Closing the Ring (27 page)

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After considering proposals from Macmillan at Algiers, and from General Eisenhower, I telegraphed to the President asking for his comments.

Prime Minister to President Roosevelt

21 Sept. 43

… I and my colleagues in the War Cabinet have come to the following conclusions:

It is vital to build up the authority of the King and the Brindisi Administration as a Government and have unity of command throughout Italy. … Despite Badoglio’s broadcast tonight we still feel it is essential that the King should go to the microphone at Bari, tell the Italian people he is there, and proclaim that Badoglio is carrying on the legitimate Government of Italy under his authority. This is needed, not only for the Italian people, but for the Italian representatives and garrisons abroad.

The King and Badoglio should be told that they must build up the broadest-based anti-Fascist coalition Government possible. Any healthy elements that can deliver some goods should be rallied in this crisis. These points should be made plain in the King’s broadcast. It would be very useful if Count Sforza and the professors who claim to represent the six parties were willing to join in the common effort. It must however be clearly understood that none of these provisional arrangements, dictated by war needs, will stand in the way of the free choice by the Italian people of the form of democratic government which they prefer.

The question of giving the Badoglio Government an Allied status does not come into our immediate programme. Co-belligerency is good enough. On this footing we should work for the gradual conversion of Italy into an effective national force against Germany, but, as we have said, she must work her passage. Useful service against the enemy will be recognised by us in the adjustment and working of the Armistice terms. In return we expect Badoglio to continue to work for the Allies on the basis of the Armistice. Our principle will be payment by results. Badoglio should be free to declare war on Germany, and by so doing he would at once become, though not an ally, a co-belligerent.

Badoglio can be told that it is no part of our plan to install Allied military government everywhere. If he will co-operate, we are ready to hand over territory to his Government as quickly as it is free from the enemy. This offer applies to the historic mainland of Italy, Sicily, and Sardinia. The dealings of the United Nations with the Italian Government in territories which they are allowed to administer will be carried out through a Control Commission.

It would make it much easier for us if the full instrument of surrender, even though somewhat superseded, could now be signed. It is true that many of the clauses could not be operated by the Brindisi Administration in their present situation. But as we go up the peninsula and turn over territory to the Italian Government, these questions will become real. We do not want to put ourselves in the position of having to haggle over every requirement with the Government. The longer we leave it the more difficult it becomes to get the instrument signed, so I hope Eisenhower will get Badoglio’s signature to it as soon as possible on the basis suggested in the Foreign Secretary’s telegrams.

This programme should be put to the King and Badoglio at once. The first essential is that the King should make the public announcement suggested. This should not surely await final refinements of policy.

  This crossed the following telegram from the President:

President Roosevelt to Prime Minister

21 Sept. 43

I will send the following message to General Eisenhower immediately upon your concurrence:

  In view of the existing situation in Italy the earliest practicable action is important.

You will withhold long-term Armistice provisions pending further instructions.

2. On the basis of military necessity, you are empowered to make recommendations from time to time to lighten the provisions of the military armistice in order to enable the Italians, within the limit of their capacities, to wage war against Germany.

3. On condition that it declares war on Germany, the present Government of Italy should be permitted, subject to the provisions of paragraph 4 hereunder, to carry on as the Government of Italy, and as such should be treated as a co-belligerent in the war against Germany; such relationship to be based on the clear understanding that it is not in any way to prejudice the untrammelled right of the people of Italy to decide on the form of government they will eventually have, and that no final form of government of Italy will be decided upon until the Germans are evicted from Italian territory.

4. The Allied Military Government and the appropriate functions contemplated for the Armistice Control Commission will be merged as promptly as practicable into an Allied Commission under the Allied Commander-in-Chief, which shall be empowered to furnish guidance and instructions from time to time to the Badoglio Government on military, political, and administrative matters.

5. You will encourage in all practicable ways the vigorous use, under your direction, of the Italian armed forces against Germany.

  Our two messages did not seem to me to conflict on any important point, except the question of withholding the long terms of surrender. On this I deferred to the President, and we agreed that his telegram should be sent to General Eisenhower as a directive from both of us.

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On September 14, Mussolini met Hitler for the first time since his “liberation.” During the succeeding days the two men debated how to extend the life of Italian Fascism in those parts of Italy still occupied by the German troops. On the 15th, the Duce announced that he had reassumed the leadership of Fascism and that a new Republican-Fascist Party, purged and uplifted from traitorous elements, would rebuild a faithful Government in the North. For a moment it seemed that the old system, now dressed up in a pseudo-revolutionary garb, might flare again into life. But the results disappointed the Germans. Goebbels’s comment at this time is revealing:

  The Duce has not drawn the moral conclusions from Italy’s catastrophe which the Fuehrer had expected. He was naturally overjoyed to see the Fuehrer and to be fully at liberty again. But the Fuehrer expected that the first thing the Duce would do would be to wreak full vengeance on his betrayers. That he gave no such indication showed his real limitations. He is not a revolutionary like the Fuehrer or Stalin. He is so bound to his own Italian people that he lacks the broad qualities of a world-wide revolutionary and insurrectionist.
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But there was to be no turning back. Mussolini’s halfhearted “Hundred Days” began. At the end of September he set up his headquarters on the shores of Lake Garda. This pitiful shadow Government is known as the “Republic of Salo.” Here the squalid tragedy was played out. The dictator and lawgiver of Italy for more than twenty years dwelt with his mistress in the hands of his German masters, ruled by their will, and cut from the outside world by carefully chosen German guards and doctors.

The Italian surrender caught their armies in the Balkans completely unawares, and many troops were trapped in desperate positions between local guerrilla forces and the vengeful Germans. There were savage reprisals. The Italian garrison of Corfu, over seven thousand strong, was almost annihilated by their former allies. The Italian troops of the island of Cephalonia held out until September 22. Many of the survivors were shot and the rest deported. Some of the garrisons of the Aegean islands managed to escape in small parties to Egypt. In Albania, on the Dalmatian coast, and inside Yugoslavia, a number of detachments joined the partisans. More often they were taken off to forced labour and their officers shot. In Montenegro, the greater part of two Italian divisions were formed by Tito into the “Garibaldi Division,” which suffered heavy losses by the end of the war. In the Balkans and Aegean, the Italian armies lost after the Armistice of September 8 nearly forty thousand men, not including those who died in deportation camps.

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I explained the situation and our policy to Stalin.

Prime Minister to Premier Stalin

21 Sept. 43

Now that Mussolini has been set up by the Germans as the head of a so-called Republican-Fascist Government, it is essential to counter this move by doing all we can to strengthen the authority of the King and Badoglio, who signed the Armistice with us, and have since faithfully carried it out to the best of their ability and surrendered the bulk of their Fleet. Besides, for military reasons we must mobilise and concentrate all the forces in Italy which are anxious to fight or at least obstruct the Germans. These are already active.

I propose therefore to advise the King to appeal on the wireless to the Italian people to rally round the Badoglio Government, and to announce his intention to build up a broad-based, anti-Fascist coalition Government, it being understood that nothing shall be done to prevent the Italian people from settling what form of democratic Government they will have after the war.

It should also be said that useful service by the Italian Government, Army, and people against the enemy will be recognised in the adjustment and working of the Armistice; but that, while the Italian Government is free to declare war on Germany, this will not make Italy an ally, but only a co-belligerent.

I want at the same time to insist on the signing of the comprehensive Armistice terms, which are still outstanding, even though some of those terms cannot be enforced at the present time. Against this Badoglio would be told that the Allied Governments intend to hand over the historic mainland of Italy, Sicily, and Sardinia to the administration of the Italian Government under the Allied Control Commission as it is freed from the enemy.

I am putting these proposals also to President Roosevelt, and I hope that I may count on your approval. As you will readily understand, the matter is vitally urgent for military reasons. For instance, the Italians have already driven the Germans out of Sardinia, and there are many islands and key points which they still hold and which we may get.

  He replied as follows:

Premier Stalin to Premier Churchill

22 Sept. 43

I received your message of September 21.

I agree with your proposal concerning the appeal by radio of the Italian King to the Italian people; but I consider it entirely necessary that in the appeal of the King it should be clearly stated that Italy, which capitulated to Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union, will fight against Germany together with Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union.

2. I also agree with your proposal about the necessity of signing comprehensive Armistice terms. In regard to your reservation that certain of these terms cannot be put into force at the present moment, I understand this reservation only in the sense that these
terms cannot be realised now on the territory which so far is held by the Germans. In any case, I should like to receive confirmation or the necessary explanation from you on that point.

  I asked the President what he thought of this, and said that I considered that the long term provisions of surrender might well be dealt with by the Armistice Commission which we were setting up in Italy. I later sent him the following:

Former Naval Person to President Roosevelt

24 Sept. 43

Macmillan now tells me that he is confident that Badoglio’s signature can be obtained to the whole set of terms within the next few days, and that the longer we leave it the more haggling there will be. It may be some time before the new Commission can give their views, and I should myself feel happier if we clinched the matter now. This might save us a good deal of trouble later on.

At Eisenhower’s suggestion we have made the preamble less harsh. We also provided that the Armistice of September 3 will remain operative.

Prime Minister to President Roosevelt

25 Sept. 43

I have not answered Uncle Joe’s
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telegram in favour of backing up the King of Italy, and also his remarks about the comprehensive terms, because I do not know what line you are taking with him. You will no doubt have received my telegram. Macmillan reports that there will be no difficulty in getting Badoglio to sign.

  The President replied:

President Roosevelt to Prime Minister

25 Sept. 43

I go along with your thought about the long set of terms if signature can be obtained quickly, and I am so advising Eisenhower.

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Other political complications occurred.

Prime Minister to Mr. Macmillan (Algiers)

25 Sept. 43

Astonishment was caused here at a broadcast from the Bari radio in the name of “the King of Italy and Albania and Emperor of Ethiopia.” I need scarcely say that any repetition of follies like that will bring our whole policy into discredit here. How would the King like to be sent back to his Empire in Ethiopia to be crowned?

… I presume we are going to see the King’s speech before he lets it off, or if there is no time for this that you will anyhow vet it. The reference to the Soviet is of capital importance, as Stalin’s support for our policy of using the Italian Government is invaluable.

  On September 28, Marshal Badoglio left Brindisi in an Italian cruiser to sign the long-term surrender at Malta. He was received with ceremony on board the battleship
Nelson
by General Eisenhower, and his Chief of Staff, General Bedell Smith, Lord Gort, and General Alexander. Badoglio hoped to be spared the clause on unconditional surrender, but the Allied commanders insisted that this was a formal meeting to sign documents presented by the Allied Governments which would admit of no discussion.

After the signatures had been appended, Badoglio had a short discussion with General Eisenhower about declaring war on Germany, which the Italian Marshal wished to do. The day ended with a visit to the units of the Italian Fleet anchored in Malta Harbour.