Sicily, invasion of (1943). HUSKY had been on the agenda ever since the Casablanca Conference of January 1943. The success of the TORCH landings in French North Africa the previous November had encouraged Franklin D. Roosevelt and Churchill to plan for a seaborne assault as soon as the Axis had been defeated in Tunisia. Although TORCH had been virtually unopposed, Sicily was reckoned to be a tougher nut to crack, with the Italians fighting on their home ground, stiffened by good German troops. But the mood was optimistic. A blend of the battle-hardened men of Eighth Army under Montgomery, the profusion of US war matériel, and American troops of the Seventh Army under Patton were considered enough to overwhelm the island garrison and bring the war to mainland Italy. Amphibious ships and landing craft were the resource that defined Allied military strategy in 1943-4, and it took six months to assemble enough for the main component of HUSKY, an operation involving 150, 000 men and 3, 000 ships.
The Sicily invasion, 1943.
(Click to enlarge)
The two Allied armies were to attack on 10 July, landing on two separate 40 mile (64 km) strips of beach, in a mutually supporting operation. Eisenhower was the theatre commander and Alexander at the head of Fifteenth Army Group was the operational commander. The British Eighth Army of one airborne and six infantry divisions, plus one infantry and two armoured brigades, and three Royal Marine Commandos, was to land in the south-east. Their objective was to clear the eastern half of Sicily, including Syracuse and Messina. The US Seventh Army of one armoured, one airborne, four infantry divisions, and one commando was to assault in the south and take the western part of the island, including Palermo. Nearly 4, 000 Allied aircraft ensured local air supremacy, although there were 1, 500 German and Italian aircraft in the theatre. In refusing to evacuate North Africa, Hitler had lost many first-rate troops in Tunisia, and the Axis could muster only ten Italian divisions of dubious quality and two dependable German formations with which to counter any landings. Furthermore, a deception plan had encouraged the Germans to expect an attack on Sardinia. In one of the murkier episodes of WW II, the gangster ‘Lucky’ Luciano had been released from prison in New York and was shipped back to Sicily to use his influence among the local mafiosi in support of the Allies, although there is no evidence that he did.
Driving winds and poor weather disrupted the first-ever large-scale deployment of Allied airborne forces by parachute and glider. The worst affected were the 144 gliders carrying the British 1st Airborne Brigade: only 54 landed in Sicily and the majority ditched in the Mediterranean, drowning their occupants. The gale also played havoc with the invasion fleet, but the rough seas caused the defenders to relax their watch. They were woken up by naval gunfire support from a bombardment fleet including six battleships, while the few airborne units scattered behind the coastal defences distracted attention and hampered the arrival of reinforcements. The Seventh Army had a rougher reception than the Eighth, but by the end of the first day the Americans held nearly 40 miles (64 km) of beach between Scoglitti and Licata, while the British held a coastal strip from Pozallo to Syracuse, having captured the latter port intact.
Recovering quickly from the initial shock, German forces counter-attacked at Gela and Licata and were repulsed only within sight of the coast, while heavier opposition halted Montgomery around Catania. After much hard fighting, Canadian units reached Enna in the centre of the island on 20 July, and two days later Patton's troops had taken Palermo after a lightning strike across the island. Seventh Army then turned eastwards, Patton having decided to capture Messina ahead of the slower Montgomery. Italian resistance collapsed rapidly and the locals were friendly once the danger of turning their villages into battlefields was past. Nonetheless, the broken landscape favoured the Germans, commanded by the energetic Gen Hube, who defended a series of stop lines, counter-attacking with armour when the terrain suited. But once his main position at Adrano had been captured, Montgomery advanced towards Messina on either side of Mount Etna. Kesselring, the German C-in-C in Italy, was determined not to see another army thrown away and prepared to evacuate his best forces from the island in defiance of Hitler. He concentrated them in the north-east corner and lined both shores of the narrow Straits of Messina with anti-aircraft artillery.
By the time Patton occupied Messina a few hours ahead of the indignant Montgomery, Kesselring had evacuated 40, 000 German and 60, 000 Italian troops to the mainland, along with much valuable armour, from under their noses. The success of this German Dunkirk was to have serious repercussions for the Allies in Italy later on, and represents a glaring failure to apply near-total air and sea superiority. Patton's advance into Messina was politically questionable, but a lot of Americans were tired of being patronized by more experienced British officers, and Patton was also keen to complete the rehabilitation of the fighting spirit of his troops after the defeat at Kasserine Pass in February. On 17 August, after 38 days' fighting, the whole of Sicily was in Allied hands. The Eighth Army had suffered 9, 000 casualties and the Seventh 7, 000. The Axis losses were 160, 000, including 30, 000 Germans. The invasion of Sicily prompted King Vittorio Emanuele III to order the arrest of Mussolini, while Marshal Badoglio negotiated an armistice with the Allies.
— Peter Caddick-Adams
