General Alessandro Pirzio Biroli

Alessandro Pirzio Biroli was one of the most accomplished (and later controversial) Italian soldiers of World War II. He was born in Bologna on July 23, 1877 into a family of noted explorers. An athletic youth, he was a particularly skilled swordsman and won the silver medal in fencing at the 1908 Olympic Games in London. He joined the army as a young man, served in the First World War and by 1918 was promoted to commanding officer of the 8th Bersaglieri Regiment. In 1921 he was assigned to the General Division in Padua and has his first experience with the new Fascist movement. A short time later, however, he was sent to head the military mission to Ecuador, remaining there until 1927. After returning to Italy he was made commander of the Monte Nero Division in 1932 and in 1933 was promoted to command the V Trieste Corps, a post he held until 1935. During the Second Italo-Abyssinian War he commanded the colorful Eritrean Colonial Corps. His men fought with such vigor that they were often employed as assault troops during the campaign, in spite of their training being somewhat outdated and the fact that they were often poorly equipped. This was due to a combination of the skill of their general and the tenacity of the Eritrean colonial troops who had a particular zeal for fighting the Ethiopians, their traditional enemies, who were always threatening to conquer them. For Biroli, the high point of the campaign was his capture of Dese which had formerly been the military headquarters of the Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie.

Emerging from the war with a military record of success, though with some the fact that he commanded African troops meant he might not always have the reputation he deserved, General Biroli continued in the colonies, serving for a year as Governor of Amhara province, the native land of the original Ethiopians, in Italian East Africa (the combined name for Eritrea, Somalia and Abyssinia). When the Kingdom of Italy entered World War II, General Biroli saw action on the Balkan front, taking command of the Ninth Army in 1941, leading it in the latter stages of the war with Greece. After the Greek surrender, General Biroli entered the most controversial phase of his career, being assigned as military governor of the Kingdom of Montenegro, a post he held until 1943. A firm believer in the imperial legacy and destiny of Italy, Biroli was convinced that it was their duty to bring Roman civilization to the backward lands of the Balkans and he would tolerate no opposition to this mission. He was also disgusted by the contrasting reputations of the German and Italian soldiers with the Germans always viewed as the harsh, brutally efficient warriors and the Italians as the casual, fun-loving “nice guys”. As far as the locals were concerned, the appointment of Biroli as governor certainly meant, ‘no more mister nice guy’.

In a pamphlet distributed to his men, General Biroli encouraged his Italian troops to deal with any opposition harshly, reminding them that “It is the same people against whom we fought for centuries on the shores of the Adriatic.” He did not see only the present conflict but also the Slavs who had fought for Austria-Hungary against Italy in the First World War, the Turks and their Slavic subjects who fought the Italian city-state of Venice and all the way back to the barbarian tribes first subdued by the Roman legions thousands of years earlier. Enemy partisans were dealt with severely and their friends, family and associates often suffered along with them. Adolf Hitler was certainly impressed and awarded General Biroli the Knight Grand Cross of the German Eagle, a rare award for anyone much less a foreigner not of the highest military rank. However, in all fairness to General Biroli, it should also be remembered that World War II in the Balkans was an extremely brutal affair all around. Throughout history, even to our own time, it is a region where mercy is so rarely given that few expect it. The communist enemies he was fighting were every bit as brutal as he was and quite often much more so.

The Italian armistice of 1943 marked the end of his military career. The general who had fought red guerillas in Montenegro and led African troops to victory in Ethiopia retired to private life and died in Rome on May 20, 1962.

General Count Pier Ruggero Piccio

One of the founding fathers of the Regia Aeronautica was Count Pier Ruggero Piccio who was also one of the most accomplished Italian fighter pilots of the First World War. He was born in Rome on September 27, 1880 and graduated from the Military Academy of Modena in 1900, assigned as a second lieutenant in the 43rd Infantry Regiment. He saw service in central Africa as part of an officer exchange program with the Kingdom of Belgium and he saw extensive service in the Italo-Turkish War as an artillery officer and the commander of a machinegun section attached to the infantry in which role he earned the Bronze Medal for Military Valor in 1912. This war saw the Kingdom of Italy become the first to use aircraft in combat, though air operations ended before Piccio arrived in Libya. Nonetheless, he had a great interest in this new branch of military service and tried repeatedly to gain the chance to train as a pilot. After being promoted to captain in 1913 he finally got the opportunity and attended Malpensa flying school. Passing with flying colors he qualified first to fly the Nieuport monoplane and later the Caproni bomber before being assigned to the fifth squadron. In 1914, after World War I had broken out but before the Italian intervention, he was awarded the Order of the Crown of Italy.

In January of 1915 the Military Air Corps was established and later that year the Kingdom of Italy entered the conflict with a declaration of war against Austria. Piccio had his first chance at aerial service in wartime, flying reconnaissance missions. He showed great skill and courage, carrying out his missions despite heavy enemy fire and having his aircraft hit numerous times. Awarded another Bronze Medal he was posted to Malpensa for more bomber training. After finishing he took command of third squadron flying the Caproni bombers in missions against Austria from August 1916 to February 1916. After that he was given more training in air-to-air combat in France and returned home to command a fighter squadron, scoring his first success in bringing down a German observation balloon. He was supposed to wait for French pilots to join him with special anti-balloon rockets but went out on his own, doing the job and earning a Silver Medal. In the spring of 1917 Piccio shot down an Albatros, rapidly gaining more ‘kills’ and earning the status of an ace. At one point, he even managed to shoot down the great Lt. Frank Linke-Crawford, the fourth highest scoring ace of Austria-Hungary (thankfully, Linke-Crawford survived though he was later killed in combat).

After shooting down seventeen enemy aircraft he was promoted to lieutenant colonel and made Inspector of Fighter Squadrons. However, by the spring of 1918 he was back in action again, gaining more victories but also providing invaluable service by producing the first manual on air tactics for the Italian forces, devising new flying formations and generally solid regulations, based on his experience, on how to achieve victory in the air. Earning the Gold Medal for Military Valor, by the summer of 1918 the Italian air forces had gained complete dominance over Austria-Hungary in the skies, inflicting horrendous losses on the enemy and effectively breaking the air power of the Dual Monarchy for good. Italian fighters and bombers could attack Austrian ground forces at will, however, ground fire was still dangerous and in the autumn of 1918 luck ran out for Colonel Piccio. He was shot down over enemy territory and captured by the Austrians. Still, he emerged as one of the top Italian flying aces of the Great War with at least 24 victories to his name. He was never formally released by the Austrians but simply walked out in disguise as Austria-Hungary collapsed at the end of the war.

In 1921 Piccio was sent to France but came back to Italy where air power for the establishment of the Regia Aeronautica in 1923. Air power was being given a new emphasis by the new leader of Italy, Benito Mussolini. At the time, only Great Britain and Italy had chosen to develop a fully independent military aviation branch of the armed forces (and France was the only other continental power then building up forces for air combat). Piccio had the right balance of a record of success in the air as well as a reputation for organizing air forces, codifying techniques and instilling discipline that made him the ideal choice to be the military deputy to the Undersecretary of the Air Force. Piccio and his civilian counterpart streamlined the force, gained greater funding, started looking for new and better aircraft design and established a formal air force academy in Livorno. From 1923 to 1925 Piccio served as Commandant General of the Regia Aeronautica, his title later changed to Chief of Air Staff. Also in 1923 he received the prestigious appointment of an honorary aide de camp to King Vittorio Emanuele III.

As Chief of Air Staff from 1926 to 1927 Piccio did begin to have problems with his civilian counterpart and then with Air Marshal Italo Balbo. Much of this stemmed from Piccio’s lavish lifestyle in Paris. Ever since his earliest time there after joining the army, Piccio had a great attachment to the high life of Paris and he had also spent a great deal on the Paris stock market. It was still quite controversial when Marshal Balbo dismissed him but Piccio remained a national hero for his extensive service and illustrious war record. In 1932 he was promoted to lieutenant general and in 1933 the King appointed him a Senator of Italy. His government posts still did not manage to keep him away from France for long and he continued to spend much of his time in Paris, sometimes acting as a go-between for the French Premier and Mussolini. Despite being appointed to the Senate as a member of the Fascist Party, General Piccio was not fond of the direction Mussolini was taking the country. He moved to Switzerland and remarked to an old Belgian comrade from World War I that Italy had spent years trying to defeat the Germans only to have Mussolini helping to bring them back again. He stayed in Switzerland during World War II, giving up the wealth he had gained through his associations with the Fascists (having become thoroughly disgusted with them) and while there he helped Italian soldiers to safety after the armistice and aided the resistance movements in both France and Italy. General Pier Piccio died in Rome on July 31, 1965 still remembered as one of the great aces of World War I and one of the founders of the Regia Aeronautica.

Marshal of the Air Italo Balbo

Italo Balbo is, in many ways, evocative of the Italian story as a whole during the final decades of the Kingdom of Italy and the Fascist era. He started his life as a restless revolutionary and a radical republican; an early and rough Blackshirt beloved of Mussolini. At the peak of his career he became a zealous and talented empire-builder, a bringer of civilization and finally he became an ardent royalist, disillusioned with the Fascist regime and often at odds with Mussolini. Italo Balbo was born on June 6, 1896 in Ferrara and starting at a very young age was drawn to radical politics, nationalism and a life of adventure. He was only fourteen he went to Albania with a group of volunteers led by Ricciotti Garibaldi (son of Giuseppe Garibaldi) to fight in a rebellion against the rule of the Turkish Ottoman Empire. As a young man he supported Italian participation in World War I on the side of the Allies and when Italy did enter the war he enlisted in the Royal Army. Balbo first served as an officer candidate in the Alpini Battalion “Val Fella” before beginning training with the air service.

After the disastrous battle of Caporetto, Balbo returned to the front, serving in another Alpini Battalion where he took command of the assault platoon. He courage in the face of the enemy eventually earned him one bronze and two silver medals for military valor as well as promotion to captain before the war ended. He studied in Florence after the war and he wrote a paper on “the economic and social thought of Giuseppe Mazzini”. He was, obviously, a republican at this stage but came to detest the socialists and the labor and trade unions they controlled because of their disorder and disrupting of the Italian economy and society. He was working as a bank clerk back in his home town when, in 1921, he became one of the first members of the National Fascist Party. He rose to be secretary of the Ferrara branch of the Fascist party and soon organized his own squad of Blackshirts which he led in raids on local socialist and communist groups as well as helping to break up strikes and protests organized by Marxists in the area. Balbo soon became known as one of the most active and forceful leaders in the Fascist movement.

Balbo, second from left, with Fascist leaders

Like many of the early squadristi, Balbo had been a republican, saw himself as a revolutionary and envisioned a Fascist state in which local bosses like himself would hold more power rather than a central dictator. Obviously, this was not the vision of Mussolini who had started to move his party more to the right as the socialists and communists began to drive more support in their direction. This was also part of a deliberate effort by Mussolini to broaden his base of support beyond the radical fringe and become more than just republican revolutionaries who disagreed with the socialists almost only on their attachment to internationalism and denigration of patriotism. Unity was particularly sought with the older nationalists who were right-wing and staunchly monarchist. Yet, because Balbo had become such a star in the Fascist Party, he was chosen for a prominent leadership position. When Mussolini (from the safety of his office in Milan) planned the Blackshirt march on Rome in 1922, Italo Balbo was one of the “Quadrumvirs” chosen to lead it. However, he would serve alongside more conservative Fascists such as Cesare De Vecchi and General Emilio De Bono. The presence of Michele Bianchi, a socialist turned syndicalist, helped balance out the leadership and, Mussolini hoped, appeal to the widest array of Italians possible.

The march, of course, turned out to be little more than a parade as political maneuvering had already secured the premiership for Mussolini before his Blackshirts ever entered Rome, however, Italo Balbo had secured his place as one the leading members of the Fascist hierarchy and was appointed one of the first members of the Fascist Grand Council in 1923. The following year he was named commander of the Blackshirt militia and in 1925 was made Undersecretary for National Economy. His real significance, however, came in 1926 when he was made Secretary of State for Air. Mussolini wanted to put a renewed emphasis on Italian aviation and Balbo was the man who would be in charge of this project. Balbo learned how to fly himself and set to work organizing what became the Regia Aeronautica. By 1928 he had been promoted to General of the Air Force, later Minister of the Air Force and, eventually, Marshal of the Air. Aside from organizing the military air branch, Balbo also encouraged exploration and endurance flights that would generate publicity for the air force, encourage more Italians to take an interest in aviation and raise the profile of Italy in the skies. As part of this campaign, Balbo himself led a trans-Atlantic flight in 1930 from Italy to Brazil and in 1933 all the way to Chicago where he was received with great fanfare and media attention. President Roosevelt even decorated him with the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Italo Balbo had risen to become an international celebrity and many in the Fascist ranks began to speak of him as the future successor of Benito Mussolini. However, Balbo and Mussolini did not always agree on everything and the issues they disagreed on seemed to be growing more numerous. When, in 1933, Balbo was appointed Governor-General of Libya many viewed it as an effort to “exile” him from Rome. It was also a formidable mission he was tasked with. Balbo came to Libya with the expectation that he would make it a model colony, demonstrating Fascist efficiency and truly turning the place into the “fourth shore” of Italy. Although many today would not like to admit it, Balbo did essentially that. Expansion and development increased to such an extent that Balbo became known as the “Father of Libya” and this was largely true inasmuch that Libya became modern and up-to-date for the first time in history. Mussolini, for a time, hoped that Italy might gain the remains of the former German colony of Cameroon for an Italian Cameroon that would be linked by a land bride to Libya and give Italy an Atlantic port. With the frenzy of new roads, buildings, settlements and harbor facilities going up in Libya, anything seemed possible.

When international tensions began growing over the threat of renewing the war in Abyssinia, Marshal Balbo began making plans for an invasion from his colony into Egypt-Sudan. If Britain decided to go to war with Italy over Abyssinia, or close the Suez Canal to Italian troop transports, Balbo wanted to lead the attack to force the vital chokepoint open. Ultimately, Britain did not intervene on behalf of Ethiopia but they did reinforce their military presence in the Mediterranean, however, there is reason to believe that had such a conflict occurred, Italy would have had a legitimate chance of success. At the height of the crisis, Balbo deployed his troops along the Egyptian border and due to the poor state of British military intelligence, they had no idea it happened and Balbo would have been in a perfect position to have launched an attack on Egypt and take the British forces completely by surprise. Britain only became aware of it all via Rome itself when Mussolini rejected the planned operation, which turned out to be unnecessary in any event.

Although it was hardly seen as a promotion, by being posted to Libya, Marshal Balbo actually had far greater autonomy than he would have otherwise enjoyed and used his position to circumvent the normal military bureaucracy to create his own elite unit of Libyan paratroopers. Balbo himself, along with his pilots, undertook reconnaissance flights over Egypt and the Sudan to familiarize themselves with the area in the event of war between Britain and Italy in north Africa. He was determined to be prepared for any eventuality. However, Balbo was also aware enough of the true state of affairs to oppose Italian involvement in World War II. In fact, he had come a long way from his days as a blackshirt leader and was increasingly conservative, realistic and even royalist. Balbo was the only leading member of the Fascist Party to openly oppose the racial laws aimed against the Jewish community and the only one to publicly denounce the Axis alliance with Adolf Hitler. As Italy moved closer and closer toward the prospect of world war alongside Nazi Germany, Balbo reversed his earlier republicanism and was grateful the monarchy had been preserved and hoped that the King would intervene to stop Mussolini from taking the country to war.

Unfortunately, while the increased attachment to the monarchy was laudable, this was an all too common response of many in the Fascist hierarchy; men who had previously opposed the King and helped Mussolini gain dictatorial power suddenly demanding that the King reassert himself, taking all the political risk, to bail them out of a situation of their own making and to take actions against Mussolini that they were unwilling to take themselves. Air Marshal Balbo, to his credit, did more than most in the Fascist ranks to express his displeasure (saying that the alliance would result in the Italians being totally subservient to the Germans) but nonetheless, acceded to the policies of the government and determined to do his duty as best he could. Part of this included an intricate plan for the elimination of British armored forces in Egypt through the use of diversionary attacks from the air and a fast moving motorized column. However, Balbo would not live to see any of his plans carried out. When Italy joined the war in 1940, Balbo became supreme military commander of Italian north African forces and began planning the invasion of Egypt. Unfortunately, while flying into Tobruk on June 28, just after a British air raid, his plane was mistakenly shot down by Italian anti-aircraft batteries.

Some, then and now, believe that Mussolini set up the whole thing to get rid of Air Marshal Balbo because of his opposition to Fascist policies. However, there is no evidence to back that up and it certainly would not have looked good for Mussolini as such an action would have contradicted his boast that “Mussolini is always right” considering that he had earlier considered Balbo to be his successor as Duce. Balbo was buried near Tripoli but his body was moved to Italy in 1970 after the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi threatened to desecrate the bodies of all Italians buried in Libyan soil.

Marshal of Italy Pietro Badoglio, 1st Duke of Addis Abeba and 1st Marquess of Sabotino

Marshal Badoglio, a significant figure in the military history of the Kingdom of Italy from the time of World War I until the end of World War II. His shifting loyalties have left him reviled by Communists as well as Fascists, by Italian patriots and the enemies of Italy and by republicans as well as monarchists. Certainly, others in history have been known for changing allegiance, fighting for one side and then later opposing it, but usually they were being loyal to some greater cause, some noble principle, even if evident only to themselves. In the case of Marshal Badoglio however, it is hard to see any motivation other than a self-serving effort to shift blame, avoid responsibility and survive the consequences of what were often his own mistakes. It is hard to imagine anyone rising so high in the military while being to a considerable extent responsible for one of the worst defeats in Italian history and then rising to the top political position in the country despite being out of favor with all the major parties and distrusted by the King.

Pietro Badoglio was born in Grazzano Montferrat (later renamed Grazzano Badoglio) in Asti, Piedmont. He attended the military academy in Turin and joined the Royal Italian Army in 1892 as a lieutenant in the artillery, serving in Eritrea in 1896 and Libya in 1912. It was there that he first attracted the notice of his superiors for his meritorious service at the battle of Zanzur. He received a decoration for his service and a promotion to major. By the time Italy entered the First World War, Badoglio was a lieutenant colonel serving on the general staff of the Second Army with the Fourth Division. That unit was stationed in the Monte Sabotino sector, a bleak region that had been strongly fortified by the Austrians. Badoglio urged his superiors that Monte Sabotino be taken even though most considered the Austrian position impregnable. Badoglio, however, thought he had a better way. A frontal assault would have been all but suicidal so, instead, he proposed digging a network of tunnels underneath the Austrian lines and exploding them to disrupt their defensive line.

His plan approved, Badoglio was promoted to colonel while the engineers worked at digging the extensive tunnels as near as possible to the Austrian lines. In April of 1916, with Colonel Badoglio then serving as Chief of Staff of the Sixth Army Corps, the attack was made and was a stunning success with Monte Sabotino being taken by the Italians with only minimal losses. Because of this, by August he had been promoted to major general and he was later made Vice-Chief of Staff, widely believed to be because of the favor of General Luigi Capello who, like Badoglio, was a member of the Freemasons. By that time, Italian forces had suffered their worst defeat of the war at the Battle of Caporetto. The role that Badoglio played in this disaster is still a matter of some controversy, however, there is hardly any dispute that the commission charged with looking into the defeat after the war, to determine how such a thing could have happened, laid no small amount of blame at the feet of Badoglio. However, by the time the report was done, Mussolini was in charge and did not want any bad press for a top commander in the army and so mention of Badoglio was removed before the report was released.

In the end, this only served to tarnish his reputation further, perhaps even further than he deserved since most historians state that Badoglio was, otherwise, a competent staff officer. Still, it would not be the last time that his war record would be stained by controversy. He participated in the Italian delegation to the peace talks and served as Chief of Staff of the army from 1919 to 1921. Like some other officers, he tried to avoid politics in the turbulent years after the war and was not very supportive of the rising National Fascist Party. This stands out as there were many veterans in the ranks of the Black shirts and the Fascist message was tailor-made for many military veterans, decrying how, despite the sacrifice and heroism of the Italian soldiers, the promises Britain and France had made to them were not kept and that a stronger military was needed. Badoglio, however, tried to stay out of the turmoil and, at his request, was made Italian ambassador to Brazil until Mussolini requested his return to the post of Chief of Staff in 1925. He went along with the new government comfortably enough and the following year he was promoted to Marshal of Italy.

From 1928 to 1934 Badoglio served as Governor of Libya, taking harsh measures when necessary but requiring additional help to finally end rebellion in the colony. His greatest moment of triumph, but later more controversy, came when he was given command of the primary front in the war against Ethiopia. Mussolini had, at first, wanted the war to be a “Fascist war” with the bulk of the troops coming from his Black shirt militia and his senior Black shirt general, Emilio De Bono, in overall command. However, when De Bono proved too cautious and slow for Mussolini, he was promoted off the front line and Marshal Badoglio was called in to replace him. The Italian forces launched a renewed and more vigorous offensive which in 1936 culminated in the capture of the Ethiopian capital. Marshal Badoglio made a triumphant entry into the city and was quickly named the first Viceroy of Italian East Africa. Later, however, accusations of cruelty were made against the Marshal over the use of chemical weapons (poison gas) against the Ethiopians, in violation of the Geneva Convention. Blame for this is usually reserved for Mussolini but, according to some documents, Badoglio ordered the use of poison gas even before Mussolini himself had authorized it.

Mussolini grew to despise Badoglio more and more. He disliked having to share credit with him for the east African victory and he bristled when Badoglio advised against entering World War II, saying that the Italian army was not prepared for such a conflict, yet, at the same time, assuring the government that the Italian munitions industry was more advanced than that of the Germans. This prevarication, combined with hesitation over military policy while refusing to resign (he received the highest salary of any official at his level) earned him the wrath of Mussolini who still did not hesitate to blame Badoglio for never informing him of the true state of affairs after he plunged Italy into war while seldom seeking and never taking the advice of his Chief of Staff. Yet, there is evidence that it was Badoglio himself who proposed Mussolini being given direct command of the armed forces, perhaps in an effort to wash his hands of any responsibility. Similarly, Badoglio claimed that he advised against the invasion of Greece while other evidence indicates that he endorsed the decision with no objections. When things went wrong, Badoglio disavowed any connection with the campaign and after Fascist papers began to blame the Chief of Staff for the numerous setbacks, he finally resigned his position.

Marshal Badoglio remained quiet for a time until things began to go badly for Italy and many, even in the upper ranks of the Fascist Party, began to talk about the need to get rid of Mussolini and extricate Italy from a losing war. Badoglio began to involve himself in these talks and did not always show a great deal of loyalty, once boasting that at any given time he could overthrow Mussolini and even the monarchy if he so desired. In 1943 a majority of the leaders on the Fascist Grand Council decided that Mussolini had to go and the King was able to move against the doomed dictator. It retrospect, it is easy to wonder why Badoglio ended up being the man to replace the Duce when he was so disliked by the Fascist hierarchy and somewhat distrusted at court. The simple answer is that there seemed to be no better possible options. Badoglio had the reputation to command the army while not being tainted by recent setbacks. As a Piedmontese officer, royalists expected him to be loyal and he had distanced himself enough from the Fascists that the Allies could be expected to deal with him.

On July 25, 1943 the King dismissed Mussolini and Marshal Badoglio was appointed Prime Minister. However, there was immediate confusion as the Marshal addressed the people by telling them that the war would go on and that nothing had really changed. He told the Germans that Italy was still totally committed to the Axis while opening secret negotiations with the Allies at the same time. In September Badoglio signed an armistice with the Allies but failed to give any prior notice of this to the Italian armed forces, leaving many wondering if the news was genuine and many more cut off on foreign battlefields at the mercy of the Germans. Italy was forced to surrender unconditionally, a sore point for the King who had hoped that Italy would retain her colonies acquired prior to 1922 and maintain her territorial integrity. That would not be the case nor would the Allies commit to the maintenance of the monarchy. Even after Italy joined the Allied war effort under Badoglio this remained a point of contention. Some suggested that the King and Prince Umberto of Piedmont should abdicate their rights in favor of the young Prince Victor Emmanuel whom Badoglio would act for as regent. Badoglio, of course, favored this option but the King regarded this as almost an act of betrayal. He was also very displeased with the radical political figures Badoglio was dealing with to form a post-war government after the end of martial law.

The whole affair was badly handled and ended with the King and Badoglio being forced to leave Rome which was thereafter occupied by the Germans while the Allies fought their way up the Italian peninsula. In 1944 the increased opposition finally forced Badoglio to step aside in favor of a more leftist government. Some, particularly the Ethiopians, wished to see him tried for war crimes but by shifting to the Allied side Badoglio had ensured that he would be saved such a fate. He died on November 1, 1956 in Grazzano Badoglio at the age of 85.

General Ettore Perrone di San Martino

Ettore Perrone conte di San Martino was born in Turin on January 12, 1789 to a prominent aristocratic family of Canavese. He began his military career in the service of France when the French dominated northern Italy. In 1806 he volunteered for the “Legion du Midi”, graduated from Saint-Cyr military academy and then served as an infantry junior officer in the campaigns of 1807 to 1809. He earned the Legion of Honor for gallantry at the battle of Wagram where he was wounded. From 1810 to 1811 he fought in Spain as an officer in the Young Guard, in the summer of 1811 becoming a member of the prestigious Old Guard grenadiers. Despite being wounded, he hobbled off on crutches to serve in the invasion of Russia. As an infantry captain he fought at Luetzen and Bautzen in 1813, was stabbed by a bayonet and was wounded no less than three times at the battle of Montmirail. The following year Napoleon promoted him to command of the 24^th Infantry Battalion and during the famous Hundred Days campaign he served as adjutant to General Gerard.

Perrone stayed in France after the Bourbon restoration and was recalled to the army in 1817. After his service he returned to Turin after a stopover in England. When the House of Savoy restored the monarchy to its pre-Revolutionary form he tried to enlist the support of other nobles against it, advocating instead for a constitutional monarchy. This coincided with the Carbonari uprising in Piedmont-Sardinia and a resulting crackdown by government forces. He was arrested and condemned to death for revolutionary activity, however, he managed to escape to France and rejoined the army there, rising to the rank of general. Back home he was hanged in effigy by the authorities. In France, Perrone married a relative of the famous Marquis de Lafayette but took his family out of Paris during the uprising that brought down King Charles X. Perrone stayed with the army, rising to command the Loire Department command. However, his homeland was never far from his thoughts, nor was he from their own and in the revolutionary year of 1848 22,330 people voted for him in elections for the Constituent Assembly, despite his still being in France. That month, after the proclamation of March 23 by King Carlo Alberto, after 27 years in exile, he left France and wrote to his old friend, Cesare Balbo, offering his sword for the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia.

It was also in March of 1848, in the famous “Five Days” that Italian nationalists in Milan rose up and expelled the Austrian garrison. Afterwards, the Provisional Government of Milan gave him the post of Inspector General of the Army of Lombardy and the city of Ivrea nominated him to be their Deputy in the recently formed Subalpine Parliament in Turin. However, General Perrone dismissed all praise for himself, claiming all the time to be nothing more than a humble farmer and foot soldier. Nonetheless, the government in Turin named him Minister of Foreign Affairs though at the same time others cast aspersions on him for his long stay in France and his handling of the army. From October 11 to December 16 he held the post of Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, though his enemies still tried to spread opposition to him. Not allowed to stand for elections, King Carlo Alberto stepped in and appointed him to the rank of general in his army, giving him command of the Third Infantry Division consisting of 12,027 men and 16 canon. It was in this capacity that, the following year, he took part in the pivotal battle of Novara in the First Italian War of Independence.

The Austrians under Field Marshal Graf Radetzky had marched into Lombardy and seized Mortara and the Piedmontese army under the Polish Napoleonic veteran General Wojciech Chrzanowski (who was ignorant of the ground, the situation and did not even speak Italian) rushed to meet them at Novara. Lt. General Ettore Perrone commanded the left wing of the Piedmontese forces. A key portion of the army was cut off (whether by treachery or incompetence remains debated but the general in charge was shot) and the whole Austrian army fell on the Piedmontese at Novara. The Austrians were experienced, well trained and disciplined and with a veteran and skillful commander very familiar with northern Italy. The Piedmontese had a slight numerical advantage but were disadvantaged in every other way. The Austrians launched a heavy attack on his sector and he at least held firm but he was cut down in a heavy fusillade, being shot in the head and knocked from his horse, dislocating his shoulder in the process. He lingered for several hours in great pain before passing away.

His funeral services were large affairs attended by many people and his family went on after him. His great-great granddaughter is HM Queen Paola of the Belgians.

The King and His Generals

Count Luigi Cadorna and the King

The King and Marshal Armando Diaz

The King and Marshal De Bono

The King and Air Marshal Balbo

The King and Marshal Badoglio

Marshal of Italy Emilio De Bono

One of the most senior but actually least involved military leaders of the final years of the Kingdom of Italy was Marshal Emilio De Bono. He was born on March 19, 1866 in Cassano d’Adda in the Province of Milan. His father had been an officer in the Piedmontese army and arrived in Cassano in 1865. He met Emilia Bazzi, the daughter of a pharmacist, married her and Emilio was born soon after. As his father had been a career officer in the royal army it was perfectly natural for Emilio De Bono to choose the military life as well. He first attended the Milano Military College and then went on to the Modena Military Academy, graduating as a lieutenant in 1886. He volunteered for service in Africa and was sent with the III Bersaglieri regiment to the colonial conflict in Eritrea. His dedicated service earned him fairly steady promotion and by the outbreak of the war with Turkey in 1911 he was a lieutenant colonel. During that war De Bono saw his first service in Libya where he organized the naval supply bases at Misurata before being appointed chief of staff of the first special division.

When the Kingdom of Italy entered World War I, Colonel De Bono was chief of staff for the II Army Corps but he soon took a field assignment as the commander of the XV Bersaglieri regiment. The following year he was promoted to command the Trapani Brigade and won high praise for his actions in the capture of Gorizia in August. De Bono was promoted to general and given command of the Savona Brigade and later he was given command of the IX Army Corps which he led to victory at Monte Grappa in 1918, a feat which inspired a popular war song. As he had been at the beginning, General De Bono was there at the end as well, leading his men with reliable skill at the crushing Italian victory of Vittorio Veneto which finally forced Austria to agree to an armistice and exit the war. He was highly decorated for his service and assigned garrison duty in Verona. However, the government handling of the war, the peace settlement and the rise in radical Marxist organizations calling for the overthrow of the Kingdom of Italy pushed General De Bono into sympathy for the National Fascist Party of Benito Mussolini. It is important to note, however, that De Bono was not in favor of what the original Fascist program had been and his support, like that of many others, came after Mussolini considerably moderated his party platform for practical reasons.

General De Bono was always a patriotic Italian and a loyal subject of his King who, unlike Mussolini, believed in the monarchy as the embodiment of the history of Italy. De Bono became very close friends with Prince Emanuele Filiberto, Duke of Aosta who was also, of course, a monarchist but who also supported a more Italian nationalist position to strengthen, unite and embellish the country. De Bono had no experience in politics and no real interest in politics but he gave his support to the Fascists simply because they seemed to be in the best position to save Italy from the Marxist revolutionaries and build a more strong and proud country. Because he was so respected, and a general, the Fascists used De Bono to add respectability to their movement and capitalize on his fame. He was made inspector of the Blackshirt squads but was unimpressed with their discipline. Still, he served as one of the “Quadrumvirs” in the Fascist “March on Rome” on October 28, 1922. After the Fascists took power, De Bono was put in charge of turning the Blackshirts into a part of the national establishment, the result being the formation of the MVSN or National Security Volunteer Militia. This upset some of the older hard-line Fascists as it meant that many army veterans, who were royalists, being put in command of Blackshirt units.

After Mussolini firmly established himself as leader of the government, General De Bono was put in charge of Public Security, as the most senior military man in the Fascist hierarchy, and was appointed to the Italian Senate. In 1925 he was given the post of Governor of Tripolitania in Libya where he had to deal with rebellions by the Senussi Islamic sect. He also promoted the establishment of a modern system of agriculture in Libya, mostly by farmers brought in from southern Italy. He held that post until 1928 and the following year supported the military campaign to permanently end the Bedouin rebellion in the colony. General De Bono continued to devote his time to colonial service and in 1935 was appointed High Commissioner of Italian Africa. He played a key role in the organization of Italian forces for the war against Ethiopia and when the war began was the top Italian commander in the field. He won all of the early battles in the conflict but Mussolini was displeased by the slowness of his advance. General De Bono had planned and was waging a traditional colonial war which meant that he would keep his forces together, advancing slowly, from one defensive position to another and allowing the more numerous Ethiopians to destroy themselves by attacking the Italians with their superior weaponry in protected positions.

This was a cautious, effective strategy intended to save Italian lives. However, the sanctions imposed on Italy by the League of Nations forced a more aggressive approach. Mussolini feared, and the League of Nations hoped, that if the Ethiopians could carry on the war long enough, the Italian people would be crippled by the sanctions and it would not only force them to retreat from Ethiopia but possibly bring down the Fascist government as well. This was a real possibility as most military experts and observers expected the war against Ethiopia to take about two years at minimum to complete. To avoid this, Mussolini replaced De Bono with General Badoglio. It was a blow to the dictator who had planned the Ethiopian War to be carried out primarily by his Blackshirt militia with a Fascist general in charge. Instead, he had to turn it over to a career army man and De Bono was, as the saying goes, “kicked upstairs” with congratulations for the victories he had won and a promotion to Marshal of Italy. A new strategy was adopted and the war that was supposed to last two years ended with the Italian conquest of the Ethiopian Empire in seven months.

Marshal De Bono continued to serve in colonial posts but became increasingly less enthusiastic about the policies of Mussolini. He disapproved of the way he seemed to be sidelining the King, he disapproved of the German-inspired racial laws of 1938 and the following year reported on the woeful un-preparedness of Italian military forces and infrastructure along the French border. Unfortunately, his findings were ignored, to the detriment of the Italian forces Prince Umberto would lead into battle against the French. Even after the outbreak of World War II, Marshal De Bono remained mostly in positions in which he could review, inspect and recommend but not command. He made a report on the Italian position in Albania pointing out that they were unprepared in terms of modern equipment, weapons and supplies for major offensive operations (which was also ignored) and he had opposed Italian intervention in World War II altogether on the grounds that the military had been exhausted by the campaigns in Africa, Spain and Albania and needed a period of restoration and modernization.

Mussolini would not listen and went to war anyway and even when Marshal De Bono was made commander of the Southern Armies, this was mostly a ceremonial position. The Marshal had disapproved of almost every action taken by Mussolini in the build-up to the war and the Duce had come to view the Marshal as being overly cautious, overly pessimistic and essentially the opposite of everything he wanted to be seen as. Sadly for Italy, Marshal De Bono was proven correct during the course of the war, particularly the crucial year of 1942 when Axis fortunes began to reverse everywhere. When Sicily itself was invaded in 1943 the Fascist Grand Council, of which Marshal De Bono was a member, was called together. De Bono, quite bravely, first proposed that Mussolini hand over the responsibilities for the military and foreign policy to someone else. When Dino Grandi boldly proposed that Mussolini step down altogether Marshal De Bono was among those who voted in favor of the proposal that Mussolini had to go. Nonetheless, he was shocked when Marshal Badoglio, appointed by the King to replace Mussolini, banned the National Fascist Party and disbanded the MVSN.

In the chaotic situation that followed, Marshal De Bono felt there had never been a greater need for the structure of the old Fascist Party with the Allies demanding total subjugation, the Nazis invading from the north and communist partisans taking up arms against their countrymen. Fearful that the communists would take over, he reported for duty in Rome, prepared to help in any way he could. He also harshly criticized the Badoglio regime for ‘screwing the monarchy’. He could neither bring himself to support Mussolini’s republican regime in the north or the Allied-controlled Badoglio government in the south. In any event, he did not have long to remain in limbo. On October 4, 1943 he was arrested by the Axis forces and put on trial for “treason” by a special court organized by the Fascist Republican Party Congress. He appealed the “guilty” verdict only because of the outrageousness of referring to his actions as “treason”. Of course, it was to no avail and Marshal of Italy Emilio De Bono was executed on Mussolini’s orders on January 11, 1944.

Marshal of Italy Ettore Bastico

Marshal of Italy Ettore Bastico was one of the best Italian commanders of World War II even though he remains less well known than he should be. He was born in Bologna on April 9, 1876 and on October 14, 1894 entered the Military Academy of Modena for training as an infantry officer. In 1896 he graduated as a lieutenant in one of the elite Bersaglieri regiments. He attended the Military Academy at Turin after that and served in several commands as a staff officer; the VIII Army Corps in Florence, the Cuneo Division and the War Ministry. He was then posted back to a Bersaglieri regiment in Rome and promoted to captain. During the Italo-Turkish War he served in Libya for several months as an observer with the airship engineer specialist battalion. After this service he returned to the War Ministry as war broke out in the rest of Europe. He earned the bronze medal of merit in January of 1915 for his organization of the relief effort for the victims of the Avezzano earthquake. After Italy entered the First World War Bastico won further promotion and served in various staff positions. For his service and courage he earned a silver medal for bravery and another bronze medal from the King of Italy and the Cross of War from France. After the conflict he taught art and military history at the Livorno Naval Academy for a few years as well as writing about trench warfare and the future of warfare as he saw it, displaying military thinking well ahead of his time.

From 1923 to 1927 Colonel Bastico commanded the IX Bersaglieri Regiment in Asti. He then served as Director of “Military Review” and was commander of the National College of Physical Education. In 1928 he was promoted to brigadier general and commanded the XIV Infantry brigade at Gorizia. After being promoted to major general he commanded the Prince Eugene of Savoy division at Udine, the XVI Division at Bologna and then was given command of the first MVSN (Blackshirt) Division upon the outbreak of the war with Ethiopia. He proved himself a highly adept field commander and General Badoglio promoted him to command the III Corps. He played a decisive role in the brilliant Italian victory at the second battle of Tembien when the entire Ethiopian Army of the Center was all but destroyed. In the final stages of the war he showed his logistical and engineering talent building roads and moving supplies for the final victory of the Italian forces despite tremendous geographical hardships. For all his achievements he was promoted to lieutenant general and awarded the Military Order of Savoy (Commander), the Order of the Star of Italy (Grand Officer) and the Order of the Crown of Italy. Bastico had already proven himself one of the best field commanders Italy had but his greatest triumph was still to come.

At the height of the Spanish Civil War Mussolini sent large numbers of Italian volunteers to fight alongside the nationalists of Generalissimo Francisco Franco against the communist-dominated republicans. After the stunning defeat of the Italo-Spanish forces at the battle of Guadalajara, General Bastico was sent in to take command of the Italian army, replacing General Mario Roatta. The republicans had been stockpiling supplies in the north for a massive counter-offensive across the whole of Spain, massing up all of their strength in the hope of winning the war in one massive stroke. General Bastico developed a bold plan for attacking and wiping out the republicans in their northern stronghold, running his men through intense training exercises and coordinating infantry, artillery and airpower for an attack such as had never been seen before. When he sent his troops forward he impressed on them the need to maintain the initiative, to never stop advancing for any reason. The result was the crushing Spanish-Italian victory of Santander with the republican forces being almost wiped out completely. General Bastico was hailed as the “conqueror of Santander” and credited with breaking the back of the republican forces in northern Spain. However, he clashed with Generalissimo Franco and was recalled to Italy after that triumph.

Bastico was further decorated, given command of the Army of the Po and was made a senator in 1939. When Italy entered World War II the “conqueror of Santander” was posted to the Dodecanese Islands to defend them from a Greco-British attack that never materialized. In 1941, promoted to General of the Army, Bastico was made Governor of Libya, replacing General Italo Gariboldi who had been unable to get along with the German General Erwin Rommel. The Axis forces won some of their greatest successes but, like Gariboldi, Bastico often clashed with Rommel who had a reputation of difficult relations with his superiors. Despite the fact that he usually got his way, Rommel was officially under Italian command since the war was being fought in Italian territory. Bastico was sidelined somewhat as Rommel won his sweeping victories that drove the British out of Libya. When Rommel was promoted to Field Marshal by Hitler for his victory at Tobruk, Mussolini promoted Bastico to Marshal of Italy in 1942. However he was restricted to command only the forces in Libya. He strongly disagreed with Rommel over the invasion of Egypt. Bastico (and others) warned that Malta had to be taken first or else the British would repel any attack on Egypt simply through logistical superiority. Unfortunately for the Italian army, Bastico was ignored and Rommel led Axis forces to ultimate defeat at El Alamein where much of the Italian army was sacrificed.

In the aftermath, the British counter-attacked and Rommel retreated to Tunisia, surrendering Libya to Britain virtually without a fight. Bastico then had no function as Governor-General of Libya and retired to Rome. There was talk of Marshal Bastico trying to arrange an armistice with the Allies through the Vatican to get rid of the Fascists and set up a provisional military government to keep order in Italy but nothing came from it. After the war, Marshal Bastico was put on the reserve list, decorated by the Italian republic and spent his time studying military history, uniforms, decorations and chivalric orders from around the world. He died in Rome on December 2, 1972 as one of the most experienced, successful and skillful commanders of the Royal Italian Army in the Twentieth Century.

Marshal of Italy Armando Diaz, 1st Duca della Vittoria

General Armando Diaz will always be remembered as the man who turned around the Italian war effort in 1917, picking up the pieces after the disastrous battle of Caporetto and leading Italy to the final victory in 1918 at Vittorio Veneto. His announcement of the total defeat of the Austrians and the victorious advance of the Italian army was one of the greatest moments of celebration in the entire history of the Kingdom of Italy. His time as the top military commander in the First World War did not last long, and he certainly had his detractors, but it proved extremely pivotal. He was born on December 5, 1861 in Naples and decided at an early age to pursue a military career. That, in itself, was a bold move considering that in the youth of the Kingdom of Italy the Royal Army leadership tended to be dominated by the Piedmontese and few would have placed much money on a young Neapolitan of Spanish ancestry rising very far in the ranks of the officer corps. Still, Diaz pressed on and earned a place as an officer in the artillery. He undertook further military training, graduating first in his class and in 1895 married Sarah De Rosa-Mirabellli. Later he worked as secretary to General Alberto Pollio (who would later be commander of the army).

Promoted to major, Diaz served as a battalion commander in the 26^th Infantry Regiment for a short time before being promoted to lieutenant colonel in 1905. Afterwards, Diaz spent a few years in Florence as Chief of Staff of the local military division before he was called to serve at the front in 1910. This was the start of the Italo-Turkish War in which Colonel Diaz commanding the 93^rd Infantry Regiment in Libya. He was wounded in 1912 in the fighting around Zanzur, distinguishing himself and further advancing his career. In 1914, when World War I broke out, General Count Luigi Cadorna promoted Diaz to major general and made chief of operations. In June of 1916, after the Kingdom of Italy joined the conflict, General Diaz requested a frontline assignment and was given command of the 49^th Division with the rank of lieutenant general and later command of the entire 23^rd Army Corps. As a general, he was frequently at the front and under fire and was awarded the Silver Medal for bravery after being wounded in the shoulder. This was only shortly before the disastrous battle of Caporetto in which the Royal Italian Army was smashed and to a large extent disintegrated with only a few elements standing firm and covering the retreat to the Piave River.

After such a catastrophe there was no longer any doubt that General Cadorna had to go and on November 8, 1917 Diaz received a royal decree from King Vittorio Emanuele III appointed him Chief of Staff of the army. It was General Diaz who would have to pick up the pieces of Caporetto, reorganize, reform and reinvigorate the army to lead it to final victory over the Austro-German forces. General Diaz was determined not to use the army as a “blunt instrument” but to make more surgical strikes when necessary. Overall, however, to strengthen and rebuild the army and improve morale, General Diaz abandoned the offensive strategy of General Cadorna in favor of a defensive strategy that would save lives and test the strength of the enemy. As expected, the Austrians soon launched another offensive and the Italian forces repelled them, inflicting heavy losses on the Austrians of 60,000 dead, 90,000 wounded and 25,000 taken prisoner. Diaz had learned of the impending Austrian offensive and opened a massive artillery barrage on the enemy trenches just as they were packed with soldiers about to launch the attack. Because of this, some units of the Austro-Hungarian army retreated while others charged forward. It was a disaster for Austria-Hungary and a morale-boosting victory for Italy.

The Allies wished General Diaz to launch an immediate counter-offensive while the Austrians were in defeat and disarray, however, Diaz refused to do so, recognizing that the same elements which had helped him secure victory would be working in favor of the Austrians if the roles were reversed. General Diaz remained on the defensive, consolidating and preparing his forces for the most opportune moment while Austrian morale plummeted and the internal divisions of Austria-Hungary began to pull their armed forces apart. In fact, he waited so long that the authorities in Rome became anxious that the war might end before there was a major Italian offensive that would help ensure that Italy was given the territorial concessions Britain and France had promised. As it happened, Diaz waited until just the right moment to launch his offensive and the result was the crushing Italian victory at Vittorio Veneto. The Austro-Hungarian forces were badly demoralized, many of the ethnic minorities were rising up to declare independence and many of the soldiers at the front saw no reason to give their all fighting the Italians while their own people were struggling at home.

As bad as Caporetto had been for Italy, Vittorio Veneto was worse for the Austrians. Diaz sent troops forward to divert attention away from the main area of attack and to sever the communications between the main enemy forces. When the main offensive was launched the Austro-Hungarian forces were split and their army basically came apart. As Italian troops surged forward Austrian commanders tried to organize counter-attacks but their troops simply refused to obey orders, dropped their weapons and gave up. During the offensive Hungary broke away from Austria and ordered the Hungarian troops on the Italian front to stop fighting. Czechoslovakia declared independence as did the Yugoslavs a day later. As many as 500,000 Austro-Hungarian troops were taken prisoner in what was probably the most complete victory ever won by the Kingdom of Italy with much of the credit naturally going to General Armando Diaz. In the following years General Diaz was made a Senator by the King and given the title of Duke of Victory. That same year, 1921, he became the first Italian general to be honored with a tickertape parade in New York City when he visited the United States along with the other Allied commanders. The visit was to attend the groundbreaking of the Liberty Memorial in Kansas City.

During his later years, the most controversial aspect of the life of General Diaz was a phrase he spoke in the build-up to the “March on Rome” by the Fascist Black shirts. The First World War had ended the era when the Royal Italian Army was a small corps of purely professional soldiers with Piedmontese officers. It had become a truly national army and represented a wide array of backgrounds and opinions. The rank and file included many people sympathetic to the nationalistic slogans of Mussolini and his party. When King Vittorio Emanuele III asked if the army would stand against the Black shirts, General Diaz replied that they would always follow the orders of the King but, fatefully added, that it would be better not to put them to the test in such circumstances. The army would not be called upon to shoot down the Black shirts and in the aftermath Mussolini became prime minister and quickly began consolidating his power. General Diaz was appointed Minister of War by Mussolini in his new government and later promoted to the rank of Marshal of Italy when he retired in 1924. Marshal Diaz died in Rome on February 28, 1928 at the age of 66, remembered always as the man who had led Italian forces to victory in the Great War.

Marshal of Italy Rodolfo Graziani

Marshal of Italy Rodolfo Graziani, 1^st Marquis of Neghelli, is possibly the most infamous Italian soldier of World War II. To a large extent, this is entirely justified for he ended his career as a traitor to his king, his country and a sell-out to the Nazi German puppet state of the Salò Republic of which Mussolini was the willing figurehead. Putting politics aside, the military reputation of General Graziani has been rather unjustly tarnished over the years, perhaps because of his politics. All too often General Graziani is portrayed as an ineffective and incompetent commander when, in reality, his record was one of almost total success with his poor reputation mostly being derived from a single failed campaign. It is also worth noting that it was a campaign Graziani opposed and expected to fail. In any event, he was a more complex figure than most realize and a far more talented military commander than he is often given credit for. The record should be set straight.

Graziani in World War I

Rodolfo Graziani was born on August 11, 1882 in Filettino in the province of Frosinone. His father was a doctor and his parents wanted to send him to study at a seminary but he decided to pursue a military career and joined the Royal Italian Army in 1903. Most of his military career would be spent in the colonies and that was where he was first posted, to the colony of Eritrea where, as a young lieutenant, he caught malaria and was badly hurt after being bitten by a venomous snake. Graziani learned Arabic and the language of the native Tigreans while in the colony. During the War with Ottoman Turkey he earned promotion to captain. As a young officer he then served with great distinction in World War I. It was during that conflict that he first saw service in the north African colony of Libya where the Turks and Germans were encouraging Senussi Muslim attacks on Italian outposts. Later he was transferred to the northern front against Austria where he was wounded twice and earned rapid promotion for his skill and bravery. By the time the conflict ended he had become the youngest colonel in the Italian army at age 36.

In the chaotic aftermath of World War I, Graziani was marked for death by the communists and he decided to retire to Parma until the political situation settled down. Going into private business, he became a merchant dealing in goods from the Far East but was not successful. He was recalled to service due to the worsening attacks by Muslim rebels on Italian farms and businesses in Libya. His colonial experience and knowledge of the Arabs recommended him for such an assignment and on January 11, 1930 he was chosen personally by Mussolini to be Governor of Cyrenaica. For the next two years he came to hold the primary command of the Italian forces fighting against the Senussi Muslim rebels under the guerilla leader Omar Mukhtar. Knowing that speed and mobility were the primary advantages of the Bedouin cavalry, Graziani worked to match them in these areas. He used light, fast-moving columns, made use of aircraft and, long before anyone had ever heard of such names as Rommel or Montgomery, he became the first to use tanks in the desert.

Graziani first took back control of the Tripoli plateau, then cut the rebels off from their supply lines from the south by marching across the desert to capture the Senussi stronghold of Kufra. Then, to deprive the rebels of their supplies and volunteers coming in from Egypt he built a ‘frontier of wire’ along the border, a massive barbed wire “wall” stretching some 271 kilometers from El Ramleh to Jaghbub, effectively covering the frontier from the Mediterranean to the impassable deep desert. A formidable obstruction, this frontier fence is still in existence today. All of this created a tightening noose around the rebels, cut them off from outside aid and robbed them of their mobility. Most controversial of all, however, was Graziani’s decision to cut the rebels off from their civilian base of support by adopting a tactic first used by the British in the Boer War. After identifying the villages that were the main sources of support for the rebels, Graziani had the local populations moved into large concentration camps where many died due to unsanitary conditions. It was because of this that the Bedouin rebels gave Graziani the nickname of “the Butcher of Fezzan”. However, it all worked. Muslim attacks on Italian farmers ceased, the rebels were cut off and defeated and Omar Mukhtar himself was finally captured by a troop of Libyan cavalry allied with the Italians.

Hailed in Rome as the “Pacifier of Libya”, General Graziani was replaced by Italo Balbo and transferred to the governorship of Italian Somaliland. He was still holding that post when the Second Italo-Abyssinian War broke out in 1935. Graziani was ordered to attack from Somaliland in the southeast while the main attack led by De Bono and later Badoglio would come from Italian Eritrea in the north. Nonetheless, although he commanded a secondary front, the overall victory could not have been achieved so quickly were it not for Graziani’s contribution. At the battle of Genale Doria he wiped out an entire Ethiopian army and later, at the battle of the Ogaden, Graziani successfully defeated the formidable Ethiopian defenses designed by the Turkish general Wehib Pasha known as the “Hindenburg Wall”. Within seven months the Italians had conquered an area larger than all of France, over the most rugged terrain imaginable and for his achievements Graziani was made Viceroy of Italian East Africa and promoted to the rank of Marshal of Italy. However, controversy arose again when he ordered reprisals taken after an assassination attempt against him. The reprisals caused the Ethiopians to second his title of “butcher” and calm was not restored until Graziani was replaced as Viceroy by Prince Amedeo, Duke of Aosta whose rule was characterized by fairness and humanity.

When World War II broke out, Marshal Graziani was Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Army General Staff but, when Air Marshal Italo Balbo was accidentally killed Graziani was named to replace him as Governor-General of Libya. In that position, he commanded all Italian forces in North Africa and after British raids into the colony, Mussolini ordered him to launch an immediate invasion of Egypt to seize Alexandria and, it was hoped, break the back of the British position in the Mediterranean. Graziani had grave misgivings about such an invasion, knowing that his largely infantry force would be almost impossible to move across the desert. He had the British greatly outnumbered in terms of manpower, but the British had more and better of everything that mattered most in desert warfare, specifically tanks, trucks and artillery. Nonetheless, Mussolini was adamant that Graziani attack, regardless of the cost in human life. He had seen Graziani triumph in Libya and Abyssinia and was certain he could do the same again if he would only make the effort. However, the Marshal realized that the highly mechanized British imperial forces were nothing at all like the armies of Arab guerillas and Ethiopian tribesmen he had faced before. He had had all the tools he needed to defeat those enemies but against the British he needed weapons and transportation he did not have.

Marshal Graziani did advance with most of the Italian 10^th Army about sixty miles into Egypt and then halted and established a line of fortified camps while he called for more trucks, more tanks, more fuel and more air cover. Mussolini would promise, order him to continue the offensive and then little to nothing would show up. As it turned out, the north African front was being robbed of war materials that were instead being sent to Albania in preparation for the invasion of Greece. It remains a matter of dispute if Graziani was wise to stay on the defensive where he was or if he could have plowed ahead and conquered Egypt even at the expense of an inordinately high casualty rate. What might have been, we will never know. The British counter-attacked the Italian fortified camps, built too far apart to support each other, reducing them one by one until the Italian troops were driven out of Egypt and Libya was invaded by the British. It was the first real defeat Graziani had suffered during his career and he was replaced by General Italo Gariboldi and for the next two years took no part in the war. He had really been crushed by the defeat his forces had suffered and urgently called for Germany to send assistance to Africa. There was an inquiry into his conduct but no actions were ever taken as a result.

The failed invasion of Egypt was the biggest defeat in Graziani’s career and it is the campaign that has most marred his military record. The famous German Africa Corps was rushed in and quickly turned the situation around, driving the British out of Libya and back into Egypt. This has often led to unfavorable comparisons between Marshal Graziani and German Marshal Rommel. Graziani certainly made mistakes in the placement of his men after halting the offensive and he can be faulted for surrendering the initiative to the enemy. However, even if he had pushed forward, in all likelihood the 10^th Army would have been defeated anyway. The German and Italian forces which Rommel later led to a number of stunning victories were much better equipped and much better supplied than the force Graziani had at his disposal. If Mussolini had given him the support he later gave to his successors, it is at least possible that Graziani could have taken Egypt and brought the war in North Africa to an early conclusion.

As it was, the Marshal was sidelined as Mussolini was positively furious with him, particularly after Mussolini had been forced to turn to Hitler for help after having proudly refused any assistance previously. Nonetheless, Graziani did not seem to hold any anger against Mussolini. He had supported the Fascist regime throughout their time in power and had even supported the most reprehensible policies of Mussolini. In 1943 when Fascist Party leaders finally cooperated with HM King Vittorio Emanuele III in removing Mussolini from power, Rodolfo Graziani was the only Marshal of Italy who betrayed the King and remained supportive of Mussolini, following him north to serve the German puppet-stated named the “Italian Social Republic”. How could this have happened after such a long career in the royal army? Given certain aspects of his character, displayed at certain times throughout his career, Graziani may have been a “true believer”. It is also possible that the fact that Graziani and Marshal Pietro Badoglio were on such bad terms influenced his decision.

In any event, Graziani went north, betraying his King and his country to side with a puppet government of German manufacture. Despite his previous feelings about the Marshal, as the most senior soldier to take his side, Mussolini appointed Graziani his Minister of War. It was a useless and futile fight, doomed to inevitable failure and yet, even at that late date, Graziani again displayed some of his old military talent as commander of the German and Italian Army Group Liguria in which he halted the Allied offensive and pushed them back at the Battle of Garfagnana in December of 1944, the only successful action of the Axis forces at that stage in northern Italy. He surrendered to the U.S. Army and in 1948 was sentenced by a military tribunal to 19 years in prison for his collaboration with the Nazis. However, he was released after several months and remained totally unrepentant about his actions, writing such books as “I Defended the Homeland”, “North Africa 1940-41” and “Libya Redeemed” while in prison. He supported the Italian Social Movement in the last years of his life (a neo-Fascist party) and was named “Honorary President” of the group in 1953. He died in Rome on January 11, 1955, the most prominent and the most condemned Italian officer of World War II.