"As the Allied invasion of Italy pressed on through the summer of 1943, the strutting dictator Benito Mussolini was overthrown and imprisoned by his own people in a remote mountaintop resort in the Apennines. Furious at the turn of events, Adolf Hitler, Il Duce's loyal ally, promised to rescue Mussolini and restore the Rome-Berlin Axis." "On September 12, a small convoy of glider aircraft suddenly began crash-landing near the hotel-prison where Mussolini was being held. German commandos poured out of the half-wrecked planes. The soldiers quickly overwhelmed the hotel and seized Mussolini, who had watched the drama unfold from a second-story window." "Hitler's rescue of Mussolini would enter history as one of the most famous commando operations of the twentieth century. It shocked a war-weary world. It was also the dramatic culmination of the bizarre relationship between Hitler and Mussolini." "In this vivid account filled with action, intrigue, and some of history's most notorious characters - among them the infamous Otto Skorzeny, who was catapulted to worldwide fame as a result of the exploit - Greg Annussek recounts the story of the secret six-week operation in all its drama and suspense."--Jacket.

Prologue: Mussolini Falls from Power --Into the Wolf's Lair -- Treason in the Air -- An Early Friendship -- A Dangerous Game -- Tonight No Sleep for Anybody -- The Odyssey of Benito Mussolini -- Hitler Takes Control -- The Raid on Santo Stefano -- The Mystery of Maddalena Island -- The Badoglio Shuffle -- The Highest Prison in the World -- The Double Cross -- A Simple Plan -- Freeing Mussolini -- Epilogue: The Aftermath -- The Story of Operation Oak.