The Italian Resistance in World War II began as a spontaneous rebellion against Nazi oppression in the days following Italy"s unconditional surrender to the Allies on September 8, 1943. The story of the underground battle of the Italians against the Nazis and Fascisti, largely unknown outside Italy, was, unlike the French Resistance, a spontaneous city-by-city, region-by-region uprising. This book traces the growth of the wartime resistance from its birth in 1943 against overwhelming odds to its dramatic triumph two years later. Here are Neapolitan youngsters fighting German tanks; patriots operating an underground radio station inside Nazi occupied Florence; Romans ambushing a Nazi patrol; mountain fighters blasting enemy convoys; peasants who hid partisan and Allied escapees; and priests and nuns who outfoxed Nazi and Fascist patrols. It was a moving episode, a lesson for all of us who live so easily in the kind of society dreamed of by the partisans. This is a story of courage,...