On October 24, 1929, with the stock market crash of the New York Stock Exchange, a major economic crisis swept the world across the world, causing panic in the entire capitalist world. The surge in the number of unemployed, the sharp decline in the country's finances, the sharpness of social contradictions, for the sake of social stability, many countries followed the Roosevelt New Deal of the United States, while some countries embarked on the fascist road, the tit-for-tat confrontation between the two camps of capitalist countries and fascist countries, so that the outbreak of World War II was inevitable.
The Italian dictator Mussolini, the Nazi Party leader Hitler in Germany and the Japanese Prime Minister Hideo Tojo formed the Axis power bloc and began a worldwide expansion of aggression. However, Italy seems to have no sense of existence compared to Germany and Japan, and the whole time it is the role of playing soy sauce.
Germany occupied most of Europe, and few countries were its enemies. Japan has launched a frenzied invasion in Asia, and many Southeast Asian countries except China have also suffered heavy injuries. Italy, far from these two, went to invade North Africa, but surrendered after some resistance, and was besieged by the other side many times or Germany sent troops to save it.
If you want to classify their combat effectiveness, Germany is 8 points, Japan is 5 points, and Italy is a pitiful 2 points. That's why former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill scoffed that thanks to Italy being An ally of Germany, not ours. But Italy was not useless, and it also had an outstanding time when it took only two hours to annihilate an opponent who refused to surrender in a fit of rage.
In 1941, the British landed from Tobruk, Libya, preparing to launch an offensive against retreating Italian troops. Two months of fierce fighting caused heavy losses to the Italian army, 10 divisions were completely annihilated, and the remaining soldiers were also unwilling to fight. Germany, of course, as its ally, would not sit idly by, so it sent Rommel, the Fox of the Desert, to support. After Rommel arrived, on the one hand, he ordered the Italian army to hold the defensive line to prevent the British from continuing to advance, while he himself used flexible blitzkrieg to effectively counterattack the British army. So in just one week, the British lost their former battlefield and had to retreat more than two hundred miles.
But even with such a great victory, the Italians were not happy, because their original purpose was to retreat, they did not want to continue in such a quagmire of war, and now they seemed to be crucified in the positions.
So in order to return home as soon as possible, they waved the white flag to the retreating British army, but the British army did not seem to buy it, and suffered a heavy loss from the German army on the front line, and was planning to take out his allies.
However, this time, the British army's wishful thinking was bad. The Italians were not lambs to be slaughtered, and after they refused, the whole army was furious, so they pulled away and prepared to give the British a little color, and with their strong firepower advantage, they completely annihilated the British army in less than two hours. In this way, it seems that the Italian army is really not invincible. So why do they show such laziness and no intention of fighting?
In fact, Italy is different from Germany and Japan, their preparation for war is not sufficient, on the day of the full outbreak of World War II, their domestic reserves are stretched thin, and they are simply unable to support their long-term war of attrition. Italy's defense minister, however, said that the country was well fed and advocated for people to go to war. However, actual combat is the best criterion for testing combat effectiveness; only 19 of the 74 army divisions of the Italian army on the battlefield are fully formed, and the rest are more or less ammunition personnel, and it is okay to engage weak countries, but when encountering a little strong enemy, it shows a fatal weakness.
So they always took the offensive behind the Germans, avoiding their sharp edges, and they could also catch some oil and water. Moreover, the Italians were not belligerent, they admired freedom and romance, believing that war would only bind them, so we saw an Italian army that fought if it could win and surrendered if it could not win.