Vincent P. O'Hara's book, the Struggle for the Middle Sea was an interesting study of the naval campaigns of the British, Italian, German, American, French and other nations in the Mediterranean.

Several things jumped out that I was ignorant of. The Italians were responsible for nearly all the logistics between Europe and Tunisia in support of the North African land war. O'Hara praises the Italian Navy for this effort as they shouldered it largely on their own and were exceptionally effective in getting men, munitions and supplies to the Afrika Korps and the Italian Armies in Africa. The losses in this logistical campaign of freighters and merchants were light.

The Italian Navy had multiple battleships and heavy cruisers which caused the British Navy anguish and concern in the middle Mediterranean. The British held superiority on the eastern side, but the possibility of the Italian Navy sailing out - as they did numerous times - to challenge the convoys to Malta and Alexandria meant that the British shipped their supplies to North Africa via the Cape and the Suez Canal. Essentially the Italian Navy caused the British to go around Africa rather than across Sicily.

The Italians were not a match in night fighting or intelligence for the British. When there was a show down during a night action the British were all over the Italians. During the day it was more of an even match even though the Italian Admirals were hamstrung by orders which were did not allow much in the way of aggressive action.

Another problem for the Italian Navy was that the Italian Air Force was ineffective. It gave poor intelligence, reconn and when it was asked to attack shipping it did a poor job. When the German Air Force became heavily involved in the Mediterranean a lot of allied shipping ended up on the bottom of the ocean. By the end of the war in the Mediterranean more shipping was sunk by air superiority than by ship borne action.

Another area that surprised me was that the Italian Navy was constantly short of oil, to the point where actions were canceled for lack of fuel. German was precious about the fuel supply and did not let Italy have any. Italy had to procure its own fuel and as a consequence the big ships never had enough.

The British did not have the ships or the power to drive the Italian Navy from the Mediterranean even though the British slowly established ascendancy in the air and enough of a problem in numerous actions for the Italians that they were losing ships at an unsustainable rate.

Once Italy surrendered several ships came over to the allies, though many were taken by the Germans and pressed into the German Navy. The big difference is the United States. It started sending large convoys of sixty merchant ships at a time through the Straits of Gibraltar to support the actions in Africa and Italy.

Compare that number to the British who's convoys to Malta in 1940 were averaging three merchant ships. Even if Italy had remained an axis Navy during 1943 it would have been obliterated by the increasing Naval and Air power of the British and United States.

The latter being the naval and air power in the Mediterranean after the war, and to this day.

Note The photo at the top is of an Italian Cruiser, the Bartolomeo Colleoni, that was sunk in an action by HMAS Sydney and British destroyers during an engagement off Cape Scada in the Mediterranean.

More Reading on World war ii

• World War II
• Australian Foreign Policy in WWII
• MacArthur As Worst American General Ever
• Britain's North Africa Campaign in 1940-1943
• The Italian Navy In The Mediterranean During World War II
• Logistics in the North African Theater in World War II
• HMAS Sydney and Surface Combat In The Mediterranean
• Logistics and Motor Transport in the North African Theater During World War II
• The Battle Of El Alamein
• British 2 Pounder Gun In The Western Desert
• Afrika Korps and Tank Warfare in North Africa