History of military operations at Longare

Here is a fascinating history of military operations at Longare, according to a local Vicenza military historian, Mr. Guiseppe Versolato--from an e-mail dated March 19, 2002 in response to a question from the webmaster as to what the camp at Longare was used for before the 69th moved there:

"Good morning Mr. Roy, glad to give some informations about Longare. Well, as your member who was at Vicenza know, the camp at Longare was , and is also to day, a dependence of the main Camp Ederle in Vicenza town. My two sons play soccher (italian football) with the Team of the Village of Longare and their field is just in the border with the military camp!!

"As your friend know, the camp of Longare is near the Berici Hills and the main part of base is under some hills. There are several tunnels who were, in the past, at the time of the "Cold War" and just before the treaty for the limitation of weapons with Soviet Union, used as depot of atomic weapons. Many magazines wrote articles about this "Pluto" . At the time of 60 Years probably the holes were used from US Army as depot of tactical atomic weapons. I remember that, at this time, were in service with US Army the first rockets Honest John and the missiles Corporal and Seargent and it was well known that this weapons could have also tactical atomic ogives.

"This tunnels under the Berici Hills are well know from the age of old Romains. Here there were mines for to take stones for to built . The following consequence was that during the centuries this tunnels were always more large and long. During the first years of WWII its were used from Italian Army as fuel depots. It was told that here were on depot just to a million of tons of fuel. After Italian Armistice, Germans take possession of the base. On 1944 all this large underground area was used as factories for eapons and the parts of planes. Some parts of engines D.B.605 for Me 109s, bullets, and also was told some parts of german rockets. All, at interior of this area, was well organised. Thousands of workmen (italians) were here employed for military works.On Spring 1945, before Allied arrived to Vicenza, Germans had order to destroy all with some mines placed in the tunnels, but there was an able touch of Partisans with german command of the area for to save from distruction all the important industrial machines who were in this site and that was very useful for our i ndustries in the post war.

"After the WWII the first military forces to utilize this area were just the Americans . They comes in Vicenza on 1955 coming from Austria, when this country became neutral. This is all, of course, resumed.

"Please send my best wishes to my friend Fred.

"Best regards. Giuseppe"

Go here for pictures described in this narrative, also provided by Mr. Versolato.