The dramatic Allied invasion of Sicily in 1943 and the downfall of Mussolini

The war in Europe had begun on September 1, 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded Poland.

This act of aggression led to the United Kingdom and France both declaring war on Germany.

For the next two years, the conflict would largely be fought in the West, as the Allies tried to push back against German advances.

Then, in June of 1941, the strategic situation in Europe changed dramatically when Hitler's forces launched a surprise invasion of the Soviet Union. 

This was called Operation Barbarossa and was the single largest military operation in history in both manpower and casualties.

However, Hitler failed in his attempt to defeat the Soviet Union in six months, and this new theatre of the war turned into a battle of grinding attrition.

What complicated matters for Hitler was that Germany was now fighting a two-front war: Britain in the west and the Soviets in the east.

When Japan suddenly attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor and started the Pacific theatre of the war, Hitler took the opportunity to declare war on America as well.

Then, as the war continued into 1942, the losses in the east of Europe started to mount for Germany, particularly in the Battle of Stalingrad.

While the Nazi regime was in control of the continent, the growing strain of maintaining the war meant that their forces were stretched thin and were potentially vulnerable to a concerted reinvasion of Europe.

Once America had joined the Allies in their fight against Nazi Germany, US President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Churchill started discussing plans for a counterattack against Hitler.

However, it would take significant time to amass all of the necessary troops, tanks, aircraft, and resources to do so.

Due to the movement of so many resources, Allied planners knew that the Nazis would be able to guess that a large invasion force was being assembled.

While they couldn't hide that fact, Churchill and Roosevelt thought they could at least try and hide when and where a potential attack would happen.

To do this, they came up with an operation known as 'Mincemeat' which was designed to feed false information to the Germany forces.

As part of this operation, British military intelligence services planted fake 'classified' military documents on the body of a dead soldier.

This body was then dropped in a strategic location where it could wash up on a beach that was being monitored by the Germans.

They took the bait, believed that the documents were real, and based upon what was written in them, were confident that they knew that the impending invasion would take place in Sardinia and Greece.

As a result, large sections of the German army were diverted to these locations.

The ease with which the plan worked please the Allies. They had successfully distracted their enemy from the real Allied plan, which was to invade the island of Sicily, codenamed 'Operation Husky'. 

The massive landing began on the morning of July 10, 1943, a large naval armada transported the 160,000 Allied troops across the Mediterranean Sea.

The Allies launched simultaneous amphibious landings on the southern shores of Sicily.

Despite the fact that the Nazi army had diverted resources in response to the Operation Mincemeat deception, there was still a strong presence on Sicily of Italian and German soldiers.

The next 38 days saw fierce fighting. After establishing a beachhead, the Allies were able to quickly expand into the interior of the island.

With air and naval superiority, the campaign moved at a surprisingly rapid pace and by the end of August, the Allied forces were able to cross over to the mainland of Italy.

Approximately 5,000 Allied soldiers lost their lives during this operation, while Axis casualties numbered around 29,000.

The speed with which the invaders had advance shocked Mussolini's Italian government.

As a result, Mussolini had been removed from power on the 25th of July 1943 and imprisoned, while a new prime minister took his place.

Then, on the 3rd of September 1943, the new Italian government formally announced an armistice with the Allied powers.

Even though Italy had surrendered, Nazi German forces still fought back against Allied advances into Italy.

As the invasion force slowly moved north towards Rome, they faced continued resistance from the Germans who took up strong positions in the mountains and over crucial roadways.

The Allied advance came to a sudden halt at the Battle of Monte Cassino, which took place between 17 January – 18 May 1944.

This location was a natural bottleneck, as the route to Rome had to pass by the medieval monastery of Monte Cassino.

It was believed that the German forces were using the imposing religious building as a stronghold due to its commanding view over the area.

For months the Allies tried to scale the mountain and seize the monastery, but they suffered massive losses and continued failure.

Eventually, frustrated that the invasion had stalled and that it was costing so many lives, the Allies finally decided to destroy the monastery itself with heavy bombers.

With the obstruction now clear, the invasion continued marching north. The Allies reached Rome and liberated it on June 4, 1944, almost 11 months after the invasion of Sicily had begun.

However, Mussolini was not yet finished. He had been rescued from prison in September 1943 by German forces.

He had then fled to northern Italy where he established a new fascist regime, supported by Hitler.

Even though Rome had been captured, the Allies continued to fight their way north to help in the effort to finally defeat Hitler.

Mussolini would eventually be captured by Italian resistance fighters and executed on April 28th, 1945.