Hitler's Raid to Save Mussolini
Hitler's Raid to Save Mussolini

Author: Greg Annussek

Publisher: Hachette+ORM

Published: 2009-04-13

Total Pages: 366

ISBN-13: 0786735716

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As the Allied invasion of Italy wore on through the summer of 1943, Mussolini was unexpectedly overthrown and imprisoned by his own people in a remote mountaintop resort. Hitler was furious when he heard the news and swore to rescue his ally and friend. On September 12, a small convoy of glider aircraft suddenly began crash-landing near the hotel where Mussolini was being held and German commandos poured out of the half-wrecked planes. The soldiers quickly overwhelmed the hotel and seized Mussolini, who had watched the drama unfold from a second-story window. "I knew my friend Adolf Hitler would not abandon me," said a grinning Mussolini to his rescuers. Hitler's daring rescue mission to free Mussolini was one of the most famous commando operations of the twentieth century, and it shocked the Allies. It was also the dramatic culmination of the bizarre relationship between Hitler and Mussolini. In this vivid narrative filled with action, intrigue, and some of history's most disreputable characters- among them the infamous leader of the raid, Otto Skorzeny, who was catapulted to worldwide fame as a result of the exploit-Greg Annussek recounts the incredible story of the secret six-week operation in all its drama and suspense.

Rescuing Mussolini
Rescuing Mussolini

Author: Robert Forczyk

Publisher: Osprey Publishing

Published: 2010-04-20

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781846034626

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The successful rescue of imprisoned Italian dictator Benito Mussolini from atop the Gran Sasso plateau by German glider-borne troops on 12 September 1943 was one of the most dramatic Special Forces operations in military history. Arrested by his own officers in July 1943, Mussolini had been whisked away to an isolated and heavily-guarded mountain-top resort, the Hotel Campo Imperatore at Gran Sasso, which could only be reached by a heavily guarded cable car station. It was clear to the Germans - who wished to rescue Mussolini in order to keep at least the appearance that Italy was still on the Axis side - that any conventional rescue operation would have to fight its way through too much opposition and that Mussolini's captors would have ample time to execute him before he could be rescued. However, the Waffen SS had begun to develop the genesis of a commando-style raiding force that appeared suitable for the mission. Once Mussolini's location at Gran Sasso was confirmed, Hitler ordered the assault force, led by SS Haupsturmführer Otto Skorzeny, to conduct a rescue mission to extract Mussolini alive from the mountaintop. Despite unfavorable terrain for a gliderborne landing - including large boulders and steep cliffs near the landing zone - most of the German gliders succeeded in landing atop the Gran Sasso and the assault force was able to move in before the stunned Italian defenders could organize a response or eliminate Mussolini. Adding to the successful assault, Skorzeny was able to organize a desperate and ad hoc extraction plan using a light Fiesler Storch aircraft, when failed communications scuttled the pre-planned extraction method. At great risk, Mussolini was flown off the mountain and Skorzeny's raiding force had achieved all their objectives without firing a shot. Although the rescue of Mussolini failed to keep Italy on the Axis side, it did serve as a valuable propaganda boost for Germany in the face of defeats in Italy and the Soviet Union, as well as pointing toward a new dimension in warfare. This title details the strategic context of this daring raid, the origins of the plans, and the initial strategy adopted by the German Special Operations forces, before going on to describe in full detail the plan, execution and final outcome of the operation. Forczyk also offers a complete and comprehensive analysis of the events and their aftermatch, along with suggestions for further reading. Discover the history of this classic wartime raid, which continues to fascinate military history enthusiasts and lovers of adventure, in this new addition to the Raid series by Robert Forczyk.

Freeing Mussolini
Freeing Mussolini

Author: Óscar González López

Publisher: Grub Street Publishers

Published: 2018-08-30

Total Pages: 202

ISBN-13: 1526719991

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The untold inside story of the audacious Nazi plot to rescue il Duce from an Allied prison. The operation to free Mussolini, who was being held prisoner in a high mountain hotel on the summit of Gran Sasso, Italy, in September 1943, is without a doubt one of the most spectacular operations not only of the Second World War, but in all military history. German paratroopers, the Wehrmacht’s elite, were responsible for organizing the rescue in record time, and executing a daring and perfectly synchronized operation between land and airborne detachments. Surprise and speed were the Fallschirmjäger’s main weapons, surprising the Italian garrison guarding il Duce. For political reasons Otto Skorzeny, the clever SS officer, also participated in the operation, leading a dozen of his commandos. Propaganda and his connections with Himmler made him into the false hero of the mission, over-emphasizing his role in the whole search and rescue operation. Based on the testimony of several protagonists in this incredible operation, as well as analyzing major documents (letters, reports by General Kurt Student, etc.) and the abundant literature available on the subject, this book dismantles the “Skorzeny Myth” and reveals the truth of what really happened in a mission that even Churchill called “one of great daring.”

Beneath a Scarlet Sky
Beneath a Scarlet Sky

Author: Mark Sullivan

Publisher: Lake Union Publishing

Published: 2018

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781503902374

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A teenage boy in 1940s Italy becomes part of an underground railroad that helps Jews escape through the Alps, but when he is recruited to be the personal driver for a powerful Third Reich commander, he begins to spy for the Allies.

Otto Skorzeny
Otto Skorzeny

Author: Stuart Smith

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2018-09-20

Total Pages: 410

ISBN-13: 1472829476

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This first book to reassess the myth and the realities of Otto Skorzeny, Hitler's favourite commando. SS-Obersturmbannführer Otto Skorzeny became a legend in his own time. 'Hitler's favourite commando' acquired a reputation as a man of daring, renowned for his audacious 1943 mission to extricate Mussolini from a mountain-top prison. Skorzeny's influence on special operations doctrine was far-reaching and long-lasting – in 2011, when US Navy SEALs infiltrated Pakistan to eliminate Osama Bin Laden, the operational planning was influenced by Skorzeny's legacy. Yet he was also an egoist who stole other men's credit (including for the seminal rescue of Mussolini), brave and resourceful but also an unrepentant Nazi and a self-aggrandizing hogger of the limelight. Stuart Smith draws on years of in-depth research to uncover the truth about Skorzeny's career and complex personality. From his background as a student radical in Vienna, to his bloody service with the Waffen-SS on the Eastern Front, his surprise rebirth as a commando, and his intriguing post-war career and mysterious fortune, this book tells Otto Skorzeny's story in full – warts and all – for the first time.

My Commando Operations
My Commando Operations

Author: Otto Skorzeny

Publisher: Schiffer Military History

Published: 1995

Total Pages: 504

ISBN-13:

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The memoirs of the legendary Skorzeny appear here in its first unabridged English edition. Skorzeny's fame began with the successful raid to free Benito Mussolini from the Gran Sasso, Italy in 1943. His elite commandos surprised Italian guards in a daring daytime raid. Hitler presented Skorzeny with the Knight's Cross for this operation. Not only is this raid explained in minute detail, many of Skorzeny's previously unknown operations in all European and Russian theatres of World War II are given in detailed accounts. Operation Griffin - the innovative use of German Kommandos dressed as American soldiers working behind enemy lines - during the Ardennes Offensive in 1944 is given in-depth coverage, as is Skorzeny's rememberances on the Malmedy massacre. Skorzeny also offers his insights into the mysterious Rudolf Hess mission to England in May 1941, and offers a behind the scenes look at German and Russian secret military intelligence, and the workings of Canaris and Gehlen.

Hitler's Raid to Save Mussolini
Hitler's Raid to Save Mussolini

Author: Greg Annussek

Publisher: Da Capo Press, Incorporated

Published: 2005-08-23

Total Pages: 366

ISBN-13: 9780306813962

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The first book to tell the incredible story of the most famous German commando operation of World War II-the dramatic and daring rescue of Benito Mussolini

Secret Missions
Secret Missions

Author: Otto Skorzeny

Publisher:

Published: 1950

Total Pages: 264

ISBN-13:

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War memoirs of the most dangerous man in Europe.

The Nazis, the Vatican, and the Jews of Rome
The Nazis, the Vatican, and the Jews of Rome

Author: Patrick J. Gallo

Publisher: Purdue University Press

Published: 2023-02-15

Total Pages: 227

ISBN-13: 1612497888

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On October 16, 1943, the Jews of Rome were targeted for arrest and deportation. The Nazis, the Vatican, and the Jews of Rome examines why—and more importantly how—it could have been avoided, featuring new evidence and insight into the Vatican’s involvement. At the time, Rome was within reach of the Allies, but the overwhelming force of the Wehrmacht, Gestapo, and SS in Rome precluded direct confrontation. Moral condemnations would not have worked, nor would direct confrontation by the Italians, Jewish leadership, or even the Vatican. Gallo underscores the necessity of determining what courses of actions most likely would have spared Italian Jews from the gas chambers. Examining the historical context and avoiding normative or counterfactual assertions, this book draws upon archival sources ranging from diaries to intelligence intercepts in English, Italian, and German. With antisemitism on the rise today and the last remaining witnesses passing away, it is essential to understand what happened in 1943. The Nazis, the Vatican, and the Jews of Rome grapples with this particular, awful episode within the larger, horrifying story of the Holocaust. Despite the inadequacy of memory, we must continue to attempt to make sense of the inexplicable.

Hide & Seek
Hide & Seek

Author: Stephen Walker

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2012-05-01

Total Pages: 354

ISBN-13: 0762785713

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Hide & Seek chronicles the intensely personal war between wartime Rome’s Nazi SS Chief Herbert Kappler and the Vatican’s Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty, a fiercely fought rivalry that culminated in Kappler attempting to kidnap and murder his Irish opponent, who was determined to fight Rome’s Nazi rulers. Called “Ireland’s Oscar Schindler,” O’Flaherty masterminded a large-scale operation from inside the neutral Vatican, to hide and help Jews, downed airmen, and escaped Allied prisoners. Using safe houses and church buildings, the priest sheltered around five hundred Jews in the Holy See and many thousands more Jews and Allied escapees in and around Rome. After a Resistance bomb killed thirty-two German soldiers, an enraged Hitler ordered revenge. Kappler planned and oversaw the firing squad execution of 335 people in the Ardeatine Caves outside Rome. The massacre became the worst atrocity committed on Italian soil during the war. After the war, the Nazi colonel was found guilty on all the charges relating to the massacre and sentenced to life. Amazingly, O’Flaherty began visiting his former rival in prison, engaging in a long-run conversation that led to Kappler’s conversion—and baptism by the Irish Monsignor.