If by Chance by Major General John Strawson

Author:Major General John Strawson [Strawson, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781447235538
Publisher: Pan Macmillan

NINE

The Hard Underbelly of Europe

Britain’s prime and capital foe is not Italy but Germany.

WINSTON CHURCHILL, HOUSE OF COMMONS, 27 JULY 1943

In 1980 that distinguished and, alas, late historian, John Grigg, published a book called 1943: The Victory That Never Was in which he put forward one of the more interesting Ifs of the Second World War. His book attempts to show that the cross-Channel invasion, which was at length mounted in 1944, should have taken place a year earlier. Grigg argues that the four prerequisites for landing successfully in France – air superiority, enough troops, shipping to carry them, and some means of preventing the Germans from concentrating against and eliminating an Allied beach-head – either existed or could have been created in 1943. In making this claim, bearing in mind the strategic circumstances of early 1943, he may be said to have overlooked the very commodity which he is trying to save – time.

In order to gauge these circumstances, we must go back to the Casablanca conference of January 1943 at which, as Michael Howard put it, the Mediterranean strategy was legitimized. To prepare for this crucial meeting between Churchill and Roosevelt, together with their military advisers and commanders, the British Joint Planning Staff had produced a paper remarkable for its prescience and persuasion. The central point of their deliberations was how to exploit the strategic advantage which possession of the whole of North Africa would present to them. In debating how to knock Italy out of the war, they reasoned that bombing alone would not induce the Fascist regime to sue for peace, and even if such a move were on the cards, the Germans would not permit it, but simply occupy Italy. Yet a combination of bombing together with the capture of Sicily and Sardinia might destroy Italian morale and bring about an internal collapse. In this event the Germans might be compelled to take over Italy in order to defend it and be obliged to assume all the other Italian commitments in the Balkans. Despite Churchill’s misgivings, he agreed with the US policy of attempting to divide the Italian people from Mussolini’s government. The Joint Planning Staff therefore produced a report which outlined how the Allies could achieve a dual aim of inducing the Italians to give up and force the Germans to occupy Italy, so stretching their resources still further. This would be done by continuing bombing, raiding the coasts and shipping, capturing either Sicily or Sardinia, threatening Crete and the Dodecanese, and stepping up subversion in the Balkans. Their report thus concluded:

The prizes open to the Allies in the Mediterranean in 1943 are very great. They include the severe reduction of German air-power, the reopening of the short sea route, the denial to Germany of oil, chrome and other minerals, the elimination of one of the Axis partners and the opening of the Balkans.

If we decide to exploit the position which we have gained, our first object should be to induce the Italians to lay down their arms everywhere; our next should be directed against the Balkans.

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