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Pact of Steel

The Pact of Steel (German: Stahlpakt, Italian: Patto d'Acciaio), formally known as the Pact of Friendship and Alliance between Germany and Italy (German: Freundschafts und Bündnispakt zwischen Deutschland und Italien, Italian: Patto di amicizia e di alleanza fra l'Italia e la Germania) was a military and political alliance between Italy and Germany.

Pact of Friendship and Alliance between Germany and Italy

Military-political

22 May 1939

Berlin, Germany

1949 (effectively in 1943)

Joachim von Ribbentrop
Galeazzo Ciano

German, Italian

The pact was initially drafted as a tripartite military alliance between Japan, Italy and Germany. While Japan wanted the focus of the pact to be aimed at the Soviet Union, Italy and Germany wanted the focus of it to be aimed at the British Empire and France. Due to this disagreement, the pact was signed without Japan and as a result, it became an agreement which only existed between Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, signed on 22 May 1939 by foreign ministers Galeazzo Ciano of Italy and Joachim von Ribbentrop of Germany.


Together with the Anti-Comintern Pact and the Tripartite Pact, the Pact of Steel was one of the three agreements forming the main basis of the Axis alliance.[1] The pact consisted of two parts. The first section was an open declaration of continuing trust and co-operation between Germany and Italy. The second section, the "Secret Supplementary Protocol", encouraged a union of policies concerning the military and the economy.[2]

Background[edit]

Germany and Italy fought against each other in World War I.[3] Popularity and support for radical political parties (such as the Nazis of Adolf Hitler and the Fascists of Benito Mussolini) exploded after the Great Depression had severely hampered the economies of both countries.[3]


In 1922, Mussolini secured his position as Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Italy.[4] His first actions made him immensely popular - massive programs of public works providing employment and transforming Italy's infrastructure.[5] In the Mediterranean, Mussolini built a powerful navy, larger than the combined might of the British and French Mediterranean fleets.[3]


When he was appointed Chancellor in 1933, Hitler initiated a huge wave of public works and secret rearmament.[6] Fascism and Nazism shared similar principles and Hitler and Mussolini met on several state and private occasions in the 1930s.[7] On 23 October 1936, Italy and Germany signed a secret protocol aligning their foreign policy for the first time on such issues as the Spanish Civil War, the League of Nations and the Abyssinia Crisis.[8]

Japan[edit]

In 1931, Japanese forces invaded the region of Manchuria because of its rich grain fields and reserves of raw minerals.[3] This, however, provoked a diplomatic clash with the Soviet Union, which bordered Manchuria.[3] To combat this Soviet threat, the Japanese signed a pact with Germany in 1936.[3] The aim of the pact was to guard against any attack from Soviet Russia were it to move on China.[3]


Japan elected to focus on anti-Soviet alliances instead of anti-Western alliances like Italy and Germany.[9] Germany, however, feared that an anti-USSR alliance would create the possibility of a two-front war before they could conquer Western Europe.[9] So when Italy invited Japan to sign the Pact of Steel, it demurred.[9]

Name change[edit]

After being told the original name, "Pact of Blood", would likely be poorly received in Italy, Mussolini proposed the name "Pact of Steel", which was ultimately chosen.[15]

Dissolution[edit]

According to Article VII, the pact was to last 10 years, but this did not happen.[11] In November 1942, the Axis forces in North Africa, were decisively defeated by the British and British Commonwealth forces at the Second Battle of El Alamein.[16] In July 1943 the Western Allies opened up a new front by invading Sicily.[16] In the aftermath of this, Mussolini was overthrown by 19 members of the Gran Consiglio who voted in favour of the Ordine Grandi. The new Italian government, under Field Marshal Pietro Badoglio, signed an armistice with the Allies in September and became a non-belligerent, thus effectively ending Italy's involvement in the pact.[16]


Although a puppet government under Mussolini, the Italian Social Republic, was established in Northern Italy by Nazi Germany, Italy continued as a member of the pact in name only.[16]

Anti-Comintern Pact

Causes of World War II

Tripartite Pact

Belco, Victoria (2010). War, Massacre, and Recovery in Central Italy, 1943–1948. University of Toronto.  978-0-8020-9314-1.

ISBN

Corvaja, Santi (2013). Hitler & Mussolini: The Secret Meetings. Enigma Books.  978-0982491164.

ISBN

Hiden, John (2014). Germany and Europe 1919–1939. Routledge Publishing.  978-1-317-89627-2.

ISBN

Knight, Patricia (2013). Mussolini and Fascism. Routledge.  978-1136477508.

ISBN

Knox, MacGregor (2002). Hitler's Italian Allies: Royal Armed Forces, Fascist Regime, and the War of 1940–1943. Cambridge University.  978-1-139-43203-0.

ISBN

Maltarich, William (2005). Samurai and Supermen: National Socialist Views of Japan. Peter Lang Publishing.  978-3-03-910303-4.

ISBN

Nicholls, David (2000). Adolf Hitler: A Biographical Companion. ABC-CLIO.  978-0-87436-965-6.

ISBN

Shirer, William (1960). . Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-0-671-62420-0.

The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich

Stumpf, Reinhard (2001). "From the Berlin–Rome Axis to the Military Agreement of the Tripartite Pact: The Sequence of Treaties from 1936 to 1942". . Vol. VI: The Global War – Widening of the Conflict into a World War and the Shift of the Initiative 1941–1943. Clarendon Press. pp. 144–160.

Germany and the Second World War

Notes


Bibliography