This plan did not win universal support, however. The Allied Combined Chiefs of Staff concluded that the Sicily operation, code-named Husky, would secure the Mediterranean sea lanes and airspace and ease the invasion of the main Italian peninsula. Eisenhower, decided that they must conquer Sicily before pushing on to Italy and that the Sicily campaign would have to wait until the Allies had crushed German resistance in Tunisia. In addition to approving an around-the-clock strategic bombing offensive against Nazi Germany, Allied leaders, including Gen. Saturation bombing, plus limited shelling by the Royal Navy, broke the enemy’s defenses and will to resist.įor all that, it was an offensive that almost didn’t happen.Īllied leaders convened at Casablanca in January 1943 to draw up plans to take the offensive against the Axis powers where they were most vulnerable–in the south of Europe. In fact, the aerial offensive marked the first time in history that an enemy land force was compelled to surrender in the absence of an accompanying ground invasion. The operation called for using sustained aerial bombardment to crush enemy power on the island and therefore reduce the number of Allied ground forces needed to capture and hold it. Between May 8 and June 11 in 1943, Allied aircraft flew 5,285 bombing sorties against targets on Pantelleria and dropped 6,313 tons of bombs on Italian and German forces ensconced there.
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