Pact of Steel

Germany and Italy fought against each other in World War I.{{sfn|The Road To War}} 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.{{sfn|The Road To War}}

In 1922, Mussolini secured his position as Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Italy.{{sfn|Knight|2013|p=22}} His first actions made him immensely popular - massive programs of public works providing employment and transforming Italy's infrastructure.{{sfn|Knight|2013|pp=68–69}} In the Mediterranean, Mussolini built a powerful navy, larger than the combined might of the British and French Mediterranean fleets.{{sfn|The Road To War}}

When he was appointed Chancellor in 1933, Hitler initiated a huge wave of public works and secret rearmament. Although Italy initially signed the Italo-Soviet Pact aimed against Germany when Hitler came to power,{{cite book |last1=Stoker |first1=Donald J. |last2=Grant |first2=Jonathan |title=Girding for Battle: The Arms Trade in a Global Perspective, 1815-1940 |date=30 August 2003 |publisher=Bloomsbury Academic |isbn=978-0-275-97339-1 |page=180 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ylK2AAAAIAAJ |access-date=27 July 2024 |language=en}} Mussolini’s attitude changed. {{sfn|Shirer|1960|pp=258–262}} Fascism and Nazism shared similar principles and Hitler and Mussolini met on several state and private occasions in the 1930s.{{sfn|Corvaja|2013|p=13}} 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.{{sfn|Stumpf|2001|p=146}}

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

Japan elected to focus on anti-Soviet alliances instead of anti-Western alliances like Italy and Germany.{{sfn|Maltarich|2005|p=75}} Germany, however, feared that an anti-USSR alliance would create the possibility of a two-front war before they could conquer Western Europe.{{sfn|Maltarich|2005|p=75}} So when Italy invited Japan to sign the Pact of Steel, it demurred.{{sfn|Maltarich|2005|p=75}}

Officially, the Pact of Steel obliged Germany and Italy to aid the other country militarily, economically or otherwise in the event of war, and to collaborate in wartime production.{{sfn|Hiden|2014|pp=187–188}} The Pact aimed to ensure that neither country was able to make peace without the agreement of the other.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}} The agreement was based on the assumption that a war would not occur within three years.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}} When Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939 and war broke out on 3 September, Italy was not yet prepared for conflict and had difficulty meeting its obligations.{{sfn|Belco|2010|p=37}} Consequently, Italy did not enter World War II until June 1940, with a delayed invasion of Southern France.{{sfn|Knox|2002|p=181}}

{{blockquote|

;Article I

:The Contracting Parties will remain in permanent contact with each other in order to come to an understanding of all common interests or the European situation as a whole.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}}

;Article II

:In the event that the common interests of the Contracting Parties be jeopardized through international happenings of any kind, they will immediately enter into consultation regarding the necessary measures to preserve these interests. Should the security or other vital interests of one of the Contracting Parties be threatened from outside, the other Contracting Party will afford the threatened Party its full political and diplomatic support in order to remove this threat.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}}

;Article III

:If it should happen, against the wishes and hopes of the Contracting Parties, that one of them becomes involved in military complications with another power or other Powers, the other Contracting Party will immediately step to its side as an ally and will support it with all its military might on land, at sea and in the air.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}}

;Article IV

:In order to ensure, in any given case, the rapid implementation of the alliance obligations of Article III, the Governments of the two Contracting Parties will further intensify their cooperation in the military sphere and the sphere of war economy. Similarly the two Governments will keep each other regularly informed of other measures necessary for the practical implementation of this Pact. The two Governments will create standing commissions, under the direction of the Foreign Ministers, for the purposes indicated in Article I and II.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}}

;Article V

:The Contracting Parties already at this point bind themselves, in the event of a jointly waged war, to conclude any armistice or peace only in full agreement with each other.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}}

;Article VI

:The two Contracting Parties are aware of the importance of their joint relations to the Powers which are friendly to them. They are determined to maintain these relations in future and to promote the adequate development of the common interests which bind them to these Powers.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}}

;Article VII

:This Pact comes into force immediately upon its signing. The two Contracting Parties are agreed upon fixing the first period of its validity at 10 years. In good time before the elapse of this period they will come to an agreement regarding the extension of the validity of the Pact.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}}}}

The secret supplementary protocols of the Pact of Steel, which were split into two sections, were not made public at the time of the signing of the Pact.{{sfn|The Pact of Steel}}

The first section urged the countries to quicken their joint military and economic cooperation whilst the second section committed the two countries to cooperate in "matters of press, the news service and the propaganda" to promote the power and image of the Rome-Berlin Axis.{{sfn|The Pact of Steel}} To aid in this, each country was to assign "one or several specialists" of their country in the capital city of the other for close liaisons with the Foreign Minister of that country.{{sfn|The Pact of Steel}}

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.{{sfn|Nicholls|2000|p=195}}

According to Article VII, the pact was to last 10 years, but this did not happen.{{sfn|The Italo-German Alliance}} 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.{{sfn|The Mediterranean And North Africa}} In July 1943 the Western Allies opened up a new front by invading Sicily.{{sfn|The Mediterranean And North Africa}} 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.{{sfn|The Mediterranean And North Africa}}

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.{{sfn|The Mediterranean And North Africa}}

• Anti-Comintern Pact
• Causes of World War II
• Tripartite Pact

Notes

{{reflist}}

Bibliography

::Print

• {{Cite book |last=Belco |first=Victoria |title=War, Massacre, and Recovery in Central Italy, 1943–1948 |publisher=University of Toronto |year=2010 |isbn=978-0-8020-9314-1}}
• {{Cite book |last=Corvaja |first=Santi |title=Hitler & Mussolini: The Secret Meetings |publisher=Enigma Books |year=2013 |isbn=978-0982491164}}
• {{Cite book |last=Hiden |first=John |title=Germany and Europe 1919–1939 |publisher=Routledge Publishing |year=2014 |isbn=978-1-317-89627-2}}
• {{Cite book |last=Knight |first=Patricia |title=Mussolini and Fascism |publisher=Routledge |year=2013 |isbn=978-1136477508}}
• {{Cite book |last=Knox |first=MacGregor |title=Hitler's Italian Allies: Royal Armed Forces, Fascist Regime, and the War of 1940–1943 |publisher=Cambridge University |year=2002 |isbn=978-1-139-43203-0}}
• {{Cite book |last=Maltarich |first=William |title=Samurai and Supermen: National Socialist Views of Japan |publisher=Peter Lang Publishing |year=2005 |isbn=978-3-03-910303-4}}
• {{Cite book |last=Nicholls |first=David |title=Adolf Hitler: A Biographical Companion |publisher=ABC-CLIO |year=2000 |isbn=978-0-87436-965-6}}
• {{Cite book |last=Shirer |first=William |title=The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich |url=https://archive.org/details/risefallofthirdr00shir |url-access=registration |publisher=Simon & Schuster |year=1960 |isbn=978-0-671-62420-0}}
• {{cite book |first=Reinhard |last=Stumpf |chapter=From the Berlin–Rome Axis to the Military Agreement of the Tripartite Pact: The Sequence of Treaties from 1936 to 1942 |title=Germany and the Second World War |volume=VI: The Global War – Widening of the Conflict into a World War and the Shift of the Initiative 1941–1943 |publisher=Clarendon Press |year=2001 |pages=144–160}}

::Online

• {{cite web

| title = The Italo-German Alliance, May 22, 1939

| publisher = United States Office of Counsel for Prosecution of Axis Criminality

| url = http://astro.temple.edu/~rimmerma/Italo_German_alliance_1939.htm

| access-date = 12 March 2015

| ref = {{sfnRef|The Italo-German Alliance}}

| archive-date = 20 July 2011

| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20110720055919/http://astro.temple.edu/~rimmerma/Italo_German_alliance_1939.htm

| url-status = dead

}}

• {{cite web

| title = The Pact of Steel: The Pact of Friendship and Alliance Between Germany and Italy, May 24, 1941

| date=10 September 2008

| publisher=Historical Resources

| url=https://historicalresources.wordpress.com/2008/09/10/the-pact-of-steel-the-pact-of-friendship-and-alliance-between-germany-and-italy-may-22-1939/

| access-date =12 March 2015

| ref = {{sfnRef|The Pact of Steel}}

}}

::Media

• {{Cite AV media |url=http://www.worldmediarights.com/index.php?hidAction=episode&eid=557&page=The_Mediterranean_&_North_Africa_ |title=The Mediterranean and North Africa |publisher=World Media Rights |year=2009 |place=United States |access-date=12 March 2015 |ref={{sfnRef|The Mediterranean And North Africa}} |medium=television documentary |archive-date=22 October 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141022091419/http://www.worldmediarights.com/index.php?hidAction=episode&eid=557&page=The_Mediterranean_&_North_Africa_ |url-status=dead }}
• {{Cite AV media |url=http://www.worldmediarights.com/index.php?hidAction=series&sid=8&name=World_War_Two_-_World_War_II_in_Colour_and_HD |title=The Road To War |publisher=World Media Rights |year=2009 |place=United States |access-date=12 March 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150228033513/http://www.worldmediarights.com/index.php?hidAction=series&sid=8&name=World_War_Two_-_World_War_II_in_Colour_and_HD |archive-date=28 February 2015 |ref={{sfnRef|The Road To War}} |medium=television documentary |url-status=dead}}

{{Diplomatic history of World War II}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pact Of Steel}}

Category:1939 in Germany

Category:1939 in Italy

Category:20th-century military alliances

Category:Germany–Italy relations

Category:Military alliances involving Italy

Category:Military alliances involving Nazi Germany

Category:Treaties concluded in 1939

Category:Treaties entered into force in 1939

Category:Treaties of the Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)

Category:World War II treaties

Category:May 1939 in Europe

Category:Axis powers