Hopefully, they were wearing their Italian badges of rank more properly than than as yanks. Captains bars are never worn centered on the epaulet of a dress uniform. Only a General's star is ever worn centered at this location. All others are worn out on the sewed-down part. If Italians were dropped behind American lines as a "captain" was wearing his that way, they would have been suspect immediately.
West German theatrical version was cut by approx. 26 minutes to tighten the pacing. The VHS release from Toppic was cut even more (additional 13 minutes) to use shorter (and thus cheaper) tapes.
Italian