MARINA NAZIONALE REPUBBLICANA

The bulk of the Italian Fleet attempted to "go south" and join the Allies, according to the orders given by the High Command (the surrender of the fleet was one of the Armistice conditions). Actualy, it is not very clear what Admiral Bergamini, the Fleet Commander, was trying to do. He ordered the fleet to move from La Spezia to the Bocche di Bonifacio, the strait between Sardinia and Corsica, and that was absolutely not the correct direction for Malta. Admiral Bergamini was deeply shocked by the order to surrender the fleet, and there is some thought that he was moving toward Spain to have the fleet interned and put under the custody of a neutral power, in this case Spain, until the end of the war. As Bergamini was killed in the sinking of the battleship Roma by the Germans, the real goal of the Admiral may never be known.

A few battered cruisers, destroyers and submarines remained in the ports, often sabotaged by their crews, and were taken over by the Germans, but they were never returned to the Republican Navy in operational conditions. A great number of smaller Torpedo Boats, patrol craft and other various auxiliary vessles and merchant craft were also taken over by the Germans after the Italian surrender.

The bulk of the Republican Navy was the "Divisione Decima", a huge organization born from the 10th MAS Flottilla, the very successful underwater raiding unit of the Italian Navy prior to the 1943 surrender. The morning after the Armistice, Prince Junio Valerio Borghese, a highly decorated and dashing submarine commander and commander of the 10th MAS Flottilla commandos, started gathering all the naval personel he could find in La Spezia inside the 10th MAS barracks. He then went to the local German command offering the services of his troops. The German were quite puzzled, but they accepted. In the following weeks, Borghese traveled all over Italy, recruiting hundereds of soldiers, until the 10th MAS was of divisional strenght. When the Italian Social Republic was formed, at attempt was made to disband the Decima (Decima = Tenth), but Borghese refused, threatening to shoot at sight anyone who dared come close to the Decima barracks. Thereafter, an arrangement was arrived at and the Decima officially became part of the Marina Nazionale Repubblicana (National Republican Navy). It remained out of the central command structure of the RSI - and out of the command structure of the Germans too. It was a truly independent force, fighting with the same reckless, devil-may-care attitude of a Renaissance "Condottiere" (commander of a "Condotta", i.e. = a merchenary unit)! The Decima fought as a ground unit against the US and British forces at the Anzio bridgehead, and then in North East Italy against Italian and Yugolsavian communist partisans.

At peak strenght the Divisione Fanteria di Marina "Decima" was organized as follows :

1st Combat Group


Fusiliers Bn "Barbarigo" (an ancient Venetian admiral - Anzio veterans)

Fusiliers Bn "Lupo" (wolf) (*)

Bn "Nuotatori-Paracadutisti" (2 coys of Assault Swimmers and 3 of Parachutists)

Artillery Bn "Colleoni" (a Renaissance Condottiere) (*)

1st Coy, Engineer Bn "Freccia" (arrow)

2nd Combat Group


Fusiliers Bn "Fulmine" (lightning - previously called "Maestrale" SW wind) (*)

Fusiliers Bn "Sagittario" (archer) (*)

Mountain Assault Engineer Bn " Valanga" (avalanche)

Recruits Bn "Castagnacci" (from the name of the first Decima KIA)

Artillery Bn "Da Giussano" (another Condottiere)(*)

Mountain Artillery Bn "San Giorgio" (the saint-patron of Genova)

Engineer Bn "Freccia" (2nd and 3rd coy)

Independent units:


Fusiliers Bn "Risoluti"

Fusiliers Bn "Giobbe" (10th MAS Flottilla hero KIA in a raid on Malta - previously "Ardimento" - courage)

Fusiliers Bn "Longobardo" (hero of the Italian Submarine forces)

Fusiliers Bn "Pegaso" (pegasus) (*)

Fusiliers Bn "San Giusto" (the saint-patron of Trieste)

Fusiliers Bn "Scire' " (the submarine of Borghese)

Fusiliers Bn "Serenissima" (the nickname of Venice)

Fusiliers Bn "Vega" (a star) (*)

Fusiliers Coy "Adriatica"

Fusiliers Coy "D'Annunzio" (famous poet and WWI hero)

Fusiliers Coy "Sauro" (a WWI naval hero)

"Operativa" Coy (no details about that)

Fusiliers Coy "Mai Morti" ("never dead")

Women Auxiliary Service

The translation of the names of the Bns is a litteral one. Several of them, indicated by an (*) were the names of ships of the Italian Royal Navy, whose crews formed the "core" of each Bn.

Naval Units:


"Comandante Todaro" Raiding Crafts School (both surface and underwater)

Underwater Diver School

Underwater Operations Group

"Gamma" Group (assault swimmers)

"Comandante Moccagatta" Surface Crafts Units.

Both Commander Todaro and Commander Moccagatta were heroes of the 10th MAS Flottilla, both of them KIA).

Besides the almost-independent "Decima" units, the Marina da Guerra Nazionale Repubblicana also had the following units:


Minesweepers Flottilla at Venice.

Submarine base at Bordeaux, France, defended by "Divisione Atlantica Fucilieri di Marina" (3 Naval Fusiliers Coys + 1 Arty Bty)

An Anti-submarine Flottilla with some light sub-chasers.

Midget submarine Flottilla "Longobardo" with 22 boats.

Others various minor naval units...

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For the first time I have seen "History" at close quarters,and I know that its actual process is very different from what is presented to Posterity. - WWI General Max Hoffman