The Bitter Sea: The Struggle for Mastery in the Mediterranean 1935–1949. Simon Ball

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      He was only mildly propitiated when an Australian cruiser intercepted an Italian cruiser on its way from Tripoli to Leros and sank her with an outstanding display of gunnery ⁵² Conversely, Mussolini was ‘depressed on account of the loss of the Colleoni, not so much because of the sinking itself as because he feels the Italians did not fight well’. ⁵³ The battle of Cape Spada, as the sinking of the Colleoni was called, made more of an impression than Punta Stilo. It occasioned another round of mutual denunciations between the Regia Aeronautica and the Regia Marina–Italian aircraft responded to the Colleoni’s demands for assistance only when it was too late. They instead bombed the British destroyers which were trying to pick up Italian survivors, provoking Cunningham’s order that in future, ‘difficult and distasteful as it is’, shipwrecked sailors should be left to fend for themselves. ⁵⁴

      Failure made Mussolini and Churchill gamblers. There were striking parallels between them. They both met their advisers on the same day in August 1940. They both demanded a new approach to Mediterranean conflict. The difference was that Churchill, although dictatorial, was not a dictator. His military chiefs fought back against his demands. Mussolini was a tyrant: when his military advisers displeased him, he found others who would agree with him. Churchill’s gripe was the supposed impassability of the Mediterranean. In the debates of the 1930s he had been a partisan of battleships over aeroplanes. He was not minded to change his view. Somerville and Cunningham should stop pussyfooting around and force supplies through the central Mediterranean to Egypt. ⁵⁵ In particular Churchill was fascinated with the possibilities of large merchant vessels converted to carry tanks. If, Churchill believed, he could send a rapid supply of tanks through the Mediterranean, he could force a reluctant Wavell to attack Libya. The admirals were ‘unduly pessimistic’ about the risks. The ships could pass ‘without great difficulty’. The dangers of sending tank reinforcements to Egypt ‘had been exaggerated.’ It was lucky for Somerville and Cunningham–particularly lucky for Somerville who had sailed back to Britain to argue the case–that no one in the military hierarchy could be found to break ranks and endorse Churchill’s belief. ⁵⁶ In the end Churchill could not quite bring himself to overrule the admirals, generals and air marshals based solely on his own judgement–his political leadership would not have survived a slaughter in the central Mediterranean. ⁵⁷ What he wanted was a merchant convoy–what he got, after a great battle’, was ‘Hands Across the Sea, a mission to send major warship reinforcements east to Cunningham. ⁵⁸ Not that he conceded the point. Instead of congratulating Somerville and Cunningham for their excellent handling of the mission, he claimed that it showed that he had been right, they wrong. ⁵⁹

      Mussolini’s gamble was of a quite different order. Before the outbreak of war, troops had been rushed to Libya to defend it against the nonexistent British legions that Italian intelligence estimated were present in Egypt. When the weakness of the British became apparent, Mussolini demanded that his army should attack. Churchill firmly believed that his generals and admirals were deliberately smothering his plans–they were, he complained, ‘very wily when they don’t want to do anything’. ⁶⁰ Mussolini suspected the same. General Rodolfo Graziani, the chief of staff of the Army and the commander of forces in Libya, suggested that it was too hot to fight in Egypt and that it would be much better to wait until the next spring before any action was considered. He offered the poor compensation of a minor campaign, in the not notably cooler Somaliland instead. ⁶¹ Graziani used every wile at his disposal to avoid attacking Egypt. British intelligence had every right to be confused. There seemed to be endless orders for Graziani to attack, British forces braced themselves and then nothing happened. ⁶² Instead Graziani retired to his Mediterranean bungalow to be soothed by ‘escapades’. In the first week of September 1940, Mussolini finally lost patience: he gave Graziani an ultimatum. If after a weekend of contemplation he could not bring himself to do anything, then he was to come home in dishonour–not a pleasant experience in the Fascist regime. ⁶³ The fear of loss of emoluments, or worse, was too much for Graziani to bear. ⁶⁴ Mussolini had given the world’s most reluctant warrior little choice but to act. At the same time he consoled him with the thought that his campaign need be nothing more than a demonstration. It would be nice if he could sweep along the Mediterranean coast and capture the British fleet base at Alexandria. But Mussolini did not demand this. He did not even demand that Graziani should reach the first coastal town that the British held in strength. There were no ‘fixed territorial objectives’, he just had to do something. ⁶⁵

      Mussolini’s gamble was to twin his attack on Egypt with an attack on Greece. This was a course that the disgruntled viceroy of the Dodecanese, De Vecchi, had been urging almost since the war began. De Vecchi hated the Greeks–as indeed the Greeks hated him. From the beginning of the war Cunningham had gone ‘so far as to say that we shall never be able to control the Central Mediterranean’ until the fleet could operate from a base in the Greek islands. The location he desired above all others was Suda Bay on the north coast of Crete. ⁶⁶ The Greeks had no intention of giving it to him. Indeed the Greeks protested vigorously on each occasion they believed that the British had entered their territorial waters. Metaxas held no brief for the British war effort, victory in the Mediterranean meant little to him, only the safety offered by neutrality. That was the reality, but De Vecchi worked himself up into such a rage against the Greeks, he would never believe it was so. His reports to Rome were stridently insistent that the Greeks were allowing the British to operate from Suda, and that all the denials they issued were nothing more than dirty lies. De Vecchi was unapologetic about the indiscriminate bombing of Greek ships in their own waters–Greeks, British were all the same in his eyes. ‘To your fine diplomats who whine about me (who has had to amuse himself with Greeks here for four years),’ he scolded Ciano, ‘I can answer that in French “Greek” means “swindler”.’ ⁶⁷

      Project G, the attack on Greece, was hatched in August 1940, after only a few days’ discussion, with the hope of an easy victory. Its architects were Ciano and his henchmen in Albania. Their motives were opportunistic. Mussolini wanted something to happen. The Ciano équipe were sucking money out of Albania for their own enrichment and glory–Ciano had renamed an Albanian port Edda, after his wife. If Albania got bigger then there would be more money and fame to suck. They quickly cobbled together all the border disputes that existed between Albania and Greece in Epirus and claimed all the land for Albania. They threw in the island of Corsica for good measure. This done, Ciano wheeled his men in to see Mussolini. To Ciano’s delight Mussolini thought the plan a good one. The first stage was his long-preferred method of intimidation. The movement of troops to the border and the use of terrorism might make ‘the Greeks cave in’. If threats didn’t work he was willing ‘to go to the limit’. ⁶⁸

      Mussolini may have thought the plan good; his military commanders were aghast. The happiest man was De Vecchi. If there was going to be a war, the Italians wanted a casus belli. De Vecchi already had the means of inflammation in his own hands. Mussolini and Ciano were mulling over a ‘pirate submarine’ campaign of the kind they had used against Spain. The very evening that the idea was