found a nice youtube channel for warbird history - “Military Aviation History”. IL-2 has just one Italian fighter modeled (the MC.202) so I found this video interesting.
(this guy has a pretty detailed video about Luftwaffe war crimes so he seems like one of the good ones, as far as “German guys too into WW2” go)
Sidenote but i didn’t realize so much weird shit happened in Italy post-1943. So the Allies invaded Sicily, the fascist council overthrew Mussolini and signed an armistice with the Allies? but then Germany invaded most of Italy and freed Mussolini? and then created a second fascist state that waged civil war and stuck around until unseated by partisans and Allies in 1945? I dunno why but I don’t really remember learning any of this, I thought Mussolini was just sort of in charge until the end.
I learned this because it turns out the MC.202 was also flown by the Co-Belligerent Air Force (Royalist South Italy) in the Balkans from 1943-45. Two Italian air forces on opposite sides, planned to never fly against one another.
truly baffling to see an Italian P-51D
