From Suspicious Observation to Ambiguous Collaboration: The Allies and Italian Partisans, 1943–1944

Abstract

During the first months of the Italian Campaign, partisans' activity was isolated and spasmodic, and Allied support was minimal. In fact, it took the Allies nine months to consider the Italian partisans not so much as a threat as a potential opportunity. This article seeks to explain the Allies' attitude toward the Italian partisans. Relations among the Allies, the Italian government and the partisans involved a combination of military and political problems. The Allies' weak support for Italian partisans was in fact the by-product of an overall strategic plan in which means were limited and priorities had naturally to be established in a context of world war. It also revealed their fears: the common suspicion toward irregular fighters, the growing fear of communists and the fear of possible Italian post-war demands.

Key Words:

• Second World War
• Italian Campaign
• Partisan Warfare
• Allies
• Resistance

Notes

¹Luigi Valiani, Tutte le strade conducono a Roma (Florence: La Nuova Italia 1947).

²Raffaele Cadorna, La Riscossa: Dal 25 Luglio alla Liberazione (Milan: Rizzoli ditore 1948).

³Roberto Battaglia, Storia delle Resistenza italiana (Turin: Einaudi 1953).

⁴Renzo de Felice, Rosso e nero (Milan: Baldini e Castoldi 1995).

⁵Bernard Droz, foreword to Claudio Pavone, Una guerra civile. Saggio storico sulla moralità della resistenza (Turin: Bollati Boringhieri 1991).

⁶Ferrucio Parri, Il movimento partigiano (Roma: Partito d'Azione 1947).

⁷Norman Kogan, Italy and the Allies (Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP 1956); David Stafford, Britain and European Resistance: 1940–1945 (London: Macmillan 1980).

⁸Cordell Hull, The Memoirs of Cordell Hull (New York: Macmillan 1948); Harold Macmillan, The Blast of War: 1939–1945, (London: Macmillan 1967).

⁹[Turin, Italy, Archivio nazionale cinematografico della Resistenza]Le prime bande, 1980.

¹⁰[Kew, United Kingdom, the National Archives] W[ar] O[ffice] 204/7283, ‘The Partisan Movement in Italy’, Lt. Whitty, Major G (Ops) ‘B’, 15 Nov. 1944.

¹¹Ibid.

¹²[Kew, United Kingdom, the National Archives], CAB[inet] 101/227, ‘Allied Forces and the Italian Resistance (1943–1945)’, report from Major D.F. Butler.

¹³Ibid.

¹⁴Georgio Bocca, Storia dell'Italia partigiana (Bari: Laterza 1966).

¹⁵Enzo Collotti, Renato Sandri and Frediano Sessi (eds.), Dizionario della Resistenza (Torino: Einaudi 2000).

¹⁶Ibid.

¹⁷CAB 101/227: Gen. Sir Henry Maitland Wilson, ‘Basic Policy for Special Operations’, 10 March 1944.

¹⁸ The Times, London, 23 May 1944.

¹⁹Field Marshal Earl Alexander of Tunis, ‘The Allied Armies in Italy from 3rd September, 1943, to 12th December 1944’, supplement to The London Gazette, 12 June 1950, 2940.

²⁰Pietro Secchia and Filippo Frassati, La Resistenza e gli alleati (Milano: Feltrinelli Editore 1962), 111–12.

²¹[Kew, United Kingdom, The National Archives], H[ome] S[ecurity] 7/58: ‘Air Supply: Monthly Tonnage Figures Infiltrated in Northern Italy by No.1 Special Force, January 1944–April 1945’, SOE Activity in Italy.

²²Secchia and Frassati, La Resistenza e gli alleati, Note of McCaffery to G.B. Sacchi, 98.

²³CAB 101/227, ‘Allied Forces and the Italian Resistance (1943–1945)’, report from Major D.F. Butler, 10.

²⁴WO 204/9899: Judge Advocate General's Memo on Partisan Forces, 9 Oct. 1944.

²⁵CAB 101/243: telegram from Churchill to Mr Law and Sir Alexander Cadogan, 21 Oct. 1943.

²⁶CAB 101/250: telegram from Winston Churchill to Gen. Wilson (Algiers), 22 Feb. 1944.

²⁷CAB 101/244: telegram from Churchill to Foreign Secretary, 3 March 1944.

²⁸CAB 101/244: telegram from Churchill to Eisenhower, 10 June 1944.

²⁹CAB 101/243: telegram from Churchill to Foreign Secretary, 16 Feb. 1944.

³⁰Hull, Memoirs of Cordell Hull, 1550.

³¹MFA 1392: Relations between French Committee of National Liberation with enemy countries; Italy, declaration of Bonomi Government, 23 June 1944. Author's translation.

³² L'Unita, 11 July 1944. Togliatti's address to the Roman people.

³³Mark A. Stoler, The Politics of the Second front: American Military Planning and Diplomacy in Coalition Warfare, 1941–1943 (Westport, CT/London: Greenwood Press 1977).

³⁴[Washington DC, United States of America, the National Archives Research Administration], Record Group 43, entry World War II Conferences, box 1A, Cairo and Teheran Conferences.

³⁵John Ellis, The World War II Data Book (London: Aurum Press 1993), 165.

³⁶Alexander, ‘The Allied Armies in Italy from 3rd September 1943, to 12th December 1944’, supplement to The London Gazette, 12 June 1950, 2879–975, 2930.

³⁷The Garigliano is a river from which the French battle took its name.

³⁸CAB 101/244, Telegram from Winston Churchill to Foreign Secretary, 4 May 1944.

³⁹Peter Lagrou, ‘Guerre honorable sur le front de l'Ouest’, in Gaël Eisman and Stefan Martins (eds.), Occupation et répression militaire allemande (1939–1945): La politique de maintien de l'ordre en Europe occupée (Paris: Autrement 2007), 201–20; John Horne and Alan Kramer, German Atrocities 1914: A History of Denial (New Haven, CT: Yale UP 2001).

⁴⁰WO 204/2796 Assistant Adjutant-General H.L. Ostler's report, 10 July 1944.

⁴¹WO 204/9901 Report of the Public Safety Division of Headquarters Region II Allied Military Government, 21 Sept. 1944.

⁴²Ibid.

⁴³CAB 106/653.

⁴⁴WO 204/7283 Regional Control and Military Government Section, 18 July 1944, Col. Norman E. Fisher, for Brigadier Regional Commissioner.

⁴⁵[Vincennes, France, Historical Service of Defence] 11 P52: 3rd Algerian Infantry Division, mail sent (1 Jan. 1944 to 31 Dec. 1945), letter from Gen. de Monsabert to Gen. Juin, 10 June 1944.

⁴⁶11 P52: Gen. de Monsabert's memo, 16 June 1944.

⁴⁷WO 204/9901 Report from the Headquarters of the Allied Armies in Italy on the Control of Partisans in the Florence Area, Sept. 1944.

⁴⁸WO 204/7283 Report from Norman E. Fisher, head of the Regional Control and Military Government Section, 18 July 1944.

⁴⁹CAB 106/653 Italy: Report on Partisan and Subversive Activity in German Occupied Italy (10 September 1943–14 May 1944) by Brigadiers J. F. Combe and E.J. Todhunter.

⁵⁰WO 204/7283 Report from Norman E. Fisher, head of the Regional Control and Military Government Section, 18 July 1944.

⁵¹WO 204/9900 Allied Armies in Italy Headquarters directive, 22 June 1944.

⁵²Claudio Pavone, Une guerre civile: Essai historique sur l'éthique de la Résistance italienne (Paris: Le Seuil 2005).

⁵³Parri, Il movimento partigiano, 113–15.

⁵⁴WO 204/9901 Report from Maj. Drage (Allied Control Commission, Patriot Branch) to Col. MacCarthy, 18 Sept. 1944.

⁵⁵Ibid.

⁵⁶CAB 101/ 244 Telegram from Winston Churchill to Foreign Secretary, 4 May 1944.

⁵⁷WO 204/9901: report from Maj. Drage (Allied Control Commission, Patriot Branch) to Col. MacCarthy, 18 Sept. 1944.

⁵⁸ Parla Candidus: Discorsi dal 13 aprile 1941 dal 3 dicembre 1944 (Milan: Mondalori 1945), 261–3. Author's translation.

⁵⁹Macmillan, The Blast of War, passim.

⁶⁰WO 204/9900 Italian Partisans: Formation, Policy and Functions, Headquarters Allied Control Commission, R.C. 1 M.C. Section Patriots Branch, 25 Sept. 1944.

⁶¹MFA 1395 Relations with Italy 1942–Dec. 1943: letter from Lt. Col. Panella, North African Garibaldian Committee's chief to Gen. de Gaulle, 14 Sept. 1943. Author's translation.

⁶²MFA 1400 Telegram from Pierre Viénot to René Massigli, 22 June 1944. Author's translation.

⁶³MFA 1400: letter from René Massigli to Gen. Béthouart, 4 July 1944. Author's translation.

⁶⁴[CARAN, Paris, The National Archives], National Assembly, C13-19 Massigli's Declaration to Foreign Affairs' Commission, 28 June 1944. Author's translation.

⁶⁵WO 106/3964 Note MI3B on the Italian Resistance movement, 26 Aug. 1944.