The Duce or how I came to hate Mussolini
First, this article was not my idea. It was suggested by my daughter-in-law. I said, “L, give me a couple of article ideas.” She was thinking like she does all the time and finally she said, “You know, I would like to know about Mussolini.”
The reason you want to know about El Duce is that you learned little about him in your youth, but he is in the back of your mind. “I would like to know more about him,” he said.
Of course, I know everything that is important to know about Mussolini just as I know everything that is important to know about Tojo and Hitler.
I have read the best books on Hitler, but they add little to the brain of a “who was there”.
In 1939, when German troops invaded Poland, I remember walking with my older brother, A, and his friends. It was a warm autumn afternoon and the moon had risen and what they said scared me to death. And seeing a play in the church (our cultural center), the place where the stormtroopers stomped into a house with young children, threatening them with bayonets, taking their books and burning them, I knew that Hitler was a bad man. . (Books were everything to me. I lived in the library).
Now let’s see. In 1939, he was seven years old.
I learned about Japan on December 7, 1941. Upon learning that our navy was almost completely destroyed at Pearl Harbor, my cousin and I expected to see Japanese planes in the blue sky at any moment. Ice Cream Again!
Now he was almost ten years old. It was then that I first heard the name, Tojo. It was in all the cartoons. We learned to hate Tojo for sure. We blame Tojo for everything that happens in the Pacific.
I recently read a book about Tojo and his trial after WWII. I came to the conclusion that we should not blame him for all the atrocities of that war. Tojo told the court that we should blame the field commanders. Regardless, he was sentenced to death when he could have remained a great source of historical information. He was the only bad boy left. He was not a threat to anyone and he was a perfect gentleman. I guess he didn’t fool the court, just me.
Goodbye!
During the war we all knew “El Alce”, “El Duce”, Mussolini. It was the fat man in the brown uniform who always got his mouth off. Like Hitler, he was a corporal during the First World War. Hitler greatly admired him and rescued him from the partisans, but near the end of WWII he was finally shot and hung to dry in the public square in Milan. (I was there a few years ago. Someone had moved the bodies).
You can learn about Mussolini’s early life at: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/2WWmussolini.htm.
I quote: “Benito Mussolini was born in Forli, Italy in 1883. After working briefly as a school teacher, Mussolini fled to Switzerland in 1902 in an effort to evade military service.
“Mussolini returned to Italy in 1904 and for the next ten years he worked as a journalist and eventually became editor of” Avanti. “Mussolini was active in the socialist movement, but moved to the right in 1914 when the Italian government did not support the Triple Alliance In 1915, Mussolini resigned from the Socialist Party when he advocated support for the Allies in World War I.
“When Italy entered the war, Mussolini served in the Italian army and eventually rose to the rank of corporal. After being wounded, he returned to Milan to edit the right-wing” Il Popolo d’Italia. “The magazine demanded that the allies fully support to Italy. Demands at the Paris Peace Conference “.
(For those of you who like to know such things, the Triple Alliance was a defense pact between Italy, Germany, and Austria-Hungary.)
Benito Mussolini invaded areas of Africa. (He used mustard gas on the local guards, the only leader who used gas during the war.) He was stopped by the British. Despite Germany’s entry into the African campaign, the British, with the help of General Eisenhower, won.
The Allies wanted Mussolini completely out of the war, so they invaded Sicily. It helped to relieve the pressure on the suffering Soviet armies and provided a base for the invasion of Italy.
Hear! This is what Mussolini said in 1929:
“In the creation of a new authoritarian but not absolutist, hierarchical and organic state, that is to say, open to the people in all their classes, categories and interests, lies the great revolutionary originality of fascism, and a teaching perhaps for the entire modern world. world oscillating between the authority of the state and that of the individual, between the state and the anti-state. Like all other revolutions, the fascist revolution has had a dramatic development but this in itself would not be enough to distinguish it. Terror is not a revolution: it is only a necessary instrument in a certain phase of the revolution. “
When we were children, we thought that Mussolini was a clown, a fat jester. We also had a lot of jokes about the Italian army. We did not think they were a great fighting force. The Italian fans thought otherwise. They knew that Mussolini was an evil tyrant who had brought misery to thousands of people.
They were sure to get him.
Using our original reference, we read about the death of Mussolini. The record is from the “Manchester Guardian”:
“April 30, 1945. Mussolini, with his lover, Clara Petacci, and twelve members of his cabinet, were executed by partisans in a village on Lake Como yesterday afternoon, after being arrested in an attempt to cross the border Switzerland The bodies were brought to Milan last night A partisan knocked on my door early this morning to tell me the news.
“We drove to the working-class neighborhood of Loreto and there were the bodies piled up with hideous promiscuity in the open plaza under the same fence against which a year ago fifteen partisans had been shot by their own compatriots.
“Mussolini’s body lay on top of Petacci’s. On his dead hand had been placed the bronze insignia of the fascist Arditi. With these fourteen were also the bodies of Farinacci and Starace, two former general secretaries of the fascist party, and Teruzzo, former Colonies Minister who had been captured elsewhere and executed by partisans.
“Mussolini was captured yesterday in Dongo, Lake Como, driving alone in a car with his uniform covered by a German coat. He was driving in a column of German cars to escape observation, but was recognized by an Italian customs guard.
“The others were captured in a neighboring town. They include Pavolini, Barracu and other lesser lights in the fascist world whom Mussolini had to call in later days to form his puppet government.
“This is the first conspicuous example of popular justice in liberated Italy. Otherwise, the leaders have kept the partisans well in check. The opinion expressed this morning by C.-in-C. Supporter, General Cadorna, son of the former field marshal, was that such incidents in themselves were regrettable. However, in this case he considered the execution to be a good thing, as popular outrage against the fascists demanded some satisfaction. The risk of lengthy trials, such as the one that has been taking place in Rome was thus avoided. “
Mussolini’s beautiful wife said after his death that he had done nothing wrong except run away with Clara Petacci.
Anyway, the Moose was dead!
Goodbye!
PS: I know this will only pique the interest of my dear daughter-in-law. Other good sources are: http://cidc.library.cornell.edu/DOF/italy/italy.htm and http://www.euronet.nl/users/wilfried/ww2/mussolin.htm,
© John Taylor Jones, Ph.D. 2005