So why did the Italians do so poorly in WW2? Their Navy seemed

Bump.
I am very curious about this. It seems that they their military was too well equipped to do so poorly.

>>30953479
Both. Rommel thought Italian soldiers were okay, but their officers were preening lazy little pieces of shit. And a lot of their kit was world-class, like their ships. They just wound up being less than the sum of their parts.

>>30953479
>No military culture of serious note
which led to
>Weak officer corps
which led to
>Unmotivated enlistedmen and lack of clear endgame
which led to
>Poor strategic planning
which led to
>Italy memes

The Italian Navy was very well equipped for the era, but they spent too much time in port sucking on corks. The Alpine troops were also well reputed, but too little of anything to make a serious effect.

>>30953479
Because the UK was better than Germany and Italy combined.

>>30953523
>>30953538
This makes sense. I also have heard that the country itself has a lot less of a national identity like German, England, or the US so the soldiers were a lot less motivated. Is this true at all?

>>30953546
>National identity
Yeah to an extent they never have had a strong national identity, having been fiercely independent city states for so long, combined with VERY different cultures between north and south Italy, they were united by a monarchy that has more or less always been just symbolic.

t. sexted a qt3.14 from Milan for a year who wouldn't stop telling me how much she hates shitskins southerners.

>>30953538
implying
they r*ped turkey in 1911 and abyssinia before that
they invented bombers

>>30953566
I dated a northern Italian too. Same story. In fact I met a Southern Italian later whose recollection on Italian history was very very different than the Northern.

>>30953546
Not that I'm aware of.

Spain also has some very bitter regional rivalries, and it didn't prevent Franco from putting together a hard-as-nails army.

>>30953542
The US did more in Africa and Italy than the UK though

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>>30953582
>r*ped

And no, anecdotal marvels like "inventing bombers" and fighting a country that at the time had an ancient and grossly inferior navy is not an argument.

>>30953546
Yes and no.

The traditional view is lions led by asses.

The lower level niggas fight just as hard as anyone else, but the politicians never manage to put together a unified command that actually works.

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>>30953479
Its all right here.
>operation Mincemeat

https://www.damninteresting.com/mincemeat-and-the-imaginary-man/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5570fDdBOQ

>>30953479

Dang, that really is a nice battleship. Like an "almost-Iowa."

>>30953523
>>30953538
They followed an effective but somewhat lethargic strategy by concentrating fleet assets to become a "fleet in being"

This meant their mere presences causes headaches for anyone wanting them ded.

I think of all the Axis navies only Italy came out mostly intact and battle ready.

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>>30953609
>US did more in Africa and Italy than the UK though
Italy, yes. Africa, not so much.

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Italians aren't White. Only Whites and Asians can into modern warfare.

If you don't believe me look at the nipples. If the nipples ain't pink you are a mud person.

Italians. No. White.

>>30953609
Yes and the Royal Navy completely annihilated the Italian Navy mostly in port

>>30953666
Only with American lend lease ammo

>>30953666
iirc most of their fleet was simply surrendered

>>30953479
I'm pretty sure that the reason why the Italian didn't do jackshit during the war was because of economics and logistics. Italy didn't have much in the way of oil manufacturing, not even on the level Germany which lead to the high command being very conservative with its navy and always keeping it in port.

>>30953673
The eternal burger.

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>>30953609
B o i

Na srsly yanks didnt win the desert war

>>30953673
Muh Swordfish were not lendlease

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>>30953645
>>30954599

Without American tanks, the Brits would have lost N.Africa.

>>30953479
In the context of warfare "Italians have big appetites and bad teeth"
Im not sure who im quoting here

>>30953479
it doesn't help if you surrender mid war and have your country split in two either.

>>30955260
Without my cock you wouldn't exist you little shit

>>30953652
is the doge trying to eat the rainbow? :3

>>30955285
They didn't exactly surrender but had problems with a split population. South and North Italians aren't exactly the biggest friends.

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>>30953479

It was a shitty combination of bad officers, very bad supply chain and absolutely no esprit de corps. The problem was not in the high command, but in the officer corps as whole.

Imagine
> be italian army lieutenant
> cadet son of a noble family from piedmont
> your NCOs are all from Milan, half of them secretly communist, the other half jewish and fascist.
> the first group hates you for being a nobleman and oppressing the people, the second for being a nobleman that didn't immediately support the fascist revolution
> both hate your guts because you are from piedmont
> the enlisted men are a smatter of sardinians and southerners ranging from subhuman goatherders to intellectuals who despise you for being a cultureless moron
> you hate the NCOs and the soldiers, the NCOs hate the soldiers and you, the soldiers hate the NCO's and you
> since they cannot shoot you for fear of MP's they express their hate with shenanigans

Try to make a war with this force composition, I dare you.

This was absolutely devastating.

To be honest the more "uniform" military formations, drawing soldiers from similar backgrounds were actually better than their allied and german equivalents.

Examples are the Bersaglieri (mostly northerners), who at El Alamein stopped a british armoured division with a light infantry brigade, the Alpini (all northerners) who routed a soviet mechanized brigade in history's first and last succesful bayonet charge against tanks, and the X MAS (all officers, both southerner and northerner) that, well, sank battleships using manned, reusable torpedoes.

The italian army's greatest failing was not lack of spirit or morale, but a lack of cohesion and a shitty supply chain.

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>>30953625
Battleships built in the late 30s tend to be really cool looking

>>30955260
Good thing im a kiwi then m8, still got the lee enfield my grwat grandfather took to war. No yank on that

>>30953479
>So why did the Italians do so poorly in WW2?
I am sure there is a very long winded explanation of why OP, but all you really need to say is
>Italians

>>30953479
>So why did the Italians do so poorly in WW2?
The majority of the country didn't want to be at war. A lot of Italians in the US made Italy unwilling to fight american soldiers,and the persons in power were generally corrupt and didn't want to lose their power or position.

There's a reason they tossed Mussolini out and switched sides.

>>30953546
Germany did/does not have a strong national identity, it spent most of its history being divided states

Mussolini probably didn't expect Hitler to drag him into a war, but there were so many other tinpot dictators in that era everyone else glosses over. There was Tito, Franco, and others. Germany did a shitty job of capitalizing on their foreign supporters.

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>>30953645
Brits only had real success in North Africa after they got their Lees and Shermans.

>>30953542
That's why the UK won the war single handedly

>>30953479
Italy was, and in many ways still is, a very divided country with the north being a very different country than the south.

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"The Italian command was, for the most part, not equal to the task of carrying on war in the desert, where the requirement was lightning decision followed by immediate action. The training of the Italian infantryman fell far short of the standard required by modern warfare. … Particularly harmful was the all pervading differentiation between officer and man. While the men had to make shift without field-kitchens, the officers, or many of them, refused adamantly to forgo their several course meals. Many officers, again, considered it unnecessary to put in an appearance during battle and thus set the men an example. All in all, therefore, it was small wonder that the Italian soldier, who incidentally was extraordinarily modest in his needs, developed a feeling of inferiority which accounted for his occasional failure and moments of crisis. There was no foreseeable hope of a change for the better in any of these matters, although many of the bigger men among the Italian officers were making sincere efforts in that direction."

-Rommel

>They were bad because their industry wasn't up to it
That explains their problems against the industrial powerhouses like Greece or Albania

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>>30953479
>shitty logistics (both in terms of organisation and capability)
>tiny industrial base
>extremely limited access/production of vital resources
>no capital to stockpile imported resources
>not ready for any kind of real fight until 1943

There are plenty of other smaller tactical reasons why they didn't fare so well, but like Japan, Italy as a country was never fundamentally ready for a fight against the Allies.

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>>30955260
>>30956350
The first real success for the British came in 1940 (Operation compass), i.e. before the arrival of the Lee and Sherman.

But, no doubt, when they did arrive they were essential to survival and then victory.

>>30955260
>>30956350

Are you seriously trying to attribute victory in an entire complex strategic scale theatre of war across land, sea and air at expeditionary distances for all involved nations with all arms of land militaries involved in multi-faceted terrain underlying intelligence warfare, espionage and logistics to acquiring two singular pieces of land equipment that at the time were only a portion of its own wing?

Jesus christ, /k/ has hit a new low these days.

>>30953618
Who is this girl?

My grandpa served both in Greece and Albania,always told me that albanians were subhuman tier and hated/feared them with a passion

In Greece some NCO or probably a captain ordered to him,his friend and the rest of the squad to climb up on hill which was guarded by an MG nest, they tried a couple of hours before but failed and half of their squad was goner, grandpa faked a charge and shot a bullet on the head of his TL, then they went back to FOB saying officer was KiA awaiting orders

Took a mortar shell which left him with a mangled leg and killed his friend.Went back to Italy cause the war for him was over

People here loves the partisans even if all they did was a mess and caused innocent victims,then after Mussolini was gone SHTF left and right as groups of partisans started to fight against each other,started to persecute commies and whatnot and that's when I've stopped to give a fuck about those guys as their actions are comparable to those done by the mob.

Mean "when Mussolini was up you looked down on me too much, that's why I've decide to kill you, your wife, your children and whatever relative we'll come up to, cause I fucking feel so"

>>30953601

Regional conflicts were a major cause of Spain's civil war.

Franco's army was made up primarily of Castilians. The Republicans on the other hand were mostly Aragonese.

Believe it or not, when troops don't give a shit about the country they're fighting for they tend to not fight.

>>30959724
That's the country's fault for not bringing people together and writing towards national unity. If that doesn't work because of divisions between North and South Italians, then they probably shouldn't be in one country together.

>>30956165
>spent most of its history being divided states
Once unified, Germany was one whole nation, and under Uncle Adolf they were again unified. The wonders of authoritarianism.

>>30956393
Or Ethiopia.

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>>30956377
Goddammit, Rommel, why'd you have to be on the losing side? We would have elected you President.

>>30953673
not so, partly because the raid on taranto occured before lend lease, but mostly because the americans didnt supply much naval ammo to the british

>>30953479
rip

>>30953479

You know something just occurred to me.

Why didn't the axis just bomb the Panama canal?

>>30956108
I don't think he wanted a cliche answer.

>>30955930
>>30955411
>>30953566
>>30953538
>>30956377

Pretty much all said here, I'd have little more to add on top of it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_participation_in_the_Eastern_Front
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_Army_in_Russia
I'd like to point out hat when Italian soldiers fought under German leadership or command, they performed notably better.

>>30953479
>So why did the Italians do so poorly in WW2?
is this a rhetorical question?

they're italians, dude. if you want something organized, you call the swiss. not a bunch of greasy dago wops.

>has their shit together
>italian

choose one and only one

This has been a much more thoughtful and fulfilling threat than I imagined. Thanks for enlightening me.

>>30953516
they "cut their teeth" by bombing ethiopia with gas...
>its one thing to batter africans who have no way to resist you but the italians didnt seem to have the will to fight a real war

Do Italians ever feel sad comparing themselves to Romans

>>30956350
Oh shutup you drolling retard. I'm an apologist for American armor in ww2 and even I dont believe this stupid shit

>>30960122
>Italy didn't have authoritarian rule under Mussolini

>>30953479
because they were niggers

>>30964745
/thread

>>30964745
/thread g