The Mediterranean Theater in World War II: The History of the Fighting on Land and Sea across the Region

Given its location, the Mediterranean Sea was of paramount importance for both transportation and commercial reasons, so controlling the sea and the land around it was vital for both sides. This makes it all the more ironic that, aside from the North African campaign, the fighting in places like Greece and Italy have been overlooked, while the most decisive naval battle in the Mediterranean, the Battle of Cape Matapan has largely been forgotten today, even as military historians have recognized its significance and some have even compared it with the legendary Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. Control of the Mediterranean would prove crucial when the Western Allies would use it to amphibiously invade Sicily in 1943, marking their return to the European mainland and helping turn the tide against the Nazis on the continent.

Near the start of the war, Mussolini's farcical army – ill-trained, ill-equipped, and led with a startling purity of incompetence – attacked Greece out of Albania and, despite its huge numbers, suffered a swift and stinging defeat at the hands of the Greek army. Accordingly, the Wehrmacht invaded, taking the Balkans and Greece in just three weeks. British, Commonwealth, and Greek troops evacuated to Crete, and that set the stage for a Nazi invasion of the island, one involving the first mass deployment of paratroopers in history.

Although British maneuvering in North Africa began successfully against the Italians and they maintained control of the Suez Canal, the British forces suffered a series of defeats over the next two years, due to several problems the British army faced as a result of inadequate preparation and weaponry. For example, when the war began, junior officers were unprepared for the kind of cooperation between units that was necessary in the battles of North Africa. At the same time, while British tanks were capable of opposing Italian tanks, they were vastly inferior to German models.