Chapter 21

NOV 1940 ITALIAN FLEET CRIPPLED AT TARANTO, ITALY

Nighttime attack by British torpedo bombers cripple an Italian fleet in the Mediterranean Sea.

A surprise raid by World War I British naval aircraft on the Taranto naval base in 1940 crippled several Italian warships and it marked the first time that carrier launched aircraft had attacked in such a manner on other ships in the water.

The notoriously slow “Fairey Swordfish” biplanes launched from the British carrier Illustrious and flew at low altitude into Taranto naval base in southern Italy.

Taranto was the primary Italian naval base in southern Italy at the time.

Only two of the total 21 older torpedo bombers were lost in the attack. The original estimate of probable losses was fifty percent of the attacking force.

In return for those slender losses, the British devastated the Italian fleet leaving three Italian battleships sinking, two cruisers heavily damaged and two transport ships sunk.

After this engagement, the Axis only had one battleship in working condition and the balance of power in the area was shifted from Italy to Britain almost immediately.

The Italian navy became decidedly less likely to challenge the British navy in the Mediterranean. The exception to this was the ever-present U-Boat armada that struck silently from below without warning. All non-Axis shipping became targets regardless of military or civilian purpose.

This raid on the Italian navy at Taranto was studied with great interest by the other Axis power, the Imperial Japanese Navy. Historians have opined that the Japanese used it as a blueprint for their much larger attack on the United States Pacific Fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor the following year.

I knew that the engagement in Taranto harbor was not highly publicized in international press and was not overly amazed when my submitted content was never printed back in New York City. It had been buried like most of the stories about the “Final Solution” that was deemed far too dark for normal public input. Even Britain was reluctant to print some of the grizzly details of the concentration camp regime and the slow demolition of Jewish culture and Jewish populations from both Old Europe and the newly formed Eastern Bloc. Very few off those vitally placed countries would be allowed to stay outside the fray in a neutral status because neutrality more often than not meant they were the enemy to both sides in the conflict.

I had even submitted a nice report on how the unexpected loss of two fleets slowed Hitler’s absorption of the smaller countries down slightly and made his re-supply of North Africa a bit more difficult. Rommel often wrote in later years of how the interruptions to the supply lines caused him to change his tactics and made his movements less effective.

First, the French Fleet was sunk off the North African coast by British naval units making the traitorous transfer from Vichy France to the arms of the Nazi war machine impossible. Then, the sinking of the Italian fleet at Taranto made that source of power no longer a part of the Axis surface naval power. Hitler resumed his plans with the invasion of Russia a first priority and acted as if the losses were of no importance despite the warnings of his General Staff that the southern flank of Europe was now vulnerable and the oil fields might be compromised if the Allies assumed the correct strategy.

What seemed “minor” to inexperienced editors in the West were red flags to military men with the training to see the writing on the wall.

It was also a fact that the debacle at Taranto underscored the already embarrassing defeat suffered by the less than dependable Axis ally Italy. The Italians with their infantile preparations and their bureaucratic idiocy in making operational decisions using common sense and a knowledge of the enemy’s strengths and weaknesses during the attack on Greece that was doomed to failure from the very beginning because the Italian intelligence was dubious at best and complete conjecture with the worst scenario imaginable. The forced quick retreat from Greece was not the image that Hitler wanted to portray just before he kicked off the invasion of the Soviet Union.

The Fuhrer had barely finished his explosion over the dual disasters when the lead elements of Operation Barbarossa were ready to sweep across the new borders to the east.

I had noted that during the past week the influx of refugees from the occupied zone of France had reached an epidemic proportion. It was obvious that the occupied zone was more efficient in collecting up the undesirable elements of the French population that was always expanding in segments of the population as time went on. Of course the Gestapo still focused their primary attention on the Jewish population and that was fully in concert with the “Final Solution” of Jewry in Europe. Hitler had certainly never hidden his intentions in that regard and it was no secret that the trips to the concentration camps were strictly intended to be a one way journey.