The Italian government paid for the reconstruction of Monte Cassino, although Abbot Ildefonso Rea made the appeal to restore the monastery two years after it was destroyed. Before they could rebuild the abbey, they had to remove more than 900,000 cubic yards of rubble from the site.
In January, General Sir Harold Alexander, the British officer who commanded the two Allied armies in Italy, gave the signal to start the Rome operation. General Clark, as commander of the U.S. Fifth Army, thereupon opened a massive attack at Cassino.