*
Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
March 28, 2024, 08:54:52 AM

Login with username, password and session length

Donate

We Appreciate Your Support

Recent

Author Topic: Italian defence WWII 28mm  (Read 2010 times)

Offline nevermore

  • Mastermind
  • Posts: 1172
    • http://www.victorian-steel.com/
Italian defence WWII 28mm
« on: May 04, 2018, 12:21:48 PM »
Italian defence WWII 28mm

Great game, rules were Iron Cross, with ammendments, put a little bit of history about the Italian army as it always seems
to get knocked, were they really that bad ?

more photos of the game at --- http://www.victorian-steel.com/

During General Erwin Rommel's First Desert Offensive, it was the Ariete Armoured Division and 8th Bersaglieri Regiment
who formed the vanguard of the Afrika Korps, obtaining Rommel's first victory in North Africa with the capture of Mechili
and 3,000 British Commonwealth troops on 8 April 1941. It was also the units of the Ariete, Trieste, Bologna, Brescia, Pavia
and Trento Divisions that actually manned the actual seige lines around Tobruk, capturing 14 strongpoints along with 400
Australian soldiers in the night-fighting of 1 May and 16 May that seriously dented Australian morale, forcing General Leslie
Morshead to accept defeat and have his division (suffering from PTSD and self-inflcted wounds) shipped out early
(starting August) in 1941 to Syria.





During Operations Brevity and Battleaxe in the summer of 1941, Italian soldiers under the command of fine officers
(Colonel Ugo Montemurro and Major Leopoldo Pardi) stood and fought tanks with anti-tank guns, giving and taking losses
and blunting the British armoured offensives.





It was also the Ariete who defeated the British 7th "Desert Rats" Armoured Division at Bir el Gub, knocking out 40 Crusader
tanks and derailing Operation Crusader.



And it was Ariete who ploughed through the British-officered 3rd Indian Brigade, during Operation Venezia on 27 May 1942.
While Rommel's panzers were pinned down nearby in the fighting for Tobruk, the Trieste breached a dense British minefield,
all the while being bombarded by British artillery and aircraft, and saved the entire Afrika Korps from complete capitulation.



The capture of the Mersa Matruh fortress in late June 1942 is often credited to the German 90th Light Division but the real
damage was in fact done by the gunners of the Italian Brescia and Trento, who stuck to their guns despite the fierce British
air attacks, and the Littorio Armoured Division who along with the 7th, 9th and 12th Bersaglieri Regiments overran 1,000
Gurkhas regrouping outside Mersa Matruh before surrounding and penetrating the British fortress, capturing another
6,500 POWs at bayonet point. The Bersaglieri, soon after shepherded into captivity another 1,000 demoralized New Zealander
soldiers who had lost their way during the fighting.



The main defences of the El Alamein front were formed by the Bologna, Pavia, Trieste, Trento, Sabratha and the Folgore
Airborne Division backed up by the Ariete and Littorio Armoured Divisions and Bersaglieri Corps. As noted in "A Pint of
Water Per Man" by US War Correspondent Harry Zinder from TIME magazine, it was the Italians who stubbornly manned
the anti-tank guns during the Second Battle of El Alamein (destroying 70 British tanks from Brigadier John Cecil Currie's
9th Armoured Brigade at Tel el Aqqaqir) and it was the Italians who were betrayed in the final battle, with Rommel ordering
the commandeering of trucks under gunpoint to evacuate the German forces.



Italian troops were the main participants in the Tunisian Campaign and there were a number of experienced Bersaglieri
battalions amongst the Afrika Korps assault formations at Kasserine Pass. They were in the thick of the fighting and along
with the Centuaro Armoured Division obtained Rommel's last victory in driving back the US infantry (under Colonel Anderson Moore)
and tanks (under Colonel Louis Hightower) along the mountain pass and Highway 13, with the Bersaglieri capturing 2,450
POWs in this action. As German morale crumbled in April and May 1943 and the entire Afrka Korps surrendered en masse,
the Italian 1st Army under General Giovanni Messe kept on fighting, defeating the British 56th "Black Cat" Division and a Free
French Division on 11 and 12 May.

http://www.victorian-steel.com/
The Victorian Outpost

Its a new gaming place in Grimsby with new terrain and new scenery, lots of respect for all wargamers and is the best place to game in town.

Anybody who wishes to visit the venue to arrange a game then  just pm me and lets roll those dice.

http://www.victorian-steel.co

Offline Jeff965

  • Scatterbrained Genius
  • Posts: 2634
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #1 on: May 04, 2018, 12:26:22 PM »
Excellent looking game and figures :-*

Offline Arrigo

  • Mastermind
  • Posts: 1074
  • errare humanum est, perseverare diabolicum est
    • Forward HQ my new blog where you can laugh at my crappy photos!
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #2 on: May 04, 2018, 06:46:19 PM »
Excellent pictures! And good overview.

One minor note, at Bir el Gubi it was not the the whole 7th Armoured Division, but only the 22nd Armoured Brigade that attacked the Italian position. It did not derail Crusader, because initially Rommel did not believe the Italian reports of British tanks coming from the south (of course the British were were he, and not even his signal interceptions, put them). Worth to note is that in the Royal Gloucester Hussars museum in... Gloucester, the battle is covered, but no mention is made of the Ariete division, the opponents were German panzers.    Also Ariete played a role at Sidi Rezegh.

During operation Venezia Ariete overrun the 3rd Indian Motor Brigade box at the start of the battle (the whole bloody Afrika Korps...) in the first action of the operation and then made it to the Cauldron beating back more British attacks than the German division. The cauldron was not close to Tobruk, but a bit south, Tobruk was invested later on in the operation. By the way years ago I once spoke to an old gentleman (very old even then) who was a guncrew in one of the Italian 88mm equipped battalion attached to the Ariete. He even met Rommel once, he was a bit too admiring of him... but he told me one interesting tidbit, often the Germans gunners from the 88mm equipped Panzerjager battalions were coming to the Italian units begging for HE ammo because the German did not have them. sometime they were begging the Luftwaffe flak Abteiulngs, but Goering's guys were often stingy...   

"Put Grant straight in"

for pretty tanks and troops: http://forwardhq.blogspot.com

Offline Helen

  • The Grey Heron
  • Supporting Adventurer
  • Galactic Brain
  • *
  • Posts: 5806
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #3 on: May 04, 2018, 07:46:21 PM »
Thanks for the game report and a little history of the Regio Esercito in the Tunisian campaign.
Best wishes,
Helen
Love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well (V van Gogh)

Offline Marine0846

  • Supporting Adventurer
  • Galactic Brain
  • *
  • Posts: 6607
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #4 on: May 04, 2018, 08:49:08 PM »
Great AAR.
Love the history lesson also.
That's what I love about LAF.
So many people with lots of knowledge
they are willing to share.
Thanks
Semper Fi, Mac

Offline Volleyfire!

  • Scientist
  • Posts: 451
  • At 100 yards................Volleyfire!!!
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #5 on: May 04, 2018, 10:01:29 PM »
Lovely set up you have there. Have you a mixture of Perrys and Warlord Italians that I spy there? I've stuck resolutely to Perrys but there are a few gaps in their range and I was wondering how the Warlord figures mix in amongst them? From the look of your game, assuming they are a mixture of both then they look very compatible.

I thoroughly recommend reading Iron Hulls Iron Hearts by Ian M Walker for more interesting reading of the desert war from the Italian perspective. Also The Folgore Parachute Division in North Africa by Paolo Morisi which is especially revealing about the tenacity of these troops in Tunisia and at Alamein.

Just to add, when 3rd Indian Motor Brigade was overrun in only half an hour the Indians admitted to 41 officers and 453 men killed and 600 prisoners taken, and according to the Ariete War Diary that bag included a general and 3 colonels. In fact the 'general' was 72 yr old Admiral Sir Walter Cowan a famous hero of WW1.

The South Africans also had a healthy respect for the Italians, especially their artillery, and the Italians only had to 'demonstrate ' by driving up and down creating large dust plumes for the South Africans to hold off and not engage.

Offline Helen

  • The Grey Heron
  • Supporting Adventurer
  • Galactic Brain
  • *
  • Posts: 5806
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #6 on: May 04, 2018, 11:28:58 PM »
There will be more Italians coming from Michael Perry in the future. Michael indicated he needed to do some additional packs. I look forward to them in finishing off my collection.


Offline Volleyfire!

  • Scientist
  • Posts: 451
  • At 100 yards................Volleyfire!!!
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #7 on: May 05, 2018, 06:13:41 AM »
There will be more Italians coming from Michael Perry in the future. Michael indicated he needed to do some additional packs. I look forward to them in finishing off my collection.

Excellent news! I read somewhere ages ago that he said something along the lines of needing to be able motivate himself in order to produce the Folgore at some point in the future. Hopefully he can push himself to do some Marines and Blackshirts as well.

Offline nevermore

  • Mastermind
  • Posts: 1172
    • http://www.victorian-steel.com/
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #8 on: May 05, 2018, 07:25:00 AM »
Thanks everybody for the comments and history lessons, well spotted on the Warlord/perry miniatures, these are all the collection of one of the guys we game with my mate Rob.   :)

Offline dhtandco

  • Scientist
  • Posts: 290
Re: Italian defence WWII 28mm
« Reply #9 on: May 05, 2018, 09:37:53 AM »
Iron Hulls is a very good read.figures are as you said Perry and Warlord and I believe some Black Tree also.
Rules are Cross of Iron and figures are all from Rob Coopers collection.

With more to come. You can never have too many figures!