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<p><b>New page</b></p><div>{{Short description|1943 armistice between the Kingdom of Italy and the Allies}}<br />
{{Redirect|Italian armistice|the 1918 armistice with Austria-Hungary|Armistice of Villa Giusti|the 1940 armistice with France|Franco-Italian armistice}}<br />
{{More citations needed|date=January 2022}}<br />
[[File:Dopo_la_firma_dell'armistizio_3_settembre_1943.jpg|thumb|right|After the signing at Cassibile on 3 September 1943.<br>From left to right: [[Kenneth Strong]], [[Giuseppe Castellano]], [[Walter Bedell Smith]], and Franco Montanari.]]<br />
{{Campaignbox Italy}}<br />
The '''Armistice of Cassibile'''<ref>Howard McGaw Smyth, "The Armistice of Cassibile", ''Military Affairs'' 12:1 (1948), 12–35.</ref> was an [[armistice]] that was signed on 3 September 1943 and made public on 8 September between the [[Kingdom of Italy]] and the [[Allies of World War II|Allies]] during [[World War II]].<br />
<br />
It was signed by [[Major General (United States)|Major General]] [[Walter Bedell Smith]] for the Allies and [[Brigade General]] [[Giuseppe Castellano]] for Italy at a conference of generals from both sides in an Allied military camp at [[Cassibile (village)|Cassibile]], in [[Sicily]], which had recently been [[Allied invasion of Sicily|occupied by the Allies]]. The armistice was approved by both [[Monarchy of Italy|Italian King]] [[Victor Emmanuel III]] and [[Marshal of Italy|Marshal]] [[Pietro Badoglio|Badoglio]], who was the [[Prime Minister of Italy]] at the time.<br />
<br />
[[Nazi Germany|Germany]] moved rapidly by [[Gran Sasso raid|freeing]] [[Benito Mussolini]] (12 September) and [[Operation Achse|attacking Italian forces in Italy]] (8–19 September), [[southern France]] and the [[Balkans]]. The Italian forces were quickly defeated, and most of Italy was occupied by German troops, who established a [[puppet state]], the [[Italian Social Republic]]. The king, the Italian government and most of the navy escaped to territories occupied by the Allies.<br />
<br />
==Background==<br />
{{Main|Fall of the Fascist regime in Italy}}<br />
After the surrender of the Axis powers in [[North African Campaign|North Africa]] on 13 May 1943, the Allies [[bombing of Rome in World War II|bombed Rome]] on 16 May, [[Allied invasion of Sicily|invaded Sicily]] on 10 July and prepared to [[Allied invasion of Italy|land on the Italian mainland]].<br />
<br />
In the spring of 1943, preoccupied by the disastrous situation of the Italian military during the war, the Italian dictator, [[Benito Mussolini]], removed several figures from the government whom he considered to be more loyal to King [[Victor Emmanuel III]] than to the Fascist regime. <br />
<br />
To help the execution of his plan,{{clarify|what plan?|date=March 2022}} the King asked for the assistance of [[Dino Grandi]] (1st Count of Mordano), one of the leading members of the Fascist hierarchy who, in his younger years, had been considered the sole credible alternative to Mussolini as leader of the [[National Fascist Party]]. The King was also motivated by the suspicion that the Count of Mordano's ideas about Fascism might be changed abruptly. Various ambassadors, including [[Pietro Badoglio]] himself, proposed to him the vague possibility of succeeding Mussolini as dictator.<br />
<br />
The secret rebels later involved [[Giuseppe Bottai]], another high member of the Fascist Directorate and Minister of Culture, and [[Galeazzo Ciano]] (the 2nd Count of Cortellazzo and Buccari), probably the second most powerful man in the Fascist Party and Mussolini's son-in-law. The conspirators devised an "Order of the Day" for the next meeting of the [[Grand Council of Fascism]] (''Gran Consiglio del Fascismo''), which contained a proposal to restore direct control of politics to the King. After the Council, held on 25 July 1943, the "order of the day" was adopted by majority vote, and Mussolini was then summoned to meet the King and dismissed as prime minister. Upon leaving the meeting, Mussolini was arrested by ''[[carabinieri]]'' and spirited off to the island of [[Ponza]]. Badoglio became President of the Council of Ministers ([[Prime Minister of Italy|Prime Minister]]) although Mordano had been told that another general of greater personal and professional qualities ([[Marshal of Italy|Marshal]] [[Enrico Caviglia]]) would have taken the position.<br />
<br />
The appointment of Badoglio apparently did not change the position of Italy as Germany's ally in the war. However, many channels sought a peace treaty with the Allies. Meanwhile, [[Adolf Hitler]] sent several divisions south of [[the Alps]], officially to help defend Italy from Allied landings but really to control the country.<br />
<br />
[[Image:Giuseppe Castellano.jpg|thumb|upright|General [[Giuseppe Castellano]]]]<br />
Three Italian generals (including [[Brigade General]] [[Giuseppe Castellano]]) were separately sent to [[Lisbon]] to contact Allied diplomats. However, to open the proceedings, the Allies had to determine who was the most authoritative envoy, and the three generals had started to quarrel about who had the highest authority. In the end, Castellano was admitted to speak with the Allies to set the conditions for the surrender of [[Italy]]. Among the representatives of the Allies were the British Ambassador to [[Portugal]], [[Sir Ronald Hugh Campbell]], and two generals sent by [[Dwight Eisenhower]]: the American [[Walter Bedell Smith]] (Eisenhower's chief of staff) and the British [[Kenneth Strong]] (assistant chief of staff for intelligence).<br />
<br />
On 27 August, General Castellano returned to Italy and, three days later, briefed Badoglio about the Allied request for a meeting to be held in [[Sicily]], which had been suggested by the British Ambassador to the [[Holy See|Vatican]].<br />
<br />
To ease communication between the Allies and the Italian government, a captured British [[Special Operations Executive]] (SOE) agent, Dick Mallaby, was released from [[Verona]] Prison and secretly moved to the [[Quirinale]]. It was vital for the Germans to remain ignorant of any suggestion of Italian surrender, and the SOE was seen as the most secure method under the circumstances.<ref>{{cite book<br />
| last = Marks<br />
| first = Leo<br />
| author-link = Leo Marks<br />
| title = Between Silk and Cyanide<br />
| publisher = [[HarperCollins]]<br />
| year = 1998<br />
| location = London<br />
| isbn = 0-00-255944-7<br />
| no-pp = true<br />
| page = chapter 47}}</ref><br />
<br />
==Terms==<br />
Badoglio still considered it possible to gain favourable conditions in exchange for the surrender. He ordered Castellano to insist for any surrender of Italy to be conditioned on a landing of Allied troops on the Italian mainland. The Allies then held only [[Sicily]] and some minor islands.<br />
<br />
On 31 August, [[Brigade General]] Castellano reached [[Termini Imerese]], in Sicily, by plane and was transferred to [[Cassibile (village)|Cassibile]], a town near [[Syracuse, Sicily|Syracuse]]. It soon became obvious that the two sides in the negotiations had adopted rather distant positions. Castellano pressed the request for the Italian territory to be defended from the inevitable reaction of the German ''[[Wehrmacht]]'' against Italy after the signing. In return, he received only vague promises, which included the launching of a parachute division over [[Rome]]. Moreover, the actions were to be conducted contemporaneously with the signing, not to precede it, as the Italians had wanted.<br />
<br />
The following day, Castellano was received by Badoglio and his entourage. Italy's Foreign Minister, [[Raffaele Guariglia]], declared that the Allied conditions were to be accepted. Other generals, such as [[Giacomo Carboni]], maintained that the Army Corps deployed around Rome was insufficient to protect the city because of the lack of fuel and ammunition and that the armistice had to be postponed. Badoglio did not pronounce himself in the meeting. In the afternoon, he appeared before the King, who decided to accept the armistice conditions.<br />
<br />
==Signing==<br />
A confirmation [[telegram]] was sent to the Allies. The message, however, was intercepted by the ''[[Wehrmacht]]'', the German armed forces, which had long since begun to suspect that Italy was seeking a separate armistice. The Germans contacted Badoglio, who repeatedly confirmed the unwavering loyalty of Italy to its German ally. His reassurances were doubted by the Germans, and the ''Wehrmacht'' started to devise an effective plan, [[Operation Achse]], to take control of Italy as soon as the Italian government had switched allegiance to the Allies.<br />
<br />
On 2 September, Castellano set off again to Cassibile with an order to confirm the acceptance of the Allied conditions. He had no written authorisation from the head of the Italian government, which wanted to dissociate himself as much as possible from the forthcoming defeat of his country.<br />
<br />
The signing ceremony began at 14:00 on 3 September. Castellano and Bedell Smith signed the accepted text on behalf of Badoglio and [[General Eisenhower]], respectively. A bombing mission on Rome by 500 aeroplanes was stopped at the last moment and had been Eisenhower's inducement to accelerate the procedure of the armistice. [[Harold Macmillan]], the British government's representative minister at the Allied Staff, informed [[Winston Churchill]] that the armistice had been signed "without amendments of any kind".<br />
<br />
==Aftermath==<br />
Only after the signing had taken place was Castellano informed of the additional clauses, which had been presented by General Campbell to another Italian general, Zanussi, who had also been in Cassibile since 31 August. Zanussi, for unclear reasons, had not informed Castellano about them. Bedell Smith, nevertheless, explained to Castellano that the further conditions were to have taken effect only if Italy had not taken on a fighting role in the war alongside the Allies.<br />
<br />
On the afternoon of the same day, Badoglio had a briefing with the senior commanders of the ''[[Regia Marina]]'' (Italy's Royal Navy) and the ''[[Regia Aeronautica]]'' (Italy's Royal Air Force), with the War Ministers and with the King's representatives. However, he omitted any mention of the signing of the armistice and referred only to ongoing negotiations.<br />
<br />
The day of entry into force of the armistice was linked to a planned landing in central Italy and was left to the Allies' discretion. Castellano still understood that the date was intended to be 12 September, and Badoglio started to move troops to Rome.<br />
<br />
On 7 September, a small Allied delegation reached Rome to inform Badoglio that the next day would have been the day of the armistice. He was also informed about the pending arrival of the American [[82nd Airborne Division]] into airports around the city. Badoglio told the delegation that his army was not ready to support the landing and that most airports in the area were under German control. He asked for a deferral of the armistice of a few days. When General [[Eisenhower]] learned that, the landing in Rome of American troops was cancelled, but the day of the armistice was confirmed since other troops were already en route by sea to land in southern Italy.<br />
<br />
When the armistice was announced by Allied radio on the afternoon of 8 September, German forces immediately attacked Italian forces by executing [[Operation Achse]]. Most of the ''[[Regio Esercito]]'' (Italian Royal Army) had not been informed about the armistice, and no clear orders had been issued about the line of conduct to be taken in the face of the German armed forces. Some of the Italian divisions that should have defended Rome were still in transit from southern France. The king, along with the [[Italian royal family|royal family]] and Badoglio, fled Rome on the early morning of the 9th and took shelter in [[Brindisi]], in southern Italy. Their initial intention had been to move army headquarters out of Rome together with the King and the Prime Minister, but few staff officers reached Brindisi. In the meanwhile, the Italian troops, without instructions, collapsed and were soon overwhelmed. Some small units decided to stay loyal to the German ally. From 8 to 12 September, the German forces occupied all of the Italian territory that was still not under Allied control, except [[Sardinia]] and part of [[Apulia]], without meeting much organised resistance. In Rome, an Italian governor, with the support of an Italian infantry division, nominally ruled the city until 23 September, but in practice, the city was under German control from 11 September.<br />
<br />
On 3 September, British and Canadian troops had crossed the [[Strait of Messina]] and begun landing in the southernmost tip of [[Calabria]] during [[Operation Baytown]]. The day after the armistice had been made public, 9 September, the Allies made landings at [[Operation Avalanche|at Salerno]] and at [[Operation Slapstick|at Taranto]].<br />
<br />
The Allies failed to take full advantage of the Italian armistice and were quickly checked by German troops. In terrain that favoured defence, the Allied forces took 20 months to reach the northern borders of Italy.<br />
<br />
Some of the Italian troops based outside Italy, in the occupied [[Balkans]] and [[Greek islands]], held out some weeks after the armistice, but without any determined support by the Allies, all had been overwhelmed by the Germans by the end of September 1943. On the island of [[Cephalonia]], the Italian [[Massacre of the Acqui Division|Acqui Division was massacred]] after it had resisted German forces. A similar fate awaited 103 Italian officers of the 50th Infantry Division ''Regina'' on the island of [[Kos]], [[Massacre of Kos|who were shot]] in early October 1943 after the Germans captured the island. Only on the islands of [[Leros]] and [[Samos]], with British reinforcements, would the resistance last until November 1943, and in [[Italian occupation of Corsica|Corsica]], Italian troops forced the German troops to leave the island.<br />
<br />
In other cases, individual Italian units, mostly of smaller size, remained loyal to the Axis powers. Many of the units formed the nucleus of the armed forces of the puppet [[Italian Social Republic]].{{citation needed|date=August 2022}}<br />
<br />
==''Regia Marina''==<br />
Both the ''[[Regio Esercito]]'' (Italian Royal Army) and the ''[[Regia Aeronautica]]'' (Italian Royal Air Force) were virtually disintegrated with the announcement of the armistice on 8 September. The Allies coveted the ''[[Regia Marina]]'' (Italian Royal Navy), with its 206 ships in total, including the battleships {{ship|Italian battleship|Roma|1940|2}}, {{ship|Italian battleship|Vittorio Veneto||2}}, and ''Italia'' (known as {{ship|Italian battleship|Littorio||2}} until July 1943). There was a danger that some of the navy might fight on, be scuttled or (most concerningly for the Allies) end up in German hands. As such, the truce called for Italian warships on Italy's west coast, mostly at [[La Spezia]] and [[Genoa]], to sail for North Africa and to pass Corsica and Sardinia and for those at [[Taranto]], in the [[heel of Italy]], to sail for [[Crown Colony of Malta|Malta]].<ref name="Wallace57">Robert Wallace & the editors of Time-Life Books, The Italian Campaign, Time-Life Books Inc, 1978. p.57</ref><br />
<br />
At 02:30, on 9 September, the three battleships ''Roma'', ''Vittorio Veneto'', and ''Italia'' "shoved off from La Spezia escorted by three light cruisers and eight destroyers". When German troops, who had stormed into the town to prevent the defection, became enraged by the ships' escape, "they rounded up and summarily shot several Italian captains who, unable to get their vessels under way, had scuttled them". That afternoon, German bombers attacked the ships by sailing without [[air cover]] off Sardinia and launching [[Fritz X|guided bombs]]. Several ships suffered damage, and ''Roma'' sank with the loss of nearly 1,400 men. Most of the remaining ships made it safely to North Africa "while three destroyers and a cruiser which had stopped to rescue survivors, docked in [[Menorca]]".<br />
<br />
The navy's turnover proceeded more smoothly in other areas of Italy. When an Allied naval force headed for the large naval base of Taranto, it watched a flotilla of Italian ships sailing out of Taranto Harbour towards their surrender at Malta.<ref name="Wallace57"/><br />
<br />
An agreement between the Allies and the Italians in late September provided for some of the navy to be kept in commission, but the battleships were to be reduced to care and maintenance and effectively disarmed. Italian mercantile marine vessels were to operate under the same general conditions as those of the Allies. In all cases, the Italian vessels would retain their Italian crews and fly Italian flags.<ref>Armistice with Italy: Employment and Disposition of Italian Fleet and Merchant Marine (Cunningham-de Courten Agreement) 23 September 1943</ref><br />
<br />
==See also==<br />
* [[Military history of Italy during World War II]]<br />
* [[Allied invasion of Italy]]<br />
* [[European Theatre of World War II]]<br />
* [[Italian Co-belligerent Army]]<br />
* [[Operation Margarethe]]<br />
* [[Operation Panzerfaust]]<br />
* [[1944 Romanian coup d'état]]<br />
* [[1944 Bulgarian coup d'état]]<br />
* [[Moscow Armistice]]<br />
* [[Italian Army in Russia]]<br />
* [[Badoglio Proclamation]]<br />
* [[Treaty of Peace with Italy, 1947]]<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
==Sources==<br />
* {{cite book|first=Elena |last=Aga Rossi|title=Una nazione allo sbando|location=Bologna|language=it|year= 1993}}<br />
* {{cite book|first=Gianfranco |last=Bianchi|title=25 luglio, crollo di un regime|location=Milan|language=it|year= 1963}}<br />
* {{cite book|first=Luigi |last=Marchesi|title=Come siamo arrivati a Brindisi |location=Milan|language=it|year= 1969}}<br />
<br />
==External links==<br />
* {{in lang|it}} [https://web.archive.org/web/20070929084029/http://www.romacivica.net/anpiroma/Resistenza/8_settembreo.htm Il diario del generale Giuseppe Castellano], La Sicilia, 8 settembre 2003<br />
* {{in lang|it}} [https://web.archive.org/web/20070810184758/http://www.romacivica.net/anpiroma/Resistenza/8_settembre.htm 8 Settembre 1943, l'armistizio] Centro Studi della Resistenza dell'Anpi di Roma<br />
* [http://avalon.law.yale.edu/wwii/italy01.asp The Avalon Project at Yale Law School: Terms of the Armistice with Italy; September 3, 1943]<br />
{{World War II}}<br />
{{Authority control}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:20th century in Italy]]<br />
[[Category:Politics of World War II]]<br />
[[Category:Armistices|Cassibile]]<br />
[[Category:Italian campaign (World War II)]]<br />
[[Category:1943 in Italy]]<br />
[[Category:World War II treaties]]<br />
[[Category:Peace treaties of Italy]]<br />
[[Category:Peace treaties of the United States]]<br />
[[Category:Peace treaties of France]]<br />
[[Category:Peace treaties of the United Kingdom]]<br />
[[Category:History of Syracuse, Sicily]]<br />
<!--Signed in Cassibile, a hamlet of Syracuse--><br />
[[Category:Treaties concluded in 1943]]<br />
[[Category:Treaties entered into force in 1943]]<br />
[[Category:Treaties of the Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)]]<br />
[[Category:Italy–United States relations]]<br />
[[Category:Peace treaties of the Soviet Union]]<br />
[[Category:September 1943 events]]</div>Bot