Drawing on mostly unpublished documents, A Nation Collapses revises the traditional understanding of a critical moment in the history of World War II: the collapse of the Italian fascist regime and Italy's unconditional surrender in September 1943. The book argues that, during their secret negotiations before the overthrow of Mussolini in July 1943, both Italy and Britain negotiated in bad faith and with a great deal of duplicity. The resulting misunderstandings and misjudgments resulted in an unexpectedly long and brutal campaign of conquest following Italy's surrender.