Well done for bringing up this often forgotten theater. I have a next door neighbor in Australia who is polish and hate the germans with a passion as his unit was doing the dirty work
Question regarding invasion from the "Toe" of the "boot". I would've thought that the allies had no choice given the amount of trouble they had securing Sicily and Malta from the incessant air attacks and bombings which almost crippled the convoys and Malta itself.*
So many ships went to the bottom of the Med Sea so close to Africa, wouldn't it have been suicide to go further north?
* The bombing must've been bad, not even the Britons were offered the George Cross for what they went though, so for them to offer it to every inhabitant on Malta, they must've been though some wild ride.