military moved heaven and earth to stabilize the situation. Huge resources were poured into Albania that dwarfed the Italian effort in North Africa. With all their incompetence, the Italians were wearing the Greek army out and would have soon been able to resume the offensive and muddle their way to Athens.

Meanwhile the Germans wanted to further humiliate their allies and further interfere in their sphere of influence. The prideful Greeks knowing they were at the breaking point wanted to preserve the illusion of victory over the Italians. So, they did not seriously resist the German attack but rather kept the bulk of their Army against the Italian front as the German swept in from behind. Then they quickly surrendered to the Germans. They would rather rapidly lose to the Germans than retreat an inch to the Italians -- as nonsensical as that seems.

Balance.....
In real life Italy performed craptastically. However, they had an impressive looking military. The game gives us plenty of ways to nerf a nation. You can give Italy an historic OOB and still have it perform poorly in the AI's hands by nerfing it in other ways. I would prefer if they got the history right by giving Italy its military and use more realistic reasons for poor performance -- equipment, leadership, etc. The Italy in my mod has a very accurate OOB and more often then not gets stomped in Albania and in North Africa. I play as Haiti with fog of what turned off and watch a stack of incompetent Italian divisions get routed by a few well equipped commonwealth divisions in North Africa all the time.

Very good analysis ... well done

 

[WeissRaben]

Italy lost to Greece historically. If the Germans had not intervened, Greece was set to defeat Italy.

Hahahahahano. The attack on Greece was organized horribly, and what should have been a cakewalk in the Duce's mind became a horrible slog, but the Greeks threw grandmas and sinks at the Italian army, just to repel that first thrust, and even that counterattack was getting halted by the time Germany entered the fray. And this had been obtained, I'll repeat, by throwing everything at the Italian army, so much that the Germans found almost no one when they attacked. And it was fine for the Greeks, because they didn't want to surrender to the Italians - which was a closer and closer prospect.

While this was happening, Italy was fighting with most of its forces in Africa, with its naval supply lines deeply contested by the Royal Navy, and while Greece was throwing everything at Italy. Yeah, the war in Greece was an absolute disaster, as far as how you organize an invasion, but saying that "Greece won", or "Greece was going to defeat Italy" is not even off the mark. It's delusional.

 

[Lifthrasil]

#1 Here is the Italian conquest of British Somaliland it ended with the British evacuating(The British did another "Dunkirk").

#2 The not so well known Operation Abstention - Here the Italians hindered a British Commando invasion on the island of Kastelorizo in Greece.

#3 Another one is when 700 hundred Italian soldiers on horseback charged 2500 Russian soldiers of the 304th infantry division and routed them, the clash of the Savoia Cavelleria at Isbuscenskij.

#4 Regia Aeronautica bombed British oil refinerys in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. These raids had a great importance in the technical and propagandistic side. In fact, after the raid, the RAF was compelled to place a squadron of fighters near the refineries and protect the plants with a couple of battalions and some batteries of antiaircraft guns.

#5 Italian frogmen of the Decima Mas raiding Alexandria and disabled the two British Battleships HMS Queen Elizabeth and Valiant, a tanker and a destroyer. The Italian fleet had temporarily wrested naval supremacy in the east-central Mediterranean from the Royal Navy.

So it seems they did succeed in more places than Albania... Both strategical and tactical.

When you have to use an instance, where single Italian battallions (700 men) performed well, as an argument for the "competent" Italien military, this really says a lot.
Of course not every Italien soldier was incompetent and of course there where also examples where Italian troops performed well.
But none of your examples involves more then 2 or 3 divisions on the Italian side. Most only a couple of hundred men.

Overall the Italian performance in the war was very very unimpressive.

 

[Praetonia]

Hahahahahano. The attack on Greece was organized horribly, and what should have been a cakewalk in the Duce's mind became a horrible slog, but the Greeks threw grandmas and sinks at the Italian army, just to repel that first thrust, and even that counterattack was getting halted by the time Germany entered the fray. And this had been obtained, I'll repeat, by throwing everything at the Italian army, so much that the Germans found almost no one when they attacked. And it was fine for the Greeks, because they didn't want to surrender to the Italians - which was a closer and closer prospect.

While this was happening, Italy was fighting with most of its forces in Africa, with its naval supply lines deeply contested by the Royal Navy, and while Greece was throwing everything at Italy. Yeah, the war in Greece was an absolute disaster, as far as how you organize an invasion, but saying that "Greece won", or "Greece was going to defeat Italy" is not even off the mark. It's delusional.

The Germans intervened because the Greeks had taken Italian territory and the Italians had failed to expel them. On the eve of German intervention, Greece had already defeated all Italian operations to that point. Sure, have the war last another three years and the Italians would probably have eventually worn the Greeks down. On the other hand, wait even another one year and there is probably an Anglo-American army in Greece...

 

[Leoap]

The problem was not the men but there commanders !!!

 

[griffor]

idk i will have to see how it plays out in game, but being at war right off the bat should allow them the army experience to fix their divisions up and of course training and Spanish civil war will give more of course

 

[Secret Master]

Praetonia - The thing is you wrote "Italy lost to Greece historically" and that my friend is not true.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Italian_War

I am curious as to what metric you are using to define winning and losing.

Italy achieved none of her stated war aims before Germany conducted Operation Marita. Even after Greece capitulates, Mussolini's dream of presenting Hitler with a fait accompli never came to pass.

Whether or not Mussolini's war aims are reasonable or even possible, it looks to me like Italy did not achieve her goals. That looks like losing to me.

With all their incompetence, the Italians were wearing the Greek army out and would have soon been able to resume the offensive and muddle their way to Athens.

From what I've read, the Spring Offensive in 41 was a complete failure. I suppose that if the war dragged on long enough, Italy would eventually bleed Greece dry, but I'm not sure how long that would have taken without German intervention.

How much longer do you think it would have taken for Italy to finally defeat the Greeks, given performance in March of 1941?

 

[WeissRaben]

The Germans intervened because the Greeks had taken Italian territory and the Italians had failed to expel them. On the eve of German intervention, Greece had already defeated all Italian operations to that point. Sure, have the war last another three years and the Italians would probably have eventually worn the Greeks down. On the other hand, wait even another one year and there is probably an Anglo-American army in Greece...

Three years? Greece didn't have three years. They had stripped every single front so much that they had 65,000 men not fighting Italy in Albania - half of them fight-worthy, and all of them green recruits. Italy had organized the whole matter horribly - chiefly sending, at first, 90,000 men to fight a mountain nation - but Greece was going down.

 

[Praetonia]

Three years? Greece didn't have three years. They had stripped every single front so much that they had 65,000 men not fighting Italy in Albania - half of them fight-worthy, and all of them green recruits. Italy had organized the whole matter horribly - chiefly sending, at first, 90,000 men to fight a mountain nation - but Greece was going down.

And that was the only front on which they were fighting.

Sure, when Germany intervened their position was untenable, but no one is saying that the German army performed poorly in WWII

 

[WeissRaben]

And that was the only front on which they were fighting.

Sure, when Germany intervened their position was untenable, but no one is saying that the German army performed poorly in WWII

No, you don't get it. The rest of the front was almost empty, even though a German attack was a possibility. The Greeks were asked to defend something more than the yard immediately in front of the Italian army by the British generals, and refused. They knew full well a German attack would pulverize everything they had out of Albania, and even though they did have a chance to bog down the German army in the mountains, they threw it away because they had to avoid losing to Italy. That was literally it: Italy started an attack with 87,000 men, Greece countered with 105,000 men. The disorganized attack, thrown through ridiculously defensive terrain, was easily repelled, and the Greek army used the confusion to advance in Albania. The counterattack was later stopped cold, but dislodging from the mountains an army just under your size often proves difficult, even with great leadership (which Italy doesn't have). Keeping the Italians there required the whole Greek army to be concentrated on the Albanian front (Yugoslav attempts to close the deal before the German came were swatted away easily), to the point of disintegrating any chance to actually, you know, defend the country.