| This
is the second in Rick Atkinson’s planned trilogy of
the European Theater of World War II and follows the first,
immensely successful and Pulitzer Prize winning, An Army
at Dawn. Like most previous accounts, this one chronicles,
as the title implies, the campaign from the invasion of Sicily
to the liberation of Rome, instead of recounting the entire
Italian campaign that lasted well into the late spring of
1945.
The decision to
invade Italy, the so-called “soft underbelly”
of the Nazi Empire was a compromise made after considerable
disagreement among the Allies. The Prologue to the book provides
a discussion of the debates that led up to the ultimate agreement.
Wearing masks of harmony, Roosevelt and Churchill disguised
the fact that American and British military strategists argued
for very different schemes and their discussions simmered
for a week, fueled partly by a heating animosity among them.
Then suddenly, when it looked as if all was lost and no agreement
could be found, the British and American chiefs of staff met
alone, without their underlings, for ninety minutes ultimately
reaching a compromise. I wish that Mr. Atkinson had provided
some detail — it is covered in less than a paragraph
— about what went on in that room during that final
meeting. Agreement was reached — an agreement that was
significant for the European Theater but especially for this
book. What innovative give-and-take and by whom provided the
framework for the compromise?
With lucid analysis
of primary source material, Mr. Atkinson allows us to follow
the preparation to invade Sicily, even though there is no
consensus what the following step ought to be. The invasion
is, of course, successful, although not with losses sometimes
perpetrated by friendly fire. With the success comes the decision
to invade the mainland and the quickly devised plans to invade
both the western and eastern side of the peninsula.
Names such as Naples,
Anzio, Salerno, San Pietro, and Monte Cassino were etched
into the twentieth-century American consciousness, not only
for the huge costs in human lives but by motion pictures and
numerous written accounts that glorify Allied exploits and
that recognize their failures. Mr. Atkinson’s narrative
not only provides extensive, detailed accounts of these memorable
scenes of battle, but he stresses equally vital and less celebrated
battles such as the struggles across the Rapido River and
through the Liri Valley.
The first-person
words of the brass and foot soldiers present ironic descriptions
of personal animosities among Allied commanders and grim portraits
of the fighting men whose courage and down and out strength
often won the day and the glory for their leaders. While not
an original narrative technique, juxtaposing the voices of
leaders and those of their followers is one of the great strengths
of Mr. Atkinson’s text.
The Italian campaign
itself provided some advantages that the author used well.
Fighting was generally well contained, as the geography of
Italy divides the peninsula rather neatly into an eastern
front of the Adriatic and a western front on the Mediterranean.
The emphasis of the book is on the latter with the Americans
as the major players. While the eastern front fought by the
British and Commonwealth forces is covered, it is treated
in less detail.
Although geography
played a significant role in the Italian campaign, it and
the pervasively foul weather are significant forces —
armies in their own way. Unusually heavy, unceasing rain and,
in the winter, unseasonably cold temperatures hampered the
efforts of Allied forces throughout much of the war on the
peninsula. Mechanized vehicles, which were becoming increasingly
essential in modern warfare, became impediments forcing the
foot soldiers to slog their way into battle often using donkeys
to carry supplies across ranges of mountains. Swollen rivers
and thick mud can be as much of a menace to an army on the
move as an entrenched enemy. The Day of Battle details
the movement northward towards Rome and the gradual wearing
down of the German’s lines of defense.
Through scenes
of carnage, of small victories and of horrific defeats, Mr.
Atkinson provides an opportunity to follow in some detail
the philosophies, leadership and the decisions of the major
American military strategists, especially the most controversial
figure of the Italian campaign, General Mark Clark. There
is reasonable cause for many “what if’s”
and “had he instead’s” when discussing his
performance. Perhaps the rest of the war in Italy would have
been less bloody had Clark followed to the letter Alexander’s
instruction and forgone the glory of “liberating”
Rome instead of neutralizing a significant part of Germany’s
Tenth Army. For the most part, Mr. Atkinson provides a description
of Clark’s goals and plans with an objectivity that
avoids for the most part a judgement, and for this I commend
the author. To write otherwise would have diminished the book’s
intent.
Rome is finally
taken, and Mr. Atkinson’s account essentially ends,
as I assume he will now focus in his final volume of the WW
II trilogy on D-Day and the battles beginning at the Atlantic.
But the rest of
the Italian campaign happened, and Germany’s Tenth Army
set yet another line — the Gothic Line — north
of Florence. The war turned brutal and messy with assassinations
and reprisals, partisan uprisings and atrocities emphasizing
the horrific inhumanity that war can provoke. It would be
eleven more months of chaotic struggle before Germany’s
final stand in Italy is crushed, yet the history of these
bloody days receives virtually no treatment in this book,
except for a summary, apologetically sounding, in an Epilogue.
In the final pages
of the Epilogue, Mr. Atkinson also wisely provides a summary
of divergent opinions about the military and psychological
worth of the Italian campaign and a brief account of the fate
of some of its major players — Kesselring and von Senger
for the Germans, Alexander, Keyes, and the problematic Clark
for the Allies.
The Day of
Battle: The War in Sicily and Italy, 1943-1944 is ultimately
a superb narrative. Mr. Atkinson’s writing style is
lucid; his descriptions are vivid; his sense of weaving together
the voices of players in this campaign is engaging. That the
Italian campaign has not receive the reflective attention
equal to that of the war beginning with the Normandy invasion
is understandable, given the ultimate momentum of the war
against Germany. The Italian campaign proved the mettle of
the Allies and that the victory in Africa was no fluke. The
Allies could muster the forces and machines it needed. It
was up to the leadership to use these resources effectively.
The Italian campaign provided a second testing ground for
the Allies and the Germans. Yet, the biggest test began two
days after the Allies liberated Rome.
Richard Sweterlitsch is professor emeritus,
University of Vermont
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