Leibstandarte ϟϟ on Anti-Partisan duty - Biscari and Boves Massacres

Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler meets with Italian fascist Benito Mussolini

SS-Sturmbannführer Joachim Peiper and fellow officers in Reggio Emilia

SS-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 2 LSSAH in Reggio Emilia

Italian soldiers captured in Sicily by U.S. 36th Engineer Brigade

Partisan group of Communist Brigate Garibaldi in Northern Italy

SS-Obersturmführer checking papers of Italian civilians in Northern Italy

Because the Allied invasion of Sicily began during the Battle of Kursk, Adolf Hitler was forced to divert troops to meet the Allied threat in the Mediterranean. Immediately after landing in Sicily on July 10 1943, massacres of civilians by Oklahoma's U.S. 45th Infantry Division Thunderbird, were reported; one happened in Vittoria, where 12 Italians was killed in cold blood, including the mayor of Acate Giuseppe Mangano, and his 17-year-old son Valerio, who was killed by a bayonet stabbed in his face. During the capture of the Biscari airfield in Santo Pietro on July 14 1943, troops of U.S. 180th IR of the 45th ID brutally murdered 71 Italian and two German POWs in what has been known as the Biscari massacre. Gen. George Patton noted his response in his diary: ...tell the Officer to certify that the dead men were snipers or had attempted to escape or something, as it would make a stink in the press... Anyhow, they are dead, so nothing can be done about it. Col. Forrest E. Cookson, testified that Patton had stated that if the enemy continued to resist after U.S. troops had come within 180 meters of their defensive position, surrender of those enemy soldiers need not be accepted. The problems with that defense were that the prisoners had already surrendered, and the surrender had been accepted. Sgt. Horace T. West, who machine-gunned 37 shirtless and shoeless POWs, continued to serve and received an honorable discharge after the war. West died in Oklahoma in Jan. 1974. Capt. John T. Compton, who ordered the killings of another 36 POWs, was transferred to the U.S. 179th ID and KIA on Nov. 8 1943 at Cassino. The names of the murdered Italian infantry and airmen are known. German Olympic long-jumper Carl Luz Long, notable for winning Silver in the Olympics of 1936, also died on July 14 1943 following his capture at the Biscari airfield. Long went down in history for the handshake with winner Jesse Owens. Two more atrocities took place at Comiso airfield. The massacres of Comiso were witnessed and denounced by British war correspondent Alexander Clifford. Clifford reported that 60 Italians, captured in the first lines, were unloaded from a truck and machine-gunned. A few minutes later, the same scene was repeated with a bunch of German POWs: 50 of them were killed. The records and associated reports were classified secret and stored at the Pentagon. The U.S. Army generally failed to hold the massacres’ perpetrators accountable for their crimes due to its desire to keep details of the atrocities secret. After the German failure at Kursk, which had emboldened fascist dictator Benito Mussolini's opponents, Hitler met with Mussolini in Feltre on July 19 1943. Hitler began the meeting by blaming the Italians for their weak military performance. The Germans had lost faith in the Italians and were only interested in occupying northern and central Italy, leaving the Italian army alone to defend the country from the Allies. The SS-Pz.Gren.Div. Leibstandarte SS was sent to Italy for security duties and to act as a core for the creation of a new and more fervently fascist Italian army that would bolster Mussolini's crumbling empire. The division was transferred from the Kursk salient in late July 1943 and arrived on the Pianura Padana in Northern Italy on Aug. 8 1943. While serving in this role, the elite Leibstandarte SS only conducted anti-partisan operations in Northern Italy. During this rather short period, the 28-year-old SS-Stubaf. Joachim Peiper's battalion was involved in several skirmishes with Italian partisans. On one occasion, Peiper was met by an Italian officer who warned that his forces would attack unless Peiper's unit immediately vacated the Province of Cuneo. Peiper refused, which as intended goaded the Italians into attacking. The Italians were no match for the Eastern Front veterans of the Leibstandarte SS who defeated them and then proceeded to disarm the remaining Italian forces in the area. In Sept. 1944 an incident in the village of Boves took place that is known as the Boves massacre. Two of Peiper's NCOs had been kidnapped and were held by partisans in the vicinity of Boves. Peiper reacted characteristically by leading his battle-hardened SS grenadiers to the rescue. On arrival a fire fight took place and the Leibstandarte SS shelled the village. Peiper's men were freed, but some 20 civilians died in the process. In Dec. 1968, an Italian court decided that there was insufficient evidence for a war crimes case and German District Court in Stuttgart reached the same conclusion, terminating any potential prosecution of Peiper. During its brief period in Northern Italy, the Leibstandarte SS was reformed as a full panzer division, and redesignated 1.SS-Panzer-Division Leibstandarte SS. In early Nov. 1943, the division was ordered back to the Eastern Front of the Axis. Credit: hist. Rick Atkinson, hist. Fabrizio Carloni, Sen. Andrea Augello, Rev. Prof. William J. Bosch, Prof. em. James J. Weingartner, hist. Gerhard Schreiber i.a. Top image: Schloss Klessheim Salzburg 22-4-44. Heinrich Hoffmann Photo Archive. Fair use. Clips: SS-Hstuf. Paul Guhl, SS-Stubaf. Joachim Peiper and SS-Ustuf. Werner Wolff marching with SS-Pz.Reg.2 through the Italian town of Reggio Emilia in Aug. 1943. Footages probably shot by SS-KB Ferdinand Rottensteiner. Die Deutsche Wochenschau. Forth image: Italian soldiers captured by U.S. 36th Engr.Bde. Sicily in mid-July 1943. Credit: Andrea Moretti. FU. Fifth image: partisans of the communist Garibaldi Brigades wearing captured German Gebirgsjäger smocks in front of the Cuneo railway station in Piedmont. Source: Istituto. FU. Bottom image: an SS-Ostuf. check identification papers of civilians to weed out possible communist and anti-Mussolini partisans in Northern Italy. As part of its pacification campaign in Italy the Leibstandarte SS was expected to assist other German security personnel. The German commanders did not even use Leibstandarte SS in halting the Allied advance in Italy. This clearly was a waste of one of the German military's most potent units. Photo by Hitler's private cameraman OLt. d. LW Walter Frentz. Walter Frentz Collection. FU.