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The Italian Empire in 1940
************************************************
Benito Mussolini had a large impact on
World War II. He wasn't always a powerful
dictator though. At first he was a school
teacher and a socialist journalist. He later
married Rachele Guide and had 5 children.
He was the editor of the Avanti, which was
a socialist party newspaper in Milan.
Benito Mussolini founded the Fasci di
Combattimento on March of 1919.
"This was a nationalistic, anti liberal, and
anti socialist movement.
This movement attracted mainly the lower
middle class." Fascism was
spreading across Europe. Mussolini was
winning sympathy from King Victor
Emmanuel III. Mussolini then threatened to
march on Rome. This persuaded
King Victor Emmanuel III to invite Mussolini
to join a coalition, which
strongly helped him gain more power.
Benito Mussolini brought Austria on
Germany's side by a formal
alliance. "In 1937, he accepted a German
alliance. The name of this
alliance was the Anti Comntern Pact. On
April 13, 1937 Benito Mussolini
annexed Albania. He then told the British
ambassador that not even the
bribe of France and North Africa would keep
him neutral." The British
ambassador was appalled and dismayed.
On May 28, 1937, Mussolini strongly gave
thought to declaring
war. He then attacked the Riviera across the
Maritime. "On September 13, 1937 he
opened an offensive into British-garrisoned
Egypt from Libya."
On October 4, 1937, while the offensive
still seemed to promise
success, Benito Mussolini met Adolf Hitler
at the Brenner Pass, on
their joint frontier. "The two of them
discussed how the war in the
Mediterranean, Britain's principal foothold
outside its island base,
might be turned to her decisive
disadvantage. Hitler suggested to
Mussolini that Spain might be coaxed on the
axis side, thus giving
Germany free use of the British Rock of
Gibraltar, by offering Franco
part of French North Africa, and that France
might be persuaded to
accept that concession by compensation with
parts of British West Africa".
Mussolini seemed enthusiastic and very
understandable why this was the
case, since this scheme included the gaining
of Tunis, Corsica, and Nice
(annexed by Napoleon III in 1860) from
France. Hitler then hurried home
to his house in Berlin to arrange visits to
Franco and Petan. "Back in
the capital Hitler created a letter to
Stalin inviting Molotov, the
Soviet Foreign Minister, to visit early,
when Germany and the U.S.S.R.
might then agree among themselves how to
profit from Britain not having
a defense.
A week later, on October 20, he left in his
command train, Amerika, to
meet Petan and Franco. The meeting with
Franco took place on October 23
at Hendaye on the Franco-Spanish frontier." It had become quite famous
in the history of World War Two for Hitlers
furious parting shot that he
would "rather have three or four teeth
extracted from than go through
that again." Franco, who was greatly
supported by his Prime Minister,
Serrano Suner, stonewalled throughout the
hours towards negotiation with
Franco. When his train left at two in the
morning, Hitler had not
advanced an inch towards co-belligerency
with Franco.
Petan met Hitler on October 24, and proved
to be equally unresponsive.
Petan convinced Hitler that they had a
meeting of minds. Petan had only
agreed to a promise to consult his
government, Hitler decided to make a
bigger deal out of it and believed that they
were united in a productive
hostility to Britain.
Hitler now had the outlines, despite Francos
struggle, of a larger
coalition war to present to Molotov at his
next visit. "When Hitler was
waiting for the Soviet Foreign minister to
come, he was distracted by
the weird behavior of Mussolini, who then
chose to mount an attack from Albania
(occupied by the Italian army in April 1939)
into Greece."
Mussolini said that he was motivated by the
fear that the British would
establish positions in Greece if he did not.
"He had good strategic
reasons for wishing to deny them naval and
air bases any closer to his
own along the Adriatic that those who
already possessed in Egypt and Malta. He
attacked Greece in October, 1937."
Mussolini's participation in the Battle of
France aroused the derision
of neutrals and enemies. He was determined
to win in Greece his share of
the laurels which had fallen in a not
proportionate number to the
Wehrmacht.
The failure of Mussolini's invasion of
Greece greatly upset Hitler as
he waited Molotov's arrival. This not only
messed up his scheme to
change the Balkans into a satellite zone by
peaceful diplomacy; it was also upsetting the Soviet Union. "On October
31, Britain occupied Crete
and the Aegean Island of Lemnos with troops
sent from Egypt. In the next
few days they transferred air units to
southern Greece, putting
Romania's Ploesti oil fields, his main
source of supply, in danger of bombing
attack."
The Panzer units Mussolini wanted would
instead be used for
communicating in Greece from positions
inside Bulgaria, Germany's First
World War aly, which Hitler was now trying
to coax into the tripartie
Pact, while Mussolini's army was left to
manage its desert campaign
against British as best it could. On June
24, 1938 Petain signed terms
with Mussolini.
Benito Mussolini was Italy's dictator for 21
years. He had gone through
a lot with the people of Italy. All in all
they did not like Mussolini.
During the mid summer of 1943 many many
supporters turned on him with a
great passion. Sicily was being overrun by
Allied armies. Italy's
economy went straight downhill from here.
The Grand Council of Fascist party, a
rubber-stamp assembly that had
not met for 3 and a half years, met to
decide Mussolini's fate. With
unexpected anger, Dino Grandi, a much
respected council member shouted:
"In this war, we already have a hundred
thousand dead, and we have a
hundred thousand mothers who cry: Mussolini
has assassinated my
son!'...You have imposed a dictatorship on
Italy that is historically
immoral." After hours of heated debate, the
party leaders in the early
hours of July 25 voted 19-7 for a motion of
no confidence in the aging
dictator. On this very same day King Victor
Emmanuel III diverted
Mussolini of his powers and then later
arrested him.
"After his arrest, Mussolini was taken to a
ski lodge on Gran Sasso
d'Italia in the Apennine mountains about 75
miles north-west of Rome.
The lodge was accessible only by a railroad
and had been built so
recently that it was not marked on military
maps or on mountain climbers
charts. But German intelligence agents under
the direction of SS Captain
Otto Skorzeny had learned of Mussolini's
whereabouts, and at Hitler's
direction a rescue mission was organized.
To determine how safe the landing will be,
Skorzeny flew over the Gran
Sasso at 15,000 feet in a Heinkel-111.
Leaning out the window in a
numbing 200-mile-an-hour wind, he took
pictures while his friend held
tightly to his legs. These pictures showed a
spot where they could land
their planes.
When Skorzeny and his 90 men swept silently
down on the lodge in 12
gliders, they discovered to their great
dismay that the meadow had a
rapid drop-off at its end. "It was much like
the platform for a ski
jump," Skorzeny later said. He ordered his
pilot to make a "vertical
landing" which tore open his flimsy glider
but brought it to a halt in
less than 30 yards.
Jumping from the plane, Skorzeny and his men
swept past shocked guards
and without firing a shot made their way to
Mussolini. "I knew that my
friend Adolf Hitler would not desert me,"
the old dictator said.
Soon a small plane came into the meadow.
When Skorzeny and Mussolini
climbed in it, the pilot was shocked. With
both men in it the plane
would probably crash. Yet Skorzeny insisted
that they go ahead.
The plane bounced along the meadow, brushed
off a rock and staggered
over the edge of the plateau. It dropped
through the thin air, but made it's way to
Rome."
From Rome, Mussolini was flown to Vienna and
finally to Wolf's lair,
Hitler's headquarters at Rastenburg in East
Prussia. Hitler very much
wanted to restore Mussolini's power.
Yet Duce thought they should retire from the
public life so as to avoid
having Italy in the Civil War. Hitler was
quite upset. He argued that
only a strong fascist government in northern
Italy could save the Italian people, and that Mussolini could
lead such a regiment. Hitler
was really upset because Mussolini showed no
enthusiasm to wreak
retaliation on the members of the Grand
Council who had betrayed
him-presumably because one of the traitors
was his son-in-law, Count
Galeazzo Ciano.
After the meeting Hitler told his Minister
of Propaganda, Joseph
Goebels, of his frustration with Mussolini
saying that the Duce, whom he
had once greatly admired, seemed a far
smaller man than before.
Hitler and Mussolini discussed for three
days, and the Fuhrer finally
had his way. On September 15, Mussolini
approached him and said, "I have
come for my instructions." The instructions
were very harsh: A new
Fascist republic would be established in
Northern Italy under Mussolini,
but the Germans would assume control of its
foreign policy and many of
its economic resources and would govern part
of the country.
Also, all the members of the Grand Council
that had voted against
Mussolini would be tried and executed. On
September 27, the Duce flew to
Gargnano, north of Salo, to establish the
headquarters of his new
republic in German-occupied northern Italy.
As Hitler's puppet, Mussolini came to be
called "the prisoner of
Gargnano." German guards tapped his phone
lines and watched his every
move. "They are always there, like the spots
of the leopard," Mussolini
once said. His key appointments had to be
approved by the Germans, and
each Italian official was assigned a German
adviser.
Mussolini tried to revitalize the army and
to swell the ranks of his
new social fascist party by promising better
working and living
conditions. But his time was running out:
the people had deserted him,
the Allies were penetrating deeper into
Italy, and he was growing
physically and mentally weaker.
"The people turning on him, and the king
arresting him and taking away
his powers destroyed Mussolini leading him
to a morphine addiction."
This caused him to become too weak to work
long hours, although he kept
a light on at night in his empty office for
show. His moods changed
daily between outbursts of anger and periods
of deep despair. He
compared himself to Jesus and Napoleon, and
blamed his failure on
others-especially the Italian people. He
proclaimed that the people of
Italy were a "mediocre race of
good-for-nothings only capable of singing
and eating ice cream," and he expressed
sickly happiness when Naples was
bombed by the Allies.
He lived for almost two years after his
arrest. He participated in a
series of bizarre and humiliating
experiences before finally coming to a
gruesome end.
Mussolini died on a clear spring day in
April 1945. Allies had moved
into the northern part of Italy during the
same month. Mussolini
attempted to flee to Austria. Near the town
of Dongo his truck convoy
was ambushed by partisans. The Duce was
dressed as a German soldier, in
a greatcoat and steel helmet, but his
expensive leather boots gave him
away. The partisans took him to a farmhouse.
He was then joined by his
mistress, Claretta Petacci. Claretta had
begged to be reunited with
Mussolini.
The next day the communist partisan drove
both Claretta Petacci and
Benito Mussolini to a nearby villa. He
ordered the both of them out of
the car and stuck a machine gun in their
guilty as sin faces. This gun
jammed but he got another one and quickly
shot at Claretta Petacci and
killed her instantly. Mussolini holding back
the lapels of his jacket,
said "Shoot me in the chest." The partisan
shot him twice in the chest
and Mussolini was dead.
The morning after Mussolini and his mistress
were slain, the partisans
dumped their bodies in front of a garage in
Milan's Puzzle Laureate. A
crowd gathered around; some people shouted
foul language, others just
stood there and laughed. One woman fired a
pistol at Mussolini five
times to "avenge her five dead sons."
Eventually, the two mutilated
bodies were strung upside down for everyone
to see. For hours the crowd
laughed and spit at Mussolini's body. On the
following day he was buried
in the family tomb in Predappo.
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