Talk:Allied invasion of Sicily

message: The flag icon on the article indicates that British Indian forces participated in the campaign, but there is no mention of their contribution, casualties, etc.  Can anyone add info on this?
:there were no Indians or Australians. Only British and Canadian units in the 8th Army at this time. The Indians arrived for the campaign on the mainland. I'll adjust the warbox accordingly. Stephen Kirrage talk - contribs 17:45, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  British Indian Army? 

message: Why is there no mention of the Canadian contribution?  One would think they weren't even there.
: See Operation Husky order of battle, they are listed there.  Or you can add more details. Beanbatch 22:22, 25 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  O Canada? 

message: Where do the numbers come from that support the following claim: "casualties on the Axis side totalled 29,000, with 140,000 captured". According to  total German KIAs and MIAs were 57,800 + 18,300 for July 1943 and 58,000 + 26,400 for August 1943, including the battles of Kursk and Kharkov and all other fighting on the eastern front, that is 44,700 MIA on all fronts combined. 140,000 captured on Sicily would mean how many Italians? 143,000? Yes, I can see that they are quoted from  but that site does not claim what source it used in it's turn.
Also, the impact on the battle of Kursk was not that big. It might be worth mentioning that there is a big discussion concerning these issues on the talk page for that battle.
--itpastorn 15:22, 14 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Exaggerated German casualties 

message: ::I posted the official US Army Center for Military History account of the campaign, and their reading list. You may want to consolidate the two accounts to conserve space. I also added the Campaign Streamer.
SSG Cornelius Seon (Retired) 21:05, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Official Account, Reading List and Campaign Streamer 

message: In the text I don`t see a word about the German-Italian counter-offensive of Gela (July 11) of the German armoured division "Hermann Göring" and of the Italian division "Livorno". 600 soldiers of the "Livorno" started a frontal attack and were destroyed. It was the last offensive of the Italian Army during the war 1940-43. Moreover I don`t see a word about the battle of Valledolmo against the division "Assietta" (July 21)(sources are Attilio Tamaro and Eddy Bauer). The important role played by the Italo-American mafia and by the sicilian separatist who corroded the Italian units made up by Sicilians and "prepared" the Sicilian population isn`t to be undervalued.
::: If there is content you think should be added please do so. DMorpheus 14:37, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  BATTLES IN SICILY 

message: Is there a convention for commanders in the infobox? On the Allied side we currently have the army group commander (fair enough) then the two army commanders (ditto) but then one Corps commander (Bradley) out of a possible four. Then one divisional commander (Simonds) out of a possible 12 (or more if you include replacements) Then Andrew McNaughton is included although he wasn't in the chain of command for this operation (any more than the members of say the US or British chiefs of staff). On the Axis side we have Hitler and Mussolini - why? After all we don't have Churchill or Roosevelt in the box. We have the army commander Guzzoni (fine) and Corps commander Hube but not Corps commanders of the Italian XII and XVI Corps. Also, the German troops in Sicily, although under  Guzzoni, actually took their orders from Kesselring and von Senger und Etterling (the German liaison officer to Guzzoni), so there is an argument to include them. Unless this provokes a howl of protest, I am proposing to remove in a couple of days evryone except the army / army group commanders - all the other names can be found in the order of battle —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Kirrages (talk • contribs) 17:10, 2 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: In the absence of further comment I am executing the aboveStephen Kirrage talk - contribs 12:50, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Commanders in the infobox 

message: Can anyone write somthing about the preparations that where done in Malta for Operation Husky? The information I have states that the operation was coordinated from Malta in the Lascaris tunnels in Valletta and the landing ships gathered in Malta. Also on Gozo an emergency landing strip was done in a few days time. Also during the invasion the naval dockyard in Malta was used for emergency repairs on allies ships.  Malteseman1983 15:40, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Importance of [[Malta]] during Operation Husky 

message: Seems the intro became garbled at some point. Part of it currently reads The invasion of the island was codenamed Operation Husky and it launched the Italian Campaign amphibious operation of World War II in terms of men landed on the beaches and of frontage. I hadn't followed the article before so I have no clue how the intro read before and the change doesn't seem to be recent. Maybe it should be changed to something like The invasion of the island was codenamed Operation Husky and it launched the Italian Campaign. It was the largest amphibious operation of World War II in terms of men landed on the beaches and of frontage. But something else might also have been deleted so I'd prefer it if someone more experienced with this article took a look first.--Caranorn 16:26, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay, I've now tried to correct that problem, largely as I proposed above.--Caranorn 20:46, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  garbled intro 

message: There is an error in the number of Canadian casualties from this part of the Italian Campaign. The Canadian casualties were not in the range of over 2,300. In fact, with POWs et al, subtract 1,000.
Considering the original author provides the link to  wwii.ca/page25.html, such an error is inexcusable, even if it was only mathematic. These can be further verified at http://www.vac-acc.gc.ca/remembers/sub.cfm?source=feature/italy2004/italy_educators/italyinfosheet .
I have also corrected the total casualties list in the boxed info.
Wikig39 14:53, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Incorrect data for Canadian casualties 

message: Anyone have information on the naval participation in this operation? Oberiko (talk) 00:06, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: An old friend of mine, who has since passed away, served on the lead ship - HMS Hilary (he told me the hold was filled completely with tens of thousands of sealed barrels; to keep the ship afloat if holed). He described the naval participation as involving thousands of ships; as 'far as he could see'. I don't know how accurate that is; his memory may have exagerated it over the years, but it warrants more than just 5 lines in the article.  Obscurasky (talk) 17:17, 1 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Naval participation? 

message: I have rolled back some dubious edits from this anonymous user. If anyone can cite or otherwise confirm this information, please do so. NewEnglandYankee (talk) 18:02, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Contributions from User 151.213.150.167 

message: Hi all. I was bold, and rearranged the belligerents' flags in the infobox in alphabetical order. Seems to me this should be the preferred order for all such battles, and seems less denigrating to the "lesser" allies without taking anything away from the "bigger" allies. Comments are, or course, welcome. Esseh (talk) 23:34, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: At second glance, the numbers of Allied personnel in the infobox should be broken down by country, as it is for the Axis powers. Anyone have estimates or exact numbers? Esseh (talk) 23:38, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Flag order 

message: The text says there were four parachute drops  - two British, two American, one Canadian and one Australian (which adds to six!!). Also there are no Canadian or Australian airborn troops listed in the Operation Husky order of battle. Any idea what is going on here? Stephen Kirrage talk - contribs 09:43, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Kirrages. Good work on the changes you made. I am certainly no expert, but I was unaware of any Cdn or Oz airborne landings in Sicily. That's probably what intrigued me, and got me to wondering where they were on the map. Keep hunting. I suspect you found an error in your source. Cheers Esseh (talk) 00:47, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Parachute Landings 

message: The book FROM THE NORMANDY BEACHES TO THE BALTIC SEA states that "The Axis garrison of 200,000 Italians and 30,000 Germans had no prospect of actually holding the island; but General Alaxander, commanding the 15th Army Group, exerted little control, and  his army commanders, Patton and Montgomery, hammered out a course of action of their own ." The book THE ITALIAN ARMY 1940-1945: ITALY 1943-1945 says "The Axis forces defending Sicily, nominally under the command of General Guzzoni, consisted of 230,000 men including 40,000 German troops; these latter included elite units such as Gen Paul Conrath's Panzer Division 'Hermann Goring', north of Gela, and the 15th Panzer Grenadier Division."  And the book AERIAL INTERDICTION reports that "The German infantry numbered 32,000; the Italians 200,000" and you would have to be simple-minded to conclude that the author is referring solely to foot-sloggers. And yes the author quotes Carlo D'Este when claiming the Germans shipped reinforcements to Sicily but where is there an online account or book of pilots straffing reinforcements heading to the island??? And what was the composition of these reinforcements???Now going back to the Axis numbers, the authors of the book SEA POWER:A NAVAL HISTORY report that "There were in Sicily two German and four Italian combat divisions, amounting to about 255,000 troops." And the book WORLD WAR II GLIDER PILOTS claims that "Ten Italian and two German combat divisions totalling over 200,000 troops were waiting for the Allies in Sicily." Even the ordinary soldiers of the Invasion force, like Hollis Stabler in the book NO ONE EVER ASKED ME report only about half the ridiculous figure now approximating 400,000 "Gozzoni's total resources by the end of June 1943 included six coastal divisions, two coastal brigades, one coastal regiment, four mobile divisions (a total of 200,000 men), and two mobile German divisions. Another book, At The Water's Edge that goes into some detail says "The Italian Sixth Army, commanded by General d' Armata Alfredo Guzzoni, was responsible for the defense of the island. Before the arrival of German reinforcements in June, the Sixth Army consisted of two corps headquarters, five static coastal divisions, four mobile divisions, two coastal brigades, and other miscellaneous units for a total of two hundred thousand men."—Preceding unsigned comment added by Flylikeadodo (talk • contribs) 01:14, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe I already explained above that four German Divisions took part in the campaign. Though I seem to have mixed up two Panzergrenadier-Divisions. According to Mitcham and Stauffenberg: Hermann Göring Panzer-Division, 15. Panzergrenadier-Division, 29. Panzergrenadier-Division and the 1. Fallschirmjäger-Division. Of the Italians, five Coastal and four Infantry Divisions are clearly identified (202, 206, 207, 208 and 213 CD, 4, 26, 28 and 54 ID), also a large number of non divisional units. By the way, not only the simple-minded consider Infantry to mean just that, Infantry, excluding Armour, Artillery, Train etc.--Caranorn (talk) 11:26, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Two Sides of The Coin:Italo-German strength in Sicily 

message: Does anyone have/know somewhere where specific casualties for the German and Italian forces can be found? Such as captured and wounded because those are currently missing. Red4tribe (talk) 10:59, 24 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Casualties 

message: checked the order of battle article and the Free Fench were there, high command was british but the french fought there so you have to add the Free French flag in the combattants list. Cliché Online (talk) 08:18, 20 February 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Fair enough, although the OOB article shows just one Tabor (equivalent to a battalion) of goumiers. However, before making a change I would prefer to see a citation that the OOB is correct and that the tabor actually landed and fought in Sicily. Stephen Kirrage talk - contribs 09:58, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Ahah, right, and how did the French troops help? Ahhh, but they were Moroccan goumiers... Guess the most fighting they did was to undress and rape some local children. --95.235.233.39 (talk) 18:26, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  lacks the free french (as usual) 

message: How can the allied invasion of Scilily come before the second battle of El Alamein? 86.15.144.198 (talk) 09:23, 23 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: It didn't. Where are you seeing this in Wikipedia? Student7 (talk) 22:29, 27 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh yeah sorry, I misread the dates 86.15.144.198 (talk) 08:40, 1 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Date 

message: Don't understand why the changes from Italian Fascism to Kingdom of Italy, an ally both in WWI and for the last year of WW II. The allies were fighting Germans and some Italians in Sicily. It seems to me that Mussolini, a fascist, dutifully declared an unpopular war against the US. Student7 (talk) 00:06, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Took Sicily from Fascism 

message: The Canadian participation section unbalances the article, giving undue prominence to the presence of a single formation. Most of the section is not about planning, which it should be, given the article's structure. I propose therefore to move this content to the 1st Canadian Infantry Division article which is more appropriate. Stephen Kirrage talk - contribs 09:44, 4 July 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Coming back to this, I feel it totally inappropriate to have a special Canadian participation section. Much of it has nothing to do with Sicily and the rest is unbalanced (with respect to the rest of the article) and somewhat POV. I have moved some up to the Land forces section and the rest I have cut and am pasting here so it is not lost. It's better it should appear in a Canadian-specific article (say the 1st Canadian Division or Canada in the Second World War) but I leave that to someone else.Stephen Kirrage talk - contribs 16:46, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Canadian participation 

message: I hope not. I have Undid revision 529951802 by Nirvana77 for as Wikipedians we are taught to "Assume Good Faith". As far as I can tell "Odds And Sods"  has done his homework and consulted in the main "Allied" books, except for one or two "Italian" books to get some balance, and has provided the full name of the author, and the relevant book and page for us wikipedians to consult.--199.245.56.11 (talk) 01:13, 28 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Edit war in the making? 

message: I believe there is some confusion in this section's lead paragraph regarding the American drops.  The article begins by describing the 505th's D-Day assault drop objectives, then confuses the narrative by describing the fratricide events involving the 504th's reinforcing drop 48 hours later - without noting the difference in unit, time, place, etc.  It seems that whoever wrote this (or subsequently edited it?) mashed up the two events into a single episode.  These were two separate drops involving two separate regiments, spaced 48 hours apart.
98.255.89.22 (talk) 18:41, 26 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I see what you are talking about. Tried to unmerge the one report on the 505th and merge 504th with the report below. Probably needs more work. Student7 (talk) 01:32, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Airborne Landings 

message: I found this other page (see link hereunder) where the same picture is used to represent the bombardment of Bari. Can someone please verify if the picture is from Sicily or Bari?
http://perdurabo10.tripod.com/ships/id305.html  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.106.249.123 (talk) 22:03, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Picture of the allied attack in Sicily - origin not certain 

message: ~300 American paratroopers were killed or wounded when an American naval squadron opened fire on them en route to their drop at 600 feet. I guess that is extraneous information, but I think it is very important. It is morale sapping and has a tinge of stupidity implied in the wrongful-firing forces, when the stupidity implied lies with the implementers lack of completeness and thus competence- a vastly far more dangerous implication as it concerns a component of the very command structure itself rather than a score of apparently poorly reigned gunners.       
And double so on archival information meant to benefit i.e.: put this topic not only in the context of such material but of course into the awareness of everyone reading it, especially a young person accessing it who is pursuing a military career and studies made by this person in the past may save lives in the future. 
Once again, it should be addressed as part of each such documentation/study/war collage to allow human-beings to encompass a complete thus competent ability to dot "every i and cross every t", so to speak. An "orientation" on such a topic is almost useless and while it is known as the current manner of addressing this topic of several branches of the American military services, it is also known that during World War II "when the British fire, the Germans duck, when the Germans fire, the allies duck, when the Americans fire, everyone ducks".     
For What It's Worth: Should be not only included, but also be known as a component of the primary results data (a implementation indicator, and implementation makes, impairs or breaks any plan) on after action reports tendered to command. This puts it again in the thought-order of the human-beings that comprise (a/the) command. The highest command will be especially attentive. Their "plan" was ingenious perhaps, but in an aspect(logistic awareness in this case) was poorly executed by one or a few of those that comprise their staff, other secretaries, adjuncts and liaisons- what else is not being thought through by those that "also serve" that may end up in a failed operation in the future.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.238.33.2 (talk) 01:39, 10 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Friendly Fire Losses 

message: De facto, the number of allied soldiers reached nearly the amount of 500,000 in Sicily. It is quite weird the way it has been made the distinction between the initial and the peak strength. it is really misleading!! Magnagr (talk) 01:32, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Peak Strength, Initial Strength? 

message: This article states the Maddox was sunk by Italian Stukas but it's own article states it was sunk by a German Ju 88. Both claims are sourced.
Could someone clear this up please?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.210.114.6 (talk) 12:48, 9 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: The source is only available in snippets; from what I can see on Google Books it only mentions an unidentified bomber. According to  and  it was a specific German JU-88. The Italian article also says German aircraft. Ian Lancaster (talk) 02:12, 1 January 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Contradiction in the fate of the USS Maddox 

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