Italian law doesn’t allow for people of that age to be jailed. It would be house type arrest. If he was part of say a firing squad, which I think is the case, as you point out his age might preclude his being top dog, then following an order is most likely what he did. It is all very sad. Of course, the Italians didn’t much care for Germans to begin with
and from what I’ve would rather have fought the Germans. That would have been a one day war.
Pretty sure Italy fought against the Kaiser in 1915, but was their ally in 1914. So the old flip-flop is nothing new.