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Radio War Nerd EP #131 — The Italian Resistance Movement, with Annibale (Patreon)

Published:
2018-04-30 21:46:01
Imported:
2023-06

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Content

Guest: Annabile, Italian war nerd 

Recorded April 26, 2018

We know all about the French Resistance in WWII, but nothing about the far larger Italian Resistance movement that emerged in 1943, and the various wars that took place inside Italy from 1943-45. Thankfully we have Italian war nerd "Annibale" to walk us through the complex and little-known history of that ugly war. All insurgencies are horrific, as Annibale reminds us over and over . . .

At 2:20:30 the War Nerd & Ames discuss current war news. First, the War Nerd talks about the assassination of the number two Houthi leader Saleh al-Samad. The Nerd theorizes he was killed by a drone — confirmed after we recorded this show by subsequent news reports . . . Then Ames discusses the alleged Douma chemical attack, which initially was said to be a sarin nerve gas attack, but lately has been described as a chlorine chemical attack. Ames explains why a chlorine chemical attack would be problematic for the US war party . . .

* Map: Italy during resistance 1943-45 

Total time: 2:53:31

Direct link to this episode's mp3 here 

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Comments

Anonymous

Does Annibale have any info on the non-fascist extreme right that he mentioned fighting in the resistance? Been reading a book called “The Extreme Right in the French Resistance” and I was wondering if there had been a similar experience in Italy

xnfec

Great episode!. Interestingly, the area mentioned around Bologna (Emilia Romagna) is still one of the most left wing regions of Italy despite being one of the wealthiest - Ferrari, Ducati and Maserati are all from there.

Anonymous

discussion re: the consequences of insurgency reminds me of a story out of Egypt re: Sisi taking power... it was reported that people just kept being disappeared, and the conclusion was that neighbors were informing on one another to resolve neighborhood conflict--if you didn't like your neighbor, you just said they were a CIA informant, and they disappeared. you can imagine (or maybe you can't--i can't) what that must be like if you live next to particularly unscrupulous people

Beloved

Heavenly ep

Anonymous

On Jemen: There seems to be some indication that Sudan considers sending troops. Probably still haggling over the price.

Anonymous

Great ep.

no_funeral

Amazing episode. It would be tremendous if you had Annibale back on to discuss some finer points of this story.

radiowarnerd

Yeah, Annibale is fantastic. We hope to get him back soon.

radiowarnerd
>>12134636

Thanks. That's exactly what we're planning to do. Annibale is a prodigy--he could've gone into detail on any one of those topics.

Benjamin Glover

It's been brought up a few times, but I think it's worth recalling Leigh Cowart's excellent NSFWCORP piece on the history of Sarin gas and what it does to the human nervous system (spoilers: it's not pretty). <a href="https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/sarin/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://www.nsfwcorp.com/dispatch/sarin/</a>

Anonymous

What's the name of the book you mention about the jewish industrialist in Turin who supported Mussolini?

Mark Ames
>>34993585

About Jewish industrialists who supported Mussolini. "Benevolence and Betrayal: Five Italian Jewish Families Under Fascism" by Alexander Stille.

Anonymous

Does Annibale have any sources on the death squads mentioned around 1:26? Not sure I am spelling it right, but I believe he called them “Villateristi”

Anonymous
>>66526155

H Andrew, there's plenty of sources on the "Ville Tristi", unfortunately it's all Italian, as far as I know. There's an excellent overview here. https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villa_Triste

Anonymous
>>66526155

The most infamous operator of a "villa triste" was Pietro Koch https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pietro_Koch

Anonymous

Does Annibale have any books or articles (any language) on Operation Cinders that he mentioned, or on the SOE/ OSS involvement in Italy? It looks like there isn’t much out there written on it

Anonymous
>>80125379

As far as I know, there's been only one study written on Op Cinders, and it's in Italian. It was prepared by the late professor Gianni Perona, who was the full professor of Resistance Studies at the University of Turin, and as far as I know, was the first to make extensive international research into the later phase in the relationships between the CLN and the Allies. The article title (translated) is "Turin between Athen and Warsaw - Operation Cinders", who was published in 1976 in the academic journal "Mezzosecolo". I will see if I can make a digital copy somewhere. Perona (who unfortunately passed away in 2019) had enormous experience in archival research but told me that while he had been given relatively easy access to US archives, he had been given just a slight chance to dig into the British documents, who have been classified for the most part until quite recently and are still classified in some part. Perona's thesis was that the British leadership was worried about a repeat of the Greek experience (and thus wanted to move proactively to seize Turin and the western Alps), but in the back of their mind there was also the desire to stop De Gaulle from attempting to do the same (which in fact he was planning to do...). Eisenhower cut short any talk about this because the OSS felt that any preemptive "police" operation in the Turin area would have been a disaster. The quick and brutal way Turin was seized by partisan forces in April 27 (despite the presence of large German forces in the area) quite vindicated the US prudence.

Anonymous
>>80125379

As I've said, De Gaulle had made extensive planning to seize large areas in the Western Italian Alps, both political and military, through the use of three "missions" who had to prepare the terrain. De Gaulle's strategic goal was to seize the Aosta Valley, the Susa Vallet at least down to Susa, and the Roja Valley, linking Nice to Cuneo. But firm US opposition, the lack of enthusiasm of the local population and the presence of large Italian partisans forces, in the end, reduced the whole thing to the occupation of the Roja valley between Tenda and Ventimiglia. In the Susa valley, there was heavy fighting between the French Maquis and the Italian partisans for a couple of weeks, but the French forces never made any significant gain and the border was moved only one kilometre near the Montgenevre pass. The biggest disappointment for De Gaulle was the Aosta Valley, where he had planned a speedy military occupation and even printed maps with the new border near St. Vincent, but in the end, local French-speaking "autonomist" partisans decided it was against their interest to become French, and the US let De Gaulle know that any unilateral action would have created political and practical consequences. So, except for minimal adjustment of the border, the pre-war situation was maintained there.