Air mail during World War II

This period is one of where, from the point of view of the aeropostal history, there is still much to investigate and discover. A period that, the whirlwind succession of events made it difficult to decipher, also because at a certain point the civilian needs were confused with the military ones and a lot of information was lost. Nevertheless, through the patient study of airmail collectors and the consultation of what remains of the archive sources, a picture emerges more and more, so complicated, but very fascinating to study.
We recall that Italian commercial aviation, on the eve of Second World War, represented a very important reality in the world air connections sector. Equipped with planes to date and well-trained crews, it was present on almost all European and Mediterranean routes, also carrying out a widespread penetration in Africa, in the territories of the Empire and, in the final phase, the connection had been started. transatlantic with South America.
In 1940, with the entry of Italy into the conflict that was already inflaming Europe, the war organization of our Civil Aviation was implemented, which paid a very high price to the conflict. The three companies then in operation (Ala Littoria, LATI and Aviolinee Italiane) were militarized and placed under the control of the “Special Air Services” (SAS), to ensure the continuity of operation of the civilian airlines that could be maintained; lines that the course of the war reduced more and more drastically until exhaustion.
Similar scenarios were presented in the other belligerent countries (Germany, Holland, France and Great Britain). Also in these countries, with the appropriate differentiations, the civilian air transport networks underwent a drastic reduction and also the main intercontinental and transatlantic air routes were suspended, leaving the American “Pan American Airways”, also in some way put in the service of war, the quasi-monopoly of air transport throughout the conflict.