AIR POWER FOR MARINA MILITARE

Patrick Boniface looks back at the design and career of the Italian Navy’s 35-year-old aircraft carrier Giuseppe Garibaldi, which is due to be replaced in 2022 by ITS Trieste, a large and capable landing helicopter dock ship.

For 50 years after the end of World War II the Italian Navy, the Marina Militare, wanted to be able to deploy aircraft at sea. During the war the Italians had started to develop aircraft carriers by converting a number of former liners. In fact, Italy’s first venture into naval aviation came in 1927, when the aircraft carrier Giuseppe Miraglia was commissioned, but this ship only served as a test vessel for catapults and later as a transport.

During World War II, the Marina Militare came close to organising its own air component, when the passenger liner was converted to serve as the aircraft carrier . At the time of Italy’s surrender to the Allies, was almost and and was then taken over by the Germans, who intended to use the ship to block the entrance to the port of Genoa.