"Masterly . . . a heartbreaking, beautifully told story of wasted sacrifice." Vince Rinehart, The Washington Post
The Allied attack of Normandy beach and its resultant bloodbath have been immortalized in film and literature, but the U.S. campaign on the beaches of Western Italy reigns as perhaps the deadliest battle of World War II’s western theater.
In January 1944, about six months before D-Day, an Allied force of thirty-six thousand soldiers launched one of the first attacks on continental Europe at Anzio, a small coastal city thirty miles south of Rome. The assault was conceived as the first step toward an eventual siege of the Italian capital. But the advance stalled and Anzio beach became a death trap. After five months of brutal fighting and monumental casualties on both sides, the Allies finally cracked the German line and marched into Rome on June 5, the day before D-Day.
Richly detailed and fueled by extensive archival research of newspapers, letters, and diariesas well as scores of original interviews with surviving soldiers on both sides of the trenchesAnzio is a harrowing and incisive true story by one of today’s finest military historians.
Italy in WWII...
Related Scanning WWII dates...
- 28 Oct 22: Fascist Mussolini takes control of Italy
- 11 Feb 29: Lateran Treaty signed between Mussolini and the Vatican
- 03 Oct 35: Italy invades Ethiopia
- 06 Nov 37: Italy signs the Anti-Comintern Pact
- 10 Jun 40: Italy declares war on Britain and France
- 21 Jun 40: Italy unsuccessfully invades southern France
- 27 Sep 40: Italy signs Tripartite Pact with Germany and Japan
- 09 Jul 43: Allies invade Sicily
- 25 Jul 43: Italy's king imprisons Mussolini, replaces him with Badoglio
- 08 Sep 43: Italy surrenders to Allies; Germans seize Rome and northern Italy
- 09 Sep 43: Italian forces in German-controlled areas made prisoners of war
- 04 Jun 44: Allies liberate Rome - one down, two to go
- 27 Apr 45: Mussolini captured by Anti-Fascist partisans and executed
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by Benito Mussolini - The Pope and Mussolini:
The Secret History of Pius XI and the Rise of Fascism in Europe - Avanti:
Mussolini and the Wars of Italy 1919-1945 - Hitler & Mussolini:
The Secret Meetings - Anzio:
Italy and the Battle for Rome - 1944 - The Italian Resistance:
Fascists, Guerrillas and the Allies