Chapter 19
22nd of January 1942, 7:00h
The engine of the A6M Zero roared loud as the squadron turned south.
Souta had sweating hands that were even shaking a little bit. This was his first combat mission and he was excited as well as a bit afraid regarding to whether he’d survive it or not.
Sosa Jupita, the invasion of Italy, had officially started on the 11th of January, as the carrier group of the IJN Soryu appeared in the Aegean Sea, launching numerous air strikes against targets in Greece, Crete and Rhodes. This was done as a distraction, just as with the way the air-force dealt with Malta: Heavy bombers started from Benghazi and were bombing the Italian entrenchments on the island for about six days now. The Regia Marina had abandoned the port soon after the start of the bombardments. Therefore High Command decided to let the British take their island back on their own.
The IJN Souta shipping through the Aegean led to a naval engagement with the Regia Marina, in which the Japanese airplanes inflicted heavy damage upon the Italian ships, but couldn’t sink any.
The biggest distraction was probably the British offensive in Libya, which helped diverting the Italian look for potential invasions of their homeland.
Souta and the 3rd CAG squadron were to launch an assault on Palermo, the big Sicilian port and airfield. This city was the major obstacle as well as mission target of the invasion. The fighters had to come in from the north to divert the enemy from the real position of the attack.
The sun was rising slowly in the east, shedding first rays of light onto the port of Palermo and revealing the positions of some destroyers and transport ships.
He wondered shortly how the submarines might have fared that were patrolling the Adriatic since 0:00 this morning as part of the operation, but then forced himself to focus on what was ahead of him.
“4th squadron: attack the ships in the port. Focus on the transporters, we don’t want the Italian Army to get its troops out of Libya just so that we can meet them again elsewhere! Good luck boys! 3rd squadron: we proceed to the airfield to destroy the naval bombers on the ground. Their torpedoes might endanger the whole invasion.” announced the captain via radio.
Soon, the sky was not only filled with the sound of the engines of the planes, but also with explosions, AA-gunfire and sirens.
They were above the airfield after a few minutes, as the harbor had already turned into the hell of a battlefield.
“Yari 1 and 2, take on those planes that are trying to start! The rest: Destroy the other planes on the ground and al resistance you can find. Try not to destroy the fuel-tanks, they might be of use for us later on!”
As ordered, Souta started to dive at some of the planes, destroying three naval bombers in the first run and damaging some more.
In the meantime, Italian forces rallied to the port, expecting an invasion from the north.
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22nd of January 1942, 8:00h
There was a strong wind coming in from the south. The sea was rougher than expected, but, due to the direction of the wind, this would only be a problem once they were at the beach.
With the Italian defenders rushing to Palermo, little resistance was coming from the coast. The heavy cruisers of the 11th Kantai provided an excellent shore-bombardment and light bombers from the air-force did their part in wrecking havoc amidst the defenders.
Takumi stood in a landing craft filled with other men from the division. They were on their own, the equipment would be brought in once they had secured a beachhead.
“As soon as we arrive at the beach, I want you to run from the coast to search cover. You know our rally point and our mission target. Once we’ve secured the villages near the beach, we’ll be setting up a perimeter and let our heavy equipment move in. I know fighting so far from home Is difficult, but remember: Our brothers and sisters at home are counting on us! We are carrying the war to the enemy, so that they can’t avenge the fall of China and threaten us! Every inch of ground we are gaining on this campaign will bring us one step closer to end this war and to return home to our families!” Takumi shouted out loud, so that the men could hear him despite the sound of the waves and the landing craft.
“Nice speech, lad. Let’s hope we endure this so that we can see its end.” McFarne commented.
“It’s incredible. The whole beach is completely undefended. There are the remnants of some foxholes and corpses lying in artillery craters, but there is no one around here. The villages are completely deserted, not even animals are left there. Sergeant! Get to the radio and tell army command they can bring in the heavy equipment. We’re done here.” Takumi said.
“Well, I hope I’ll remain assigned to you. It’s always nice doing amphibious assaults at your side ‘cause you’re always landing where no defenders are. Whether it’s blind luck or tactics, I’d really like to keep things up like this.” the Scotsman admitted.
The men took some rest and then prepared for a march through the night to take over Sicily as fast as possible.
Takumi even had some spare time to check the latest technology reports.
Takumi’s division reached Palermo at midnight, where they immediately assaulted the town, hoping to overwhelm its defenders, who had been busy repairing the damage that had been dealt by the air attack on the landing day.
Unfortunately, the city proved to be highly fortified, but its port and airfield were crucial for further advances into Italy, so it could not be ignored. Bombers flew ground strikes at the city day and night, but the defenders fought well.
Messina fell on the 24th, leaving Palermo as the only place of resistance on the island.
Yet, the defenders held their positions.
High Command came under pressure, as the port was desperately needed to ship in supplies for the Japanese forces. Also, a delay might enable the Axis to assemble strong forces in Italy, making a Japanese invasion even more difficult. The invasion-fleet was already blocking the Strait of Messina, but even they couldn’t help when the Axis set up defensive positions in the Italian mountains.
The airborne invasion of Malta was called back because “the British can handle this for themselves” and the paratroopers were dropped in at the port of Palermo, seizing control over the warehouses there and ripping all supplies from the Italian defenders.
Furthermore, the city became completely encircled.
As the city fell on the 27th, the IJA was already two days behind its timetable, so the mobile forces gathered up at the port to be brought to the Italian mainland. The Strait of Messina was blocked for passage, so some Italian infantry divisions were caught in Regio di Calabria, unable to cross the sea.
Another IJA landing was made near Taranto, and this landing did also include mountaineers as well as light tanks.
Those tanks managed to push fast into the western boot-tip, cutting off about 8 Italian infantry divisions, while the mountaineer-units were moving north to set up a defensive line in the Italian mountains until the tanks were back to provide support for an advance.
In the mean time, the motorized divisions from Sicily were brought to the Italian mainland.
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31st of January 1942
Souta started the engine of his Zero.
The IJN Kaga had been blocking the Strait of Messina for enemy forces since about a day after the invasion, and now Japanese light tanks had mopped up an Italian force consisting of about 8 divisions in Regio die Calabria.
The Italians lacked air-cover and, on the bare rocks of southern Italy that didn’t offer lots of vegetation to hide in between, they were sitting ducks. As it appeared, the Italians were slowly running out of supplies and the air-planes were only needed to take out enemy hard-points such as mortar pits.
The IJN had been shelling the coast for some days now, so it should be a quick battle.
On the same day, Japanese Marines were landing on the island of Crete, aiming to take out the major Italian port in the Eastern Mediterranean and to secure the route for Japanese supplies.
Also, 2 Tanku Gundan landed on the island of Sardinia.
High Command was convinced of the low enemy strength in the area, so they decided that the tanks could handle the island easily without much naval or aerial support.
The plane rose to the air and immediately found its place amidst the attacking formation, just as it had been trained time and time again.
“This should be an easy day. The Italians lack air-cover as well as AA-guns. We’ll be back on the carrier before the sun reaches its zenith.” the captain announced.
And the captain was right. It didn’t take long for them to reach the Italian trenches and started to wrench havoc among them.
Souta dropped the light bomb that was attached to his plane into a mortar hole.
This was when the tanks started to advance. They were easily pushing the Italian infantry out of their trenches, where they were easy prey for the machine guns of the tanks and the air-planes.
“Captain! Look! They are raising a white flag! They surrender!” Souta exclaimed.
“Damnit, don’t shout into the radio that loud! Do you want the entire squadron to go deaf?? And yes, I can see it, too! Good work, lads, it seems like we’re finished here!”
On this day, 1,000 Japanese soldiers and 3,623 Italians died. The rest of them surrendered unconditionally.
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14th of February 1942
“I’m slowly getting fed up with digging out trenches all day long. Damned rocky Italian ground!” Takumi swore.
“Seems like our luck has once more kept us out of the fighting. And, unfortunately, that’s what’s disturbing your High Command.” McFarne threw in and jumped back into the hole that was supposed to become an MG-nest in the northern outskirts of Naples.
“I mean, the only resistance our invasion hit so far was on Palermo. Crete doesn’t count, it doesn’t belong to the Italian mainland. And us marching into an undefended Naples on the fourth was all but expected.” McFarne explained, breathing heavily while digging.
Cagliari had fallen in early February after a long but easy fight.
Occupying the island had been but a formality for 2 Tanku Gundan.
The situation on Crete had been different.
While the marines were landing on the island, the Regia Marina was attacking and managed to sink three of the fleet’s five transport flotillas. Luckily, the marines had already reached the coast, so they didn’t lose any strength.
On the island itself, the Italians had air-support, while the Japanese CAGs were still busy fighting of the Italian fleet. Fighting had been intense and the island had been won only because of the redeployment of some Japanese bomber-squadrons.
“We cannot advance any further now. We need to dig in and wait for the rest of our forces to catch up, so that we can advance as a whole, and not in single divisions that can easily be encircled and destroyed. Our reconnaissance-planes have spotted Hungarian and German forces moving into Italy. There will soon be the hell of a resistance, I can promise you that! Listen, Takumi, I know you want to end this quickly so that you can finally see your new-born daughter and miss as few moments of her life as possible. But, for Christ’s sake, you don’t help her when you return in a coffin because you are losing all caution! So stop complaining and help me digging this hole!” McFarne continued.
Aimi, Takumi’s daughter, had been born on the 7th of February, one week ago. He had received the letter on this morning and had immediately written back to his wife and asked, almost begged, her to send him a picture.
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20th of February 1942
Three days ago, a landing had been made on Rhodes and a Japanese spy had been taken in by a submarine. With him, he brought new technological knowledge about several techs.
The landing on Rhodes, however, went easily, as the Regia Marina did only interfere after the island was already taken.
Last night, the last few Japanese forces had arrived at the Napoli line and now, the army was preparing for a push towards Rome.
The Italians had also recovered from the serious blows that had been dealt to them with the fall of Palermo and the end of the Calabria-pocket.
Hungarian forces had arrived in southern Italy and were attacking the Japanese army together with Italian bombers.
The invasion had started about a month ago and -save for the liberation of Malta- all operational goals of stage one had been achieved or outdone, as the easy capture of Napoli moved the planned defensive line a lot more to the north.
Souta had an Italian bomber right in front of him. In fact, he was diving at him from behind with the rest of the squadron.
He liked the idea of being a pilot because he couldn’t deal with the thought that he was actually killing human beings. Thus, he settled things with himself by pretending that enemy airplanes were nothing but machines, with no humans on board.
It had worked out well so far. He had only a bad conscience for the Italians he killed during the attack on the airfield in Palermo and on the Calabria pocket.
He swallowed.
No, he wouldn’t want to be a front soldier.
“Now or never!” the heard the captain’s voice through the speaker and he pulled the trigger.
The thunder of the guns filled the air and the bomber’s left engine caught fire.
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Author's Note:
It seems to be quite common for Italy to invade Malta and for some reason I don't see the British try to take it back! In fact the same seems to hold in reverse with Sardinia, as though the AI likes to take territory but can't be much bothered to recover lost territory!
Anyway, I like the plan for Italy and hopefully it will result in a useful encirclement if the Italians supply some troops. Nice overview.
I saw the same, but, as the Regia Marina abandoned the port, i decided that the island had no longer a major priority for me and to let the British take it beack once they were done in Northern Africa.
I do apologize for the lack of screens of the Calabria pocket, I simply forgot them.
Awesome AAR, and great narrative. Even greater is your fight to keep your democracy... seems you're getting bombarded by random events!
Thanks!
Yes, the random events made things really difficult, but also believable.
Since the last elections, however, things have changed and I'm barely getting such events, which might also be caused by the fact that I'm now in a global conflict.