La Spezia Naval Base

La Spezia Naval Base is one of the Italian Navy's most important and historic bases. The base lies in the central-western zone of the Gulf of Spezia, close to the historic centre of La Spezia.

It was Napoleon Bonaparte who first conceived the idea of building a great arsenal in the Gulf of Spezia.

Napoleon's idea was revived in 1857 by Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, then Chairman of the Board and Secretary of the Navy, who arranged funding and entrusted Domenico Chiodo, an official of the Military Engineers, with the construction of the new naval base.

Work began in 1862 and ended on August 28, 1869, when General Domenico Chiodo formally inaugurated the plant by flooding the newly-built docks.

During the Second World War, because of its strategic importance, the base was heavily bombed and was almost completely destroyed, but was quickly renovated to full operation in the postwar period.

The 2nd Squadron and Decima Flottiglia MAS, among others, were based here.

After the war and throughout the Cold War era, the base has been home to the 1st Naval Division. Currently it employs approximately 1,000 civilian employees and 200 military. It covers an area of nearly 85 hectares and within it there are about 13 kilometers of roads. The layout is still based on the original nineteenth-century design. The advent of aerial warfare has made the base almost redundant, as it is too exposed to air attack.

The fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Soviet threat changed Italy's defense needs, shifting the focus to the south, in the Mediterranean. This resulted in a significant decline in importance of La Spezia base in favor of those of Taranto and Augusta. The only complete units left in La Spezia are the Maestrale-class frigates of the 2nd squadron with the Vesuvio, the Lerici-class minehunters of the Mine Countermeasures Forces, and the Elettra multipurpose support unit.

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Wikipedia