World Battlefronts: ITALIAN FRONT: Sad-Sack Role

The melancholy winter sky of Italy cleared briefly. Gratefully the Allies flung out their Air Force, sending 2,500 planes over German positions for the best day's work in three months. To the wet, cold, tired doughfoot slogging endlessly up Italian mountains and across Italian rivers, it was a welcome but temporary sight. The weather would soon close down again, return the infantrymen to the dreariest, most discouraging fighting in Europe.

It was slow and inconclusive on the ground. In some places the Germans attacked, won back a few mountain positions from the Fifth Army; in others the Allies attacked, won...

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