While confusion reigned in Rome as to the future direction of the post-fascist Badoglio government, during August 1943, Galimberti made contact with the commander of Italy's elite 2nd Alpini Regiment - his own former regiment - which was headquartered and stationed in Cuneo. He was, however, not successful in his attempts to persuade the commander of the local regiment to oppose the German army, which had responded to the fall of Mussolini by piling reinforcements over the Brenner Pass into Northern Italy, while the government in Berlin ignored the resulting protests from the Badoglio government. Galimberti's own intention at this time was not to create a local partisan army, but to keep the Italian army operational, and to boost its numbers through the enlistment of able-bodied civilian volunteers able and willing to take up arms against the country's German (former) allies. Although the formal status of the "axis alliance" remained unclear through August, it was clear from German military operations in northern Italy that Berlin already regarded the alliance as dead.