Jay Honeck wrote:
The Italians weren't entirely hard to humiliate in WWII - the tiny
island of Malta humiliated the might of the Italian air force with three
Fairey Swordfish.

True, the Italians were pathetically clumsy in WWII. It's interesting
to note that despite this performance there are few in America who make
"Italian jokes" the way we poke fun at the French.

As a second generation Italian-American on my fathers side I've heard
plenty. But the reason you don't hear as many is because the Italians
don't think they are great warriors.

The best isn't really a joke though. When, during the first Persian Gulf
War, a bunch of Iraqis supposedly surrendered to an Italian news crew
the joke was that they had taken more POWs than the entire Italian Army
during WWII.