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I have often seen it posited by many, including people ideologically aligned, that the Italian military was weak and ineffective in ww2.

This is only half true. Yes, they were weaker than Germany's military, that's a given (except the Regina Marina). But they did not *need* to be as strong as Germany to accomplish anything that the axis originally planned to do.

Both Hitler and Mussolini had a presumption that the west would not join the war. Naive optimism probably, but for a war in the east exclusively (what Italy and Germany planned for), Italy did not have to be the strongest because Italy was not going to bear the brunt of the red army, Italy was supposed to be a pain in the ass to the reds in the south and sweep the balkans.

To that end, with the exception of Greece (which was aided extensively by the UK, and which should have aligned with the axis anyways considering metaxist stances on issues, don't know why he didn't do that), Italy was pretty successful. Italian contributions to capturing the balkans were extensive even considering that the other half of their army was in Africa fighting the British, which they did not even plan to do in the first place, and their fight against the British in Africa was also a very good one. And so was the fight against the allies in Italy proper.

So why do we presume that the Italian military was bad? As already mentioned, it was completely unprepared to fight a 2 front war in the same way that the German army was, but to a greater extreme. If the forces of the Italian army were actually diverted fully to Southeastern Europe and the southern ussr (as was actually planned initially), the Italians would have been a massive benefit to Germany and would have contributed very extensively to an overall axis victory.

The idea that Italy was a weak and useless ally that only hindered Germany is soy pop history that simply isn't true. Neither Hitler nor Mussolini had properly planned for war with the west, and if both of their original plans had gone through, Italy would have had no problems whatsoever. Their army was perfectly prepared for what the axis had on the table. And, even considering that everything fell through, the Italians still give the allies hell particularly in Africa and absolutely carried their own weight as much as they possibly could have done.

Furthermore, Italy was hindered by an ineffective and retarded monarchy with extensive corruption and complete incompetence among its admirals and generals. The damage that this did to Italy can't be overstated. Mussolini should have bolshevik'd the house of savoy (they would have actually deserved it) and purged the general staff and admiralty of Italys military. The fascist generals like Graziani were great, the monarchist ones were awful. This could be seen as far back as ww1 with retards like Luigi Cadorna. If Mussolini had made Italy the Italian social Republic from the start instead of the kingdom of Italy, Italy would be moving as much muscle as Germany. Possibly more, given that fascist Italy was notably older than the 3rd reich. Plus, almost every Italian general officer except Graziani was a scum sucking royalist freemason traitor that probably performed poorly and sacrificed thousands of Italians entirely on purpose.

As far as the claim brought up by nu male redditors and soy faggots in general with a 90 iq, the body build of an alien, no jawline, and that couldn't even deadlift a bar, that Mussolini was a blithering retard that everyone hated and everyone in Italy was happy to join the allies, this is fucking retarded. Everyone in Italy except jew funded partisans hated the armistice. The entire existence of the Italian social Republic dispels all of this. The Italian people did not kill Mussolini, jews did, and he will be a martyr for the rest of history who died leading a nation against and ensnared by certain defeat. The torch bearer of the greatest ideology in modern times and the antidote to the worldly jewish poison. The partisans and jews who killed him, and the house of savoy and general staff who betrayed him, are now looking up at him from the pits of hell.

https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/crime/nomad-owner-alan-yazbek-facing-intense-backlash-losing-business-after-allegedly-holding-nazi-poster-at-propalestine-rally/news-story/335ff7c4995927ebd3b173c5d4e85b66?amp&nk=94b8fb269d104097215a58a286df48df-1728601534

That way they know how evil Hitler was and will never support him