This week in the War, 18–24 March 1940: Brenner Pass meeting

A much publicized meeting between right-wing dictators, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, took place this week in the war, on Monday 18 March. Only Franco was missing from the mix. Snow was falling in the Brenner pass as the Fuehrer’s train rolled to a halt in the town of Brennero, on the Italian side of the border with Germany. Ostensibly, discussions were to focus on a peace proposal that Hitler had drawn up and shown to American Secretary of State, Sumner Welles, when the latter had visited Berlin at the beginning of the month.

In reality, the purpose of the rendezvous was to arrange how and when Italy would join in the war against Britain and France. Hitler deliberately concealed his intention to invade Denmark and Norway, but laid out his planned invasion of France.

Mussolini promised to enter the war, once it became evident that the German offensive would prove victorious. And enter he did. On 10 June, in with France’s army in full retreat and with the evacuation of the French capital well underway, Mussolini declared war from the balcony of the Palazzo Venezia in Rome.

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