Historynerd

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/blackchickenstudios/victory-belles/posts/2930590 - So... how everything started, eh? Interesting choice for Espero for being the first one to awaken. Of all the places in the Mediterranean, one wonders why Corruption decided to go and show up at Tobruk.

Actually, I was referring to the mere existence of the Savoy neutral zone (or not, I'm not sure, the Italians sure would have loved for it to exist when they were drawing plans for a war against France, during the Triple Alliance, but France sure thought it was no longer an issue), and the fact that somehow a deal between the Duchy of Savoy and the Swiss Confederation had somehow kept going since the Middle Ages, till it was finally abolished at Versailles. I see what you mean, I misunderstood then.

I'm sorry, I don't understand; in which way did she violate the abrogation of the Savoy neutral zone (a nice piece of medieval diplomacy that somehow survived till the modern age, much to the befuddlement of the Stato Maggiore of the Regio Esercito, when they were trying to come up with a war plan against France...)? Anyway, really nice; Aosta is nice. And she does look out for her own. Just a warning, guys, don't get used to it, since in the Regia Marina there is usually a divide between captains and officers, and the enlisted men. Only in submarines, eventually, things got a bit better.

It took me a while to think about that, but a similar, if more reduced, situation would be present in the Regia Marina as well, since in 1938 all the servicemen in all Italian armed forces of Jewish origins were cashiered. I believe I mentioned that when, in the topic I opened back in the day, I discussed General Umberto Pugliese, the guy who designed the Littorio-class battleships among other things.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/blackchickenstudios/victory-belles/posts/2802790

So, we're getting closer to getting a release date? Awesome, thanks a lot, guys, for all your work! 👍

I'm fine. Sitting tight, and getting my nose out of the door just for essential reasons, but so far so good. I hope it's the same for everyone in here. 👍

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/blackchickenstudios/victory-belles/posts/2783625

If I may, that should be the RM (Regia Marina). RN could indicate the prefix used for Italian ships (Regia Nave - Royal Ship), but I think it's more common used to mean the Royal Navy.

So, what is the best way to come back with a bang, after being absent for months and years? Write a fanfic, duh! 😜 ...So, being Italian, I chose to write something about the Regia Marina. And I chose to delve into a confusing situation, between an unclear international situation, infighting between the politicians and the brass, and uncertainty towards navies that may be both allies and enemies... or not. I am open and welcome towards any constructive criticism, I know well that my style can use several improvements. But I hope the setting of this work may prove sufficiently interesting. Also, I'll put in a few historical domain characters (admirals, engineers and the likes). I would like to preface that I took a small liberty, and without spoilering anything, I'll just drop here that, unlike IRL, in this story a certain large ship that was never completed had a different fate than the blowtorch... Chapter 2 may clarify things. ... Oh, I'll drop quite a bit of Italian expressions and words here and there, but I'll strive to keep them easy enough for Google translate! 🙃

@Legate of Mineta Sorry for the tag, and likewise sorry, as this is not quite a suggestion per se, but merely a clarification for the future. If and when the Italian battleship Duilio will come, I would like to clarify that her name (often put in as Caio Duilio) is in fact the former, not the latter. While the inconsistency showed by the Italian navy throughout its history does not help and can confuse, I have the proof of that; namely, the 1911 decree that established the name for her and her sister ship Andrea Doria. I just wanted to bring this to the dev team's attention.

...Who has awakened me from my slumber...? - Happy to be back! 😉 As for this battleship that I very obviously missed when she was announced 😪, my impression overall is that she is about "being in control". She knows her stuff and knows how to play the game. I believe that overall she fits well with her namesake, a shrewd statesman, and also quite successful gambler! 😄 The Corfu incident... I think she references the old claims on some Greek islands because of the longstanding Venetian presence there. Plus, it could have come in handy as a naval base (in WWI it served as such), so the Italians wouldn't have dismissed it out of hand, even though in 1923 it wasn't in the cards, you're right. No discussion about her status, unfortunately. The castle that was bombarded didn't have any soldiers, just innocent refugees.

I'm not going to pick out a fuss, but I just want to point out that this joke, like many others of the same kind about the same thing (for example, the "one gear fowards, four gears in reverse" one) are in contradiction with a little known and somewhat tragic truth. The truth that one flaw that the Italian tanks carried with them for a long time (all save the ones built from 1943) was their underpowered engine, and therefore reduced speed both on road and on broken ground. This meant that the Italian tankers not only could not effectively pursue a beaten enemy, but, more importantly, were unable to disengaged if defeated in battle; especially in the later engagements, against overwhelming force and equipment, they could do nothing but literally charge the enemy, hoping to get a few of them before being destroyed. And they did, knowing they couldn't even run away, like after all these years many people believe they did. I hope that, in this light, I won't offend anyone if I say that jokes like this don't make me laugh.

This was the so-called "H Review" (Rivista H), done in honour of Hitler's visit in Italy. It pretty much involved most of the Italian naval forces, and no less than 85 submarines were present. There has been some discussion about it, in retrospective. Some find it an impressive show of force, some accuse the Regia Marina of having fallen victim to the show business and having put on an "equestrian show". An Italian admiral present wrote that "M. seemed satisfied, H. not that interested, and his chief sailor [likely Admiral Raeder] managed only to ask us wheter we do these kind of things with bad weather.".

Thank you! Actually, the discussion about the Pugliese TDS is rather complicated, also because I have a feeling that not many of the historians who commented on it have looked at the actual damage suffered by the ships so equipped, as stated on primary sources (i.e. damage reports compiled by the Regia Marina). And I believe that this bit about the system actually increasing damage, rather than reducing it, was stated by someone who did not properly look at such sources, but came to that conclusion on his own. The recent book by Erminio Bagnasco and Augusto De Toro on the Littorio-class battleships (which i heartily recommend to everyone, although it's pricey) showed, in my opinion, that some of the criticism is excessiv,, relative to the ships where its dimensions were optimal (as on the older rebuilt battleships its dimensions were inadequate and therefore the system was of limited efficacy). For example, about the damage suffered by the Littorio at Taranto, it's interesting to note that the flooding caused by the third torpedo hit was not attributed to an avoidable weakness of the TDS, but to other design and damage control flaws (the latter of whom partly corrected later in the war) and to the hurried fitting out of the ship. However, the authors do not try and hide the fact that, as weapon research went on and better and more powerful torpedoes were developed, the Pugliese system (which they detail as having been conceived in the final years of WWI and first tested in the 1920s) was becoming more and more inadequate, and it somewhat showed during the war, as the damage suffered by the Vittorio Veneto at the hands of HMS Urge was more limited thanks to the structural robustness of the ship rather than the Pugliese TDS, which failed completely. About that, though, I believe that one has to remind that the Littorio-class battleships were the earliest Washington-type battleships to be finalized and built, with their projects dating from the early 1930s. Therefore, while I don't want to make this an excuse or anything, I believe it would be (to a degree, let me be clear) foolish to expect from them performances and defences that few would have envisioned back then. - I don't know anything about a "spaghetti tuesday", therefore you may already know more than me about this. Sorry.