However, German forces soon took control of Northern and Central Italy Mussolini, who was rescued by German paratroopers, established a collaborationist puppet state, the Italian Social Republic (RSI), to administer the German-occupied territory. The new government signed an armistice with the Allies on 8 September 1943.
The invasion of Sicily in July 1943 led to the collapse of the Fascist Italian regime and the fall of Mussolini, who was deposed and arrested by order of King Victor Emmanuel III on 25 July. On the Western Front of World War II, Italy was the most costly campaign in terms of casualties suffered by infantry forces of both sides, during bitter small-scale fighting around strongpoints at the Winter Line, the Anzio beachhead and the Gothic Line. Over 150,000 Italian civilians died, as did 35,828 anti-fascist partisans and some 35,000 troops of the Italian Social Republic. Fascist Italy, prior to its collapse, suffered about 200,000 casualties, mostly POWs taken in the invasion of Sicily, including more than 40,000 killed or missing. The number of Allied casualties was about 330,000 and the German figure (excluding those involved in the final surrender) was over 330,000. It is estimated that between September 1943 and April 1945, 60,000–70,000 Allied and 38,805–50,660 German soldiers died in Italy. The joint Allied Forces Headquarters (AFHQ) was operationally responsible for all Allied land forces in the Mediterranean theatre and it planned and led the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, followed in September by the invasion of the Italian mainland and the campaign in Italy until the surrender of the German Armed Forces in Italy in May 1945. The Italian campaign of World War II, also called the Liberation of Italy following the German occupation in September 1943, consisted of Allied and Axis operations in and around Italy, from 1943 to 1945.
0 kommentar(er)
