Battle of Europe

The news of Italy's surrender came over the air at 11:47 a.m. (E.W.T.). By lunchtime the extras were on the streets. But after the thunderous fall of Mussolini, after the conquest of Sicily and the Italian invasion, the biggest news of the war had an air of anticlimax. The U.S., by & large, greeted the collapse of Fascism's cradle with almost complacent indifference. An old New York custom sent down a brief explosion of ticker tape and torn telephone-book pages from its sky scraper windows; on Mulberry Street the sad-eyed people of "Little Italy" over came their hurt long enough to pretend to celebrate for the benefit of news photographers. But otherwise, as in the rest of the U.S., the first sharp ripple of excitement, the first burst of good feeling soon faded and died on the surface of another war-as-usual day.

To the Alpine Station. By week's end, with the Germans occupying Rome for the first time since the year 1527, with most of the Italian fleet in Allied hands, with Adriatic seaports in Allied possession, the whole complexion of World War II had suddenly changed enormously.

Italy's surrender was of highest military, political and economic significance to the U.S. The Mediterranean was now an Allied lake. Militarily, the Allies were not now pacing fretfully around Festung Europa-- they were on the drawbridge of Hitler's fortress. And since the fortress has no roof, the whole of the German heartland lay exposed to constant attack.

What Price Victory? Economically, Italy's surrender is red ink on the U.S. ledger. If any U.S. hopeful thought the fall of Italy would mean an increase in anchovies and antipasto, olives and olive oil, his taste was more advanced than his economics. The Italians, who want peace, also want bread. And a good deal of the bread must come from the U.S.

Italy must in part be fed, although if the war moves quickly off Italian soil, and if enough of her demobilized soldiers return to the farms, Italy could be 95% self-sufficient in food. Normally producing a surplus of fresh fruits and vegetables, Italy is dependent on imports for meat, eggs, coffee, oats, corn and wheat. Her wheat supply has in recent years been stepped up by the successful reclamation of the Pontine Marshes, but her estimated annual wheat supply of 7,000,000 tons is still less than 90% of her rock-bottom requirements.

As a member of the Axis, Italy was an economic liability to Germany, got more than she gave: coal, rolling stock, iron & steel products, machinery, machine tools. The prime Italian demand on the U.S. will be for coal (she has been receiving 1,000,000 tons a month from the western Reich and Silesia). The day after the surrender was announced, Fuel Administrator Harold L. Ickes revealed that the U.S. is already sending undisclosed amounts of coal to Italy. Only the future would reveal how much oil and gasoline the U.S. must now add to the total going abroad.

But Italy's surrender will mean immediate demands on U.S. production of other goods than fighting materiel: clothing, farm machinery, steel rails, power plants, machine tools, sewer pipes, telegraph lines, locomotives, and many other peacetime items needed to make Italy an Allied base. The Battle for Italy was not a skirmish, but a main action for the decision. The U.S.--perhaps overconfidently--awaited the verdict.

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