At the request of Marco Massaro we will publish a copy of the article in Italian.
The history of military formations called Alpine arrows today has many white spots. In order to tell Italians about the fate of these units, especially during the Second world war, we created the military history club "Forza, Italia!". Generally speaking, I was surprised that people in Russia often know more about Alpine shooters than we do in Italy. And it became a kind of duty for me to present to the people in detail the true story that concerns the Alpine shooters during the Second world war. At one time, I came to Russia with my colleagues from the reenactors ' club. We were preparing a reconstruction of the battle of Voronezh together with the Russians. I want to say right away that in modern Italy, not everyone knows about the existence of this Russian city. But when you start telling my compatriots that it was near Voronezh that the Red Army defeated the formations of the Italian army, the elite formations of Alpine shooters, I see a great interest in this topic. We brought photos from Voronezh where we participated in a recreated fragment of the operation near Voronezh together with Russian representatives of military-historical and reconstruction clubs and teams. At that meeting, I really felt what the war meant for Russia, how hard it was for the Soviet people, who were forced to resist not only German formations. Near Voronezh, the Red Army was forced to act against a large group of Germans, Hungarians, Romanians, and Italian units, including the Alpine rifle corps, during operation Maly Saturn. When the reconstruction of the fighting was completed, I and my colleagues asked the Russians for forgiveness. This made it a little easier for the soul, because it has a load on it, which I call the load of shame for the decisions made by the Italian leadership in the 1940s.
For many thousands of Italian soldiers, the war ended in the snow near Voronezh. It was an inglorious end in a foreign land. Few were able to return to their homeland. They barely managed to get away. That is why I consider it my duty today to tell modern Italians about that war. We must all remember this so that we do not repeat the terrible mistakes of the past.
Marco Massaro
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