<P> Other Italian forces remained trapped in Yugoslavia following the armistice and some decided to fight alongside the local resistance . Elements of the Taurinense Division, the Venezia Division, the Aosta Division and the Emilia Division were assembled in the Italian Garibaldi Partisan Division, part of the Yugoslav People's Liberation Army . When the unit finally returned to Italy at the end of the war, half its members had been killed or were listed as missing in action . </P> <P> Bastia, in Corsica, was the setting of a naval battle between Italian torpedo boats and an attacking German flotilla . </P> <P> Italian soldiers captured by the Germans numbered around 650,000 - 700,000 (some 45,000 others were killed in combat, executed, or died during transport), of whom between 40,000 and 50,000 later died in the camps . Most refused cooperation with the Third Reich despite hardship, chiefly to maintain their oath of fidelity to the King . Their former allies designated them Italienische Militär - Internierte ("Italian military internees") to deny them prisoner of war status and the rights granted by the Geneva Convention . Their actions were eventually recognized as an act of unarmed resistance on a par with the armed confrontation of other Italian servicemen . </P> <P> In the first major act of resistance following the German occupation, the city of Naples was liberated through a chaotic popular rebellion . Its people rose in the last days of September 1943 . Elsewhere, the nascent movement began as independently operating groups were organized and led by previously outlawed political parties or by former officers of the Royal Italian Army . Many partisan formations were initially founded by soldiers from disbanded units of the Royal Italian Army that had evaded capture in Operation Achse, and were led by junior Army officers who had decided to resist the German occupation; they were subsequently joined and re-organized by Anti-Fascists, and became thus increasingly politicized . </P>

What did the italian partisans fight for#