to be empty. In the October raid Borghese took Sciré deep into Gibraltar Bay, making a difficult submerged passage in order to release the SLC as close to target as possible. For this he received the Medaglia d'Oro al Valor Militare (MOVM), despite the mission's overall lack of success. In May 1941 a further attempt ended in failure, but on 20 September 1941 a successful mission damaged three merchant ships in the harbour. After this last attack he was promoted to Capitano di Fregata, and named commander of the Decima MAS''' sub-surface unit. On 18 December 1941, he reached Alexandria in Sciré and launched the daring raid by three SLCs that heavily damaged the two Royal Navy battleships and and two other ships in the harbour. The six Italian Navy crew that attacked Alexandria harbour all received the Medaglia d'Oro al Valor Militare, and Borghese was named Cavaliere dell'Ordine Militare di Savoia. In May 1943, Borghese took command of the Decima Flottiglia MAS("10th Assault Vehicle Flotilla"), or Xª MAS with Roman numerals, which continued active service in the Mediterranean and pioneered new techniques of commando assault warfare. The roman numeral was in memory of Caesar's famous Decima Legio. 8 September 1943: the Armistice After Italy's surrender to the Allies on 8 September 1943, the Xª MAS was disbanded. While some of its sailors joined the Allies, Borghese chose to continue fighting with the Italian Social Republic (RSI) alongside the German Armed Forces (Wehrmacht). On 12 September 1943, he signed a treaty of alliance with Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine. Many of his colleagues volunteered to serve with him, and the Decima Flottiglia was revived, headquartered in Caserma del Muggiano, La Spezia. By the end of the war, it had over 18,000 members, and Borghese conceived it as a purely military unit. The X Flottiglia gained a reputation for never firing a shot at any Italian military units fighting with the Allied forces. In April 1945 when the US command discovered that the British had granted permission to Marshal Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia, and his Communist troops, to occupy northeastern Italy from Venice to the east, Borghese moved the bulk of the X Flottiglia from the Ligurian and Piedmontese area to the Veneto. The X Flottiglia built a line of defense on the Tagliamento river where they resisted until the arrival of the Allied troops. In this action the X Flottiglia lost