Operation Husky

Operation Husky was the Allied invasion of the island of Sicily on 10 July, 1943 which started the Italian Campaign.

Participants

Main article: Operation Husky order of battle

The invasion of Sicily involved primarily four nations: The British Commonwealth and United States as the Allied landing force and Italy and Germany as the Axis forces defending the island.

The Anglo-American landing force was under control of the Allied 15th Army Group. It consisted of the U.S. 7th Army and British 8th Army, each with two Corps underneath them. The primarily Italian defenders were two Italian Corps (XII and XVI) and one German Panzer Corps (XIV).

Planning

In the early part of 1943, following the realisation that the invasion
of France would be impossible that year, it was decided to use the
troops from the recently won North African Campaign to invade the Italian island of Sicily. The strategic goals were to remove the island as a base for Axis shipping and aircraft, allowing free passage to Allied ships in the Mediterranean Sea, and to put pressure on the Italian regime in the hope of eventually knocking Italy out of the war. It could also act as a precursor to the invasion of Italy, although this was not agreed by the Allies at the time of
the invasion, the Americans in particular resisting commitment to any operation which might conceivably delay the invasion of France.

General Dwight Eisenhower was in overall command of the invasion, with
General Sir Harold Alexander as commander of land forces. The land
forces were designated the 15th Army Group, and comprised the British 8th Army, under General Bernard Montgomery, and the U.S. 7th Army
under General George Patton. The Axis defenders comprised around
365,000 Italian troops and around 40,000 Germans with at least 47 tanks and about 200 artillery pieces, under the
overall command of Italian General Alfredo Guzzoni.

The landings

The landings took place in extremely strong wind conditions, which made the landings difficult but also ensured the element of surprise. Landings were made on the southern and eastern coasts of the island, with the British forces in the East and the Americans towards the West.

Four airborne operations were carried out, landing during the night of the 9/10 July, as part of the invasion; two were British and two American. The American troops were the 82nd Airborne division, making their first combat parachute jump. The strong winds blew the dropping aircraft off course and scattered them widely; the result was that around half the US paratroops failed to make it to their rallying points. British glider-landed troops fared little better; only 12 out of 144 gliders landing on target, many landing in the sea. Nevertheless the scattered airborne troops maximised their opportunities, attacking patrols and creating confusion wherever possible.

The sea landings, despite the weather, were carried out against little opposition, the Italian units stationed on the shoreline lacking equipment and transport. The British walked into the port of Syracuse virtually unopposed. Only in the American centre was a substantial counterattack made, in exactly the point where the US Airborne were supposed to have been. On the 11 July Patton ordered his reserve parachute regiments to drop and reinforce the centre. Unfortunately not every unit had been informed of the drop, and the transports,
which arrived shortly after an Axis air raid, were fired on by their own side, losing 37 out of 144 planes. It was friendly fire.

The land battle

However resistance in the British sector then stiffened. Montgomery persuaded Alexander to shift the
boundaries so that the British could by-pass the resistance and retain
the key role of capturing Messina, while the Americans were given the role of protecting and supporting
their flank. Patton sought a greater role for his army, and decided to
try to capture the capital, Palermo. After dispatching a
'reconnaissance' toward the town of Agrigento which succeeded in capturing
it, he persuaded Alexander to allow him to continue to advance.
Alexander changed his mind and countermanded his orders, but
Patton claimed the countermand was 'garbled in transmission', and by
the time the position had been clarified Patton was at the gates of
Palermo.

The fall of Palermo inspired a coup against Mussolini, and he was
deposed from power. Although the removal of Italy from the war had
been one of the long-term objectives of the Italian campaign, the
suddenness of the move caught the Allies by surprise.

After Patton's capture of Palermo, with the British still bogged down
south of Messina, Alexander ordered a two-pronged attack on the
city. Patton became obsessed with the idea of reaching Messina before
the British, writing "This is a horse race in which the prestige of
the US Army is at stake.". The Axis, now effectively under the command
of German General Hans Hube, had prepared a strong defensive line, the
'Etna Line' around Messina, that would enable him to make a
progressive retreat while evacuating large parts of his army to the
mainland. Patton began his assault on the line at Troina, but it was a
lynchpin of the defense and stubbornly held. Despite three 'end run'
amphibious landings the Germans managed to keep the bulk of their
forces beyond reach of capture, and maintain their evacuation
plans. Elements of the US Third Infantry Division entered Messina just
hours after the last axis troops boarded ship for Italy. However
Patton had won his race to enter Messina first.

Consequences and aftermath

The invasion also had an impact on the Eastern front. One of the reasons why the Germans had to cancel their offensive near Kursk was that they decided to send units to Italy after they received news of the invasion.

Husky was the largest amphibious operation of World War II in terms of
men landed on the beaches, and of frontage; it overshadowed even the later
Normandy landings. Strategically, the Sicilian operation achieved the
goals set out for it by Allied planners. Axis air and
naval forces were driven from the island; the Mediterranean sea lanes
were opened and Mussolini had been toppled from power. It opened the
way to the invasion of Italy, which had not necessarily been seen as a
follow-up to Operation Husky.

Constituent operations

• Operation Barclay: Deception operation aimed at misleading Axis forces as to the actual date and location of the Allied landings.
• Operation Chestnut: Advanced air drop by 2 SAS to disrupt communications on July 12, 1943.
• Operation Corkscrew: Allied invasion of the Italian island Pantelleria on June 10, 1943.
• Operation Fustian: Airborne landing at Primrose Bridge ahead on July 13-14, 1943.
• Operation Ladbroke: Glider landing at Syracuse on July 9, 1943.
• Operation Narcissus: Commando raid on a lighthouse near the main landings on 10 July, 1943.
  

  See also

• Operation Husky Order of Battle

  External links

• US Army account of the battle
• 82nd Airborne account of Sicily
• World War Two Online Newspaper Archives - The Sicilian and Italian Campaigns, 1943-1945